Martinsville Bulletin, Inc.
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204 Broad Street
Martinsville, Virginia 24115
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Donna Belcher, human resources manager at the Martinsville-Henry County SPCA, tells visiting second-graders about pet safety while student Jessica Rodriguez (right) uses a Flip camera to videotape her. The students visited the SPCA as part of a grant program. |
Monday, March 1, 2010
By ELIZA WINSTON - Bulletin Staff Writer
Cats and dogs at the Martinsville-Henry County SPCA recently helped second-graders from Henry County Schools learn about money management, technology and caring for animals.
Donna Hicks, curriculum specialist for the school system, said second-graders visited the SPCA through a grant program called Project Parallax. A partnership between Henry County Schools and the University of Virginia, it is funded through the U.S. Department of Education, she said.
The focus of the grant is identifying and nurturing talent in elementary students in the areas of science, technology, engineering and math.
As students filed into the SPCA, many were grinning with excitement, especially when they noticed a cat lounging in a large cage by the entrance. A few children pointed to the cat, and some tried to start a conversation with it.
Bryan Walker, 8, said he hoped to see hundreds of cats, but he wasn’t sure the SPCA could hold that many.
Once inside the SPCA, the students visited stations, and SPCA staff taught them about caring for animals. Bryan said he learned a lot.
“Animals must eat good food, and they need attention, just like people,” he explained. “Also, if you see a cute dog that you want to pet, you should ask the owner if it is OK to pet them, and then pet the dog slowly so it doesn’t get scared and try to bite.”
Some animals could have rabies, Bryan said. If a dog has rabies, he said, it might not have a collar, and it will be foaming at the mouth.
“Dogs and cats also have to get shots,” Bryan said, “so they don’t get extinct.”
Asha Manns, 7, who recently came to the United States from Ghana, said she learned that pets should always get baths, medicine and get to sleep early.
In addition to learning about animals, students had a chance to try out some new technology when they used Flip cameras to record parts of their visit. The cameras are small, portable video cameras that children can operate, said Gale Lintecum, coordinator of instructive technology and gifted education for the schools. The cameras look like rectangular plastic boxes with small screens and large red buttons for recording.
Students took turns using the cameras to ask SPCA staff members questions. They planned to use the footage in their classrooms later, and some of it might be posted on the schools’ Web site, Lintecum said.
The second-graders also learned math and money skills through their field trip, she said. The grant provided money for the each class to purchase supplies for the SPCA, and the students were given the task of figuring out which supplies they would need to buy, she said.
“They have to determine the best way to spend money, which will also teach them to budget later in life,” Lintecum said.
Fifteen second-grade classes took part in the field trip, she said. |
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