They love the “herps” and they’d like to teach others to love them, understand them and not to unreasonably fear them.
So a group of Sweet Home Junior High School students will take their amphibians and reptiles to elementary students at Hawthorne in May for a hands-on educational presentation.
The seventh- and eighth-graders are part of the “Hip on Herps” after-school club at SHJH. They met last Wednesday to talk about how to give their presentation and how to help the younger children handle different reptiles and amphibians.
“What we’re doing is we’re preparing students to present and also learning about herps,” said Liz Johnson, seventh-grade science teacher and club adviser.
After her own presentation to the junior high students, they moved around the room handling and talking about a variety of snakes, lizards, frogs and turtles, most of them belonging to Johnson.
“It’s just fun for me,” said Sean Steinborn, a seventh-grader who was busy with a dwarf-sized Mexican black king snake.
“He was grown from a smaller-marble-sized egg,” he said. “I’m going to get one.”
Seventh-grader Thomas Goble was busy with a “dumpy frog,” a palm-sized frog that occurs in several varieties across South America. “I’ve been a reptile fan since I was little,” he said. “They’re just awesome.”
It wasn’t all reptiles and amphibians though. Michelle Carper, an eighth-grader, nervously held a tarantula on the back of her hand.
“We work with arachnids too,” she said, adding that she is looking forward to teaching the younger children about the animals.
“It’s a really cool experience to get this close to snakes and stuff,” she said.
Shawn Jefferson, an eighth-grader, has three ball pythons, a mother and two babies, which he brought to the club meeting.
“It’s just kind of fun getting them to where they won’t bite you,” he said. He enjoys taming and raising reptiles.
The animals sometimes bite, he said, but every time he’s had that happen, it’s been his fault.
The animals are harmless, he said.
“But older people are just kind of afraid of snakes. They think they’re slimy or afraid of them.”
Shawn said he hopes to get elementary students used to the animals while they’re young, before they begin fearing them. He said he wants to eliminate ignorance about the animals.
The club provides several benefits to the junior high students, Johnson said.
“Number one, for these kids, it gives them some confidence,” she said. “It helps them apply science to something they’re really interested in. They can apply what they learn in school.”
It also helps youngsters learn not to fear animals they don’t know much about, such as snakes and tarantulas, she said. By creating their own presentations, the students also get to mentor younger students.
The club has a variety of students €“ male and female, seventh- and eighth-graders and A-students to struggling students.
They will give their presentation at Hawthorne on May 28 to children in all grades.
Club members talked about each of the reptiles and amphibians that will go with them and what grade levels should be allowed to handle which animal.