Garden Heights 4th-graders get new bike helmets
Charles H. Featherstone/Columbia Basin Herald A Garden Heights fourth-grader tries on the free bike helmet she received as part of a program to help them learn about and avoid head injuries.
MOSES LAKE — Llayleni Fuentes already had a bike helmet.
“I had one but I don’t use it so much,” she said, tugging on the chin strap of the new red helmet sitting on her head.
“I will use this one,” said a smiling Fuentes, a student in Will Caballero’s fourth-grade class. “I have a BMX bike and I ride it a lot.”
Fuentes was one of 82 fourth-graders at Garden Heights Elementary School to get a free bike helmet on Thursday, the day after students participated in a program on the dangers of head injuries and how to avoid them.
“The concussion glasses were the best part,” said Liz Pray, school nurse at Garden Heights Elementary. “I put them on and saw double. It was disorienting. It almost made me sick.”
The program was sponsored by Providence Sacred Heart Children’s Trauma Services in Spokane, and the hour-long presentation was designed to teach kids how to recognize serious head injuries, when to ask for help, and how to protect themselves from a traumatic head injury.
Including wearing a properly fitted bicycle helmet — the law for anyone 18 or younger in the city of Moses Lake.
“The kids loved it, It was geared toward their age group, and it allowed them to use things they’ve already learned in school — like anatomy and parts of the body — to answer questions,” Pray said.
Seven Moses Lake firefighters were on hand to help outfit the Garden Heights fourth-graders properly, pulling on chin straps and adjusting the helmets so they fit just right.
“We do a lot of outreach with kids,” said Brian Russell, an 11-year MLFD veteran and father of three. “We try to get out in the community as much as possible.”
“I love it,” he added.
Pray said while Garden Heights was the only school in the district to outfit its fourth-graders, Providence Sacred Heart hopes to be able to outfit every fourth-grader in Moses Lake next year. Garden Heights was chosen at random among the Moses Lake elementary schools
“It’s run on grants, and there are only so many schools,” she said.
Charles H. Featherstone can be reached via email at countygvt@columbiabasinherald.com