Last week I was a part of the education team involved with delivering the Feathered Frenzy program. I was a little nervous for the day to begin, because it became evident that these students knew a lot about birds. A lot of them knew more than me. Once we got into groups and began the first station the nervousness immediately disappeared. It was so much fun. My group had students around 10 years of age. They were calm and cool. As it turns out I was able to teach them some new information. It was a great morning.
After lunch we went out on the trails to look for birds. We heard a couple birds, but that was the extent of our birding. The group became fascinated with butterflies hanging around the Autumn Olive. One boy found a couple red-back salamanders under two separate logs. As I could tell they were very interested in herpes we made our way to the vernal pond. Most of the students had been there before and new the routine. They had a great time collected macro-invertebrates and naming them. They found caddis fly larvae and a right handed snail. That was a good sign.
Lastly we made our way to the observation deck at Onion Bottom. What an experience. There were water snakes all over the water, giant bullfrogs, turtles, and tad poles the size of my fist. It was a stupendous ending to our nature hike.
I fostered student learning by allowing them to choose what we did while on the nature hike. I facilitated learning by asking questions related to our experiences and answering questions they asked me. What did not work was using knowledge learning during the morning stations to identify birds, but I am pretty sure they do that at home.
After lunch we went out on the trails to look for birds. We heard a couple birds, but that was the extent of our birding. The group became fascinated with butterflies hanging around the Autumn Olive. One boy found a couple red-back salamanders under two separate logs. As I could tell they were very interested in herpes we made our way to the vernal pond. Most of the students had been there before and new the routine. They had a great time collected macro-invertebrates and naming them. They found caddis fly larvae and a right handed snail. That was a good sign.
Lastly we made our way to the observation deck at Onion Bottom. What an experience. There were water snakes all over the water, giant bullfrogs, turtles, and tad poles the size of my fist. It was a stupendous ending to our nature hike.
I fostered student learning by allowing them to choose what we did while on the nature hike. I facilitated learning by asking questions related to our experiences and answering questions they asked me. What did not work was using knowledge learning during the morning stations to identify birds, but I am pretty sure they do that at home.
Um, was that a purposeful typo? If so, that's hilarious. If not, it's even more hilarious :)
ReplyDeleteGreat idea letting them choose what to do. I haven't felt like I could do that very often in teaching this year, but when I did it was really cool. The students got way more into the activity, and they always chose fun things! I wonder if it's possible to meet standards and still teach in this way. Thoughts?
I concur, absolutely side splitting!!!
DeleteWhat do you do if your group is divided in a chosen activity? I would worry that I am not prepared for whatever the group may choose. It certainly is true that if they are doing something they want to do, they are certainly more into it. (How cleverly can we coax them down the road of the planned activity, making them believe they came up with it, thus making sure we hit the required standards?)
ReplyDeleteHerpes is/are, of course, very interesting. That sounds like it was an incredible hike. A fist-sized tadpole!!! What I've really come to love about hikes, and teaching, is that we will be presented with surprises and opportunities, and responding to them can keep all of us young and excited.
ReplyDeleteBwahaha, I was wondering why the students were so interested in a STD.
ReplyDeleteI think all of the students were more interested in the animals they were actually seeing (herps) instead of the few birds in the distance. I tried asking my group what kinds of birds would eat the snake/frogs/etc to link it back to the theme of the day, and they would quickly answer, but they didn't seem to care too much about the random bird questions when two dozen snakes are swimming around. And I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing. The herp frenzy was an exciting experience!