NEW TRAIL GETS KIDS TO WALK AND LEARN

By Wilson Brown/OF THE COMMERCIAL STAFF

Students at Townsend Park North Elementary School are putting their math and science skills to use as they get fit using a new walking trail unveiled last week.

The 225 students will use their skills in measuring measure their laps around the track and examining plants growing near the trail.

During the dedication ceremony, students also used the trail to "walk away from drugs," a theme used because of Red Ribbon Week, the annual week when students are told to keep away from drugs.

But the walking trail and the grant that funded its service learning project, is meant to do much more.

According to the grant writer, Donna Hobbs, healthy bodies lead to healthy minds and healthy minds can make energetic, better-performing students.

"A study conducted by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Sciences found that students who eat breakfast have improved academic, behavioral and emotional function," Hobbs wrote in her grant proposal. "The same is true for students who are healthy and physically fit."

Hobbs wrote a Learn and Serve grant two years ago after Towsend Park staff saw the track and playground at Oak Park Foreign Language and Communications Magnet School, said Ernestine Roberts, principal for Townsend Park North.

Meanwhile, the purpose of the trail is to exercise both students' bodies and minds at the same time, Hobbs said.

According to Hobbs, the learning trail was a collaborative effort of students, parents and staff as well as a compromise of all the suggestions they gave to the School Leadership Team.

Students use the one-fifth of a mile trail every school day -- boys on even days and girls on odds -- Roberts said.

After exercising and walking a lap around the track, students get a stamp on their physical fitness cards. Once the card is full of stamps, students can receive prizes such as little tokens shaped like feet, Roberts said.

According to Roberts, before the trail and its accompanying fitness area were built, the school didn't have much of a playground.

"It's just a blessing to have," Roberts said.