With my "Naturalists Club" -which is mostly a BIRDERS Club, I h ave never enticed the students with promises of a thrill a minute.
At my first meeting this year I had 50 4th and 5th grade students turn out. Now, the number is closer to 25, and many of those only show up for our "outside" days and skip the class work, which I frown on (as nicely as possible).
I have about three students from my previous class (pre-club) who are back this year as regular attendees.
My decision to make the activity a club was to encourage only those students with at least minimal interest.
This activity has made such an impression on at least two of my students and their parents, new to the activity this year, that the students received binoculars for Christmas.
The kids do have short attention spans. And yes, they do have trouble handling the binoculars and field guides. Some only come because their friends do. But if only one of these great kids pursues this as a profession,
I'll be very satisfied.
By the way, those teenage hormones sidetracked me too, for about twenty years.
Happy New Bird Watching Year!
Michael Brown
MBEB1215 at DELPHI.COM
Puyallup, WA