Meadowbank Special School, Cardiff

Teacher: Diana James

In May 2008 a class of three Year 5 and four Year 4 pupils with special educational needs used the Birds of a Feather activity.

Why we chose this activity

‘The school motto is ‘Learning and Caring with Friends’ and the ethos is very much about caring for and considering all living things in a nurturing environment. Also as an Eco School we have been raising the profile of ESDGC through out the curriculum and across the key stages and highlighting how people can affect the environment and need to protect it.

Dosbarth Gwyrdd had been involved in ‘Bird Box’ week in February which included a trip to Cogmoors Environmental Centre where they had made fat balls and gone on a bird hunt in the woods nearby. They had also built their own bird box to bring back to school (photo ‘bird box making’ here). This box was used to replace a rotten one on a tree in the school courtyard where a pair of Blue Tits nest every year and a camera was installed in the box. During the summer term the whole school had been able to watch the birds making their nest and laying their eggs. (photo ‘watching blue tits’ here)The children learn best from a very multisensory approach and so the hand-on, real life experiences that the topic of bird watching/studying demands is very appropriate for their special needs.

Preparation

‘In order to help the children to structure their ideas, the school uses a system of Colour Coding whereby different grammatical parts of a sentence are linked to a specific colour to help the children structure their speaking and writing. It is called 'The Thinking Jigsaw' and was devised by Zein Pereira and Janice Attard in 2007. For more information, please contact Meadowbank School.

The worksheet to accompany the walk was adapted to reflect this strategy used in class and thereby help the children in their understanding of the activity to be undertaken ‘Adapted Birds of a Feather’. The word search was also simplified and used as a follow-up homework activity ‘Spot Bird Wordsearch’. The school is located on the banks of the River Taff and we already have a risk assessment in place for short riverside walks.

We had already identified the different birds that we might see in the countryside in Wales as well as those that we are able to see every day at school. In preparation for the activity we identified the equipment we would need, looked at the ‘RSPB Code of Conduct for Birdwatchers’ and reminded ourselves about the health and safety aspects of walking by the river.’

What the children did

birdwatch3 birdwatch4 ‘We decided to go for a short walk around the school and then outside the grounds along the River Taff. The latter would give us more opportunity to spot a wider variety of birds, (the children were very keen to see a Kingfisher because of its beautiful colour!)

The final part of the activity involved finding out about a particular bird of their choice and this was extended to allow the children to do their own research using various secondary sources.’

Learning outcomes

‘The practical fieldwork activity itself afforded the children an opportunity to develop a range of skills – locating and understanding places, environments and patterns, investigating, observing and gathering evidence. The follow-up work gave them the opportunity to further investigate and organise their information before communicating it to others in the form of books and an assembly which included a class rap entitled ‘Meadowbank Twitchers’ and a ‘Guess the bird song quiz’!!!

The children’s interest and enthusiasm for birds was capitalised on and used in a very cross curricular way:

In Maths/ICT we have been looking at repeating patterns and the children used their IT skills to download three images of birds of their choice to create their own bird repeating patterns.
A five minute filler activity/game that the children love is listening to and identifying the sounds of the different birds on the RSPB website
In Art/DT the children have made bird masks
In literacy and the children wrote and then role played their own stories about bird life in the garden.’

What the class said:

A: “It’s so fun and great because I saw the Kingfisher – the blue one.”

E: “I loved talking to the birds.”

T: “I liked the blackbird – like my mask.”

E: “I liked the little Kingfisher. He went faster flying.”

Teaching Assistant: “The activity has captured their interest and imagination. They were using their new knowledge and information in the literacy session to help their stories. It was exciting looking for the Kingfisher by the River Taff!”

ClassTeacher: “The Countryside code education resource is stimulating, user-friendly with fun illustrations and artwork. Now I am familiar with the format and content I would be likely to use some of the ideas again with my classes.”

Future Plans

‘We have a ‘Book Shop’ in the class room and the children are keen to use the information they found to make a class bird spotting book to sell.

We continued to watch the Blue Tits in our box and awaited the arrival of the chicks with excitement. The work on developing the section of the garden where the nest is situated had to go on hold. The children wrote to the Headmistress to ensure that she was aware of this. The direct involvement in stopping human activity in order to protect the birds was a valuable experience.’