GILROY — Marina Eugenios’ El Roble Elementary School class is
hoping for wind.
Every afternoon, her 33 restless sixth-graders keep their eyes
on the treetops, hoping they will wave in the breeze so they can
put their latest projects to good use.
”
It’s spring fever,
”
Eugenios said.
”
They’re very excited and their looking for wind.
”
GILROY — Marina Eugenios’ El Roble Elementary School class is hoping for wind.
Every afternoon, her 33 restless sixth-graders keep their eyes on the treetops, hoping they will wave in the breeze so they can put their latest projects to good use.
“It’s spring fever,” Eugenios said. “They’re very excited and their looking for wind.”
For the past few weeks, Eugenios’ class has been working on making kites. But these aren’t just any kites, she said.
“They’re Greek kites,” she said. “It’s very complicated.”
The kites take on a special meaning for Eugenios.
“My dad was born in Greece,” she said. “He made the kites when he was a little boy and he died when he was 85. The construction of this kite may go back hundreds of years.”
Eugenios’ father died in 1995, but she asked her father to pass on the tradition.
“Before my dad passed away, I asked him to show me how to make them,” she said.
But what exactly makes a Greek kite different from others? Eugenios said it’s a little bit math and a little bit style.
“I would say the characteristic is lots of geometry to make it, a beautiful fringe and vibrant colors,” Eugenios said. “And lots of good memories for the teacher.”
For sixth-grader Robert Molina, the difference between Eugenios’ kites and kites he has gotten from the store is simple.
“They’re not like these,” he said. “These stay up.”
That is, unless they find their way into a dangerous locale, like Aaron Patronaggio’s first kite did.
“My first one got stuck in a tree,” Patronaggio said as he managed his kite, which was about 100 feet up in the air and 200 feet across the field at El Roble. “I was trying to pull it but the string broke.”
While the wreckage from that kite still is stuck in a tree at El Roble, Patronaggio scrambled to make a new kite, which he was trying out for the third time last Friday.
Believe it or not, this was the first time Patronaggio had ever flown a kite in his life. Eugenios said she hadn’t even thought to ask the kids if they had ever flown one before.
“These kids have never flown a kite?” she asked. “Isn’t that sad.”
Patronaggio said making the special hexagon-shaped kites took a lot of concentration.
“It takes a couple of hours to make,” he said. “The hardest part is the sticks because you have to put the string and round it and tie it, but it’s hard.”
Eugenios, who has been at El Roble for 14 years, has been incorporating the kites in her class for about 10 years now. She has arthritis in her hands, so it isn’t easy for her to make a bunch of the kites. Instead, she taught students Molina, Cecilia Perez, James Yamamoto, Nathan Plaza, Elizabeth Martinez, Melisa Garcia, Lisa Papion and her Teacher’s Assistant Kathleen Gwinn to make the kites, and they helped the rest of the class.
The kites are made using three 24-inch sticks, yarn, kite string and thin wrapping paper, foil paper or tissue paper.
“It has to be light,” Eugenios explained.
And the kites are more than just fun for the kids, they also learn many different lessons.
“I’m trying to teach them geometry, measuring, cooperative groups, following directions and traditions,” Eugenios said. “Also making something with their own two hands.”
The 11- and 12-year-olds also get exercise out flying their kites and, like student Juan Triana, get to put a little of their own creativity in the kites by choosing the color of their kite.
“They’re my favorite colors,” Triana said.
Eugenios said she has run into several of her old students who still remember making the kites. One student even came back to show Eugenios a large-sized version of the Greek kite that he had made at home.
“What are the things you remember from being in school,” Eugenios said. “It’s the fun things. They don’t forget – they remember this stuff.”
She hopes her kids will remember how to make the kites and continue the tradition.
“May dad passed it on to me and they can pass it on as well,” she said. “I’m teaching it to pass it on to others.”
