Lincoln Heights kids juggle more than studies

Apparently, it’s not hard to teach 29 fourth-, fifth- and sixth-graders how to juggle.

The trick is getting them to stop.

The kids are a part of the Juggling Jaguars of Lincoln Heights Elementary School.

Patty and Daniel Sparks, both retired teachers, taught the children to juggle in January.

Walking into a room full of elementary school students hurling objects into the air and at one another isn’t as scary as it sounds.

Really.

The kids toss rings, beanbags, clubs, rubber balls and miniature basketballs. And they don’t seem to be worried about getting hit.

“They learn so quickly,” Patty Sparks said.

She and Daniel Sparks taught themselves how to juggle after seeing a performance in Coeur d’Alene by a 55-year-old woman who had taught herself at the age of 50.

Now, every Thursday from 3 p.m. to 4:30 p.m., the Sparkses keep track of what the kids have learned and reward them for each milestone with stickers and their own set of beanbags with their names stitched on them.

The children have learned tricks called the rainbow cross, the cascade, clawing and columns. They can pass back and forth with other kids and even can jog while juggling – a neat trick called “joggling.”

Kate Meisfjord, mother of sixth-grader Sam Meisfjord, likes to stop by the school on Thursdays to help the kids. She also has learned to juggle.

“I come as often as I can,” she said.

Kate Meisfjord said the kids enjoy juggling so much that when one of them broke his arm not long ago, he had the doctor adjust his cast so he could keep on juggling.

Her son juggles in the grocery store and at home in front of the television. She has dents in her walls from the time Sam was learning to juggle rings.

Kate Meisfjord said that when one juggler reaches a milestone, the rest of the jugglers celebrate and cheer.

“Everybody works hard,” she said.

One thing the Sparkses didn’t have to teach the kids, however, was showmanship.

When the group performed recently at the South Side Senior Activity Center, the children didn’t wait to be introduced before the juggling began.

The school’s principal, Michael McGinnis, bought the jugglers T-shirts for their performance.

At first, the children kept their distance from the crowd, but they slowly began to inch their way closer.

They spent some time juggling to music and juggling in groups of four or five. They showed off how they can pass the juggled objects to other kids.

Patty Sparks told the kids in advance to do the tricks they know the best. If they didn’t know how to juggle clubs, for example, it wouldn’t be a good idea to learn while they were performing, she said.

The children brought out their A-game. Some of them tossed balls in the air and spun around before the balls came down. One child juggled while lying on the floor. And all of them kept smiling the whole time.

Pretty impressive for a group of kids who have been juggling for only three months.

The crowd went wild. Not only did the audience enjoy the show, but the kids also cheered their teammates on and clapped for them when they weren’t juggling themselves.

“It was great,” said spectator Ann Brotherton. “It was wonderful.”