Grandparents Day Is Lesson for All Ages

“I love Grandparents Day!” an excited Madison Kawakami said of the Harbor Day School’s annual event Friday.

By all accounts, the second-grader’s sentiment was shared by most of her classmates who reveled in the opportunity to show off their accomplishments to their grandparents.

Grandparents Day at the private Newport Beach elementary school was started 23 years ago by then-headmaster John Marder. Although he thought the idea was a good one, he didn’t expect many grandparents would take him up on the invitation.

However, the event has gotten so huge, the school erected a big-top-sized tent on its athletic fields, where the 580 grandparents and great-grandparents were served breakfast and lunch.

And the Corona del Mar neighborhood surrounding the school was so packed with cars, the school used a pair of black BMWs, with placards identifying them as Grandparents Day shuttles, to transport the visitors between the school and their autos.

Nia and Thomas Cortese of Indianapolis, Ind., were among the dozens of grandparents who traveled from across the United States and three foreign countries to spend the day with their grandchildren at school.

It was a long way to come, the Corteses said, but it gave them an excuse to visit the family and find out what their two grandchildren are learning at school.

What most of the grandparents found out was that some aspects of elementary schools today are quite different from the schools they attended as children.

The grandparents marveled as they watched their youngest family members cruise the Internet for information on plants and animals or consult software programs for assistance with math and spelling problems.

Or course, much of what they saw was familiar. Children sang, performed skits to demonstrate what they are studying and showed their grandparents the walls decorated with their artwork.

Emma Lebenzon of Laguna Beach attended her seventh consecutive Grandparents Day, visiting with her grandchild, 8-year-old Annie Olson.

Lebenzon said she looked forward to Grandparents Day because it shows families that their children are being taught respect in addition to academics.

“You often hear that we in America don’t respect our elders, but I think they are definitely being taught that here,” Lebenzon said.