"Officer Buckle & Gloria"

Authors:  Peggy Rathmann

Summary: A police officer named Officer Buckle is assigned to take a police dog named Gloria to his safety speech at the local school. Until that time, whenever Officer Buckle tried to tell schools about safety, everyone fell asleep! Then, unbeknownst to Officer Buckle (literally, behind his back), Gloria does tricks imitating the safety tip demonstrating safety rules, and Gloria is a big success!

Theme: Safety first!

Initiation Questions and Activity:

Questions: What is safety? What do police officers do? What do you think this story is about?

Activity: Have a police officer off duty come in and explain to the class about what his duty is, and talk about how they have their own K-9 unit!

Culminating and Extending Questions and Activity:

Questions: What was your favorite part of the story? Why do you think safety is important? What other ways you can be safe?
Activity: Illustrate a scene from the story by using Gloria and teaching your own safety lesson!