Kindergarten students and others throughout our community loved the addition of our twelve eggs and an incubator to our space. Daily visitors would check in to see the progress of the eggs as we waited patiently and made predictions about which egg would hatch first. Many observational drawings were created to document this wonderful project focusing on the life cycle of a chicken.
After seven days of wonder and waiting, Monday morning arrived and so did the first hatches from our twelve eggs. The children were overjoyed! They watched in amazement as the newborn chicks struggled to take their first steps after working so hard for hours chipping away at the eggshell with their egg teeth. There was some initial concern that the chicks were not okay because they were wet and not moving much. After the heat of the incubator dried their down, the baby chicks began to stir and began chirping and moving about with more ease.
Then it was time to move the chicks to the brooder box where they could be introduced to food and water for the very first time. The children watched in amazement as the chicks quickly acclimated to their new living space complete with a heating lamp and a multitude of siblings!
The chicks became the focus of our week as friends watched the growth and behavior changes as the days passed. The highlight of the week was when each child carefully held a chick. The baby chicks quickly became dear to the children as a variety of names were heard to name "their" chicks with names such as Fluffy, Fluffy One, Stubborn, and Samuel Jr. Our kindergarten chick project is something to look forward to each year and it is fascinating to see children in older grades return and share in the joy once again!
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