Lake Ridge EMS Paramedic Stanley Steele provides instruction to LFNTES second graders on the proper application of Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) using a simulator device.
A school project on the duties of America’s first responders turned into a classroom meeting with two real-life first responders for LFNTES students in Amanda Greichunos’s second-grade class.
Lake Ridge EMS Paramedics Stanley Steele and Melissa Pyle paid a visit to the school and left students with a valuable lesson.
“We believe it is important to talk to children as young as second grade about the life-saving techniques of CPR. There are a lot of times when we get phone calls and children are the only ones there with the person in need. We instruct them on how to give CPR until we arrive, and yes, they have saved lives,” said Steele, a 31-year paramedic veteran.
Bopping to the lyrics of “Staying Alive” by the Bee Gees from the 1977 disco-themed movie Saturday Night Fever, students compressed the chest of the human simulator device.
What impressed every adult in the room was how well the seven-year-old students actually knew the lyrics to the 46-year-old movie’s title song.
“I was really surprised they knew the song,” their teacher said jokingly. “That is one of the reasons why we have guests come in to speak with our students. It gives them the opportunity to learn new things and apply them to real-world activities.”
LFNTES Principal Melissa Rettig said the visit from the first responders is one students will not soon forget.
“I could see the excitement on their faces when the paramedics walked into the classroom with their uniforms on pulling the gurney. They had the students’ attention,” Rettig said. “You can never tell what experience or moment may spark a student’s passion or desire, but that was certainly one of them. We may have gotten a couple of future paramedics out of that visit.”
