Birds of a Feather Flock Together!

We are on Spring Break here and have even had some Spring weather to go with it. In between enjoying the Pesach holiday, we have also been enjoying some extra time together as a family. I love that S is now in the age and stage of being able to direct our home play and learning activities based on his current interests and curiosities. Lately he has really wondered a lot about eggs and animals that hatch from eggs. This began with a book we checked out of the library (and later bought used) called Guess What Is Growing Inside This Egg by Mia Posada. This beautifully illustrated book contains several little riddles with some clues about what type of animal is growing inside an egg. As the egg's tiny resident is hatched and revealed, additional information about the creature inside is given to curious readers. Well, this led S to want to play and learn more about eggs and birds in particular. 

We began by creating this Build A Bird's Nest Sensory Bin! S helped cut yarn we re-purposed for a third (and final) time from his "knitting" basket that contained scraps of yarn from my own projects. As we cut and collected the colorful yarn in our sensory bin, we talked about the types of materials real birds use to build their nests and what textures and colors they might like. We may at some point make a little collection outside in our play garden for the birds to use nearby. We added in some artificial nests we had from a craft supply store, some eggs I had purchased on discount as well as some fake worms for hungry birds to eat (these we found in the fishing section of Walmart!). Of course we needed some resident birds! I added in some birds we had purchased a while ago at our local Dollar Tree and later on some plastic toy birds as well as some craft feathers. Additional plastic cups and containers made for the perfect nest foundations and some tweezers and tongs offered a fine motor component for play.

Both my little birdies loved this sensory bin and S wanted a nest that he could go in. That led to today's activity of building a nest for the boys to play in using a laundry basket, plenty of soft blankets and play silks and colorful ribbons woven around the edges by my fine motor activity lover, S! They played in their nest, sat on their "eggs," took care of baby chicks and even listened to nap time stories in there!

Some of our favorite bird and egg themed reads include:

This is the fabulous book that sparked our current play theme...

We are huge Jan Brett fans. In this great classic, Hedgie helps Henny trick the chronically hungry Tomten who is eating her eggs each morning. The end includes a couple of surprises--one very prickly one and several very fluffy ones!

This is a great non-fiction read about eggs and the creatures that hatch from them! It is quite wordy, but you can pick and choose parts to read more about with your little ones (or read the whole thing for particularly curious listeners who may also be potty training this week...)

I love the series of nature-themed picture books by this author and illustrator pair. This one in particular is so lovely to read and view as each page unfolds with gorgeous illustrations and text about eggs and the creatures inside of them.

We extended our theme into a field trip to our local botanical gardens. I brought binoculars and two curious bird watchers. Can you spot the male cardinal in this tree?

Birds and eggs are a wonderful theme to ruffle your feathers off with as Spring finally emerges! You can check out some of our previous bird-themed activities here. Bird watching and journaling/drawing about birds can be a great way to supplement your outdoor adventures and park visits. I especially love this free printable workbook about birds available from Cornell. Once Pesach is over and we reintegrate the use of flour here, I look forward to making some homemade playdough for this great Bird Nest Play Dough Invitation from Fantastic Fun and Learning. S also wants to make some more bird seed treats for our feathered friends outside.

Hope you enjoyed this great egg-xample of egg-spanding on children's play interests. My little chicks' sense of wonder truly inspires my own continued learning and egg-sploration. Egg-stra time at home has taught me just how frequently a 3 year old can ask "why" in one hour, let alone one day. Following their lead allows us to indulge those curiosities and to build on the many conversational, social, scientific and critical thinking skills that are developed through asking and answering. Wishing everyone a happy spring and happy playing!