Tuesday 4 March 2014

Club Day. The Nature Version.

After an extended hiatus due to family vacations and my own continuing professional development, Nature Club was back in business.  I committed to working through the Feathered Friends materials from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.  I started the program late, though - it is a program with activities for September to May, but we didn't really get into it until we started up in January.  Aside from the activity about migration, which is listed as an October activity that I will postpone until April, the topics haven't been too dependent on the seasons.

Our focus at this meeting was moving like a bird.  We watched a few select videos of birds that have developed distinct ways of moving (this link has a select video for each bird that highlights its specific adaptations, while this one gives you a whole library to look and listen through).  Each Nature Clubber got to act out one of the birds we watched, and then we talked about how the bird was built for its movement.  For example - the ostrich is built to walk or run because its size prohibits it from flying.  Loons are at home in the water, partly because their feet are built to make them excellent swimmers.

We took our bird movements one step further by heading outside to play "Birdy Says", inspired by Simon Says.  We worked out a few bird movements for other birds - hummingbirds, vultures and penguins, then had fun flitting and jumping and waddling around in the snow. 

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