Golden Apple: Northern Elementary School In Bemidji Hosts First Ever “Ninja Run”

“I was just expecting the obstacle that you could see over there. That was all I was expecting, but when I saw all of this I was like, ‘whoa!’ says 4^th grader Noah.

It’s a challenge unlike any other. There’s 17 obstacles total and you’ll have to climb, crawl and even hang in the air a little bit to be successful.

“We were just looking for a way to use our half-mile trail behind the school. A couple of years ago we did a color run and we decided to try something different, so we asked families and teachers and groups or anybody that was willing to put together an obstacle and we would space it out amongst the trail, and we got some food vendors that came in and we’re playing some music,” says Paul Daman, a 3^rd grade teacher at Northern Elementary School.

This was the first ever Ninja Run for Northern Elementary School. All kids from kindergarten to the 4^th grade were allowed to take a lap or two.

“We climbed the rock wall,” says 1^st grader Jackson.

“And we also did ropes with handles on it,” says another 1^st grader, Jayden.

“There’s a lot of obstacles, I think it was the rock over there,” says 2^nd grader Brody, when asked about his favorite part of the obstacle course.

Around 200 kids went through the Ninja Run. Some kids went around the obstacle course three or more times, as they were allowed to go as many times as they wanted.

“We didn’t really advertise it to anyone other than Northern School families, but as you can probably see we had a really good turnout. Kids love this stuff. They wanna run and just jump and climb. We’re just really happy with how it went,” says Daman.

There were a lot of creative set-ups involved. For the Northern Elementary school staff, using their imagination to come up with the obstacles was the fun part.

Daman says, “The only limit is just being creative enough to come up with something that kids from 4 years old to 12 years old can do.”

The Ninja Run earned some stellar reviews from the kids who participated. When asked about obstacles they would want to see in future runs, the students had some pretty unique things to say.

“Monkey bars,” says Jackson.

“Swimming,” adds Jayden.

“Things that stick up off the ground that you have to jump from one to the other,” says Noah.

Brody says, “And a hockey one where you have to do a slap shot!”