A Teach-In Mane Event

Teresa Hornaday and her daughter Anastasia show off their pony, Noel for the Great American Teach-In

If you happened to see a fire engine parked outside a school Wednesday most likely the crew was not on an emergency call. It was the Great American Teach-In where professionals, craftsmen and business people tell kids about their jobs. At Belcher Elementary in Clearwater, there was a fire engine and a horse of a different color.

Noel likes to be talked to and pet on the forehead. She’s an American Shetland pony.

“She has one blue eye and one brown eye,” Teresa Hornaday pointed out. She said different eye colors are common among “paint horses.”

Hornaday’s daughter, Anastasia, attends Belcher Elementary in Clearwater. So, she hooked up the trailer and brought Noel over for the students. They came up two at a time to pet Noel.

“We just take her around to meet children and do a lot of therapy work,” Hornaday said when children are sick or depressed petting a horse can make them happy and help them heal more quickly.

After everyone in the class had a chance stroke Noel’s forehead, the pony performed a trick. She took a bow, straightening out her front right leg, bending the left and touching her nose to the grass. That earned Noel possibly the loudest round of applause at Belcher Elementary School’s Great American Teach-In.