North Hopkins ISD has begun a hands-on project involving feathered friends students at various grade level and including school organizations, as well as staff and community.

North Hopkins Elementary Principal Kodi Wright reported “11 feathery friends” arrived at their new residence on campus Tuesday morning, Sept. 6, 2022, with more to come. Eight names were submitted by Elementary, BETA, Student Council, and Gifted and Talented GT student groups. The NHISD community, staff and students voted, selecting Cluckingham Palace as the name of for the NH chicken coop.

“We are thankful for the donations from the Wharton, Trapp and Barton families, and are hoping to expand our flock to 24 laying hens and 2 roosters,” Wright said. “There are so many lessons to be learned from this outdoor project.”

The project has truly been a school project, involving students at all grade levels.

To get the project started, North Hopkins FFA and agriculture students worked very hard on the chicken coop project. Every single ag student in class contributed, either using a drill, a level, a saw, a tape measure, stained something, measured something, built something, wired something, hung something in the preceding weeks in the humid late August and September heat. And, ag advisors reported not one student complained one bit while working on this coop! The group takes pride it he motto “Learning to Do.”

NHS students also worked alongside the ag students to repurpose the school’s non-functioning greenhouse into the chicken coop for the elementary students to use as an outdoor learning experience. NH Elementary students will learn care, maintenance, observe behavior, and food recycling. Students will utilize and gain knowledge of marketing, history, biology, genetics, hygiene, math, business, food safety and life skills.

Elementary students have begun recycling fruits and veggies left from their breakfast and lunch into a “Cluck Buck,” a bucket designated to feed the chickens, teaching the youth to recycle food to livestock instead of disposing of it into the trash. Classes will be rotating, taking turns caring for the chickens by feeding, watering and checking for eggs.

The hens seemed to have settled into their new home well, as students began collecting eggs after their featheredpals had spent just one night there. GT students will be pricing and marketing the eggs to North Hopkins staff.

“We would love to have egg carton donations,” said Wright. “We want the community to be part of the process as our new outdoor education centers thrive and begin to enhance our student’s overall daily learning experiences.”