Hi Rob,

Well, of course it will depend a lot on the age of the kids.

I thought right away about "Big Year," which being a full-length
movie with some romantic themes as well, would not be for younger
children or those with short attention spans. The value of that movie
would be to explore the reasons for the main characters' interests in
birding and, from there, consider other reasons for birding. A
Socratic method if you will.

Seems to me there are many reasons for birding, and the greatest
outcome of a unit on birding would be to spark curiosity leading to
activity that helps young people connect with nature and science. I'd
be inclined to start with a least-common-denominator approach. If the
kids all know the names of some birds (Robins, Bald Eagles, Mallards,
for example) you could engage them in identification games leading to
learning more about specific birds. If they don't know any bird
names, they still can probably differentiate a duck from a pigeon or chicken.

I don't know of specific videos about birding, so I Googled "why
birding? teaching aids" and a lot of resources came up.

Marc Hoffman



At 11:19 AM 12/2/2013, Rob Sandelin wrote:
> From an introductory angle. Why watch birds?
>
>From: Marc Hoffman [mailto:tweeters at dartfrogmedia.com]
>Sent: Monday, December 2, 2013 8:48 AM
>To: Rob Sandelin; Tweeters at u.washington.edu
>Subject: Re: [Tweeters] Searching for a compelling (for kids) video
>about birding
>
> From what angle(s)?
>
>At 10:22 PM 12/1/2013, Rob Sandelin wrote:
>
>
>Looking for a birding video that makes birding understandable for students.