Students Learn About Animal Growth Thanks To Grant

Students in Yukon are working with chickens to learn about animal growth and behavior with the help of several ready to hatch, fertilized eggs.

As part of the Circle of Life program, students patiently waited for eggs to hatch over the last three weeks. The very first chick was born on Monday.

A grant was awarded by the Cox Foundation and the Oklahoma City Community Foundation in the amount of $250.

Special Education teacher Kim Garner says she's been applying for teaching grants for the past eleven years. She used the recent money to buy all the equipment necessary to make the incubation process a success.

Garner says the goal is to spice up her lessons and not rely as heavily on textbooks.

“There’s only so much you can get out of a  book. To actually have something you can touch and feel and smell because they do smell and hear and interact with which is much more concrete and they’re going to remember the chicks hatching, they’re not going to remember everything they’ve read in a book,” she said. 

Garner said she has noticed a positive change in her classroom and more attentive students since bringing in the chickens.

Students like Haley Rago agree, “It makes me feel positive and relaxing hearing the chickens like chirping. Because I like listening to relaxing music and listening to a bird chirp is really relaxing.”

Garner also has a class Guinea Pig that she used past grant money to pay for.