<< Previous   of   Next >> Enterprise/CHRIS GOODENOW  (click to enlarge) Fifth-grade students, including Elle Twomey (middle background in stripped shirt), release small salmon fry into Brookside Creek, Wednesday, April 22, next to Brookside Elementary School in Lake Forest Park. Enterprise/CHRIS GOODENOW  (click to enlarge) Fifth-grade students Ranita Hollinshed (bottom-left) and Samantha Shoemaker look on as a friend holds out her salmon fry for a photograph before releasing it into Brookside Creek during their school's annual salmon release, Wednesday, April 22, at Brookside Elementary School in Lake Forest Park. Enterprise/CHRIS GOODENOW  (click to enlarge) Fifth-grade students Elizabeth Rodacker (from right, in the foreground), Ranita Hollinshed, Bridget White and Shailee Stevens walk down to the Brookside Creek to release their salmon fry, April 22, next to Brookside Elementary School in Lake Forest Park. Enterprise/CHRIS GOODENOW  (click to enlarge) Fifth-grade students Charlotte Berkman (from left), Shailee Stevens, Sabrina Zar and a friend hold their hands over their plastic cups to prevent the salmon fry from jumping out, during their school's annual salmon release, Wednesday, April 22, 2009 at Brookside Elementary School in Lake Forest Park. Enterprise/CHRIS GOODENOW  (click to enlarge) A teacher flips through letters by fifth-grade students expressing their desire to participate in the school's annual salmon release, Wednesday, April 22, 2009 at Brookside Elementary School in Lake Forest Park. The letter pictured explains how the student, Charlotte Berkman, broke her arm the day her kindergarten class participated in the salmon release years ago and prevented her from participating at that time.

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CONTACT THE ENTERPRISE Jocelyn Robinson, News editor jrobinson@heraldnet.com

Brookside Elementary students experience annual salmon release day

By Amy Daybert
Enterprise editor

Excited children lined up in front of first grade Brookside Elementary teacher Katie Johnson on April 22. Several discussed names such as Edward, Gilbert, Jordan and Swimmy.

"Remember to give your fish a name," Johnson said.

She didn't have to worry: the second graders paired up in front of her were ready. Standing in pairs, with a hand over the top of the clear plastic cup, most were well aware of the next important step.

The salmon fry on their way to Brookside Creek bordering the school were "kind of nervous" Johnson told the students and reminded them to gently tilt their cups in the water and let the fish swim out into the creek.

Throughout the day, she repeated the lesson and led groups of kindergarten through fifth graders down to the muddy stream bank below the school grounds. In all, 200 salmon were released according to Johnson. Fifth graders were asked to write a paragraph to Johnson and her class about why they should be allowed to release a fish this year.

The reasons were abundant. "To make a difference," wrote one fifth-grader. "So the fish can come back next year and start another generation," wrote another. Several mentioned the importance of keeping the release day tradition alive at Brookside or that getting to release a young salmon for the first time "would be a treat."

Fifth-grader Charlotte Berkman wanted to release a fish because she missed the chance while she was in Kindergarten.

"I wanted to release a salmon because back in Kindergarten I broke my arm the day we did it," she said.

Berkman and a dozen other fifth graders were granted the chance to release a fingerling salmon after her first grade class approved each letter, according to Johnson.

"I thought it was really fun to have fifth graders write essays," she said. "My students were so amazed fifth graders were writing to them."

The fish release was the second Lake Forest Park Stewardship Foundation board of directors member Jean Reid has been part of this year. The first was by Lake Forest Park Elementary third graders at Grace Cole Nature Park on March 28. Students at both schools watched the salmon hatch and grow in tanks at their respective schools and signed a pledge to the salmon to conserve, recycle and respect the environment before releasing them.

"The whole idea is for kids to have a sense of place and be connected to the streams and stewarding them so they have that continuity with growing up in LFP," she said.