The birds have alighted. They are making their moves and plans. It’s spring. They’re coming home. Go outside and watch them, see what you can learn.
Take binoculars, or open your own two eyes into awareness of the trees and buildings around where you live. Bringing a field guide a plus, as you learn the names and specifics for each aviator you see, but it isn’t necessary as you make out the small differences between the song birds, the scavengers, and giant birds of prey.
Walk slowly. When you feel the urge to stop, close your eyes. Listen to the songs. Listen to how the birds call and respond to one another. Songbirds are have a vast range of sounds they are able to make. Some can mimic their environments, whether that be cats, or other birds, car alarms, you name it. Some can sing multiple notes at once. Some even have a dialect specific to the region you’re in. If you’re in the northern hemisphere the birds you’ll here most loudly are usually males, looking for some good old attention. By the equator, male and female birds are known to duet. But imagine what they might be saying to one another.
Look carefully, at what they are carrying in their beaks or their feet, what might they be using this material (living or not) for? Look carefully for nests in trees or anywhere overhead. What they made out of, what are they in?
Birds truly do carry spring on their backs. The last weeks of March and early April are a wonderful time to watch song birds. But don’t forget to look overhead, where the large birds might be circling.
A few lesson ideas:
Earth Sciences (K-4): When you get home, look the birds up that you found, listen to their songs and calls, look at their coloring and habits. Observe and compare their wingspan, their feet, and beaks with other birds. Then draw detailed pictures of the birds, male/female/juvenile. Be as detailed as possible. This can be a great beginning to a field guide for the natural environment around the home or school.
Engineering (3 – 9th grades): Study aerodynamics. observe how and why the shape of the wings and bodies help the birds throughout their lives. What kind of flight patterns do they make? What other machines have used the same shapes. Attempt to make the wings yourself by making a flying object, or even a clay model with notes on it to show your research.
ELA (7th-12th grades): Write an essay on the birds around your neighborhood, some things that you can think about: are they native? How have the bird populations changed over the years? What are ways that birds are being protected or adapting to their environment. This can be a research assignment on one bird or comparing two or three birds in the region.
History (4th – 9th grades): Learn about the mythology around a specific bird in a culture or cultures that you are studying, or that you are interested in. What did it represent in that time? Some myths give the reason why certain animals are the way they are. Can you find any myths like that? Write your own myth about that bird. How can the bird be a guide in your own life story, for your own community? When you’ve finished writing, remember to cite the mythology(ies) you studied.
Math: (2-5): Go out to the same spots to look at the birds at different points in the day. Create a chart of which birds you see, how many you see, if you heard songs, and what the birds were doing. Spend some time walking through the woods or your neighborhood and focus your attention on these things – you should spend 20-30 minutes observing to get as much data as possible. At the end of the week compare these numbers to each other and come up with conclusions about what the bird population is up to (remember, this will change season by season depending on the species).
Resources:
Bending Tree Education 