This past Thursday I did a Bird Feeder Watch program with some 3rd graders in my kids' school. It goes along with a national Bird Feeder Watch program that tracks the migration of different birds each year. I have to say I was pleasantly surprised. We actually only saw two birds, but I was informed just before we started that the feeders hadn't been out but a few days so we'd need to give it time. There were two of us volunteers and about 8 kids. Before we went out to the courtyard, we handed out the binoculars and explored how to use them with the children. I think they may have been more fascinated with that than the actual bird watching. Once we were outside we talked about what we were looking for and how we needed to explore in order to actually see birds without scaring them away. Knowing that we weren't likely to see many birds we allowed the children to walk around and explore using their binoculars. To my surprise they were all very interested in the plants and trees that live in the courtyard. BAM! Brick wall.
I had little to no knowledge of the plants, much less any information to offer them when they were asking questions. I loved it that they were so interested, but I am so disappointed in myself for not having asked to explore the courtyard and it's lifeforms before we started.
I started taking pictures of the labels and decided the next go round I will know about these trees and plants. I must! How can I not when these little minds were so very interested?? I will take this failure of mine and use it as a learning experience. Not only will I know these plants to tell the next group of kids, but I will know for me. I should have known. I can't believe I didn't think of it before hand.
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