November 23 was designated Tomi Turkey Day at Meadowlark Elementary School. Tomi and her emotional support hen, a Lavender Orpington named Tootsie, were in the school gymnasium on Tuesday helping Librarian Kelsey Harry read 'Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving by Dav Pilkey. The story time event not only intended to celebrate the approaching holiday but to honor National Picture Book Month.

The book read on Tuesday in twenty-minute time slots to each elementary group is an imitation of the famous winter holiday poem by Clement Moore, "'Twas the Night Before Christmas." In his version, Pilkey writes about a group of eight children who ride a school bus through the new-fallen leaves on a field trip to a farm in the country. Instead of Santa Claus and his reindeer, the jolly round fellow is Farmer Mack Nuggett with his "eight tiny turkey."

Harry read the book using Novel Effect, an app that employs voice recognition to track one's reading and insert sound effects and relevant audio in response to certain cue words. Instead of speech-to-text, this app matches speech-to-sound effects. As Harry was reading aloud, the app enhanced the story with the sound of leaves rustling, turkeys gobbling, and people laughing. Such features add life to the story experience and engage the audience.

Although Pilkey's characters give "downy embraces" to the turkeys in the story read by Harry, Mrs. Emily Scofield, who owns Tomi, had asked the students not to pick up the turkey and to treat her kindly as they each took their turn petting Tomi and Tootsie, who-at seven months old-has full and fluffy silvery-blue plumage.

Several students also described Tomi as colorful. Her predominantly dark plumage featured striping as well as iridescent bronze, green, and bluish feathers. Tomi's head also changed color to correspond with her emotions. Scofield identified the fleshy appendage that extends over the turkey's beak as the snood and the part hanging from Tomi's neck or chin as the wattle. "You can tell a turkey's emotions by the color of their heads. Colors can change from red to blue to white, depending on how excited or calm they are. The more intense the colors are, the more intense their emotions."

This color change was evident whenever a new student group would enter the gymnasium. The excitement and noise would cause Tomi's snood and wattles to become engorged with blood and turn bright red. During this time, she would also emit a throaty warble-or gobble-although technically, only the male birds make that iconic call. As Tomi settled and grew accustomed to the children, her wattle would return to a fleshy pink and her call would become more of a rolling, almost staccato sound.

Scofield, who teaches fourth graders at Meadowlark Elementary School, collaborated with Harry and decided it would be fun for all the students to listen to a read-aloud about a turkey, with a live turkey present to enhance the story. "This is Tomi's first 'public appearance,' so like any mother, I am hoping she behaves well," Scofield chuckled.

Scofield went on to explain that she bought Tootsie and Tomi together as chicks in April. "I had always wanted to raise a turkey for Thanksgiving. At the farm where I got Tom, Tootsie was the cutest little blue fluff ball! There was no other option; I had to have them both." In the poultry world, Lavender Orpingtons are prized not only for their unique coloring but for their mild natures and willingness to be handled.

The two chicks of different species joined a small hobby flock of chickens on Scofield's farm-these are hens with "big personalities," according to Scofield. Tom went around the first five months being affectionately known as "Thanksgiving Dinner." As time progressed, Tom began to show an enormous personality, more or less confirming in Scofield's mind that he was a male. Then, one day, she noticed a rather large egg in the nesting box and realized that Tom was a Tomi.

Because they have been together since they were weeks old, Tootsie and Tomi have bonded. However, it is not uncommon to find Tomi hanging out with humans. In the summer, she would often join Scofield on the back porch for coffee. Eventually, she started to walk down the driveway with Scofield to check the mail. "The next thing I knew, she was trying to jump in my car to go with me on errands, but I did put my foot down on that plan and kicked her out of the car!"

During Tuesday's assembly, the students at Meadowlark Elementary asked various questions about the turkey. Many of them were eager to know whether Scofield would be butchering the turkey for her Thanksgiving dinner. At the end of the morning's assembly-in fact, just prior to lunchtime-Scofield officially announced that Tomi would escape the hatchet.

"Since she has 'gobbled' her way into my heart, she has been pardoned from Thanksgiving dinner. It's a good thing I brought an extra turkey from the Hutterites just in case! My fourth grade students often get to enjoy a laugh when I share home videos of Tomi. She has quite a personality, and I kinda like her!"

After Tomi and Tootsie's successful assembly experience, Scofield imagined a "Reading to Critters" program-something she hopes to organize in the future. This program will allow a variety of animals to go into the school(s) and inspire students to write short stories and poetry. They will also be able to read out loud to the animals. Scofield has goats, turkeys, rabbits, chickens, and a Great Pyrenees (a powerful working dog bred to deter sheep-stealing wolves and other predators) that she could use in such an endeavor.

Research suggests that reading aloud to animals can boost children's literacy skills. Struggling and reluctant readers often lack confidence when reading, especially while reading aloud. When a child reads to an animal, there is no judgment. A child can stumble through a word, read at a choppy rate, or take an extended amount of time to complete a passage. The animal remains a consistent listening companion. Over time and with repetition, a child will begin to feel more comfortable reading aloud, thus building reading confidence.

Furthermore, reading fluency, rate, and phrasing improve with practice. Animals don't mind if a child reads Go, Dog, Go! by P.D. Eastman over and over. This safe listening environment provides opportunities for readers to log lots of practice time.

Mrs. Emily Scofield is thinking about tasty turkey recipes, but she decided those wouldn't be recipes with Tomi as the meat.

"Imagine the possibilities," Scofield said.