A good day to fly a kite for Hugh Bish students

Tuesday was a fine day to fly a kite, at least until the skies darkened and raindrops began to fall in the afternoon.

But before the weather put a stop to all the fun, almost all of the students at Hugh Bish Elementary School had an opportunity to fly a kite on the playground. The activity was part of Read Across America, according to first-grade teacher Lisa Ranson.

“The specials teachers organized it and the Makerspace teacher and library assistant helped put kites together,” Ranson said. Ranson said Hope Church donated almost 300 kites for the children to fly. Each student got to pick out a kite before they trooped out to the playground.

“It’s a way to get kids more excited about reading. They have been talking about it all day. They have been asking ‘When is it going to start?’” Ranson said as she stood on the playground amid students running around with kite string and kites trailing behind them. Parents and teachers were at the ready to untangle string and give the kites a boost as students took off running.

“I love seeing kids being kids with old-fashioned fun,” Ranson said. “They are using skills they learned in Makerspace, such as physics and how to get a kite in the air. Our principal has been a tremendous supporter to let kids be kids.”

Not all efforts to take flight were immediately successful.

“Did you have a Charlie Brown one?” a teacher asked a student whose kite had bit the dust.

“Go kite, go,” another student was heard yelling encouragement to their kite.

So what is the secret to getting a kite in the air?

“Only when there is wind can you do it. You have to run so the wind will pick it up,” William Burk, first grade, said.

First grader Norah Guinup at first shrugged that she didn’t know what the secret was to flying a kite. But a few seconds later she shouted out her answer as she came running by with a unicorn kite: “Wind!”

Guinup perhaps summed up the experience for most of the students. “It’s fun,” she yelled as she raced across the playground.

“Some say this is the best day ever,” said Makerspace teacher Lesley Davis-Roberts.