Did you say Mow Wow?
Yes! Mow Wow Animals Is a New Animal in Humane Education.
Mow Wow Animals is an online teaching program, designed to activate students’ imagination as they learn about animals and the world around them. The bilingual, K–5 lessons are infused with stories from world cultures, poetry, short videos, and hands-on enrichment activities. Three distinct units for each grade level cover topics such as Animals in the Natural World, Who Lives in the Backyard?, Pets and Working Animals, and The Importance of Wild Places.
Why Mow Wow?
Mow Wow Animals recognizes the natural affinity that children have for animals. Our lessons strengthen this bond—by encouraging respect, kindness and compassion, not only for our animal friends and but also for all living beings. Learning how to respond with empathy gives our youth an ethical framework to create a more caring society. California Code of Education, Character Education.
Let’s Get Started! Using Mow Wow in the Classroom
- Aligns with curriculum K–5 content standards in language arts, science, and social studies. CA Standards Alignment
- Mow Wow lessons can be used as an independent teaching tool or to enrich existing curriculum.
- The lessons can be taught in a single class period, over several days, or in 5- to 10-minute increments.
- Enrichment activities engage students in hands-on learning in visual art, digital research, peer learning, and community interaction.
- The Mow Wow curriculum is self-contained with all resources included.
It’s a Dog’s Day: Film (Pre-K–2)
This Telly Award-winning, 10-minute film tells the story of a caring community that comes to the rescue of a sad and lonely dog. The film uses puppet artistry, circus art, and dogs trained in theater performance to help children understand the concepts of empathy and compassion. The film is also accessible for the hearing- and vision-impaired.
Education Code of the
California Department of Education
Americans have long recognized the need for kindness toward animals. In acknowledgment of this need, the California Department of Education has included in its Education Code a requirement that students be taught to view animals with compassion and to grant them the same dignity they would human beings. Section 233.5(a) of the code reads in part:
Each teacher shall endeavor to impress upon the minds of the pupils the principles of morality, truth, justice, patriotism, and a true comprehension of the rights, duties, and dignity of American citizenship, and the meaning of equality and human dignity, including the promotion of harmonious relations, kindness toward domestic pets and the humane treatment of living creatures.
This farsighted code regards the humane treatment of animals as one aspect of the broader ethic of good citizenship—the responsibility of each of us toward others who live in our society, including the animals with whom we share our environment. The code also understands that when we fail to treat animals kindly and responsibly, we undermine not only their rights as living creatures but our own dignity as human beings.