Okolona teachers bring farm experiences to students
By Juliann Morris
May 4, 2023—If you pop into Pam Kusinski’s second grade classroom at Okolona Elementary School, you just might find students busy on a Zoom call with their adopted dairy cow Renegade and her caretakers in Magnolia, Kentucky.
Down the hall in second grade teacher Sean Honadel’s class, students are still buzzing about the seven ducks they helped nurture from fertilized eggs to ducklings.
At their Title I urban school, Kusinski and Honadel said many students don’t get the chance to interact with farm animals, so they decided to bring the farm to the classroom.
“Last year we had a farmer come out, and some of these kids had never seen a farm animal, let alone hold one, communicate with it, and learn about how it went from nothing to an actual living organism,” Honadel said. “Our second-grade kids now know more about farm animals and animal adaptations than most middle schoolers.”
RENEGADE THE DAIRY COW
Kusinski adopted Renegade through Discover Dairy’s Adopt a Cow program at the beginning of the school year. The class receives regular updates about her life on R & T Farms. Pictures, stories, and the culminating Zoom call help students connect with Renegade and learn about everything from physical attributes and habits of cows to how they are tagged, Kusinski said.
The class shares a stuffed cow that each student gets a chance to take home. Students write about their adventures with the toy Renegade in a journal, weaving writing standards into the fun, she said.
Students even learned a song about cows and the importance of dairy that earned them an ice cream party with the school’s music teacher.
“The kids absolutely love it,” Kusinski said. “I will definitely work on adopting another cow next year.”
SEVEN LITTLE DUCKLINGS
While Kusinski’s class beefed up their cattle knowledge, Honadel’s students were busy helping incubate seven duck eggs right there in the classroom.
Honadel got the eggs from Metzer Farms, he said, and settled in for the 28-day process from fertilization to hatching. On day one, all the students ‘candled’ each egg to see inside and found little to nothing, he said. Seven days later, they started to see blood vessels form, and then shortly after, a heartbeat. During each stage, students documented what they saw by drawing pictures.
Throughout the month, students learned about adaptations of ducks like webbed feet, down feathers, oil glands, how they preen, and how ducks are basically waterproof, Honadel said. They also had to check the humidity and temperature of the eggs and make sure they turned the eggs daily. Honadel’s class created posters to display their new duck knowledge and did presentations throughout the school.
“It was high rigor, but it was high engagement, too,” Honadel said. “They wanted to do it, and it was important for them to take care of something.”
The ducks started to hatch during Spring Break. Honadel made sure parents and students still got to experience the exciting event live, posting videos to ClassDojo.
When students returned to school, they had seven new temporary classmates who they could hold and watch grow. The ducks were divided between Honadel’s and Kusinski’s classrooms for each group to enjoy and nurture.
“It was just amazing to them,” Kusinski said. “I know one of my little girls, she had picked up the duck, and she was holding it, and she’s like, ‘I am so brave.’”
Students witnessed another interesting behavior when one of the ducklings imprinted on Kusinski and followed her up and down the hall in a straight line, mistaking her for its mother.
The ducks outgrew their space in the classroom after about two weeks and were rehomed with one of Okolona’s substitute teachers and a few of the children in the class, Honadel said.
While they’re no longer living in the classroom, the entire experience has made a lasting impression on many.
“We have several students who want to become vets now, and some who want to be farmers,” Honadel said. “This inspired them to learn more. Something just as simple as watching an animal grow inspired them to do more when they grow up.”