If you are a follower of my blog, you know how much I love using Night Zookeeper with my students. You can read more about how we got started on it here. Knowing how much I love the program, imagine how excited we were when we found out they were coming to the states to visit…
It all started last spring with this tweet. From the start of my students using Night Zookeeper I have always thought a visit would be amazing. I see on Twitter a lot of the visits they make and it looks like such a memorable experience for students. With Chicago being quite a way from the UK, I figured a visit would never been in the cards. I was wrong though…
When the start of the school year rolled, around I was anxious to get my new class on the program. I knew they would love it as much as my previous class when they begged to watch the promotion video over and over again after I introduced it to them. From there, my students fell in love and couldn’t get enough of the site. This made my teacher heart happy knowing that they were engaged on something meaningful that was furthering their writing skills.
As the start of the school year went on and we got closer and closer to the date of the visit we still couldn’t believe they were “actually” coming. My students thought it was so awesome and we began preparations. We made a bulletin board of magical creatures and wrote welcome letters to them. Night Zookeeper Paul and Buzz were the talk of our classroom!
The day finally arrived and started out with a quick visit to my classroom. Paul and Buzz instantly jumped in at my students levels and start talking to them about their zoos. Although I knew they would be amazing with kids, it was great to see in person. They were not just two people that ran an educational website. It was evident that they had a passion for helping children succeed while building their confidence in their creativity and writing abilities. I instantly knew the day would be a success.
We then met in our ICE lab with kindergarten, second and third grade. Paul and Buzz talked with the students about the zoo and the animals that are in it. The kids found it engaging, funny and inspiring. They were wide eyed watching the two and could have been entertained by them all day. My students were disappointed when we had to return to our room without the Zookeepers. A promise of an afternoon visit made them happy though.
The second grade teacher picked my students up from lunch while I was with Paul and Buzz. When we walked in they had the lights off because they felt like it reminded them of the Night Zoo. We kept the lights off and Paul read to us a chapter from their book while Buzz drew the Spying Giraffe for us.
From there we worked on our zoos with Buzz and practice drawing magical creatures. Buzz played a game with us where we had to think of four words for him to draw a magical creature from. The kids loved that! We also played a little animal aerobics. It was the perfect way to get them up and moving.
As I was taking my kids to the bus at the end of the day they all said that they wished they could come back the next day. I couldn’t agree more. A great part of the visit was the fact that we can still stay in touch. We love getting on our zoos daily and think often of what Paul and Buzz would think. We made the video below to send to the Zookeepers thanking them for visiting us. I think it is evident just how much the visit meant. Thank you SO much Paul and Buzz!
