Our New Classroom Visitors...Snails!

Today we welcomed some new friends into our classroom...snails. Mrs. Ducharme collected these little creatures over the weekend at a cottage and thought it would be interesting to observe them in our classroom for just a couple of days.  We discussed how the snails are living beings and we need to treat them "gently".  We will be keeping the snails in our classroom just for a short time and then we will return them to the outdoors.

The children were so excited to observe the snails and many enjoyed letting the snails crawl on their arms.  Check out the photos below of our little scientists in action as they interacted with the snails.

We gathered some books from the library about snails.  We learned that the slimy, gooey stuff the snails leave behind as they move is called a "mucus trail".  We also learned that the snails have 2 short tentacles and 2 long tentacles that help them see and smell. 

Just like we did with our caterpillars, we created an "I Wonder" chart of the things we hope to discover as we investigate snails.