Snakes at School

Good luck:sunny: Can't wait to hear about how well it went and see all the great pics!

I hope you had a great time today! My husband and I love taking our snakes out to these types of things. Our local club arranges Outreach demonstrations so that we can help educate the public.

We recently did a show in Eastern Washington for Earth Day. It was such a good feeling to bring something to these kids (all 400 of them!) that they had never experienced before.

Today, I'm at work and dave is off on another outreach, this time to a local elementary school's "Science Day". There will be groups flowing through most of the day from 9am until 2:30pm with a break for lunch. This is the reason I joined the club and why I will do my best to attend any of these functions.

Glad to hear that others are taking up the task of sharing our love for reptiles!

deb

Robin,

He was pretty cool. Didn't want to put the snakes down whenever he got ahold of one. Good potential to be a future customer.

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Originally Posted by rabernet

Oooh, I forgot that was today!


And Tim, that little boy just peering up at you with admiration is adorable!

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give us details JO

Oh that's so cool Deb. Mike and I are going to join the Toledo Herp Club just as soon as we can!

Okay the school snake show went off beautifully folks! First we visited our son's kindergarten class and were pleased to have the grade 1's from across the hall also join in. The kids were amazing! Both teachers were nervous of the snakes but asked great questions and got into it. We even got a group pic and persuaded both ladies to get close enough for a quick snap shot. Just this one picture though as we were just really focusing on education and fun this time around.

http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e2...-forumsize.jpg

The teacher to the immediate right of my husband, Mike, is our son's teacher. She was VERY nervous of the boa as you can see by her face LOL. Our son Mikey is front and center in the navy t-shirt with red piping.

We then visited a grades 4 and 5 and did basically the same talk. We showed and allowed the kids to touch 5 snakes:

Orlah and Riordan - adult female and juvenile male BP and used them to discuss ball pythons, Africa, how snakes "see" prey, how they hear through their jaw bones and bellies and all sorts of snake related things. They loved the heat pits, thought they were super interesting!

Emi - yearling female albino milksnake - we used Emi to lead into talks about garter/ribbon snakes that are common in the Toledo area, how they eat hundreds of rodents per year and are our friends, what to do if you see a snake in your yard, that sort of stuff - we also used the fact that Emi is an albino to bring a little talk about basic genetics and how snakes are many colors just like people are but they are all basically the same inside - everyone loved Emi (she's too pretty to resist lol)

Severus - yearling male BCI - Sev was a huge hit and the longest snake we brought today - he was his usual outgoing boa self and very inquisitive - the kids loved his black tongue and we compared that to the orange tongue Emi has and the pink tongues of the bp's - we talked about how snakes tongues work and how their senses are like ours but just operate differently

Saoirse - adult female WC BP - Saoirse came along to show everyone how to respect the wild and make sure there are always places for wild snakes - she showed that a previously scared and sick WC snake can learn to live with people if they respect her and care - all the kids were sad Saoirse didn't get to live wild but happy that people rescue snakes (most didn't know this could happen or that snakes deserved rescuing) - Saoirse helped them understand trust between different species is possible and snakes deserve to be cared about too.

As we showed each snake we had around sheds to examine from each type. The kids loved that and lined up to gently stroke each snake and check out their sheds. Lots of giggles and screeches but generally they were all thrilled, well behaved and respectful of the snakes.

We talked a bit about how to safely handle snakes, not to approach or harrass wild snakes, the jobs snakes have in nature and lots about how snakes live their lives day to day. Mikey helped demonstrate safe handling by a small child and was VERY proud to be our helper. He stated afterwards that someday he will rescue snakes too (awww how cute is that!)

We were at the school a total of 2.5 hours with not one bite or attempt to strike and only one small hiss here or there (not serious hissing, just snake grumbling really). Not one snake seemed even really fazed by the experience and mostly were their usual pretty laid back selves. All the scaley ones are now tucked back in their homes probably wondering what today was all about LOL. All in all it was a great experience and I hope we get invited back again.

Jo, that's awesome! Sounds like it went beautifully!!!!!

Wow, very cool stuff Jo!!!

That sounds like a really awesome day, Jo! It's awesome that you're doing those educational talks with kids. :) I especially like the bit where you compare snake genetics as making them look different on the outside but that they are the same on the inside--it's a -great- metaphor for kids to get about accepting other -people- who look different from them.

Sounds like you did an EXCELLENT job! Yay, Jo!

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Originally Posted by AzureN1ght

That sounds like a really awesome day, Jo! It's awesome that you're doing those educational talks with kids. :) I especially like the bit where you compare snake genetics as making them look different on the outside but that they are the same on the inside--it's a -great- metaphor for kids to get about accepting other -people- who look different from them.

Sounds like you did an EXCELLENT job! Yay, Jo!

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Ditto!! :clap: Wish I could have been there and seen the presentation!

i think you enjoyed it more then the kids JO.