preschool bird lesson

Want to teach preschoolers about the body parts of birds? Try dressing up like one!

Here are some ways you can dress up like bird to teach kids the parts of a bird's body and how even though all birds have the same body parts they can look very different!

Beaks (Heron, Eagle, Cardinal, Mallard Duck)

 

Beaks made with sturdy wire, felt, elastic cord and hot glue. I shaped the wire first to look like the beak and then wrapped it with felt. The elastic cord is used to hold the beak onto a teacher or child's face. 

Feet (Heron, Eagle)

Feet made with sturdy wire, felt, hot glue and old socks. I shaped the wire first to look like feet and then wrapped them with felt. I did have to sew the feet to the socks with a few stitches. The socks were old socks of my husband's. I cut the ankle and tow off the sock so that they could easily be pulled on over an adult or child's shoe. 

Wings (Eagle, Cardinal)

Wings made with cardboard, paint, hot glue, feathers, elastic cord and fabric. The large eagle wing is made to scale from painted cardboard. I then attached an elastic cord to the underneath as a strap for an arm and added a felt handle to the tip. The cardinal wing is also made to scale from fabric wrapped cardboard. I then glued feathers on and an elastic cord on the underneath as a strap for an arm.

Tail Feathers (Eagle, Cardinal)

Tail feathers were made with cardboard, feathers, string and hot glue. I simply cut out the cardboard and glued on the feathers. I then attached a long piece of string to the back so that the tail could be attached. 

Owl Eyes

Owl eyes were made with a child's pair of sunglasses with the lenses popped out, cardboard tubes (toilet paper tubes), felt and hot glue. I glued the tubes to the glasses then surrounded the glasses with felt so that there was no peripheral vision. Even though these are for owls and not an eagle or cardinal I still made these and brought them with. They are a super unique feature of owls and a very fun item for kids to try on. 

I have all the necessary parts to dress up like an eagle and a cardinal. These are two great birds to dress up like because all their body parts are called the same thing (where a duck's beak is called a bill) but they look very different. They are also two birds that preschoolers are likely to be very familiar with. 

What could be a more fun way to teach about bird body parts than dressing up the kid's preschool teacher up like a bird? Super fun! And such a great way to talk about bird body parts!!

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The Nitty Gritty!

This is a lesson that I designed and recently taught at my daughter's school. I started the lesson out by showing the kids pictures of birds and asking them to tell me what body parts make a bird special. We listed out the five main parts of a bird (beak, feet, wings, feathers, tails) and talked about each one (what the bird uses it for and any other special features that body part may have). Then I asked them if all birds look the same; if they all have the same body parts why don't they all look the same? Then I said we had better see just how different birds really look by comparing two birds more closely. Then their preschool teachers were brought in and we dressed them up one body part at a time. I had the students list the body parts and then we added them to the teacher. We talked again about what each body part does and how it looks different from the same body part on the other bird.  After the teachers were all dressed up I let the kids have some time to try on the bird parts and dress up like a bird themselves. 

The kids LOVED this lesson! We had so much fun with this one that I just had to share it.  

Comments

[crystal@growingajeweledrose]

So many great ideas! I love the feet! I really want to subscribe to your blog via RSS, but when I click subscribe, it pulls up a bunch of coding?

[Rebekah@GoldenGleam]

What a great way to incorporate imaginative play with learning about nature!! I am sharing this on my FB page, The Golden Gleam.

[mom kuhn]

I think that is amazing, where do you come up with all these ideas! Wow.

[Abbie]

Thanks so much! And thanks for telling me the subscribe thing was not really working. I am trying to figure out how to add an RSS button to a blog in Typepad. Keep your eyes out, hopefully it will be up in the next day or two.

[Abbie]

Thanks so much for sharing! The kids just loved being able to dress up like birds. It made me think there needs to be more (affordable) dress up options for kids that have to do with nature! Why not have our kids dress up like animals all the time instead of Disney princesses?!!