Snowy Owl Classroom Fun

Tuesday on my way to school I heard a cool story on NPR about how all these snowy owls are suddenly showing up in the USA, which is uncommon. Why? the biologists wondered. Climate change? No. Crazy weather? No. The answer is a plethora of delicious lemmings.

I was excited to share the story with my class. We were reading a fiction story about a bird learning to fly this week, The Story of a Blue Bird.

I sat my students down at the rug and started summarizing what I had heard, our luck in having snowy owls visit our country. I was just about to tell them the reason why they are here and stopped myself. Instead I asked, Can you figure out why they're here all of a sudden? Think about what you know about living things. (In first grade we learn that living things need food, water, air, and shelter.)

My little sassy girl raised her hand and said, "Maybe they're here because there's a lot of food, like, I don't know, a bunch of mice or something?"

Take that biologists! I have a future candidate for you!

P.S. 1920s GIRL SCIENTIST Looking into a MICROSCOPE came from sandshoevintageprint.