A Spot of Birdwatching Anyone?

There is nothing like a field trip that relates perfectly to a subject you have been working on. Team it with a lovely autumn day and a "sort of" picnic like lunch and you have for two very happy children.

So we took off to visit the Miranda shoreline which is not too far away from us. First stop was the Miranda Shorebird Centre where they have "stuffed" varieties of local birds (erk but helpful to see the types of birds in real ... not sure if life is the right word), souveneirs and lots of books and leaflets along with friendly voulnteers. Then we head off up the road to view some birdies armed with binoculars, camera and our bird books.

Because we had planned to end up along the beach somewhere and I knew where two little shell gathering girls would end up, I proposed the wearing of jandals (flip flops, thongs) so excuse the footwear.

Whilst the Papa and the girls went off to the purpose built bird watching room I stayed back by the car because we had thought it might be nice to take the Scruffster along for a drive. We had not even thought as far as "oh yeah a barking dog and birds may not go hand in hand" ... der.  Yes people it was a spur of the moment outing. This old bird simply had one of those moments when she needed to get out and stretch her wings. 

 

This is the view from the bird watching area.

 

 

 

This is a "pied stilt".

 

This is a "heron" of sorts ... I think. I can't quite make it out and the Fashionista can't remember. She got excited so we have lots of unidentifiable bird photos' ... lol


They didn't take too long to watch the birds as they had hungry tummies and we had told them that we would come back for a proper look (without the Papa who declared to me on the quiet that whilst he loved the walk and being out and about in nature with us that he unfortunately found sitting and watching birds slighlty boring ... poor guy ... insert maniacal laugh). Now that we know where to go and when the best time for viewing is, which  happens to be 2 hours either side of high tide (we were right at the end) we'll be sure to pop over again. Although Jan - March is the best time for viewing with the highest numbers, you can see shorebirds all year long.


We then popped off to the beach, grabbed some fish and chips (fish freshly caught from neabry) and had a small picnic with our thermos and bickies that we had brought along, whilst the girls gathered some shells and rocks and other things they found of interest. They then played on a nearby park and lastly we headed off up the road further to a secluded bay where Agent Smelly found a mans wallet in the water near where the boats would enter the water. We managed to find his business cards inside but due to him being out on a boat our phones wouldn't connect properly but I managed to leave and also text through some messages to let him know and waited a while but in the end headed back home.

Later that evening he phoned me to say thanks, that he had received my message and asked if it would be OK to come along to grab his (very wet) wallet and cards. Thankfully about 25 minutes away. He said that he would bring us some fish that he'd caught which I excitedly told Agent Smelly about when I got off the phone. Her comment "Oh great just what every 8 year old wants ... dead fish".

A most grateful gentleman arrived at our door half an hour later with some freshly prepared snapper (yum!) and this chocolate bar for his little life saver. She was over the moon!!!

F is for ... "Flying Creatures"

As part of the Flying Creatures programme we were supposed to make lap books. Unfortunately I find lap books for big curriculum quite awkward to use so I purchased a couple of journal like books for them to use.

I have them personalise their covers.

Then each week as we complete some lap booking activities they place them into their books.

They are also able to pop photo's in them of things that they do or make during the lesson.

They can paste things in that they find, like they did here when they were learning all about feathers they went out and collected some. You can really include anything as longs as it's pretty flat.

Agent Smelly's watercolour of a penguin.

The Fashionista's sketch of a Pipipi

 

They can even simply include artwork that they do on the subject.

Whilst I love lap books, I find that these journal like books are so much better suited to their needs as they get older and do more work on a subject. Do make sure to get the ones with rings to bind them as they are better suited to having things stuck inside them, scrap books tend to stick up and look untidy.

What Makes A Bird A Bird?

Today we completed Chapter 2 of Flying Creatures of the Fifth Day.

After completing the lapbooking pages, that we are using to accompany the text book, we set up a bowl of bird seed outside the front door, and before long had a pile of wee sparrows come down for a feed. We watched and listened to them and were amazed at what we  noticed after reading about the calls and songs and actions they make. We were particularly fascinated by two of them, which we assume may have been males, flapping their wings and calling at each other, obviously trying to claim the feeder.


We then moved onto making some bird feeders from pine cones.

 

First the girls applied some very expensive 100% organic natural peanut butter (only the best for our bird life apparently) over the pine cones with their hands. The expressions were priceless!

They then pressed some of Joe's bird uneaten seed onto that very expensive 100% organic natural peanut butter.

Side note; Joe now thinks she's a chicken.She lives amongst the chooks flying down to join them in pecking at the chicken food as we dish it out to the chickens morning and night. She's also now roosting inside the chook house too, rather than her tree or specially built dove house right next to the hen house ... poor confused dove, she's even laid eggs!

The girls tied some strings onto their pine cones and then went and tied them in some trees. They've placed them in different areas of the block and are planning to see if one is favoured more than another, despite them both being made from the same very expensive 100% organic natural peanut butter and bird seed.

Despite this being a very simple and easy activity (we did it when they were preschoolers) they really enjoyed making them up and going out together and hanging them somewhere.