While studying Owls we read the award winning book Owl Moon along with the National Geographic Readers Owls. Now that Jaxon's ability to read has made leaps and bounds I try to incorporate his daily reading into more interesting topics like science or social studies. Yet I still maintain his story time where he gets to enjoy having a book read to him.
As owls seem to be a hard animal to see at a local zoo we turned to Lindsay Wildlife Experience and their Private Animal Encounter. Currently Jax's has taken numerous homeschool science classes through Lindsay Wildlife and they have exceeded our expectations each time. This being said we were very excited to see what they had to offer with a private experience.
We began our tour in the classroom with a Great Horned Owl. This was an amazing opportunity to see such a majestic animal up close and learn about their characteristics. The visit was a great educational experience as we were able to see his eye and neck movement at a very close range. We were able to observe him eating during the entire presentation. Jaxon had very mixed feelings about the owls eating habits.
We were then led outdoors where we were given a fantastic opportunity to see a barn owl in flight and learn more about how they live in the wild.
Lindsey Wildlife Center has a great educational program for all ages. During our visit they shared with us their knowledge of owls their characteristics and habitats. The half hour went by so fast I wish we had went with the one hour program instead, maybe next time.
A majority of our owl study was learning the facts about different owls which I obtained from the Thematic Unit on Owls. Below are some examples from the book. I also try to incorporate things that he can play with that relate to our studies. The Safari Animals have come in handy during a lot of our animal studies.
Jaxon had been working hard on memorizing all the owls and I wanted to find something interesting and fun to incorporate into our Owl Studies. As a child one of my favorite memories of studying owls was dissecting owl pellets. So I did some research and found the perfect solution The Student Owl Pellet Kit. It included three pellets, tweezers, magnified glass, and Bone Sorting Guide. It was the perfect size for one child.
When he found the skull in tact with teeth he could barely contain his excitement! I'd say our Owl study was a success!