Recently, while pruning the plants in one of our home aquariums, a school of baby lemon tetras darted from their grassy hideout into the open to investigate the intruder.  To my astonishment, they swam around my fingertips before disappearing back into the thicket.  Apparently the adult lemon tetras my son and I had purchased some months prior found our tank an enticing place to spawn.   Their offspring escaped from being a morsel for the resident discus, as they would in nature, by dipping and darting among the vegetation. 

It’s discoveries like this that make a planted aquarium ideal for the classroom.

During back to school night this past fall, the night when students go to meet their teachers for the first time, my son made an exciting discovery.  In the back of his new 5^thgrade classroom sat a well-used, empty aquarium.  After studying its dimensions and rubbing his fingers across the limestone caked glass, I knew exactly what he was thinking before he asked.  “Maybe we could help his new teacher set up a tank like ours- a planted tank,” he whispered.

“Maybe,” I replied with some reluctance.