Little creatures teach large life lessons at RPS
School receives $1,700 grant for curriculum study of living things
BY JENNIFER KOHLHEPP
Staff Writer

JEFF GRANIT staff Fifth-grader Jessica Hickey, 10, pets the belly of her African bullfrog named Pickles for kindergartners Courtney Carduner, 5, and Jackson Mixon, 5, during a presentation on terrariums at the Roosevelt Public School on Feb. 9.

Green anoles, hermit crabs and an African bullfrog, oh my!

Roosevelt Public School has been crawling with these exotic creatures for about a month now in terrariums 12 fifth-graders made to replicate the critters' natural habitats.

Fourth-grade teacher Ilene Levine, fifth-grade teacher Scot Gershman and art teacher Barbara Atwood collaborated to create "Environments for Purposeful Learning," which is a cross-curricular, inquiry-based unit in which students study the concepts of ecology through caring for animals. The New Jersey Education Association awarded the teachers a $1,700 Frederick L. Hipp Excellence in Education Grant for the lesson, which aimed to teach students that living things have specific needs to survive, and that nonliving and living conditions affect the health of all creatures great and small.

JEFF GRANIT staff Anthony Ibarra, 10, (l-r) Ryan Vest, 6, and Beth Grossman, 5, get a closer look at a green anole climbing around a terrarium at the Roosevelt Public School on Feb. 9.

Levine said the project began in September with a discussion about what living things are and the diversity in biological evolution. After the students looked at what affects the growth of plants, Levine said they then collected and placed bugs, such as pillbugs and darkling beetles, in a terrarium that replicated a woodland habitat.

"Every living thing has a specific set of needs," Levine said. "We must know their needs to be able to take care of them."

The students then chose the type of habitat they would like to study, such as a pond, the beach, a rain forest, the desert, etc. Once they chose a habitat, students made a model of that habitat, called a vivarium. When students placed their pet into its habitat, the vivariums became terrariums.

Levine said she used the grant money to purchase items for the terrariums including lights, soil, sand, plants and other necessities.

"The parents paid for the animals," Levine said. "A couple will stay here, but most will go home with their owners after this."

Along with keeping their habitats healthy and their pets alive, the students had to express through an artistic assignment what they were learning, The students also had to write a research report about how the environment they chose to replicate in the terrarium exists in the natural world. Based on their reports, the language arts teacher helped students create keynote presentations, which described their environments in nature and their constructed environments in the classroom.

The lesson culminated with students providing a public presentation on Feb. 9 to schoolmates, parents and other people from the community about what they learned during the six-month endeavor.

During the presentation for the kindergartners in the school, Jessie Hickey sat near her terrarium, stroking the belly of her pet named Pickles. As she held the plump and marshmallow soft African bullfrog, she told the younger students, "He has a nice soft body and a stomach that feels like paper. I named him pickles because he looks like a big pickle."

Jessie, who has had Pickles as a pet in her home for six years, said she learned through the environmental project that the African bullfrog lives in parts of Africa and also in the forests of Madagascar.

"They can live in semi-desert to tropical grasslands," she explained. "The African bullfrog can grow up to 20 inches long and can live for 20 years."

Luke Dermody showed off the Uromastyx he calls Phileena.

"I thought it was a boy at first and I named it Phil," he said referencing the odd name of his pet.

Luke Vuolle had a male Uromastyx on display named Oscar. A Uromastyx is a type of gecko.

Luke and Luke explained that the Uromastyx lives in the desert and that they had to replicate the desert habitat for their animals to survive.

Luke Carnevale and his sister Tara had green anoles on display. Anoles are small, lizard-like creatures.

"He's friendly but if disturbed he might bite," Luke said explaining the reason why he decided to call his pet Ozzie.

To take care of Ozzie, Luke has to spray his pet's cage twice a day to keep it moist like a tropical rainforest. He also must keep certain kinds of plants in the terrarium as Ozzie likes to eat some, lick water off of others and go to bathroom in one particular plant, he said.

When asked why he chose the pet he did, Luke said, "I find it exciting how the green anole eats. I also like how it changes colors."

The green anole likes to eat wax worms, meal worms and crickets, he said.

Luke's sister, Tara, who had a female green anole called Kailey on display, explained the difference between her pet and her brother's.

"The female has a white stripe, but the male does not," she said.

Tara said her pet likes to sleep a lot and likes to hang on the walls of its terrarium. She said her pet is very active and that she actually lost it once but that the teacher caught it.

Victoria Pizzarelli had a crested gecko named Sleep Out due to its nocturnal nature and its habit of sleeping during most of the day. The crested gecko lives in the tropical rain forest, so Victoria has to maintain a certain temperature and humidity in her terrarium to keep her pet alive.

"We're doing this to learn about other habitats and to see what they are like," Victoria said of the environmental project.

Cameron Grayson, 11, had a fire-bellied newt with red spots named Octavius Rex. She explained to the kindergartners that her newt's tail is currently 10 cm long but that it started out at 5 cm long and could grow up to 13 cm long.

The fire-bellied newt lives in a bog or a pond and eats blood worms, she said.

"They live in water most of the time,." she said as she pointed out the large moat she created in the center of her terrarium around a fake boulder where the newt can hide.

Cameron explained that she has discovered that her newt is not that difficult to take care of as she only has to feed it three times a week, but has to change its water daily.

Caitlin Powers, 10, showed off her hermit crab named Claws, which clung to a stick during the entire presentation.

"He won't let go of his stick like he's supposed to," she explained to the younger students as they approached her station.

Caitlin said Claws likes to pinch a lot, which she found out about a week after she got him. Since he kept clawing apart the plants she put in the cage, she decided to put a small plastic toucan in there, which she said he hardly ever lets go of. However, that morning he let go of his toucan long enough to pinch her finger and give her a blood blister.

Besides having to deal with his nasty handy work, Caitlin said hermit crabs aren't that difficult to take care of. They live in a beach habitat, eat little food pellets and drink out of a sponge, Caitlin said. The habitat must also include extra shells, as hermit crabs likes to trade shells once they start growing, she said.

As Levine called the presentation to a close, the students placed their newfound friends back into their terrariums and filed out to their next class. After the students had gone, Oscar the Uromastyx dug a hole and crawled in to hide as Pickles trampled the plastic plants in his terrarium to nestle into a quiet corner, and Claws still sat clamping onto his stick. The animals may still not know, but the students at Roosevelt Public School learned that plants and animals and humans need each other and their interdependence gives equilibrium to the environment everything lives in on this planet.

Students not only presented their findings to their peers and members of the community, but also had the opportunity to be interviewed on Feb. 8 by Classroom Close-up, NJ, a show produced by the New Jersey Education Association and NJN Public Television. The program about the science projects will air Mondays at 6:30 p.m. and Saturdays at 9 a.m. on the NJN channel on April 16 and 21 and May 14 and 19.