COW HEARTS AND SHEEP TAILS

We’re reading LOVE THAT DOG as part of our poetry unit. It went well—even the reading of complicated poems later on. Today we’re going to add a technology section to the poetry—if I can get into the computer lab. (It stays locked.)

In the afternoon we studied the heart of a cow and the tail of a sheep. A very smelly unit. I purchased both the cow heart and the sheep tail at my neighborhood grocery store for a grand total of $2.14. Together we opened up the heart and the tail and made a study of what we saw.

After the oohs and ahhs and the screams from the squeamish boys and one squeamish girl, everything went really well.

After a period of after school fights, isn’t it a pleasure to have a perfect day where everything goes exactly the way it was planned?

Do people actually eat this stuff? (Yes.) Is our heart really this dark? You’re right, (gosh, a teacher being right!) there is a lot of blood on this thing. (It is a heart.) Check out the fat on this thing. Is this cholesterol?

What stinks? This tail is really gross. (This from three boys.) Why does it feel so slimy?
Where is the wool? Why is it so thick? Check out this bone. It this cartilage?

Seventy degrees outside in Chicago in March—a sunshiny day—and we enjoyed ourselves.