I went to school on Monday and could put ideas into action right away and without a lot of preparation ahead of time. I shared my learning and ideas for classroom activities with my team and those ideas fit in so nicely with our curriculum so it felt seamless. The coloring book is user friendly for my first and second graders because the color by number gives them a pretty accurate look at what the birds actually look like and it would make it quite doable as a research tool.

McColl Pond was a great venue for the institute as well. Having three different biomes and the bird feeders gave us ample opportunities to study a variety of birds, habitat, and feeding. What a treat it was to also be able to build a nesting box and a suet feeder!

After the second day of the institute, I walked away with the ability to provide authentic experiences for my students, the ability to get started right away feeding and housing birds, and the curiosity to keep learning more.

I enjoyed being “put in the shoes” of my students and participating from their lens. This allowed me to think things through more carefully and consider ways to incorporated the concepts in my classroom. The Birding Institute provided an opportunity to further explore two things I am passionate about – teaching and nature.