STEM RAYS BIRD PROJECT
Scientists: Prof. Curtice Griffin, UMass Natural Resources and
Conservation; Athol Bird and Nature Club and
Millers River Environmental Center
The Bird Project will use the study of birds
to help students engage with and explore biological concepts. Birds are
conspicuous inhabitants of urban, suburban, and rural environments, and have an
intrinsic appeal to which almost everyone responds. Wild birds constitute an
accessible educational resource that we will use to construct a program that
engages students’ natural curiosity about nature.
The program will extend a successful science
and technology program developed by Sunderland Elementary School teacher Helen
Kittredge. Her program is built around participation in Project Feederwatch, a
Web-based program of the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology that accumulates data
from feeder watchers across North America and allows observers to compare their
local observations with those from other observers.
Bird
Project participants will engage in a range of learning activities connected to
their Feederwatch observations. Students will construct bird houses, keep
journals, photograph birds, record and enter data, make models, create artwork,
invite guest speakers, take field trips, and publish newsletters. In the course
of these activities, they will make extensive use of contemporary technology,
including digital cameras, digital sound recorders, and the software needed to
analyze data, make graphs, make presentation, and publish newsletters. Overall,
the Bird Project will provide a distinctive combination of hands-on experience
with the natural world, classroom activities that build on that experience, and
a connection via the internet to a large community of fellow “citizen
scientists.”
Cornell Laboratory of
Ornithology