Grade 4 Pet Research

Lulu wants a brontosaurus for a pet ... but fourth graders were able to think of lots of reasons why that might not work out so well. So we set out to find information on more appropriate indoor pets.

First, we collected data on the kinds of pets that fourth graders have at home (Note: we had to carefully define that a pet had to be living in your house on purpose, and your parents had to let you touch it. Mice in the basement and a snake once glimpsed in the yard did not count). Then we practiced math skills by reading tables and bar charts displaying the information.

Here is one of the tables:

PETS	4G	4S	4W	4BR	4F	4FR
cat	9	8	11	9	7	12
lizard	2	1	1	2	3	2
rabbit	6	2	3	2	2	2
hermit crab	4	2	1	0	1	6
crayfish	8	1	1	1	6	1

Sample questions:

• Which class has the most students with pet crayfish?
• How many students in 4BR have pet rabbits?

Next, the students created lists of questions that a pet owner would need the answers to. The assignment was to come up with two questions per person in the group; most groups went well above and beyond this requirement. They also graded each other on effort!

Finally, we practiced using a table of contents to find the answers to the most common questions.

Dewey Decimal for pets: 636