My first mtb ride

[uforgot]

First, a story...I teach dance to 4th and 5th graders in our school district. We practice once a week and dance at the High School basketball games. Anyway, before their last performance, they all came up to me as a group and presented me with a gift certificate to my local lbs! (They think its pretty cool that an "old lady" rides her bike to school) I was absolutely astonished!

I promptly went to my lbs and purchased a mountain bike. I took my first ride yesterday on a gravel road. I have a Trek 7.2fx wsd which I ride all over town, but no way would I be able to ride it on these back roads, they are soooo rutted, and "gravel" is a little misleading too. Well, I took out my new Gary Fisher and put 10 miles on it. It was amazing! I may never ride on the paved road again except for commuting! Not one car passed me, and I saw a lot of cows, rabbits, and one crushed snake.... I purchased a low end bike because I wasn't sure if the gravel/one track/cross-country thing was for me, but if I liked riding bikes before, I'm insane about it now!!! Can't wait to hit the state parks.

Oh, and my fuzzy avatar is my girls....by the way, their performance was terrific!

[Veronica]

That's very cool! I wish my class would give me a gift certificate to the bike store.

Enjoy the ride!

V.

[ladyfish]

Veronica--send out a note to the class about one of your long rides (upcoming one would be good!). As a parent, I'm always looking for unique ideas for teacher gifts (I never give coffee mugs, "teacher" saying items, etc). I don't want to give the same old tired stuff. I usually give a gift certificate to a local eatery or make a gift basket of goodies.

If I saw a note about a teacher doing amazing bike things, I'd think "bike gift certificate"!! Besides, you could use your biking as a teaching point. Math--how far, how fast equals how long. Or health--how to eat correctly for distance. You get the drift!

Teachers are amazing! Thanks!

[uforgot]

Ladyfish
I DO use a bike to teach math. The other day I took each class out on the track, we used my bike computer to space 10 of them out .01 miles, and then they had stop-watches, while another student rode my bike at a constant velocity. It was our first pretty day in a long time, so they were pumped. We did several runs, starting at different places, and then turning around once and going back. Then we went in and the next day we graphed it. You can do a lot of stuff with graphs. Also converting the .01 miles to feet and meters. The kids loved it, we laughed and had a good time learning. I've used my bike several times for different classes (I teach physics too, man the stuff you can do there!) A few have even approached me about starting a cycling club...I love my job...

[Veronica]

We talk a lot about my biking. There's a competition at my school - The Race to Boston. The kids tally their miles from any sort of exercise. The teachers are participating too. We're WAY ahead and every time it gets announced where we are, my class asks me how many of the teacher miles are mine. Sadly, most of them.

V.

[allabouteva]

Hi all,

I think it's a different world we live in now unfortunately.

As a parent, I would be a bit nervous about letting my kids go to school unsupervised. I know that the likelihood of anything going wrong is probably very minimal, but I think the way we're conditioned to think the worst.