NHSPCA’s Reading with the Animals, Storytime and Pen Pal Animal programs now available!

The NHSPCA Humane Education department has always worked hard to provide interesting, educational, and fun opportunities for youth to interact with animals and learn about respect, compassion, and kindness for all living things.

While a new “normal” continues to evolve, their Humane Education team has been striving to develop opportunities in a variety of interactive ways. Check out their new educational programming that will be available for a variety of students’ educational, financial, and social needs while practicing responsible Covid-19 restrictions!

Reading with the Animals
$15 per session; online

We can’t invite anyone into the shelter to read to the animals right now but that doesn’t mean everyone has to miss out on this wonderful opportunity! Children in grades K-8 who can read at any level are invited to set up a Zoom meeting with an animal of your choice for a 30 minute read-aloud. The child chooses the animal and the book and we’ll get it all set up! This program helps children improve their reading skills while also helping the animals by providing socialization and human interaction. Many children struggle with reading at school and often feel reluctant to practice at home with a parent. An animal is a completely non-judgmental listener.

Animal Pen Pals
$30

Or should we say PetPals!? Do you need some practice writing friendly letters? Are you missing all the news at the NHSPCA? More likely, are you missing all the animals? You choose an animal in our Humane Ed classroom to correspond with and we’ll send you a letter telling all about that animal. When you write back to that animal, we will read your letter and then write back to you! Letters may be exchanged through either email or postal service. When you sign up and choose your animal petpal, you will also receive a trading card featuring that animal friend.

Storytime with the Animals
Every Thursday; 10:30am
Free! Donations appreciated.

We can’t invite you and your children into our classroom to hear us read stories right now but you can still enjoy listening online! Every Thursday morning at 10:30am, we host an animal story time video on the NHSPCA Facebook page read by one of our humane educators. The stories are geared towards children 3 to 6 years old- although any age animal lover will enjoy them. There will also be a coloring page and/or activity for you to print out that complements the story. Watching and listening is free– although donations to help support this program is greatly appreciated!