Feathers for Lunch

Lois Ehlert

Activities

Bird Watchers

Materials

• Empty Toilet Paper Rolls (2 for each child)

• Yarn

• Paint (Optional)

• Stickers

Allow children to paint or decorate toilet paper rolls.  Punch holes in each tube.  Take a piece of yarn long enough to go around their necks.  Tie yarn.  Now the children have their own binoculars for bird watching!

Nesting Balls

For an activity to go with spring and birds returning, try this.  Make bird nesting balls.  Collect mesh vegetable gags, such as what grapes, oranges, and potatoes come in.  You may cut them to the size you need.  Also collect such items as the following: leftover thread (I sew and save all my thread clippings), yarn pieces, tiny fabric scraps or strips.  Also you can add Kleenex, cotton balls.  Have the children take a bit of each of the materials and place them in the mesh.  Pull the mesh together around the items they have placed in the mesh.  Take a rubber band and secure the ends together.  Using a yarn needle, thread in a piece of yarn and tie ends together to make a hanger.  Place these nesting balls outside in trees or areas high enough that the birds feel safe.  They will come and pull these materials out thru the mess and take them to their nests.  Have the children observe every so often to see if any of the materials have been removed from the nesting balls or if they see any nests with familiar materials in them.

Examine Feathers

Pass feathers out to children or have set out in a science center.  Allow students to sort feathers (by color, shape, size, etc.).  Have magnifying glasses available so children can examine feathers.  Supply paper and crayons so children can draw feathers if they choose.

Additional Books

lBaby Bird - Written By:  Joyce Dunbar - Illustrated By:  Russell Ayto, Cambridge Mass. - Candlewick Press, c1998.

Description:  A bird falls out of his nest while trying to fly and has encounters with several animals before he finds success.

lRound Robin - Written By: Jack Kent - New York: Simon and Schuster Books for Young Readers, c1982.  

Description:  A robin who has eaten until he looks more like a ball than a bird finds when Fall comes that he can only walk south while the other robins fly.

lIsland Baby - Written By: Holly Keller - New York: Greenwillow Books, c1992.

Description:  Pops, a man who runs a bird hospital on an island, and his young helper Simon nurse an injured baby bird back to health.

lFeathers for Lunch - Written By: Lois Ehlert - San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, c1990.

Description:  An escaped housecat encounters twelve birds in the back yard but fails to catch any of them and has to eat feathers for lunch.

Web Links

http://www.perpetualpreschool.com/birds/birds.htm

http://ssd.k12.mo.us/birdwebquest/B.INDEX.HTM

http://www.shininghours.com/walking/springwalk.htm

http://www.friend.ly.net/scoop/biographies/ehlertlois/

http://www.rhymezone.com