From a farm to the library, plenty of services keep minds, bodies active in Olathe
With everyone making a sudden pivot to online resources, the city of Olathe is trying to give its residents options to keep their minds and bodies active during this crisis.
Letters to animals
For places that are normally all about hands-on activities, like the Mahaffie Stagecoach Stop and Farm, it’s a big adjustment but not an impossible one.
One thing staff members are encouraging children to do is write letters to the Farm’s many animals. Alexis Radil, events coordinator at Mahaffie, said not only does that encourage a creative outlet but it can help strengthen kids’ penmanship as well.
Staff members are facilitating the animals’ responses. So far, the animals receiving mail include Smoothie the sheep, Ashley the rooster and multiple horses. The idea is to send back handwritten responses using cursive, as the Mahaffie family would have done, but it also depends on the volume of mail they receive.
Radil said letters have come to Mahaffie from as far away as Oskaloosa, Valley Falls and Shawnee in Kansas, as well as some from Kansas City.
“We’re very happy to see how our regional reach has been approached,” Radil said. “We’re pretty excited to write letters back. We know sometimes kids don’t receive actual physical letters in the mail, so it’s pretty special, and it ties into how stagecoaches were important to transport the mail.”
One young correspondent, Sage, wrote to Smoothie, “You are awesome! I am so happy I got to meet you before the coronavirus. Mom said that I can come and see you when all this is over.” Sage also inquired about Smoothie’s bedtime, age and if she is a noisy sheep.
The farm was preparing for its spring programming, which includes sheep shearing and wool processing. Because they weren’t able to do that publicly this year, they’ve posted a video of livestock manager Kathy Adams shearing a sheep on their Facebook page, alongside several short videos about historically related topics.
Exercise classes
Facebook is also the medium the Olathe Community Center is using to connect residents with exercise classes. Instructors are going to their studios and recording workouts alone for people to do at home.
The videos are not livestreamed and remain on the community center’s Facebook page for anyone to use.
“I think there was a little bit of a learning curve to make sure we were doing things correctly,” said Adrienne Lund, communications specialist for the city’s parks and recreation department. “You have to be mindful of music rights.”
She hopes that this taste of activities will encourage people to join the community center after the current crisis has passed.
“We’re also reaching an audience that might not be members of a community center,” she said. “Maybe when we reopen, they’ll consider taking advantage of that.”
So far, Lund estimates the fitness videos are getting about 500 views each. The most popular ones have been a Tabata boot camp and a barre class.
Lund said that even after the center gets the all-clear to open, they may continue to offer some online options.
“We understand that even though we’re told we can reopen, some people might not feel comfortable coming in or may have restrictions,” she said.
Library services
In addition to providing eBooks, the Olathe Public Library has many other virtual services open to the public. Unlike other departments, the library hasn’t had to suddenly adjust so much in this sector, because they always offer various online resources.
One such resource is live online tutoring. Students from elementary to college age can sign up for slots to get help through the library’s website every day from 2 p.m. to 11 p.m., using Brainfuse.
Sara Eccles, the library’s website manager, said that in the last three months or so, the group most likely to use the service has been third- and fourth-graders. The most popular subjects for requesting help are reading, math and writing.
In addition to books for eReaders, the library also offers downloadable audiobooks, online access to newspapers and eMagazines. The latter includes more than 3,000 titles. There is also streaming video, with a special service for kids via Kanopy. And if you want to learn a language while you’re stuck at home, they’ve got access to Rosetta Stone as well.
For more information on online resources from the city of Olathe, visit: olatheks.org/residents/community-resources/bring-home-the-fun
This story was originally published April 30, 2020 at 7:00 AM with the headline "From a farm to the library, plenty of services keep minds, bodies active in Olathe."