When I was a in elementary school, I was always envious of the "walkers." These were the kids who lived close enough to school to walk. I lived far from my elementary school, so I had to take a bus. As a "busser" I could not go home for lunch. When we had our annual Halloween parade, I had to change at school, but the walkers got to go home and change. Luckily a friend of mine was a walker and she would take me home for lunch sometimes. It was cool.<\/p>\n
When we were looking for a preschool for my son, we were so lucky to have two good preschools within walking distance of our house. I will never forget the experience of taking his little hand and walking him out of my arms and into school for the first time. Or the fast walk home to cry until it was time to pick him up again. We grew to love our walk to school together. The anticipation on the way there of what they would be doing that day and on the way home the sharing of what he had learned and experienced was priceless. Feeling the sunshine on warm days…dodging raindrops and jumping into puddles…trudging through the blizzard of '10…<\/p>\n
It was just what we did. We didn't do it for health reasons, but what a nice benefit that was! It gave my son lots of energy on the way to school and helped him relax a bit on the way home. This is especially important with today's overuse of television and video games instead of active play. October is International Walk to School Month (who knew?!) and in honor of it, Green Works <\/a>has created a fun website to help families join the fun and walk or bike to school and in the process, earn some money for their school to the tune of $5,000. Parents can sign up here<\/a>. The top five schools with the highest participation could earn the big prize of five grand, but there's also individual prizes as well!<\/p>\n Remember, too, that walking to school is a great way to be "green." Every school is trying hard to be more green (or they should be)-paper recycling centers, cutting back on paper usage, and reusing as much as possible all work together to help make this world a little bit better. <\/p>\n So go green, use Green Works, and earn a little green for your school!<\/p>\n TKDDaughter gives the Green Works Walk to School Challenge a big:<\/p>\n![\"BBMReview](\"\/bbmreview_images\/images\/2007\/10\/16\/blackbelt_3.jpg\")
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