Baby Robins Activity Teacher s Notes 1 st Grade PSI Purpose: In this activity, students will understand that both parents and offspring have behaviors that help the offspring to survive. Standards: LS1.B: Adult plants and animals can have young. In many kinds of animals, parents and offspring themselves engage in behaviors that help the offspring to survive. Teacher s Notes: The order of events for this lab should be: 1. Activity 2. Students read handout. 3. Students answer questions. Reinforce the idea that both parents and offspring have behaviors that help the offspring to survive. For robins, parent s behaviors include sitting on the nest to keep it warm, feeding the chicks, and protecting the chicks by chasing away predators. Behaviors displayed by the chicks include chirping when hungry or threatened and opening their mouths when food comes. Activity Procedure: 1. Designate two students as parent robins. They will be in charge of chasing away predators, sitting with the chicks (this simulates sitting on the nest for warmth and comfort), and feeding the chicks (you can use any candy, cookie, etc. to simulate worms/insects). 2. Designate one student as predator. They can be another bird (ex., crow), or a dog, cat, etc. When called on, they will circle the nest until confronted by a parent robin. 3. Section off an area in the classroom/outdoors and say that this area is the nest. All chicks must stay in the nest because they cannot fly yet and are too young to go off on their own. Have both of the parents stay with the nest and remark on how everything is going well. Ask the chicks if they are hungry. If so, what can they do to signal the parents to get food? (CHIRP). Have a parent go off when they hear this and get the food. When the parent returns, what behavior can the chicks do to make sure they are fed? (Have them hold their hands out to represent an actual chick opening their mouths. Once they receive something to eat, have them close their hands). 4. Next, simulate an unwanted intruder/predator around the nest. Send both the parents off to get food, leaving the chicks alone. Have your predator start to come up to the nest. Once again, have the students guess what behavior they should do in this situation. (Chicks should cheap loudly to get their parent s
attention, while the parent robins fly back and start chasing away the intruder). Have the intruder run around the nest a bit before finally submitting to the parents and running away. 5. Finally, end with nighttime. Ask the students where they think the mother and father bird would be. (She would be in the nest while the dad bird would be somewhere in the area keeping watch.) Ask how the chicks would be feeling (i.e. comforted, full, happy, safe, etc.). 6. After students return to their seats, discuss other patterns in behavior that can be observed among other animals. a. Examples: Kittens mewing, puppies barking, babies crying, ducklings lining up and following mom, baby buffalo standing up quickly after birth to follow the herd, etc. 7. Students should read the handout and answer the questions. Answer Key 1. Yes 2. Food: Robins bring food to their chicks. Shelter: Robins build nests to shelter their chicks. Protection: Robins defend their chicks from danger. Education: Robins teach their chicks how to fly. 3. Chicks chirp when they need something (food, protection). They open their beaks to show the parents that they are hungry and to show them where to put the food.
Baby Robins Activity Name 1 st Grade PSI Introduction: The American robin is a bird that we all see in our backyards, especially in the spring and summer. They have dark feathers with bright orange bellies. We usually see robins in the spring when they begin to build their nests. Robin moms will lay 3-5 eggs and keep watch over them as they hatch. When the chicks hatch, they need a lot of help from mom and dad to grow big and strong. When the chicks are born, mom and dad take turns feeding them worms, berries, and insects. They also dive at other birds or animals that get too close to the nest. They don t want these animals hurting their chicks. At night, mom robin still sits in
the nest with them, comforting them and keeping them warm and protected. Robin chicks will chirp when they are hungry or scared. They are saying, Mom! Dad! Come to me! When their parents come back with food, chicks will poke their faces out of the nest and open their mouths wide showing them where to put the food! These are behaviors that help them to survive. When the chicks are old enough, the robin parents to teach them how to fly.
Questions: 1. Do robins show parental care? 2. Animals that give parental care to their offspring provide food, shelter, protection and education to the offspring. How do robins do this? Food: Shelter: Protection: Education: 3. Describe two behaviors of robin babies that help them to survive.