{"id":20869,"date":"2021-04-15T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-04-15T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thelaker.ca\/?p=20869"},"modified":"2021-04-15T09:00:00","modified_gmt":"2021-04-15T12:00:00","slug":"hero-chat-with-ellie-wmes-hres-students-inspired-by-talk-with-olympic-gymnast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/?p=20869","title":{"rendered":"Hero Chat with Ellie: WMES, HRES students inspired by talk with Olympic gymnast"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>[adrotate banner=&#8221;93&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate banner=&#8221;105&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>WAVERLEY\/FLETCHERS LAKE<\/strong>: Grade 5 students at a pair of elementary schools in the Waverley and Fletchers Lake area had the opportunity to speak to a Halifax Olympic gymnast recently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As she gears up for the Tokyo Olympics, and arranged through the N.S. Sport Hall of Fame, Ellie Black spoke to students at Waverley Memorial Elementary and Holland Road Elementary. The classes that took part in the talks, dubbed &#8220;Hero Chats&#8221;, were Grade 5 Trider at WMES and Grade 5 MacDonald and Grade 4-5 LeGrow at HRES.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Emily Starrat, a student in 5 Trider, said from the talk with Black she learned is to go for your dreams and to remember practice makes perfect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cSometimes you make a really huge deal about the littlest things,\u201d she said. \u201cEven some amazing sport athletes are just like us when it comes to confidence; nervousness; anxiety; and just thinking in general.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate banner=&#8221;31&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate banner=&#8221;34&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>During the Hero Chat with Black, there were many questions asked. The question that 5 Trider settled on was: \u201cHow do you stay focused when there are so many things going on around you\u201d?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Drew Piercey said he realized from the chat that if one works hard enough, they too could be the idol of someone one day. He said the chat was informative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI learned that you don&#8217;t need to move to larger places to be recognized by associations of your favourite sport or hobby,\u201d he said. \u201cBeing optimistic is the key to a lot of things as even if you come last in a tournament.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Holland Road Grade 5 MacDonald students enjoyed speaking with Black. They summed it with the following comments when asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt was cool to see her&nbsp;talking instead of just doing competitions,\u201d said Avah Nicholson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate group=&#8221;6&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate banner=&#8221;123&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;It was inspiring seeing her because she came from a small place, not a place where gymnastics people come from. It didn&#8217;t matter that she came from a small place. She kept trying when people told her she wouldn&#8217;t make it,\u201d added Grace Hilton<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;It was nice that she showed us her dog because I love puppies,\u201d said Jesse Steele.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;When lots of people say they&#8217;re not good and they just give up, she didn&#8217;t she got to go where she wanted, &#8221; Jayden Tillman said.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;If someone tells me no you need to read an easier book level, I think I will try to read a harder book level and follow my heart,\u201d Maddie Laplante said with certainty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/IMG_20210407_125635_1-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-20871\"\/><figcaption>Holland Road Grade 4-5 Legrow students were inspired by their chat with Ellie Black. (Submitted photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate group=&#8221;9&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate group=&#8221;7&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Students in Grade 4-5 Legrow said Black\u2019s speech was inspiring.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cDuring these times of Covid-19, we are unable to have guest speakers into our school, so it was nice that she took time out of her day to share with students her inspirational story,\u201d said Grade 4 student Kate Whitman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cShe taught us to never give up on our dreams and to preserve through the difficult or challenging times,\u201d said Hunter Dickinson, Grade 4.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cShe never gave up. I felt a personal connection when she was talking about how challenging Bar was for her because I find bar the most difficult as well,\u201d said Grade 5 student Addison Cross.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate banner=&#8221;95&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate banner=&#8221;84&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There were a lot of takeaways from the chat with Black, including to work hard to achieve your goals, which are not meant to eb easy; and to never give up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe set goals to push us to keep going. Goals are meant to challenge you to become your best self keep,\u201d said Aaron Marsh in Grade 5.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cEllie shared how she never gave up. It felt really inspiring to hear that someone from Nova Scotia made the decision to be the best and to see her dreams come true with hard work, grit and determination,\u201d said Grade 4 student Olivia Hollett.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cNo matter how hard you try or how bad you want something, you might not be successful at first but don\u2019t ever give up,\u201d said Alex Blair, a Grade 5 student.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate banner=&#8221;121&#8243;]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[adrotate banner=&#8221;111&#8243;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[adrotate banner=&#8221;93&#8243;] [adrotate banner=&#8221;105&#8243;] WAVERLEY\/FLETCHERS LAKE: Grade 5 students at a pair of elementary schools in the Waverley and Fletchers Lake area had the opportunity to speak to a Halifax Olympic gymnast recently. As she gears up for the Tokyo Olympics, and arranged through the N.S. Sport Hall of Fame, Ellie Black spoke to students [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20870,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,957],"tags":[963,2,29,1162,2028,581],"class_list":["post-20869","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-news","tag-ellie-black","tag-fall-river","tag-holland-road-school","tag-n-s-sport-hall-of-fame","tag-olympics","tag-waverley-memorial-school"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20869","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20869"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20869\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20869"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging-z.thelaker.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}