I am a kindergarten teacher at Fort Gay Elementary in Fort Gay, West Virginia. I am trying to bring an awareness of wildlife conservation to my students. I myself, am a great lover of animals but, I feel more can be done to get young children interested in wildlife. I am trying to inform students at an early age about animals in their natural habitats and the destruction of these natural habitats.

Upon introducing the topic of wolves, we did a basic diagram of thoughts related to wolves. Even at this young age my students had formulated generalizations about the wolf such as follows:

* Words about wolves - sneaky, hunter, pretty, tricky, fast, quiet, wild, dangerous, scary

* Wolf colors - gray, white, black, brown

* Wolf facts - killer, kill sheep, mean, bad, meat eaters, kill people, sleep on the ground, like caves, howl, have sharp teeth, sharp claws, pups drink milk from the mother, born alive from the mother, mammals, hunt deer

* Wolves live in - jungles, woods, desert, forest, snow

* Wolf stories - "Little Red Riding Hood", "The Three Little Pigs"

* Wolves look like - dogs, pretty, pointed ears

We then read two stories and did further discussion. My students began to change some of their opinion words from scary to smart, killer to hunter, sneaky to tricky. They also gave impressions that they admired these animals now more than they feared them.. We also discussed their characteristics that reminded them of the dog and then those things which separated them from dogs.

What I am trying to say is that if this much change can take place in one day, imagine what could be done over a longer period of time. And yes, these were five and six year old students.

I got your address from one of the books that I read to my students, "The Eyes of the Gray Wolf" by Jonathan London. I followed this book with "Wolf Watch" by Kay Winters. My students took great thought and interest in their discussion over these books. I would like to further challenge their thinking.


Donna Fortner
Kindergarten Teacher
Fort Gay Elementary
Fort Gay, West Virginia