Critter Club Again

Critter Club runs during the school year, and as we head into summer the club ends it's current session.  One of the projects the kids undertook was shooting a music video.  The project was inspired by a music video produced by the SPCA of Wake County in Raleigh, NC to the song by ABBA "Take a Chance on Me".   The Critter Club members saw that video, were enthusiastic about putting together their own and set about deciding on music and putting together choreography. 

After an entire meeting of listening to a variety of songs, the kids finally chose "Say Hey" by Michael Franti and Spearhead.  We all liked the idea that the song was about unconditional love -- something that fits in really well when we think about our pets. 

The video may not be professional quality, but the kids worked really hard at making it into something they could be proud of, and we rehearsed several evenings before we shot the final product. 

Another recent highlight of the Critter Club year was a few weeks ago when one of our employees. Jessica, allowed the kids to spend a bit of time with some 2 week old kittens she was fostering.   This is the time of year when we start to get them in, and many times they're too young to be away from the mother cat.  We greatly rely on foster homes that can hand raise them -- including bottle feeding every few hours and making sure they are pottied (very young kittes and puppies need to be stimulated by their mothers in order to produce urine and feces). 

Jessica was kind enough to show the kids how to feed and potty them, and then let the kids take over.  The kids were amazed by how small and dependent the kittens were, and really enjoyed caring for them. 

Critter Club Weekend

It was a busy weekend for HAWS Critter Club kids as we had activities for them both on Saturday and on Sunday.

HAWS annual Walkathon was on Saturday.  I've always wanted the education department to have some kind of activity for kids to participate in while attending the walk, but never had the time to create something.  Since one of the things incorporated into the Critter Club agenda is projects that help HAWS, I delegated the responsibility of game creation and implementation onto the club members. 

I couldn't have been more pleased with the result.  The club members came up with a scavenger hunt for kids having to do with getting answers on dog safety questions.  Once they completed the scavenger worksheet the participants brought the sheet back to the education booth.  Club members checked it over for errors, explained any answers that were wrong, and every child who completed a worksheet got a prize. 

Not only did the Critter Club members come up with a really fun and educational game, but they did a fantastic job the day of the walk itself.  They went around finding kids to play, and handled the education aspect of it in a very kind and informative manner -- making the younger kids completely at ease.   

Additionally, Critter Club member Carly Perock was awarded the Diana Boettcher Youth Community Kindness Award for her outstanding volunteer work at HAWS through Critter Club, as well as for organizing a fundraiser for HAWS in which she managed to collect and donate several hundred dollars.  Carly has been a long-time participant in HAWS kids programs, and it's fun seeing her grow up to be not only an animal lover, but someone who cares enough to take time and energy to help them. 

Eavesdropping isn't Always Bad

Fifteen 4th and 5th graders, an emphasis on science, and a week at HAWS = HAWS annual Spring Break Camp.  This year's camp was made possible due to the generosity of an Arrowhead High School's DECA donation which covered all of our expenses and enabled HAWS to offer 4 days of camp free to Hadfield Elementary Boys and Girls Clubs. 

Last year I blogged about the adventures of the 2011 Spring Break Camp.  This year, as in last year, the kids had an opportunity to observe our veterinary staff in action, spend a lot of time with animals, and put together an experiment.  This year's experiment was based on an actual study on "Social Eavesdropping in the Domestic Dog" (Marshall-Pescini et al. 2011. Social eavesdropping in the domestic dog. Animal Behaviour (2011), doi:10.1016/j.anbehav.2011.02.029).   Julie Hecht, MSc is a researcher of canine cognition and was kind enough to suggest this as a study might interest the kids -- and she was right since the kids really had a good time with it!

Social eavesdropping involves an individual watching interactions between other individuals.  In some cases it can provide information that will benefit someone in a decision making process.  In the social eavesdropping study the dog observes a person begging for food from two different people -- one of whom is generous and hands out food, and the other is selfish and refuses.  The dog is then released to see if he's learned which of the two individuals is more likely to give him food.  

The original study consisted of 100 dogs and found that most dogs went to the generous person after eavesdropping on the interactions between the beggar and the two individuals with food.   Our goal with the kids wasn't to replicate the study and have it pass a scientific peer review, but to teach the kids about how experiments are conducted, and show them that science can be fun.  For our purpose we only used eight dogs, and the goal was to find out if age made a difference in being able to socially eavesdrop. 

The kids really enjoyed the experiment and I was very proud of how much effort they put into it.  And while good experiments only have one variable, we had to work with the dogs that were available and there ended up being two.  The dogs two years and younger were shelter dogs, and the dogs three years of age and older were staff owned dogs.

I didn't think the kids would notice that discrepancy, and was initially dismayed when one of the girls pointed out that this could be a factor in why the older dogs were better at social eavesdropping than the younger dogs -- that having owners could have made a difference.  But when I thought about it a little longer it made me proud that at least one of the kids took in the information about keeping all the aspects of an experiment constant except for one variable, and that she was perceptive enough to notice we hadn't done that. 

Here's video of the experiment with the kids talking about it. 

Puppy Movie Night

She was enormous by the time she came to HAWS -- ready to give birth any day. Champagne ended up having 15 puppies in her foster home, an extremely large number of puppies for any dog to have to take care of! You can read about Champagne and her puppies on her blog.

A few weeks ago HAWS behavior manager Claudeen McAuliffe, Ph.D. mentioned that she really needed help with socializing the puppies to kids, and since I work with a ton of kids she was hoping I could help. And so we decided to host a night where kids could come to HAWS and socialize the puppies, socialize with each other, and have fun.

Our first "Puppy Movie Night" was last Friday evening. Forty-nine kids between the ages of 6 and 14 years of age came to play with puppies, eat pizza, watch a movie while munching on popcorn, and play with puppies again. By the end of it the puppies were tired, and the kids told me what a wonderful evening they had. As a matter of fact, many became very excited when I mentioned that we may have a "Kitten Movie Night" in the future.

Bucky Buckerman

The other day I was showing my Lad Lake students a PowerPoint on animal emotions and I started out talking about humane emotions and facial expressions. I showed the Dr. Paul Ekman photos depicting universal facial expressins for different emotons.

As I started to move on to talk about animal emotions one of the boys raised his hand and with a big smile asked; "Can we call the one on the bottom in the middle 'Bucky Buckerman'?"

I attempted to use his inappropriate attempt at humor to instill some empathy. "That's not very nice to make fun of his appearance," I said. "He can't help how he looks."

"Yes he can," the boy replied, "he can get braces."

"Maybe he can't afford braces, or maybe there's another reason he can't get them," I said.

At that point one of the other boys asked when these photos were taken, and I said I thought maybe the late 60s or early 70s. "Oh, no. You're right," he said. "Back then they couldn't have afforded it."

I'm not sure if they got the message I was trying to send, but I was amused.

March Madness in WI

This has been the weirdest Wisconsin weather in March I can ever remember. I've lived here my entire life and I never thought that I'd have the windows open, be comfortable wearing shorts and a t-shirt, and be too warm hiking in the middle of March unless I were to move somewhere south.

I think the weather this month has taken a lot of people by surprise, and many haven't adjusted quite yet to thinking in terms of summer.

Yesterday I went grocery shopping and as I was loading groceries into my car I heard a dog barking. As I always do, I looked around to see where the barking was coming from. I was horrified when I located the vehicle the next aisle over and saw that the windows were barely cracked. It was 75 degrees out, not a cloud in the sky, and the SUV was a dark blue color. It was the kind of situation that could kill a dog if left enclosed too long.

I went to the customer service desk of the store and reported the situation. They paged the owner of the vehicle, and I went back out to see if anyone came to get the dog out of it's automotive oven. 5 minutes later the dog was still in the car, and the owner wasn't in sight. So I called the police. The dispatcher promised to send an officer over.

It took 15 minutes for the officer to arrive. He took down the plate number, and the VIN number and asked me a few questions, and then told me I could leave. By the time I left the parking lot it had been a half an hour and the owners still hadn't shown up. The police officer was still by the SUV when I left, and I'm not sure what happened after that.

I have no doubt the owners loved their little dog. It appeared to be well groomed, and they thought enough to want to give it a car ride. But they weren't thinking about the fact that in 75 degree weather an enclosed car can quickly reach 100 degrees. And I'm sure they didn't consider that once they completed their shopping they may have returned to find a dead dog.

It might be March, but with the temperatures behaving as though it's June we need to think summer and how that impacts our pets.

Listening Goes Both Ways

When I first started out in humane education I always worried about what kind of a lesson or activity I could prepare for the groups of kids I interacted with. My assumption was that what I presented to the kids was the most important part of my visit since they'd be learning something about the treatment of animals.

I've since come to realize that the lesson is only one part of what the kids get out of my visits. Most of my visits include an animal guest. I usually do the activity with the kids first since once the animal is out they really don't have any interest in interacting with me -- and who can blame them!

Once the animal comes out I stop talking as much and the kids take that opportunity to talk to me. I hear about animals they have at home, and animals they've met at the homes of relatives. Some kids have stories about wild animals they've encountered -- some they've rescued by bringing to HAWS. Occasionally I'll hear stories about animal abuse the kids have witnessed -- either by other kids, or worse, from adults in their lives.

I've come to realize that listening on my end is just as important as wanting the kids to listen to me. Kids are desperate to be heard and be made to feel that their thoughts and comments are important. Expressing their experiences and feelings are an important part of the learning process, and making them feel as though their conversation about animals is being heard will have a huge impact on how they regard animals in the future.