Tuesday 21 January 2014

Club Day. The Nature Version.

Welcome back, Nature Club!  It's been awhile since we've seen all of you, and we're happy you could join us today.

I've been planning for our winter Nature Club activities since attending a webinar with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in the fall.  They were introducing a new resource - Feathered Friends - and as I flipped through the activities I felt they were just right for Nature Club.  Even though the activities are organized by month, the introductory activity, What Makes a Bird a Bird, could work in any month, whether it be September or January.

We read through the book What Makes a Bird a Bird? to get thinking about the characteristics that birds share with other animals (the ability to fly, sing, lay eggs, build nests) and the characteristic that is unique to birds (feathers). 

Then we donned snowshoes and walked to the park, stopping to listen when the songs of the chickadees caught our ears.  It was there we played a game of bird true or false.  We stomped a line to divide the field into two - one side of the field was the "true" side and the other side was the "false" side.  Then the clubbers took their places on the line.  I read out a statement and the clubbers had to decide whether the statement was true or false by running to the appropriate side of the field.  In their snowshoes.  By the end of the game, everyone was thoroughly tired.  But not too tired to hike over to the playground and pretend to be wolves.  Or a girl who lived with wolves.  A low howl from the alpha meant it was time to return to our den.  And while their legs were weary from trudging through the snow, they magically transformed into birds and their wings carried them back to our house just in time for their parents to come get them.   

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