In order to have some organization and flow to the Outdoor Hour Challenges and their focus on mammals, I found it necessary to schedule only a fraction of the stories in the Burgess Animal Book for Children. We are going to skip stories 15-20 this week and go right to story 21. Please share any of the skipped stories with your children when you have time in your schedule.Here is a general video about bats. Please preview the video because parts of it may make your children a little squeamish. There is also a reference to evolution.
Mammals that fly and have echolocation!
Outdoor Hour Challenge #49 Bats
1. Read pages 241-245 in the Handbook of Nature Study. Although the lesson for bats states that it should not be given unless you can directly observe bats in person, I think this interesting creature deserves his own Outdoor Hour Challenge. Make sure to watch the video about bats and then proceed with the lesson suggestions. If you need additional information, use the resources at the end of this challenge.
Video on YouTube.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWUNFxhLRTU
2. Supplemental reading in The Burgess Animal Book for Children: Read Story 21. Use the illustration on page 128 to prompt a narration after reading the story about the Little Brown Bat.
3. This week during your 10-15 minutes of outdoor time, look for any mammals in your neighborhood or in a near-by park. Many of us will not find any mammals to observe or signs of mammals like scat or tracks. This should not discourage us from taking the time to be outdoors with our children.
Try some of the techniques that we have worked on in the past.
- Stand or sit quietly and see what you can hear (Challenge 2).
- Take a magnifying lens and look at an object up close (Challenge 8).
- Make a small square with yarn and see what you can find in to look at within that small square.(Challenge 9)
- Look at the sky and observe the clouds. (Challenge 39)
4. After your walk, discuss any interesting things that you observed. Help your child to find words for their experience. Record their words on paper and have them sketch a simple drawing for their nature journal. Use some of the ideas that worked in the past like a rubbing of a leaf or feather. Take photos for your nature journals. Research and record what you learned about the bat this week from reading in the Handbook of Nature Study. One idea would be to sketch and record how a bat’s wings are different from a bird’s wings. You could discuss why a bat is considered a mammal and how it differs from other mammals that we have studied. Keep it simple but make some connections this week.
5. Share your blog entry on Mr. Linky. The challenges are all listed on the sidebar of my Handbook of Nature Study blog. Don’t forget to read other families’ entries for inspiration and encouragement.
Additional resources for this challenge:
More information on the Little Brown Bat
Brown Bat Coloring Page
Ozark Big Eared Bat coloring page
Lots of activities on bats at Enchanted Learning
Parts of a bat notebook page
Life cycle of the bat notebook page
Really interesting page on bats and pollination
Big Brown Bat information and coloring page
Bats in Australia
Jeff Corwin Video on bats in Australia:
Magic School Bus: Going Batty
Video!
(If talking about vampires is objectionable, you might want to preview this video.)
Barb-Harmony Art Mom
Thanks to Tina at Jetihoja Academy for the special mammal challenge notebook page. You can find it along with all the other notebook pages here:
Outdoor Hour Challenge Notebooking pages
Thanks Tina!
