School's Out!

The students are gone, but we had a lot of fun before they left!  We had a picnic in the park one day, a field day, and then two awesome "animal" days!  We had a visit from the "Reptile Experience" of St. Louis, and I can't brag about this guy enough.  Totally hands on, totally incredible.   He had all sorts of reptiles, scorpions, lizards, snakes, a four foot alligator, and best of all....an eight foot green anaconda that is "domesticated!"  I could not pass up the opportunity to hold this incredible creature!  When she reaches adulthood she will be up to 20 feet long, 200 lbs, as big around as a basketball and could crush me pretty easily. For now, she's 30 lbs and gets handled everyday, and is such a rarity in the reptile world that she is insured by Lloyd's of London.  I'd love to brag and say that I was the only one in the audience that got to hold her, but there were a lot of brave students who also took the opportunity. Admittedly, I tried to hide when he brought out the hissing cockroaches, but snakes are not a problem for me.

And then, by some cruel twist of fate, Dr. Sands' lab was scheduled for the day following the anaconda (I'd like to say I had nothing to do with that, but it was TOTALLY my fault!). What a show to try and top! He brought Jacquie and Marie, who shared their path to their science careers, as well  as details on their work responsibilities and some of the mice that they work with (including glow in the dark ones!).  Below is an example of a "rotarod" test, one of the behavioral tests that are given to the mice. 

Jacquie talking while Mark appears to be studying the ceiling tiles....

 I had to laugh at the pictures of the two groups of students....the first one is the seventh and eighth graders, who appear bored and not very interested.  The second one is the sixth and fifth graders, who have kept me hopping with questions all year long!  Check out the expressions between the two groups...

(jaded seventh and eighth graders...)

(enthusiastic fifth and sixth graders...)

Hopefully it was just the timing of my photography!

 Here are two of the "nonglowing" mice that they brought.  The one on the left is a normal, healthy mouse, scurrying to get away.  The one of the right is a "twitcher" mouse, called that because of the frequent tremors that they exhibit.   This mouse is a model for Krabbe disease in humans, one of the LSDs that Mark studies. 

Most of the students really enjoyed the talks and had questions and were involved.  If I do this again, I'm make sure they are not competing with big, scaly creatures!