Bird Experiment 1: What do Our Backyard Birds Eat?

Do you get Homeschool Enrichment Magazine? They always have fun features like Inventions that Changed the World, Unit Study, Adventures in History and Try It! among others. This month in the Try It! feature they have an experiment you can do to find out about the birds in your backyard.




E11 took to the computer to make his data chart. He started with an excel type spreadsheet in Open Office and then decided to switch to a word processing version to make a table. Not sure why all of his table isn't showing...I'll keep working on that mystery. For now here's a peek. He has a grid for the whole thing though it does not appear that way.

Bird Experiment Spreadsheet


Then we put the food sources out in the yard. As you can see we spread them out and I threw in our crocus too. Yes...one crocus. But it is lovely.
We set this up yesterday morning and this morning the food was gone. Except for the bread crumbs. No one like those!

The only problem...we didn't see anything take the food. Since our data collection included details of which birds like what, this is a problem for our young scientists.

So, today we are regrouping and trying to figure out how to modify our experiment to get the observations we want.

We're also predicting what stole the whole suet cake. My money is on the crows. Today we should keep our eye out for an overly energetic crow which has a taste for apple suet. Maybe I need to spring for the suet cage at $1.47. Ahem.

Mung Bean Close Ups

Today we did more measurements on our mung bean plants- Activity 1 in the Flowering Plants Science in a Nutshell Kit from Delta Education. The kids have been making observations using their hand lenses and today E10 pulled out his pocket microscope and had a good look at the plant parts and the sofa and his clothing...Then came the request to use the microscope.

Well who am I to stop good science?? After we took measurements we headed on down to the computers and the Intel Play QX3 Digital Microscope. The kids first watched me go through the process of looking at the plant under 10x, 60x, then 200x. Then they took over trying to find each part under certain magnification. The older the kid, the higher they were responsible for. As you magnify more, the field of view gets smaller so this can be frustrating for smaller children. We took still pictures of each image so we could share with them you. The kids did a great job!

Roots 10x

Roots 60x- they were in a big ball so we were disappointed not to see root hairs

Roots 200x

Stem 10x- oh and part of a root

Stem 60x

Stem 200x

Leaves 10x- it was cool to notice the new leaves coming out

Leaves 60x- check out the new growth now!

Leaves 200x- this right where the two join the stem and there is new growth. Compare the image with the first one. This is right down near the red part on the first image.

I'll say it again. The QX3 totally rocks!! This was largely student driven which is always cool. As a science mom I'm quick to say yes to stuff like this. I mean that's the fun, right? I bet we'll be getting more and more use out of the digital microscope. You can read more about this microscope in an earlier post.

Microscope Fun

So, I've been teaching this co-op class called Explorations in Science with my pal Shannon (Hi Shannon!). Shannon did a lesson with the kids on crystals. We observed them with hand lenses and the following week when their own had grown we took another under the microscope.

What better time to talk about magnification in general and to look at some other items under the microscope. We used the Intel Play QX3 Digital Microscope. This is not a traditional light microscope, but I happen to love it! Unlike its traditional counterparts, the digital model is great for working with more than one child because the image comes up on the computer monitor. Having two to three students to a scope is highly over rated. Trust me. Especially in a class of say 37. (been there) Anyhow, you can take still photographs of the object (which I have shared with you below) and you can take video and save it as well- think pond water!

You can take the magnifier out of its base and have "scope on a rope" so you can take a look at objects that don't fit on a stage. It can magnify 10, 60, or 200x. The kids don't get the feel of looking through the ocular lenses like they would on a regular light microscope, but that isn't so bad because that can be tricky for younger kids. The lens on the bottom has a protective rim so that prevents students from driving the objective lens through the slide when someone gets careless on high powered magnification.

All around this is a great microscope! The newer versions is the QX5 which reportedly has a better light in it but that's about it. Dan even found the way to work around Vista so we can use it with our new computers.

Trust me. This thing ROCKS!

Lichen on a piece of bark- 60x

Epsom Salt crystals- 60x

I'm looking forward to warmer spring so I can take the kids out and sample some pond water- maybe we can swipe some from our ditch out front. Do they still give grants to restore wetlands? I would LOVE to get one going in our front yard. I'm just sayin'.

A Few Science Options

While I'm sharing resources, I thought I'd throw out some science book ideas. These are just a few of the ones I have. Some are more teacher resource materials like the Janice VanCleave books and other experiment manuals. I had quite a collection to supplement my curriculum guide when I taught science in a public school classroom. I was always on the lookout for a simpler way to show a concept that was full proof. Nothing like 35 kids waiting on something to happen...and it doesn't! I pulled these because some kids would have a great time working on activities from these books and they would make great ideas for the workboxes. Try checking them out of your library to see how they fit for your kids.

I have an older covered version of this title. Great for nature study- once again my copy is from our local libary sale (which is coming up in May...)

One of E10's choices from last year's Usborne Show. They have a lot of fun choosing from this book.

There used to be a red version too, but I don't have it. This book is a combined volume of many smaller books on science topics with activities.

LOVE this series! Second graders on up can easily follow these directions for science fun.

There are three books in each volume of Science Activities.

Worth it to have these as a basic collection of experiments that cover fundamental science concepts in different disciplines.

For the little guys- just some fun activities to intoduce concepts of things like weather and motion.

Picked this one up at book sale. MaryAnn Kohl puts together some really fun art experiences.

Science is my thing so we have a lot on hand, but if you are not may I suggest having bunches of resources may build up your confidence?

These workboxes sure have been fun to put together and I'm still getting it all sorted out. It's been fun to survey our homeschooling materials to see what we can use and what we might have forgotten about.

I'll keep posting as I remember things and put them together.

Magnets for Box Activities

In our learning room we have a large magnet wall. We had toyed with a smaller version we made with magnetic paint on some masonite we cut down, but it wouldn't hold our marble run. Magnetic paint sounds cool, but the truth is you need many, many layers before it starts to really work well. Then I wanted a large magnetic white board. White boards are cheap. Do you know what happens when you put a layer of steel in one? Let's just say the price goes up exponentially. Really. And in case you are wondering...no. The big or little "magnetic" white boards found at WalMart aren't strong enough either. I know because I took a track piece to test on many boards. Goldilocks was not impressed.

So, Dan, being the guy he is, proposed a piece of sheet metal. I already had the white board from Lowe's for $10 for the whole 4'x6' piece. He drove to a local fabricator's shop and showed them what he wanted to use the sheet metal for. They were all familiar with our local science center's board and knew exactly what we wanted to do. They hooked us up with a 25 gauge piece of sheet metal for a mere $40. And it's big enough for four kids to use and not fight. Awesome.

Simple phonics magnets from Leap Frog- these tell you the word you spell or the letter you put in the little computer part

Good ol' fashioned magnetic letters in upper and lower case. These are nice and big. I got them from Discount School Supply.

Magnet wands with chips and balls- these are also from Discount School Supply (these are used on the floor)

The magnetic wall. It's 4' x 8'. Yes. We are absolutely the kind of people that will nail a honkin' piece of sheet metal to their wall. We've been discussing an addition. The metal walls stays. Or gets put back. I'm just sayin'.

I'm putting these in a few box categories depending on the magnet set. Lots of good letter recognition and science here. Any of these would be a welcome break in the middle of doing seat work activities from the boxes.

Snap Circuits

Here's another idea for a box item. We've had these Snap Circuits for a few years now. They are a great electronic toy. Remember using wires with batteries and hoping all the circuits were complete? With this set, it isn't so finicky!

You buy these in different sized sets- 100, 300, 500, 750. We started with the 300 set and upgraded to the 500. It might be time for another upgrade to 750. Also there is a computer interface where the kids can watch the electrical impulses on an oscilloscope. They used to sell it separately so I need to see if we can still do that.

They come with directions on how to set up the circuits.

E10 enjoys setting up new projects

They are all built on this base and the pieces are color coded. the pieces literally snap onto each other so there's always a good connection. The tricky part is building the circuit correctly. It has a place for the battery packs and you can switch them out easily, but I noticed the other day they sell an AC adapter for the sets. That might be worth getting.

You can find these at Amazon and other places on line I'm sure. These were a gift from my in-laws, but Rainbow Resources carries a full line.

Snap Circuits are a great learning tool and a lot of fun!

Classification Game

First the kids took all the pictures and made only two piles- one of flying animals (which at first included the bat) and one of everything else. Today I told them to sort them even more. We talked about different features and which ones could get split up again. Some animals are born in water and live near water when they are adults. Do you see any? Then they'd pick out the ones they thought and move them aside. Finally, we ended up with the categories above which we named.

Here they are attempting to sort the bird category. I asked the question whether or not the birds could be broken into smaller groups. R7 thought some of the birds were water birds.

Ok! So they decided this would work. We're going to take a closer look at that loon, which I considered to be a great find in a Ranger Rick magazine, because the characters pass by a loon on the way down the river.

What about the mammals? The kids right away wanted to put that kangaroo out of the group. It took some convincing to keep him in there with the other animals which both I-5 and R7 decided were night time animals. Now I didn't plan this, but it turned out well. so, then I showed them we could sort them into groups within the mammal group.

For me, the next step will be to further develop our definitions of mammals, fish, birds, reptiles, and amphibians by using the pictures. I also plan to laminate the magazine pictures so we can have them around. All of the pictures came from National Wildlife magazines and I pulled all kinds (as I was only culling the magazines one time) but set aside any that weren't fresh water habitat animals (since our current story is a river).

The first day, they put insects in one category and all other animals (that's what's above here) in another. Tomorrow we'll work on insects and I'll use the time to properly introduce various insect orders.