Free Going Batty by Nancy Krulik Page B

answered her. “No substitute would have done all this to our classroom.”
    “That’s true,” Emma S. agreed. “This is definitely a Mr. G room.”
    Mandy Banks picked up one of the stuffed raccoons. “What do you think this all means?” she wondered.
    Katie looked up at the bats hanging from the ceiling. “Maybe it’s for a Halloween party,” she suggested. “I saw toy bats just like those in the Halloween section of the Party Palace store.”
    “But Halloween’s not for two weeks, Katie Kazoo,” George said, using the way-cool nickname he’d given her back in third grade.
    “It’s kind of creepy just standing here in the dark with no teacher,” Emma Weber said.
    “Maybe we should turn a light on,” Andy suggested.
    Bam! Just then the closet door swung open.
    “AAAAHHHHH!” The kids all screamed at once.
    Then they began to laugh. Their teacher had just burst out of the closet. He was wearing gray and pink mouse ears on his head and a long gray tail on his behind.
    “Mr. G!” Emma Weber shouted. “You scared me.”
    “Not me,” George said. He was laughing really hard. “Why are you dressed like that?”
    Kevin Camilleri walked over toward the light switch. But before he could flip it, Mr. G stopped him.
    “Don’t turn on the lights,” Mr. G told Kevin. “Mice like me are happiest in the dark. So are opossums, skunks, bats, and raccoons. Too much light hurts our eyes.”
    “I think I know what this is all about,” Katie said suddenly. “We’re studying animals that come out in the dark.”

    “Very good, Katie,” Mr. G told her. “They’re called nocturnal animals.”
    Katie knew all about nocturnal animals because she had once been a nocturnal animal. One time at summer camp, the magic wind had turned her into a raccoon.
    But of course Katie couldn’t tell Mr. G that. So she said, “I already know raccoons are happiest in the dark.”
    “They sure are,” Mr. G said. “All nocturnal animals are more active in the nighttime than in the daytime.”
    “Can we get started decorating our beanbags?” Emma W. asked Mr. G excitedly.
    “Yep,” Mr. G agreed. “Go to it!”
    Decorating her beanbag chair was one of the things Katie loved best about being in Mr. G’s class. The kids in 4A didn’t sit at desks like other kids. They sat on beanbags. Mr. G thought kids learned better when they were comfortable.
    Every time the class started a new learning adventure, they got to decorate their beanbag chairs with the craft supplies Mr. G kept in bags and boxes in the back of the classroom. Katie was using construction paper and streamers to turn her beanbag into a big raccoon.
    Emma W. dotted her beanbag with pieces of shiny wrapping paper. “They’re fireflies,” she explained to Katie. “They only come out at night.”
    George used black-and-white construction paper to turn his beanbag into a giant skunk. Then he took off his sneakers and began rubbing them all over his beanbag chair.
    “Dude, what are you doing?” Mr. G asked George.
    “Making my beanbag smell,” George answered. “My sneakers stink as bad as any real skunk.”
    “That’s the truth,” Kevin agreed.
    Mr. G laughed. “How about we just pretend your beanbag skunk smells?” he suggested. “Put your sneakers back on. You’re going to need them in a few minutes. We’re going outside to play a special game.”
    Katie grinned. They were going to get to go outside and run around, and it wasn’t even gym class!
    One thing was for sure. Class 4A was the best place to be . . . day or night!

Chapter 4
    “We’re so lucky,” Katie said to Emma W. as the girls walked outside with the rest of the kids in class 4A. “Everyone else at school is inside doing work, and we’re out here.”
    “I know,” Emma W. agreed. “I wonder what kind of game we’re going to play.”
    The girls didn’t have to wait long to find out. A minute later, Mr. G stood in front of the class. He was holding a blindfold.
    “Today