The SPIDER!

So, yesterday morning as my students were doing their morning work, I was taking our moving our book-cart out into the hallway and saw a sweet little spider on the floor....and what I mean by sweet little...is A BIG BLACK SPIDER!!!!  Luckily, I was the only one who saw it so I quickly grabbed the can that was sitting on my reading table and put it over the spider. I told my kiddos that there was a can on the floor and to please just leave it there (because bless their little hearts...they are forever picking up things that are on the floor and putting them away or in the lost and found box). Then of course, I got "Why is there a can there? What is it for? Why can't we move it?" So I finally told them that there was a really big spider under the can and that I needed to find a jar to put the spider in. Well that got them all wound up and they quickly got up and wanted to see it! Such curious little kiddos...I love it! I made a promise to them that if they would please stay in their seats until I found a jar, then I would let them watch me put it in the jar. They QUICKLY sat down and waited :)

 I found the jar and collected the spider in it. I then put it on a stool in the middle of the carpet and let the kiddos check him out. They were all very excited and got their vocabulary rolling! An extension to this spontaneous little lesson would have been to have the kiddos write about it in their journals. We never did get the chance to do that, but next time it is a must!


Here is our little fella...

Needless to say our spider...whom we cleverly named "The BEAST" became the main attraction at school yesterday!

And FYI, this is the second spider of this size and that I have found in my classroom in less than a week and my friend found one that was a little smaller, in her school bag!!! Could you imagine!?!?!