So much as happened since last week with the Walks along the river trail to see the birds. I wanted to backtrack a bit to be able to provide A photo of the bird nest materials that the children came up with as we explored the trees around the park the community finding bird nests. We found a bird’s nest within the community the children noticed how much the wind was swaying the tree back and forth they were concerned that this bird nest was going to fall down so we had to stop and watch.
As we watched for couple of minutes the children discovered that the bird nest was not going to fall down. They said things as such “look it’s staying there it’s not moving” then became the questions is “how did the bird nest get up there”?
They seen a local city worker working at electrical box nearby some of them said “that man over there he put a ladder against the tree” “he must’ve put the nest up there”. I said what man?
they said “that man over there”. as they pointed to him. “He must’ve put a ladder against the tree climbed up and put the nest on the top”.
My other educator said “why would that man put the nest in the tree he doesn’t live in the nest”?
Some of the Children around me said “so that the birds can live up there how else would it get up”? Then one child “the birds put the nest and the tree they put special glue wanted to keep it in the tree, so it doesn’t fall down”.
We came back to Our center and behold we looked up we found two bird nests in the tree above where we play every day. “One of the children said I’ve never seen those they are before” “Another child said that’s because there’s nothing on the tree anymore”
This week.
All of the hive children each week go on our walks along the river trail, we’ve seen so many wonderful things along the river trail. We’ve also noticed that there are some things that are not so wonderful along the river trail. The children talk about the garbage and trash that is collected along this trail. Some of the children are quite concerned as they talk about “the birds are going to eating this garbage, trash, “then the will get sick and then they will die”.
I will have to get some I will have to get some pictures of the trash and garbage along the river trail.
Some of the children were concerned and wanted to pick Trash. I then asked a question, how can we pick it up and still be safe so that it doesn’t hurt the birds? One child said, “well, you could use a big shovel, we can bring the big ones for the adults and the small kitchen doubles for the kids so that we can all pick up the trash and garbage”.
Each time we visit we have more and more questions. But one day when we went along the river trail there were absolutely no birds except for one.
Some children say it was an eagle; some say it was a crow, and some say it was a Siegel.
During this chat on a very cold windy day where we couldn’t find any other birds. One child said that “it has to be an eagle look how big it was”!
The children quite enjoyed drawing out side with the paper and pencils as we have a spot where we go each time were done or walk to sit discuss what we have seen. I have a little backpack that has the drawing materials in them for them to access in those moments when they have that creative spark. I know one question the children have been asking is “Why do I only have pencils to draw with”? I then asked the question What do you want to draw with other than pencils? In that moment, they had no idea what they wanted to draw with other than pencils, as the response was “I don’t know”. I will make sure to revisit this question when it comes up again and see if they would like other materials to draw with.
We also gather at rest time to draw together at the table and work with different materials that they have thought of to build the birds nests. I have noticed in the drawings that there is a lot of similarities one of the similarities in the drawings is they have all drawn baby eggs there is a mommy egg’s, a daddy egg, a baby egg. and some of of drawings have there sibling names on the eggs as i have asked them. They’ve also drawn the river in on the papers, they’ve drawn salmon and have talked to me about some birds that they’ve put on their papers.
I will have to post the drawings that they have created next week as I have forgotten these drawings at the centre I have created a binder where I can put their drawings in that they can revisit any time they like.
I a had an opportunity to work with this one in particular child that was so interested in the Bird’s nest she sat there for probably about 40 minutes working with the materials she was so intricate on how she was placed in each of the branches the grass and the birds themselves.
She said things like the “big sticks go on the bottom the grass goes in between and the big sticks go on the top” then she started mixing the sticks together. She put the birds inside the nest as if the birds were laying down, I asked her why are the birds in the middle of all the sticks? I see you have you have put branches on top and branches on the bottom she also put the pine needles in the with the birds. She looked at me and said “the grass goes on the bottom to keep them Cozy and warm but the sticks around to keep it together and the sticks on top make sure that the bird are cozy and warm in between it all”.
When it came to her finishing, she stared at it and then looked at me and said ” how are we supposed to keep this together”?
I said that’s a very good question, what do you think we need to keep this together? She said “I know we can try some glue”. We didn’t have any liquid glue in the class so we took a trip to the Art closet to see about getting some glue. We ended up getting glue out of the Art closet but she also noticed that we had a big block of great stuff that was on the shelf she poked it and looked at it and said what is this I said oh that? I said that is a block of clay, :”she looked at me and said can we use that for our bird nests”?I said next time we can get the clay to experiment with that with the nests.
We went back to the class and she tried using the glee with the sticks but they did not state together the way that she thought.
The next day she wanted to ask about the clay so we went back to the Art closet and gathered the clay at rest time but as I was opening up the clay we discovered that the clay had gone bad. So then the question arises “Chrystal how are we going to get some clay”?