In Grade 3, Shelley Leach tossed our teacher’s sweater into the guinea pig cage. Among school staff, the incident stirred up more speculation about whodunit than who shot J.R. Ewing, but it was a short-lived cliffhanger as Shelley soon confessed and Mrs. Russo was forced to rethink her pet policy.

Beyond teaching lessons about life and responsibility, classroom pets can enhance the curriculum, encourage empathy and help children adjust to school, proponents say.

Caring for a classroom pet is a rite of passage that’s going strong in Calgary, where many schools use animals to enhance the education experience. The Calgary Board of Education’s documentation about animals in schools states, “The use of live animals in schools is recognized as a highly motivational avenue for a variety of significant learning experiences.”

Teachers can bring in animals if no students or staff are allergic to them, and provided there is a connection with the curriculum.

Greg Neil teaches Grade 5 at the Calgary Science School, where he shares a room with a bearded dragon named Draco. The reptile is a hit among students, who take turns caring for him and feeding him.

“Reptiles are great because they are easy to care for and there are very few allergy or health concerns associated with them,” he says. What’s more, most children have limited exposure to reptiles. “It’s a chance to learn about a different species.”

The only negative Neil relates is that Draco, like his namesake from the Harry Potter series, can be a class distraction (though his novelty wears off as the year progresses).

At Jump Start Preschool in Millrise, three-and four-year-olds enjoy seeing fish and guinea pigs daily, and have the opportunity to watch chicks hatch and caterpillars turn into butterflies at other times of the year.

Preschool owner Marla McKay says there are many benefits to having animals in a classroom. They help first-time students feel comfortable. Kids learn about responsibility and pet nourishment by feeding Baxter and Scotty, the two guinea pigs. They also learn empathy by caring for another living creature whose life depends on their kindness.

The aquarium, next to the room’s reading corner, has a soothing, therapeutic effect on the preschoolers, says McKay. “I think animals in general are a very mesmerizing thing to children.”

Parents love Jump Start’s pet program.

“I think it’s a great learning experience,” says Michelle Prather, whose twin three-year-old girls, Kya and Suraya, attend the preschool.

“They come home talking about them; that they held the guinea pigs,” says Prather, adding that she and her husband both have animal allergies, so they can’t have pets in their home.

McKay admits the guinea pigs can be distracting, with her students clamouring to hold them. This is just one downside that irritates parenting educator Gail Bell. She says animals can be yet another diversion keeping children from learning their ABCs. She’d prefer teachers “plan more for that really exciting math lesson” than spend their valuable time mucking out the hamster cage.

“What, truly, is the purpose of a pet in the classroom?” asks Bell, cofounder of Calgary-based Parenting Power.

As a former teacher and school principal, Bell wonders if maintaining a classroom pet is one more unnecessary item on teachers’ long to-do lists, which now include subjects, such as teaching values, that used to be tackled in the home.

“Isn’t that, yet again, a family thing? Many people get a huge benefit from having animals — but I think that’s a family decision,” she says.

Bell also worries about allergies among students. She recounts a story about a client whose son was exposed to a guinea pig even though his teacher knew he was allergic.

The Calgary Humane Society’s school-based Humane Education program offers a compromise. A society representative brings in animals and talks about issues from cruelty prevention to responsible ownership.

Patricia Cameron, executive director of the humane society, believes pets can “reach into a child’s heart and inspire empathy,” but she understands that not every family can have a pet and not every teacher wants that responsibility.

“Animals significantly improve community health.”