OMSI Presentation: Flights of Fancy

On Friday, February 26, 2010, our class had a wonderful time exploring with OMSI. As part of their in-school field trip program, we had the opportunity to learn about birds, flight, and dissect a second owl pellet. The students had a great time building paper airplanes and testing them.They built models of airplane wings and demonstrated with a hair dryer how air travels over and under in order to make it stay aloft.

Finally, the students were each given their own owl pellets to dissect.They were given bone sheets to use to name the bones they found. One person even found a bird's beak inside their pellet!

It was a great way to spend a Friday morning!

Science Fun!

Over the last couple of weeks, we began a new science unit called Bones and Skeletons. As an introduction to learning about bones, the students dissected an owl pellet. Inside, they found various bones. The following pictures show students sorting the bones and classifying them based on self-selected criteria. This part of the unit is always a hit!

The students will use the bones as a stepping stone for learning about their own bones. It's amazing to learn that we share similar bones with other animals, such as ribs, femurs, vertebral columns, and you can even discover, through owl pellet dissection, how our bones fit together in various joints, such as the ball and socket joint that joins the femur to the pelvis. It is a fun process to watch as some of the class moves from thinking this dark ball of fur is really gross to really cool! Hopefully, they have shared their experience with their families!