"It all began on a rainy Tuesday morning in October at Monte Vista Elementary School in La Crescenta, California. Yes, we do get rain in Southern California, but the last storm was 181 days earlier. On that Tuesday, 65 fifth and sixth graders unwittingly wiped their feet and squeaked their sneakers across the floor of Room 17, not knowing what was about to happen would change they way they would see their PE class forever. As they packed in like sardines with the desks pushed up against the walls, I’m sure that they were expecting another round of fitness and indoor sit-down beach ball volleyball. What they got instead was something they’ll never forget…8.22 seconds of Emily Fox!

Talk about getting your kids motivated to learn something new, the video of Emily had them spellbound. In my 11 years as a physical education teacher for grades 4-6 I’ve exposed thousands of kids to hundreds of the best new activities that I’ve learned from conferences, workshops, and colleagues. Nothing has compared to the anticipation and excitement generated in those 8.22 seconds and what followed in the remainder of the hour that stormy day.

I used the Speed Stacks video and my direct instruction to teach about 300 general education and 8 special education students how to handle the cups, do the 3 stack, and the 3-3 stack. You would have thought it started hailing off and on inside that small classroom as hundreds of cups were hitting the linoleum floor. Okay, so there was some slamming of the cups, but it was hard to curb their enthusiasm. We ended each lesson that day by watching Emily one more time and letting them know that next time we would learn the 3-3-3 stack, the 6 stack, and the 3-6-3. They couldn’t wait!

The next day I was off to Dunsmore Elementary and Valley View Elementary, my other two schools in La Crescenta. Actually, before I arrived word had already spread from Monte Vista to the other two schools that I was coming with this unit. It didn’t matter if a few kids heard all about it from their friends at Monte Vista, they couldn’t steal away Emily’s thunder even on the rainiest of days. Once again, it only took 8.22 seconds to get them hooked.

Over the next two weeks the rain came and went, but we found ourselves inside even when there were clear blue skies outside. The energy level was so high as we went through the competition stacks, raced the clock, and raced each other. We invited the principals, secretaries, and teachers over to see us stacking. The kids couldn’t get enough of it and neither could the faculty and staff. Mr. Dalton, one of our sixth grade teachers at Valley View, would join us daily as we worked with 84 sixth graders for an hour. Parent volunteers would pop their heads in at all three schools as we taught it in the auditorium. One parent at Dunsmore told us that all her kids could talk about at dinner was that “stacking thing.” “My son tried to show me with some sippy cups, but that didn’t work too well. So we poked some holes in some of those red Dixie cups. We got the idea and it seems really neat!” she exclaimed.

Naturally, we set up a fundraiser at each school to try to earn some Speed Stacks equipment to start an after school program. We told the parents how stacking could improve hand-eye coordination, ambidexterity, quickness, concentration, and more. After one week of sales we sold over 400 sets of cups and other Speed Stacks equipment. Surely we can’t stop teaching it now.

After our orders arrive we will be officially starting our after school stacking program at all three schools. We will be having intramural competitions as well as a three school tournament. The real highlight of our programs will be the “Each One Teach One” project. Each member of the program will go home and teach a family member (“the chosen one”) the competition stacks. We will all come together at the end of the program session to participate in our own unique family stacking events.

In the meantime, the next time it rains (or sooner) I know the kids will be expecting the cups and we’ll be ready with some new challenges. In our class we say that 100% participation equals 100% success. My students have done so well participating throughout the stacking unit that I’ve got to believe that each one of them is already feeling as successful in our PE class as Emily Fox did after her 8.22 seconds on the cycle that day."