Einstein the Class Hamster (Einstein the Class Hamster Series) Read online

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  Henry Holt® is a registered trademark of Henry Holt and Company, LLC.

  Text copyright © 2013 by Janet Tashjian

  Illustrations copyright © 2013 by Jake Tashjian

  All rights reserved.

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Tashjian, Janet.

  Einstein the class hamster / Janet Tashjian ; illustrated by Jake Tashjian.

  pages cm

  Summary: Einstein, a very knowledgeable hamster, is desperate to

  help the students in his classroom win an audition for a televised trivia

  game show but, unfortunately, only one student, Ned, can hear him.

  eISBN 978-1-62779-288-2

  [1. Questions and answers—Fiction. 2. Hamsters—Fiction. 3. Schools—Fiction.

  4. Children’s art.] I. Tashjian, Jake, illustrator. II. Title.

  PZ7.T211135Ein 2013 [Fic]—dc23 2013018839

  First Edition—2013 / Designed by April Ward

  Printed in the United States of America by

  R.R. Donnellley & Sons Company, Harrisonburg, Virginia

  1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

  To John OvEr—

  BeSt. teAcHeR. EvEr.

  “I do not like to state an opinion on a

  matter unless I know the precise facts.”

  —ALBERT EINSTEIN

  “Here’s a fact:

  Someone needs to clean out my cage!”

  —EINSTEIN THE CLASS HAMSTER

  CHAPTER ONE

  AnSwEr

  ThAt

  QuEsTiOn!

  Hello, out there in television land!

  Welcome to the number one show at

  Boerring Elementary:

  AnSwEr

  ThAt

  QuEsTiOn!

  I’m your host, Einstein the class

  hamster, and today we’ve got some

  great contestants:

  Ned

  Ricky

  Bonnie

  Our contestants will be competing

  for some amazing prizes. Tell them

  what they can win, Marlon.

  Not

  this

  again.

  Sorry about that,

  folks. Marlon’s a turtle,

  so he’s a bit slow.

  “Hey!”

  Here’s what our contestants are

  competing for today—a shiny new

  pencil, a box of mints, and a SHETLAND

  PONY! But first, the rules of the game.

  I’ll be asking several questions, and

  it’s up to our contestants and you in

  the studio audience to find the correct

  answer before our time is up. Let’s

  start with a warm-up question. Ready?

  What is the DEADLIEST ANIMAL on

  the planet? Our contestants have ten

  seconds to answer. Start thinking!

  Come on, kids. Let’s get those

  brains working!

  Still nothing? Okay, here’s a hint:

  This animal is deadlier than a shark,

  a snake,

  or even a lion.

  Time’s up, folks!

  The answer is the

  MOSQUITO!

  The mosquito may be small but it

  can be deadly, in some areas spreading

  malaria, which kills a million people a

  year. That is one nasty insect!

  We’ll be right back with more

  questions after this word from our

  sponsor. Stay tuned for lots of fun

  and games on AnSwEr . . . thAt . . .

  QuEStiON.

  “NO . . . NOT AGAIN!” Einstein

  shouted.

  Okay,

  students,

  take out your

  math books.

  “Somebody stop

  her!” Einstein said.

  “That woman is ruining

  my show!”

  “We’ll start with the five table,”

  Ms. Moreno continued. “All together—

  5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40,

  45, 50, 55, 60, 65, 70 . . .

  THIS IS

  MY AUDIENCE,

  NOT YOURS!

  WHY ARE YOU

  DOING THIS?

  “75, 80, 85, 90, 95, 100.”

  “Bring out the hook! Get her out of

  here!” Einstein yelled.

  But Ms. Moreno couldn’t hear him.

  Einstein put down his microphone

  and settled into his cage.

  “Take five, Marlon. On second

  thought, take six. I now HATE the

  number five.”

  Ned made sure none of his classmates

  were watching before he spoke to the

  hamster. “Einstein, you realize you’re

  the class pet and Ms. Moreno is the

  teacher, right? That

  SHE’S the one in charge

  and you don’t really

  have a game show?

  That you keep yelling AnSwEr . . .

  tHat...QuEStiON but no one

  ever does? That I’m the only kid who

  can actually HEAR you?”

  “Details, details.” Einstein couldn’t

  believe his show had been interrupted

  by THAT WOMAN yet again. “Can I at

  least do the Tasty Tidbits segment?”

  Einstein asked.

  Ned couldn’t help but smile. Nothing

  made Einstein happier than learning

  new, interesting facts, and Einstein’s

  Tasty Tidbits was the part of the

  show where he shared those fun

  facts with his audience to help them

  prepare for AnSwEr . . . thAt . . .

  QuEStiON.

  Einstein loved stumbling on a fun

  fact more than he loved carrots or

  kibbles or sunflower seeds, which is

  why he named the

  segment Tasty Tidbits.

  Ned wasn’t too sure

  about the whole

  dressing up like the

  fancy women who

  worked on REAL TV

  game shows, but it was Einstein’s

  show, not his.

  “Of COURSE you can do a Tasty

  Tidbit,” Ned said. “Why do you think I

  came over here?”

  Einstein looked at Ms. Moreno in

  the front of the class. She’s a no-

  good ham, Einstein thought. Always

  hogging the spotlight. But he was a

  professional, and it was time to end

  the show.

  “You ready?” Ned asked.

  When it came to Tasty Tidbits,

  Einstein was born ready.

  Believe it or not, the highest concentration

  of mosquitoes on the planet is NOT in the

  tropics but in the Arctic tundra. Because

  it’s so flat, when the snow and ice melt, the

  water has nowhere to go and forms shallow

  pools that provide breeding grounds for

  mosquitoes. When y
ou add in the constant

  sunlight of summer as well as rising

  temperatures, the pools of warm water

  make perfect mosquito incubators.

  BILLIONS can swarm in a day, filling the

  skies—in the Arctic!

  But don’t blame the males. Only female

  mosquitoes bite because they need

  protein from blood for their eggs.

  (Regular mosquito diet consists of plant

  sugar.) It’s not the mosquito’s bite that

  makes you itch. It’s the body’s immune

  response to the saliva she leaves behind.

  CHAPTER TWO

  a lItTlE BaCkGrOuNd

  On eInStEiN

  Einstein comes from a long line

  of class hamsters.

  His father,

  Aristotle, was a

  class hamster.

  Knowledge is

  power—at least

  according to Sir

  Francis Bacon.

  His grandmother

  Banjo was a class

  hamster.

  There’s a typo

  on page 29 of

  your history

  textbook.

  Even his great-great-great-

  grandfather Fuzzy was a class

  hamster.

  Dig that

  groovy Venn

  diagram,

  man.

  Because his family spent so much

  time in classrooms, Einstein learned a

  lot of facts most hamsters don’t know.

  He knows the capitals of all fifty

  states:

  Montgomery, Alabama

  Juneau, Alaska

  Phoenix, Arizona

  Little Rock, Arkansas

  Sacramento, California

  Denver, Colorado

  Hartford, Connecticut

  Dover, Delaware

  Tallahassee, Florida

  Atlanta, Georgia

  Honolulu, Hawaii

  Boise, Idaho

  Springfield, Illinois

  Indianapolis, Indiana

  Des Moines, Iowa

  Topeka, Kansas

  Frankfort, Kentucky

  Baton Rouge, Louisiana

  Augusta, Maine

  Annapolis, Maryland

  Boston, Massachusetts

  Lansing, Michigan

  St. Paul, Minnesota

  Jackson, Mississippi

  Jefferson City, Missouri

  Helena, Montana

  Lincoln, Nebraska

  Carson City, Nevada

  Concord, New Hampshire

  Trenton, New Jersey

  Santa Fe, New Mexico

  Albany, New York

  Raleigh, North Carolina

  Bismarck, North Dakota

  Columbus, Ohio

  Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

  Salem, Oregon

  Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

  Providence, Rhode Island

  Columbia, South Carolina

  Pierre, South Dakota

  Nashville, Tennessee

  Austin, Texas

  Salt Lake City, Utah

  Montpelier, Vermont

  Richmond, Virginia

  Olympia, Washington

  Charleston, West Virginia

  Madison, Wisconsin

  Cheyenne, Wyoming

  He loves to learn about history and

  music.

  He loves to make graphs and charts

  with his food.

  He loves helping kids learn about

  math and science and geography.

  Einstein based AnSwEr...thAt...

  QuEStiON on all the study questions

  his relatives had handed down through

  the years. AnSwEr...thAt...

  QuEStiON and Tasty Tidbits were

  the perfect study guides. He was the

  school’s most valuable resource. SO

  WHY WEREN’T THEY USING HIM?

  With all these interesting facts at

  his hamster fingertips, Einstein didn’t

  understand why Principal Decker

  insisted on hiring HUMANS to teach

  at Boerring Elementary when Einstein

  could do a better job at a fraction

  of the salary. (Fractions are also

  something Einstein knows a lot about.)

  Maybe THIS is the year Einstein

  gets to make his beloved ancestors

  proud.

  The capital of Texas—AUSTIN—

  rhymes with the capital of

  Massachusetts—BOSTON.

  I’m fixin’ to

  make some

  chowda!

  CHAPTER THREE

  SOmE BACkGrOuNd

  ON NEd

  Ned had no idea why he was the only

  one in Ms. Moreno’s class who could

  hear Einstein. Maybe it was because

  he had twelve animals of his own that

  were taking over his house—

  2 goldfish

  1 golden retriever

  3 chickens

  1 ferret

  3 cats

  2 parakeets

  Or maybe it was because when he

  was a baby, Ned had tubes put in his

  ears that affected his hearing in a

  way doctors couldn’t explain.

  Or maybe it was because Ned didn’t

  have a lot of friends and Einstein was

  the only one in class who seemed to

  care about what Ned thought. Maybe

  being such a sensitive kid had an

  upside—like being able to understand

  hamsters.

  Whatever the reason, Ned liked

  hanging out with Einstein. Watching

  the hamster organize his notes for

  AnSwEr . . . thAt . . . QuEStiON

  was usually the highlight of Ned’s day.

  Now all Ned had to do was make a

  few human friends.

  Ferrets are one of the most popular pets

  in the United States. The word ferret

  comes from the Latin word furonem,

  which means “thief.” Ferrets ARE master

  thieves, able to steal anything they can

  grab, so they’re often trained to hunt

  rabbits and other small

  animals. But they’re only

  master burglars when

  they’re awake—ferrets

  sleep more than

  twenty hours a day.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The

  pRiNcIpAL

  There was only one person Einstein

  disliked more than Ms. Moreno, and

  that was Principal Decker.

  The main reason Einstein disliked

  Principal Decker was that he didn’t

  notice most of what went on in his

  own school.

  He didn’t notice the ivy covering

  the front door that students had

  to squeeze through on their way

  to class every morning.

  He didn’t notice Mr. Wright, the

  janitor, playing poker with students

  during recess.

  He didn’t notice Ms.

  Moreno spontaneously

  dozing off several

  times a day in her

  classroom.

  The school could be under

  alien attack, and the principal

  wouldn’t pay one bit of

  attention.

  Principal Decker only cared

  about one thing—

  Twinkles the python.

  Twinkles was SUPPOSED to stay

  in the Science Center, but Principal

  Decker carried his tank around with

  him all day. Sometimes he even wore

  Twinkles around his neck like a scarf.

  But Einstein had to give Twinkles

  credit:
He didn’t just attempt to

  gobble Einstein up; the snake was

  creative in the ways he tried to

  devour him.

  “I’ve got something caught between

  my teeth,” Twinkles would say. “Do

  you think you could check it out?” As

  if Einstein were some kind of rodent

  dental floss.

  “My uvula’s swollen,” Twinkles said

  another time. “Would you mind giving

  it a quick look?”

  Einstein planned to stay as far away

  from Twinkles as possible.

  Pythons live in humid areas like Asia and

  Africa. They average around fifteen feet in

  length, but some types

  have grown to be as long

  as thirty-seven feet.

  Pythons squeeze the

  life out of their prey,

  usually wild animals