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Sixth-graders
learn to help others
and do the right thing
They are taking part in the
By Crystal Kua
'Kindness and Justice Challenge'
Star-BulletinStudents listened closely as teacher Sean Saturnio read aloud passages about a native Alaskan who struggled to return to his village with his team of dogs after a snowstorm.
For Saturnio's sixth-graders at Waipahu Elementary School, learning about other cultures is meaningful because it helps them to understand and appreciate differences.
"You don't judge people by their culture," Christopher Andres said.
"It doesn't matter what color you are, you gotta take care of each other," Lynn Loeak said.
Just as the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. epitomized nonviolence, tolerance and peace, these worldly 11-year-olds living in a former plantation town say they have their own example of how respect makes for a better world -- their teacher.
"He always reminds us to be kind," Nina Maea said. "He always tells us about life and stuff."In celebration of the national holiday honoring the civil-rights leader, Saturnio's class will join students from across the nation in taking the Kindness and Justice Challenge, which encourages students to help others and stand up for what is right.
The challenge, started in 1998, is sponsored by Do Something, a youth leadership organization, whose partners include the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change. Do Something provides educators with free service-learning and character education curriculum to help them with the challenge.
Beginning tomorrow and continuing for the next two weeks, students each day will learn about values that King personified. "The kids go out and then practice what they learn," Saturnio said.
The teacher and students will record their deeds on the organization's interactive Web site.
Although the program focuses students on these values during a particular period, Saturnio tells his students that kindness and justice should be practiced all the time.
"When you set high expectations for kids and you give them a proper sense of values, anything can happen," Saturnio said.
His class learns that little, everyday deeds sometimes make the most difference.
"Say, 'Excuse me,' when you bump into someone; clean up your room when your parents ask," he said.
Maea remembers her teacher's advice. "He says, 'If somebody's pencil's falls, pick it up for them.'"
Maea and her classmates said it all boils down to showing respect for others and standing up for your beliefs.
"You treat people the way you want to be treated," Samantha Picar said.
"If you see somebody who needs help, help them, even if they don't ask," Wilfred Brillantes said.
While being kind and just is the right thing to do, it's sometimes not always the easiest, Bensay Joseph said. "Be brave," she suggested.
"It's hard because some people are not so kind," Picar said.
In a short time, the students realize that it all begins with them, Saturnio said.
"It starts with one person, showing that they can empower themselves. It doesn't take a whole army. ... When all these virtues work hand in hand, the difference can be made despite the situation."
The youngsters of many ethnic mixes point out that their teacher lives by his words.
Slogans such as "think positive," "talk it out" and "express yourself" are written on baseball pennants tacked around Saturnio's classroom, which is located in a wooden portable building that shares space with a ball field across the street from the main campus.
Sporting a tight-cropped haircut and a pencil behind his left ear, the 32-year-old Saturnio leans down and pats the back of one student who is having difficulty answering a question posed to him in a class discussion.
"They're so all right," he would say a few minutes later about his students. "I love these kids."
