Latticed Learning - Birds

Learn while playing with Latticed Learning!  This week's theme has plenty of activities to go along with it - keep reading to find out more!




Some of the links on this site are affiliate links. This means if you click on a link and purchase something, I'll receive a small affiliate commission at no cost to you. Thanks so much for supporting my efforts with this blog!

Welcome back to Latticed Learning!  This year, we're continuing to learn while we play - repeating many of our favorites from the past while adding in all sorts of new activities as well.

This day's post is devoted to our weekly themes - some weeks have more activities than others, but each lesson will be fun for you to explore with your little one!

Read All About It




Feathers for Lunch not only teaches about birds, but plants, too.  I also like how it shows off the different feathers for each type of bird it highlights.






Have You Seen Birds? not only uses rhyme and excellent word choice to tell all about different types of birds, but the illustrations are really unique, too.  Each one is composed from clay, which ends up being a really effective medium for a book like this.




Have You Seen My Duckling? doesn't have a lot of text (which I love, because it really forces you to pay attention to the details in order to figure out the story), but what little it does have is very repetitive.  This is great for beginning readers - and Gv just loves searching for the missing duckling on each page!






If you've been a reader around here for a while, you probably remember that we love Boo to a Goose.  It's a fun book to read, with silliness and rhymes and repetition so that the little ones can join in with you!






An Egg is Quiet is another book I've mentioned before, because it's just so pretty.  Not every egg that's featured here is that of a bird, but most are and it's really interesting to compare the different sizes, shapes and colors of each one


The Birdwatchers

Buzzy the Vegetarian Vulture

Chick Life Cycle

Chick


The Chick and the Duckling

Make Way for Ducklings

The Ugly Duckling

Carolina Wrens



Sing Some Songs



We listened to these selections this week:


This album that I shared in an earlier post was pretty great.

We've played this album for some of our other Latticed Learning weeks and it was perfect to haul out again.

Watch Some Videos


We didn't watch too much this week, but we did find two things to explore:

Gv loves Nature Cat, so she had fun watching the Love Ya, Birdies episode.

She also had fun investigating all the birds on this BBC Nature site.



Play and Create


We did several things to correspond to our topic this week:


First, we made the world's easiest bird feeder:


Spread peanut butter over the outside of an old toilet paper tube, then roll it all in birdseed.  Tie it up with some string or yarn and wait for the birds to come!


Then Gv made this colorful paper plate bird:


Fold a paper plate in half, squirt one side with glue, and cover it all with squares of colorful tissue paper

Glue on a beak and googly eye, add some curled ribbon for tail feathers, and then fold (accordion-style) some paper for a wing (cut a slit in the plate to hold it)

Of course, we had to spend plenty of time flapping our wings like a bird:


Lots of flapping going on here.  Lots of flapping...

I set up a variation of this idea for Gv:



I covered her kiddie pool with an old blanket, then we hunted up some sticks and twigs from the backyard to help build her "nest."  I blew up a couple of balloon "eggs" and then she just hung out, doing the kinds of things birds do.


She had a blast snipping feathers out of construction paper:




I pulled out our bag of craft feathers and Gv matched them up to the birds in one of our books for the week:




She also just sorted them by color:




Then I grabbed the colander so she could do this:




And then I got a bag of buttons for her to do this with:


In case you can't tell, she threaded matching-color buttons onto the feathers

Since the Feed the Old Lady box is still one of Gv's favorite things to play with (I made it for her way back in this week), I came up with this bird we could feed using one of our trusty greens boxes:


A construction paper head and beak, googly eyes and some craft feathers for flair.  Glue it all down and then punch a small hole in the center of the beak...

Then cut a pipe cleaner into thirds, bend the piece up a bit, and feed these "worms" to the bird!


We spent some time in the backyard watching for birds.  

I liked how age-appropriate this tally sheet was for the activity.  I knew we'd never see any birds swimming, so I changed that one to "singing."



We got really lucky and witnessed a crazy bird fight.  It was just like being at a hockey game or something.  


Gv did this cute bird math activity, although I kind of completely changed it. 

I printed out the numbered birds and she cut them out, but instead of clipping the appropriate number of clothespins to each one for the tail feathers, Gv glued on that number of craft feathers.




I really love how these turned out.  This activity took a looooong time (in a good way!) and it was neat to see how Gv chose to arrange the feathers on each one.

Here are a few of my favorites:




Finally, since Grammy likes cardinals, we made this for her as a Mother's Day present:


What are all those specks?  Why, glitter of course!  Glitter adds a little pizazz to everything, don't you think?


(Grammy, if you're reading this before Mother's Day, pretend to be surprised when you open it!)


Looking for all the great posts associated with this concept in one place?  Check out my Latticed Learning page here!



What's your favorite thing that we did this week?  I'd love to hear!  Either leave a comment below or email me at lisahealy (at) outlook (dot) com.


Also, if you don't want to miss a single minute of great tips like this and all the fun around here, be sure to sign up for free updates and then look forward to having each post delivered straight to your inbox!



Linked up with: Favorite ThingsOver the MoonShare the Wealth SundayDishing it & Digging itWhat's for Dinner?Family Joy Blog Link-Up,  Literacy Musings MondayPractical MondaysHomeschool Nook Link UpHappiness is HomemadeMerry MondayMotivation MondayWhat'd You Do This WeekendMeet Up MondayTotally Terrific TuesdayTogether on TuesdaysShow Me Yours LinkyTasty TuesdaysLittle Learning Link UpTwo Uses TuesdayHip Homeschool HopLou Lou Girls Fabulous Party  Tuesday Talk, Wonderful WednesdayA Little Bird Told MeEverything Early Childhood, Creative MusterParty in Your PJs,What to Read,I Am Pinnable, Christian Bloggers Link UpThis Is How We Roll, Creative WaysHearts for HomeCreative Exchange 100 Happy DaysTry It Like It, No Rules Weekend Blog PartyTune in Thursdays,  Booknificent ThursdaysThursday Favorite ThingsI'm Lovin' It, Inspiration SpotlightHome MattersPretty Pintastic PartyWeekend PotluckAwesome Life FridayCreative CollectionThe Beautifully Creative Inspired Bloggers Pit StopWeekend Traffic JamPin Me Party,  From the ArchivesFamily Fun FridayFriday FrivolityBloggers SpotlightMake My Saturday SweetWeekend Wind-Down Party,Friday Features LinkyFuntastic Friday Best of the WeekendSweet Inspiration Link PartySmall Victories SundayYou're Invited Love to Learn Tuesdays