Constructivism in the Classroom

After reading about the constructivist learning theory, I have learned all sorts of ways to engage students and motivate learning.  Well, this week an opportunity to do just that sort of fell into my lap.  We have 3 horses and our pony is pregnant.  All the kids in my classroom know this and so everyday they ask me “Has Buttercup had her baby yet?”  Well yesterday I got a call that she had delivered her baby.  I let the kids know and promised to take pics and video to show them.  We discovered later that it was actually another pony’s baby that she abandoned and our horse stepped in to try and take care of the foal.  So today I had to explain what happened to the kids.  I used a few minutes of our morning meeting time to do this and assumed it would be a few minute discussion and then we would move on to our math lesson.  Well, was I ever wrong!  They were so extremely interested in the story that we spent our entire math time – 45 min – having such a great discussion and looking up info on google!  They wanted to know all about horses and their foals and how this could happen and what to do about it.  They had such great questions as well as ideas about how to find out more about it.  They also had some creative suggestions about how to help the foal!  While it was hard to “throw aside” the math lesson, it was so much fun to see their wonder, excitement and thought processes.  I realize that this is not a feasible idea all the time but it was sure nice to do.  There were no behaviors or tattling the entire time either!  This is something I will definitely need to incorporate more often – taking their interests and running with them!