"You're putting 'oh no' together to sound like 'Ohno'..."

This month, the book my 4th graders are reading for their "RDB" class is called "Out in the Cold." I thought it was devoted solely to Arctic explorers and mountain climbers, but it turns out there's also a section on winter sports.  Unfortunately, the athlete the authors chose to feature was Apolo Anton Ohno.  I actually wasn't aware of that whole speed-skating controversy in the 2002 Olympics, but after observing my whole class vigorously pummelling the photo in their books, I sure am now.  Hahaha.  (They were also quite taken with the fact that his name is "Oh-no" - seemed to think it very fitting.)

They started off by telling me they "don't like Ohno" and "he is vely vely bad."  When asked why, they told me that in the Olympics, he had pushed the skater in front of him, but the judge "said that he didn't push" and so he won the gold medal - this story was related very heatedly and concluded with "and that person that he pushed is Korean!!!"  I sympathized with this tragic tale of injustice and agreed that, from the sound of things, Ohno was indeed "very bad."  They waxed scornful on the topic for quite some time - I'm not sure I've heard an athlete disparaged in such disgusted tones since the days when my sisters and I took strong dislikes to Rudy Galindo, Ilia Kulik, and Philippe Candeloro (among others.)

I googled it later on and read how in fact, Ohno had not pushed anyone but had complained of being blocked by Kim Dong-Sung and gotten Kim disqualified.  I was also surprised to find that what these kids were so passionately riled up about had happened when they were babies - I had kind of figured it must have been in 2010.  Oh - and they'd also told me that the judge who ruled in favour of Ohno was Ohno's father and thus shouldn't have been officiating at an event in which his son was competing (that being the case: quite so!)  But I couldn't find anything about Ohno's dad being a speed skating nib, only a hairdresser. Hahaha.

I'm teaching the same class again next week, and this time we'll actually be reading the section on Apolo Anton Ohno (they had skipped ahead to it today.)  Being American, the book will of course praise him to the skies.  Hahaha... it should be an interesting class. :)