GARDEN GROVE : A Golden Opportunity for Students

Seeing little besides clear water and black sand inside the plastic bowl she held, Shimona Wolf, 9, sighed and began to swirl the water around once again.

As she rocked the bowl, the sand pulled away from the bottom edge and something shiny began to poke out. After a few more seconds, flecks of gleaming yellow metal appeared within the sand and Shimona gasped.

She had struck gold.

Shimona was one of 30 students at John Murdy Elementary School in Garden Grove who learned how to pan for gold as part of their lessons on California history.

During the 80-minute presentation, members of the Orange County 49ers, a local mining hobbyists group, answered questions and showed the third- and fourth-grade students how to work a claim.

“There is gold in all 50 states, but California is one of the leading gold-producing states,” Fred Serradell, 38, of Fountain Valley, told the youngsters.

However, Serradell, a mortgage broker who pans for gold on weekends, pointed out that looking for the precious metal “is one the fastest ways to make you poor. Only one out of every 1,000 miners in the old times struck it rich.”

“Your odds today are probably even less. But as a hobby, it’s a fun thing to do,” he added. To make a profit, a person would have to get about half an ounce of gold a day.

After hearing that a single ounce of unprocessed gold could be worth as much as $1,000 to a jeweler, one boy shouted out, “Give me some nuggets!”

The children watched a video showing how to use shovels, pans, screens and other equipment to coax gold flakes and nuggets from the ground. Then they left the classroom to try it.

Gathering around a metal wash tub that had been filled with water and dirt from a local claim, the students took turns sifting for gold. The scooped up water and mud and carefully shook their pans to let the lighter material wash back into the tub.

After removing all the rocks and keeping only a fine black sand, they swirled the pan to separate sand from the heavier material. Invariably, tiny flecks of gold remained.

Students said it was exciting to relive some of the same experiences and use the same kinds of techniques that miners had more than 140 years ago. Getting to pan for, and actually find, real gold was especially thrilling.

Lisa Heredia, 9, said: “I think it’s a real good way to teach us. When you’re reading in a book, you don’t know what it’s really like. But when you get to do it, you have a better idea.”