Program gets kids running

Published 4:00 am Thursday, February 23, 2006

Most of the students at Lava Ridge Elementary School spend their 20 minutes of recess on Tuesdays and Thursdays running laps around the playground field. Evidently nobody told that them that running wasn’t fun.

It’s part of the Lava Ridge Running Club, a cleverly simple idea to get kids exercising and build a foundation for a healthy life. Lisa Butler, a parent of three Lava Ridge kids and a PTA volunteer, brought the program to Bend from the school her kids attended in a state south of here that Butler will only identify in a soft whisper.

The students who want to participate in the voluntary program are given index cards with their names and grades. For every quarter-mile lap they run during recess, they get a check mark on the card. For every four checks – or every mile – they get a plastic charm in the shape of a foot to wear on a chain around their necks. Every fifth mile earns them a bigger charm, and completing a full 26-mile marathon gets them a larger foot charm.

”They really take it to heart,” Butler says, ”and they’re so proud of these necklaces. It’s such a simple thing.”

So how many kids in first through fifth grade would voluntarily run laps during recess for a chance to earn plastic feet? Four out of five. There are about 650 kids enrolled at Lava Ridge. More than 440 of them participate. Take out the 100 or so kindergartners whose half-day schedule doesn’t include a recess, and that’s more than 80 percent participation.

The program is run mainly by parent-volunteers who come twice a week to check the runners’ cards as they complete a lap. The physical education teacher distributes the charms during class each week and principal Gary Timms announces the milestones during the morning announcements.

”It’s fantastic,” Timms says. ”It pulls parents in to volunteer. The kids love it. It’s great exercise for their fitness. They’re having a great time.”

But neither Timms nor Butler had expected this kind of participation. At her kids’ old school, only a fraction of the students participated. At Lava Ridge, it’s a minority that doesn’t. Some of the teachers run. Some parents come and run with their kids. Even some siblings too young for school come to run laps.

”I was just shocked at how well the kids responded,” Butler says. ”They just craved this kind of success.”

Through the first five weeks of running club, the students have accumulated 2,500 miles. Their combined progress is being charted on a map of the United States inside a display case by the office. By mid-February the kids have run to Pittsburgh. A handful of kids have already passed the 18-mile mark, averaging more than a mile and a half per run, including many of the first-graders.

Participation is actually higher in the younger grades than in higher grades, and there appears to be no difference in participation between boys and girls.

When first-grader Grant Gorham couldn’t immediately come up with an answer about what he liked about the program, classmate Cory Hazen leaned in and prompted, ”Getting the foot tokens.”

The tokens are purchased through Fitness Finders, a private company created in 1969 to provide motivational programs for kids. They also offer incentive programs to promote reading and reward character. According to the company’s Web site, in 2005, more than 2.5 million children in more than 10,000 schools in the U.S. logged almost 30 million miles with their mileage club.

Lava Ridge is also holding a contest to design the official ”I ran the Lava Ridge Marathon” T-shirt. The PTA hopes to find some local businesses to serve as sponsors to offset the costs of the shirts and the other prizes.

Organizers hope the running club will help develop habits that stick with kids for much longer than this school year. Obesity rates at Oregon middle schools have gone up 50 percent in the last two years. Students at Lava Ridge attend two and a half classes of physical education every week. The running club adds as much as 40 minutes of exercise each week.

Before the running club, kids would play soccer or play on the jungle gym, or just mill around during the recess.

”Me and Andy would just kind of sit down and rest,” says Shea Booster, a second-grader who’s already run 21 miles. Booster plays soccer and basketball outside of school but enjoys the running. ”It’s just fun and it gives you exercise,” he says.

Parents are also hopeful that some sort of cross-over program can be established for the kids who move on to middle school next year to keep them running.

Twice a year, students at the school run a mile as part of their physical education program. In the past, many have had a hard time finishing.

That might not be the case this year. One of the parent volunteers recently asked a somewhat heavy fifth-grade girl whether she was excited to run the mile in PE this year.

”Yeah,” the girl replied, ”Because it doesn’t hurt anymore.”