The Chickens Have Hatched!!

Whew! Day 1 back from vacation was a busy one! Our eggs started hatching over the weekend - despite my assurances to their caregiver that they wouldn't hatch on her watch heehee! For some reason the little buggers decided that day 19 was to be their birthday, although all the literature says chicken eggs need to incubate for 21 days! So, this morning we had 12 little chicks ready to greet everyone as they walked in the room.

Aren't they too precious?! As you can see we have several different breeds - and no, I have no idea what kind of eggs/chickens we have. Some came from a lovely man out in Braie, OK who raises chickens and ducks to please his 3 year old granddaughter. He saw my ad for eggs on craigslist and drove a whole bunch of eggs into town for me! We met up at a local restaurant's parking lot and then he invited my husband and I to join him and his wife for dinner, after which he picked up the bill! Talk about generous! The other ones came from another lady who was contacted by my old college professor who saw my ad, asked around for eggs for me and sent a lady with a dozen eggs over to my school! I am just floored by the support we received for this project.


As the day progressed I had to assist two more chicks from their eggs - they had completely cracked their shells but they dried too quickly and sort of got "glued" to the shell. Luckily with a little warm water and a damp cloth I was able to get them out and hopefully they will be strong enough to leave the incubator tomorrow. We did have one little chick hatch on his own today - while we were in the computer lab of course! Figures that he'd wait until we left the room!  We have 4 more eggs that have yet to hatch, plus later this week our ducks should hatch as well! We have had lots of visitors because of our chicks - during recess today I walked into the room to find both the reading and math coaches on their hands and knees in front of the brooder, cooing to our chicks. Wish I had a picture of that! The math coach cracked me up - she referred to our stripey chicks as "the ones wearing chipmunk outfits". We will probably names those ones Alvin, Simon and Theodore now!


One of my students also brought in two bottles of grass with "caterpillars" in them. They don't look like any caterpillars I've ever seen before, so I'm going to use that term very loosely lol. We'll see if they go through a metamorphosis. Another student caught a lizard and brought it in as well:

My classroom is like a small zoo isn't it? Unfortunately my sub last week threw out the sugar water for our butterflies because some soap got into it (how in the world that happened I have no idea!) and then didn't bother to tell anyone or let the students ask for more sugar from the cafeteria. Thus, 3 of our butterflies were DOA this morning :( In order to make up for this, several of my girls caught butterflies at recess and brought them inside. Unfortunately, their capture and transport techniques need some work and I'm pretty sure all of those poor creatures will be DOA tomorrow too. Thus our new policy of "Look but do not catch!".



In other news, you know you are a teacher when:
Your son breaks his arm while on vacation and one of the first things you think of is: "I wonder if they'll let me get a copy of his x-rays to show my class?"

Yep, my youngest fell off some monkey bars while we were in California, necessitating a 4 hour trip to the ER.  He broke his radius and ulna but has been remarkably tough about it. They put him in a temporary splint until we got home and he will be going to get a cast put on tomorrow morning. Poor little guy had some major misconceptions about how doctors fix broken arms - for the record they do not need to cut off your arm, cut open your stomach or give you shots. The x-ray machine also does not shoot lasers, no matter what your big brother says.

He really likes his splint though - all of the kids at school were very interested in it and he just soaked up the attention!

Here's one random picture from my trip, I could not resist stopping for this photo op: