CALGARY -- A group of industrious Grade 1 students from Northcott Prairie school in Airdrie have joined the global effort to help out animals who’ve been injured or are now homeless due to devastating wildfires in Australia.
Many groups have put out a call for crafters to make various items for the animals and in this case, joey pouches are in high demand.
A joey is a young kangaroo or other marsupial.
"As soon as we started talking about this, the kids did not want to stop," said Taylor Patten, the students' teacher. "They wanted to start making them immediately and help as many of these baby animals as they can."
The students spent the day tracing out the patterns, cutting and clipping them and then, with the help of Patten, sewing them together.
"It makes me feel happy because we’re going to save the animals," said first-grader Kiaan Mann.
The students also learned about how other animals have been injured.
"Some animals in the trees are really hot and sometimes the koalas' paws get burnt when they touch the trees," said Hailey Halyk. "They go to animal hospitals too and they get little gloves,"
Ms. Taylor’s class has sewn together 20 pouches and hope to send them to Australia through the Facebook group Canadian Animal Rescue Craft Guild.
Reports show that it’s estimated that more than a billion animals have died in the Australia wildfires, in addition to at least 26 people.
