Spring Hill Elementary's Earth Day festival encourages students to appreciate the world around them and get up close and personal with nature.
By LOGAN NEILL
Published April 29, 2004
With his arms entwined in the 10-foot long torso of a green anaconda named Fluffy, Spring Hill Elementary School teacher Robert McCraw welcomed a group of third-graders to his lecture. The students stood and watched in awe as the snake slithered into position around McCraw's neck.
One youngster wanted to know if Fluffy was poisonous.
"If he was," offered McCraw. "I guarantee you I wouldn't be talking to you right now."
Last week's Earth Day festival at Spring Hill Elementary offered opportunities to get up close and personal with nature. From peering through a microscope into a drop of pond water to petting the velvety coat of a Florida bobcat, Spring Hill Elementary students were able to visit nearly a dozen activity booths during the morning-long event.
"These experiences go a long way in getting children to better appreciate the world around them," said Spring Hill Elementary science teacher Barbara Spivey, who has organized the event at the school for the past three years. "If you were to ask them, most probably will tell you they've never seen a baby gopher tortoise or looked at mosquito larvae under a microscope before today. These are fascinating things to them."
Exhibitors and guests to the event included several environment-related organizations, including the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, the Florida Native Plant Society and the Gulf Coast Conservancy. In addition to guests, the festival also included presentations and artwork contributed by the students. "These kinds of events are important because we're able to reach kids with the message that our environment is precious and getting rarer all the time," said George Gorman of Wildlife Rehabilitation of Hernando.
That message is certainly important to youngsters like fifth-grader Kristen Molloy, one of 21 members of the school's Green Team environmental club, which helped sponsor the event.
"I think it's good that kids get interested in helping wildlife, because it's going to be our responsibility some day," said the 10-year-old. "A lot of things we can't do anything about, but when it comes to the environment, it's everybody's responsibility."
Spivey says that her school's environment-based curriculum has provided a popular direction for educators the past few years. Before the festival, teachers in all grade levels were encouraged to put together activities to add to the event schedule.
Nancy Grimes' fifth-grade class spent the morning putting together "living necklaces" using flax seeds and donated medicine bottles. First-, second- and third-grade classes decorated paper shopping bags with Earth Day messages to be distributed at area Publix stores.
"The real message behind the festival is that we need to make every day Earth Day," said Spivey. "Hopefully, these kids will take that to heart."
