Be sure to contact your local school teachers to discuss plans with them to bring humane education to the classroom! If possible, start with talking with the principal to see how your group can be used to bring humane education to the classrooms in various grades throughout the school. If you can’t get a general overall “we’d love to have you” from the principal, ask them for a few teachers who might be interested… or to allow you to distribute info to the teachers. Humane education could be an excellent topic for a Teacher Inservice Day at the school.

Find one or two teachers who would be willing to work with you during the summer to discuss ways to bring humane education into their classroom. Brainstorm some ideas together, review some books and curriculum materials to see where animals can be mentioned. If you can get the teacher into your group as a volunteer, they will be more prone to bring the volunteering to their students as well.

Some basic ideas of ways to use animals in the curriculum:

• Math– add up costs associated with owning an animal; create word problems to add up # of shots needed and their prices; have students figure the number of animals one breeding pair of dogs/ cats can produce in 7 years; discuss the overpopulation problem and have them figure how many homes are needed for all animals to have a home;
• Social Studies– discuss ways animals are used in therapy; discuss service animals; history of dogs/ horses/ cats/ others and their relationships with people;
• Science– discuss hygiene for animals; for older kids, show the circulatory system for animals and bring in one or two of the animals for a hands on approach; practice observation techniques by having the kids describe the animals
• Language Arts– encourage kids to write about the animals; have the kids imagine they were the animal’s best friend and describe what they’d do together; write letters to the animal; write a poem about the animal or their favorite animal
• Reading– review books about animals, Dr. Dolittle stories; Because of Winn Dixie, Annie, Benji, Lassie, Black Beauty, and dozens of other books that are age appropriate; have children read to an animal to get over their fear of reading out loud;

Basically, there are SO many ways you can include animals in the classroom activities for any age groups! I’ve really just brainstormed a few designed for elementary aged kids, but you can work with older kids as well! Teachers are a great resource for you to use to educate our communities on the overpopulation problems shelters face. They can help you raise awareness with students and their families about the wonderful animals available through shelters and rescues, and the help they can provide through donations and volunteering.

 

Get things started soon so you’ll have some time over the summer to work on these points with a few teachers! Start a Teacher Task Force! How does this relate to fundraising?? Once you are working with the schools and providing a service to them (educating the children on proper care for animals, compassion for animals, using their classroom skills in real life situations), the school will be more open to helping you with fundraising! Penny push events, supply drives, donating garage sale items, essay contests and other fundraisers are just around the corner! Don’t forget that by working with kids now, we are encouraging compassion for animals and putting ourselves out of our rescue jobs!