To celebrate Halloween, we are featuring St. Anastasia School's "Creatures in the Classroom!" Not the creepy or scary kind of Halloween creatures, but the living, breathing and interesting kind of creatures! Many of our classrooms have animals in bowls, tanks and aquariums on display to enhance the learning environment.
 
The students use these "creatures" as learning opportunities as well as fun. For instance, the second graders in Mrs. Capezza's and Mrs. Alves' 2nd grade class have been listening to the chapter book Mr. Popper's Penguins in class. It is a story of a very untidy house painter named Mr. Popper who loves to study Geography and is particularly intrigued by the icy region of Antarctica. In the story, Mr. Popper writes to an Arctic Expedition and, in return, he receives a real penguin in the mail to care for. As a connection to this oral reading selection and to their study of animal habitats, 2nd graders in M-1 received live ants in the mail and created an ant farm! Students were eager to learn more about ants and ways they could care for them. They have fed them and given them water daily. They have also observed the
interesting ant habitat and written their observations in their Writing Journals. "Ants like to keep their habitat tidy," wrote Gabby Richards. "Ants like to eat meatballs," wrote Bryce Shevak after feeding them a tiny piece of Mrs. Capezza's meatball from her lunchbox. Mrs. Capezza also commented, "Our ant farm has been a wonderful addition to our classroom. It has given our students an opportunity to discuss different animal habitats and has also given them a sense of responsibility in caring for our little creatures."
 
Another example is in Mrs. Steele's 4th grade where they have a saltwater tank in which soft corals, hard corals, live rock, 3 hermit crabs, one brown tang (tropical fish), one black and white clown fish, and a cleaner shrimp reside. According to Mrs. Steele, the class has a saltwater tank because it teaches the children how to care for creatures popular in the Fort Pierce area. The tank has brought the class closer together as they have cared for these animals and they are learning more about saltwater habitats, which is part of the science curriculum. During the 1st week of school, the class named one of the hermit crabs Jellybean! The children help clean the tank, feed the fish seaweed/sea veggies and give them frozen brine shrimp. 
 
Two of St. Anastasia's classrooms have tadpoles! Emma Niemczyk, in Mrs. Russell's 3rd grade class, noticed that a frog in her family's fish pond laid eggs. She waited until they had hatched and brought in several tadpoles for the classroom!! The 3rd grade is studying life cycles in Science, so the addition of the tadpoles works out beautifully to enforce what the students are learning. The students have been waiting, not so patiently, for the frogs...and as of today, there is one little, tiny frog in the bowl!
 
Mrs. Schildwachter's 2nd grade class also has tadpoles. Mrs. Schildwachter first brought them in at the end of September and they were very tiny.  Everyday the students check to see if they have any back legs growing. They haven't seen any yet, but they think it's getting close since their bodies have been getting bigger. The class hopes to watch them grow all the way to frogs. At that time, they plan to let them go - although, some students are trying to talk Mrs. Schildwachter into sending one home with each of them! In 2nd grade Science, they have an animal unit and "amphibians" is one of the six animal groups that they learn about.
 
Stay tuned next week where we will highlight some other  "creatures" lurking in other classrooms...only they are not ALIVE!!!