Teaching Tales

Columbus

Who would have thought that snails could make such an impact.

Columbus

         "Ooh, yucky!" Their voices squealed that first day, but that didn't stop them from rushing towards my box of dirt.

         I dumped the damp, black earth into our empty aquarium and tossed in some leaves and carrot shavings I'd gathered and bagged in a separate sack. A single Lincoln rose -- dark, almost burgundy-red joined the pile.

         "Ooh," said Carolyn tossing her head to twirl her shiny, black curls. "That's too pretty to throw in there." She said it in her daintiest, girlish voice. Eric was standing next to her and already at eleven, Carolyn was practicing the art of flirtation.

         I took a second look at the sagging, wilted rose. I saw its beauty, but it was spent. I'd already enjoyed it on the bush. When I'd clipped it before school, I'd focused more on a new bud shyly revealing tips of velvet red.

         I turned away, and went back to the table where another bag sat. Next came the moment the students were waiting for. Inside the black, shiny wrinkles of a plastic garbage sack was a glass jar with about twenty snails.

         As I unscrewed the deli-sized pickle jar, Carlos began to gag, complaining about the terrible odor. I took a whiff. I'd earlier filled the jar with dark, wet earth, a couple of medium-sized rocks to let the snails crawl up out of the wet, and some fresh grass clippings. The grass hadn't had time to start decomposing yet, and the mud was fresh from my garden. I guess the smell kind of reminded me of summer evenings with a newly mowed lawn and the sprinkler on. The snails had no odor.

         I offered to let the students pry the snails off their roosts, but there was a definite lack of volunteers. John had raised his hand at first, but he quickly denied it. No one wanted to touch a snail!

         I reached my hand into the jar and pulled out a big daddy of a snail. He was so tightly fastened to the rock that you could hear the release of suction, like a kissing sound, when I pried him up. As I brought the snail out of the jar, thirty breaths inhaled. Every eye was focused.

         For a second I had a boyish urge to run around sticking the snail into all the faces surrounding me, just to see the children squirm and squeal, but I restrained my impulse and placed the snail down on a large piece of construction paper. I paused to notice that its thick, brittle shell was rather an attractive pattern of browns and tan. This particular snail was really rather a handsome specimen.

         I surveyed the small, enraptured faces of the children surrounding me. They were eagerly awaiting the snail's first steps.

         "Crawl!" urged Phillipe.

         "Yeah, make a get-away," said Carlos.

         The snail didn't seem to hear. It certainly didn't move in any direction. The kids, patient for about twenty seconds, began to get restless. I had to caution them to be still. I knew that the smallest movement would keep our snail frozen for minutes more.

         Unbelievably, the kids were remarkably without motion - not a finger poked, not a hand pushed or shoved. What an incredibly long moment of silence!

         Slowly twin antennae oozed out.Cautiously a speckled slug-like head pushed outwards. The neck extended becoming thinner. The eyes at the end of the thin antennae began to survey the new and strange environment.

         "Wow!" The word issued in surround sound.

         "Give it a leaf," said Roberta."It looks hungry." In her enthusiasm, she accidentally brushed the table. The snail's body compacted instantly.

         "Roberta," yelled Sam. His glare could have killed, but Roberta was too red-faced to see. She moved back, pushing Sarah in front. Sarah beamed happily at her good fortune.

         After a moment the snail once more bravely dared to peek. Sensing only silence, its long neck slowly flowed out. As the students watched, a tail poked out the other end, and with only the briefest hesitation, the snail began to push forward. Anchoring itself at the front, its huge foot crawled onward, sliming the yellow construction paper with a trail of pus-like secretion. The mottled brown shell rolled farther, and the body began to ooze onward.

         "It's really kind of cute," said Carolyn looking at Eric next to her. I swear she batted her eyes.

         "Yuck," said several others making sour faces, but others nodded, agreeing with Carolyn.

         Meanwhile the snail continued to slide smoothly across the paper. We watched its huge foot muscle pull itself onward in a rippling, fluid-like movement. Its glide was so smooth that only the shell focused our awareness of its forward propulsion.

         "Hey, look it doesn't leave footprints; it leaves slimeprints! Get it?" yelled Carlos.

         "Yeah, we get it," said someone at the back, "but we can't see it."

         I had the students rotate so they'd all get a chance to see. Sarah didn't budge until Roberta pulled her backwards. Sarah sighed loudly, but went peacefully.

         Meanwhile, the snail was getting used to the occasional earthquake from the table being budged. It hardly withdrew at all. It seemed determined to find the edge of its paper. I mentioned that to the students.

         "Maybe we should call the snail Columbus," Anthony suggested.

         "That's dumb. It's not Columbus Day, is it?" Philippe tried to get a good look at the calendar without giving up his prime spot.

         Anthony started to get red, but I urged him to explain. He hung his head but you could still hear his words. "Cause both Columbus and the snail journeyed to the edge of the world."

         For a moment nobody said anything. "Hey, that's cool," said Enrico. It was a done deal then. Enrico's approval was like a class vote.

         The students didn't like it when I put Columbus and his friends in their new home, but science time was over, and fractions were on the schedule.

         The snails settled into their new home quietly. We had to feed them with leaves and stems and leftovers from lunch, and we kept their mud moist. The snails weren't what you'd call real active pets, but we did see the eggs they laid in small depressions in the mud, and we "hatched" lots of babies. But when Columbus was found one day all dried up, the class basically lost interest.

         It wasn't until I took the whole thing home and brought back fish that the class' interest in pets resumed.

         I was beginning to think that raising snails didn't really have a lot of value as a science lesson.

         But then, last Friday I heard something that makes me think I'll probably keep on bringing them in. I was cleaning up the blackboard, and Phillipe was showing off to his little cousin.

         "Fifth grade's really cool," Phillipe told the boy. "We learn lots o' stuff. And once," Phillipe said, his eyes growing as big as two chicken pot pies, "Once we even got to study snails..."

         "Whoa!" said his cousin, suitably impressed.

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