Our class pet

I wanted the room to have a pet. I did not want a fish or a fuzzy little critter. After nixing those choices, I didn't have much to choose from...

I wanted this pet to be more than something we had to feed, water and change the bedding for. I wanted this pet to be a part of our everyday learning and activities.

The idea for this pet started before I was the pre-k teacher. I wanted to do a lesson on the Eric Carle book, A House for Hermit Crab because of the connection you can make with a year in a classroom and "having a new shell". It needed to be a long term lesson, not something you could do in a twenty minute interview.

Over the summer, the other pre-k teacher and I decided to teach color as one of our "common units"(as required through our APPR plan because we are not responsible for an SLO). I still really wanted to use this book and connect it to our room. I read it twice the first week and we made the shell and the crab/handprint. Each Monday we read A House for Hermit Crab and added something of our weekly color to our shell. The kids enjoy adding to our room/shell as we go. When the school year started, I left the room very empty so the students could make it their own, like the hermit crab in the story.

I read Welcome to the Aquarium-A Year in the Life of Children, the teacher in this story, Julie Diamond had spent 13 years in Kindergarten. She explained that she leaves her room very "empty" in the beginning of the school year so that her students can decorate it with their work. She claimed that owned the room because it was their work, everywhere. I really liked that idea and wanted to create that same feeling in my room.

I ended up getting a hermit crab for the room but while at the pet store, the sales associate explained to me that hermit crabs really shouldn't be "alone", so I got two hermit crabs for my room. I am proud to admit that they are still alive and that no one has been pinched yet.