TeachKind Rescue Stories: Christmas the Puppy’s First Holiday

Stories of humans helping other animals are all over the internet, and sharing them with your students is an excellent way to encourage kindness both in and out of the classroom. Because most children naturally feel compassion for animals, sharing rescue stories is a great way to engage and motivate different types of learners and encourage them to take action to help end animal abuse.

Each TeachKind Rescue Stories reading comprehension worksheet tells a different animal’s tale of transformation and features key vocabulary words and questions in order to encourage literal, inferential, and evaluative thinking. These worksheets were used in a study that found that students who read passages about having compassion for animals performed significantly better on Common Core–aligned assessments, demonstrating that instructional time need not be sacrificed in order to instill empathy in young people!

This rescue story is about Christmas, a dog who was found as a puppy by PETA Asia staffers on a remote island in the Philippines. He was lucky to receive treatment for a lice infestation and two wounds on his back—and now he’s living his best life in a loving home where he doesn’t have to struggle to survive. Use Christmas’ story to teach your students the importance of adopting—not buying—animal companions and having them spayed or neutered.

Use other TeachKind resources to create an entire lesson around this story. You can use this worksheet to address the following Common Core English language arts standards.

Grade 3

• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.3.1
  Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers.

Grade 4

• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.4.1
  Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text.

Grade 5

• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.5.1
  Quote accurately from a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text.

Be sure to watch Christmas’ heartwarming video to bring his story to life:

Download This Rescue Story!

Use this engaging rescue-story worksheet to bring real-world compassion into your ELA lessons. Christmas the puppy’s story follows his journey from a struggling island stray to a healthy, loved companion and provides age-appropriate vocabulary, literal and inferential questions, and evaluative prompts designed for grades 3–5. The passage supports Common Core reading standards while encouraging students to think critically about adoption, animal care, and empathy.

Pair the worksheet with a short video or class discussion to reinforce key ideas and motivate student action, such as supporting local shelters or practicing kindness toward animals. Download the printable worksheet to incorporate an effective, standards-aligned lesson that builds literacy and compassion in the classroom

Please share this resource to inspire other teachers to incorporate compassion for animals into their curricula.