Date: Wed, 06 Jun 2001 16:02:19 -0000
From: "John Wiseman" <jwiseman@ati.com>
Subject: school presentation (long)
Thought some folks might like to hear about a hang gliding talk I
gave recently at my son's elementary school.
Got a note home from the office begging for more parents to
participate in Career/Hobby day, stating that they were a few
presenters short of a full day. I had done a talk there a few years
ago on electrical engineering, with a microphone and an oscilloscope,
with tuning forks and noise makers, blah, blah, and I guess they
remembered that. I responded by saying that even I was bored with
that, but the 'Hobby' thing interested me. What do you say I bring a
HANG GLIDER, set it up in the gym, and I talk about that? After some
negotiations (I got a call from the principal's secretary making sure
that I was not going to land in the soccer fields or take off from
the gymnasium roof - True. I kid you not...) I agreed to sit there
all day and have 7 different groups of 5th and 6th graders come by
every 45 minutes to hear my narrative.
So what I did was this. I set the glider up in the gym, so there was
plenty of space to lift it up and maneuver it around. Each group of
about 20-25 kids came in escorted by their teacher, and I had them
sit down around the glider, at which time I introduced myself and
what I was going to say. After a couple of minutes I switched on the
10-minute introductory videotape that the USHGA puts out. After
that, I did a walk-around of the equipment, and explained the glider,
harness, vario, radio, parachute, etc. I then asked for a volunteer
(in all groups, ALL 50 hands immediately jumped up, and they didn't
even know what I wanted them to do yet...) to help me out. This
volunteer then got into my harness and was allowed to hang from the
glider as I held up the keel. As I explained the weight shift
techniques, the volunteer would try to do what I was saying.
Needless to say, the volunteer quickly became the envy of the class,
and I paid them off afterwards by giving them a Zing-Wing as a
souvenir.
45 minutes went by very quickly, and after questions-and-answers,
they would NOT LEAVE! They all wanted to touch the glider, and most
wanted to lift it up to see how heavy it was. Somehow, I managed to
get through 4 sessions in the morning, then it was lunch break in the
teacher's lounge. I felt so privileged! Lunch in the teacher's
lounge, that forbidden zone that as a student you always wondered
what was going on in. But that's when I came back down to earth, as
I had to talk to all boring adults. The PTA moms who had organized
the day had us all introduce ourselves and say what we were talking
about. "Joe Blow, I am talking about the Internet." "John Smith, I
am a soccer coach." "Suzy So-and-so, I collect rocks." ... "John
Wiseman, I fly hang gliders." Deafening silence. Uh, oh. The
secret was out. I could tell from the looks on the PTA moms' faces
that there might be some concern about impressionable children, and
what they would be listening to. But the introductions continued,
and of course lunch conversation was dotted with the usual inane
questions, such as these actual ones -
"Aren't you afraid of dying?" Yes, but I'm more afraid of not living.
"Your wife allows you to do this?" She talked me into trying it.
"What's the closest you've come to getting killed?" Well lately, it
was when a distracted mom on a cellphone ran a stop sign in her Ford
Expedition and almost broadsided me.
Luckily, lunch ended quickly.
I did 3 more sessions in the afternoon and by the end I could not
speak anymore. I totally lost my voice, and it took a couple of days
to recover. I think the most interesting thing about the day was the
contrast in questions between the adults and the children. The kids'
questions were highly focused and relevant, such as -
"How do you learn to do this?"
"How much does it cost?"
"Where do you buy a hang glider?"
"Can kids do this?" "Have your kids done this?"
and the best one of all, that no adult ever asks...
"What's it like?"
The next day, my family and I sat down at a table in a local
restaurant. Some lady came up to us and asked "Are you the hang
glider guy?" Seems that her daughter had recognized me and pointed
me out to her. She came over to say how much her daughter had
enjoyed the talk, and that it was all she could think about all night
long when she came home from school. That was nice. My thoughts
were something like "well maybe someday your daughter will share the
sky with my kids", but the reality came out merely as a "thank you".
As others have pointed out, you get to know your limits with the
adults really quickly.
Geez, what happens to folks when they grow up? Are we just overgrown
children? From what I saw, I certainly hope so...
john