Mrs. Vanstone’s Grade 2 class at Miami School were chirping with excitement when they recently hatched 27 baby chicks at the end of April.
The class integrated this project into their “Growth and Changes in Animals” science unit, turning learning into a hands-on experience.
“The process was a learning curve, but fortunately for us, we had a student-teacher from the previous year complete this activity with the students,” said Tania Vanstone, “so the hope is that it will become a bit of a tradition at Miami School.”
The school bought an incubator and an egg turner and researched how to hatch chicken eggs very carefully.
“We set up the incubator two days before putting eggs in to have the proper humidity and temperature,” said Vanstone. “These were excellent lessons to learn that span over other science units that we learn in Grade 2.
The class utilized eggs from both Mrs. Vanstone’s farm and another local farm. For 18 days, the eggs were kept in the incubator while the students worked hard to ensure proper temperature and humidity levels were maintained.
“During this time, we were able to use an egg candler to see the embryos develop several times, and on Day 18, the incubator went into lockdown mode, where we don’t open it and try to increase the humidity. At that time, we prepared the place that they would live outside the incubator, and gathered a chick waterer and chick starter, which are crumbles that chicks eat.”
It was supposed to take 21 days to hatch, but to the class’s surprise, they began hatching on Day 20. In total, the class successfully hatched 27 chicks – 21 in one incubator and six in another.
After hatching, the class created a brooder from a large cardboard box and utilized a heat lamp to maintain their warmth. The chicks remained in the classroom for five days and were taken home by Mrs. Vanstone every evening for overnight care.
One of the more exciting parts of the project for the students have been the naming of the chicks as each student chose their own chick after hatching and were able to choose a unique name for it.
The baby chicks are currently being rehomed to local farms in the area.
Some of the big lessons that the Grade 2 students learned throughout this exercise include the life cycle of the chicken, parts of the egg, parts of the chicken, chick embryo development, chicken breeds, types of chickens and how to take care of chickens.
“It has been a very rewarding experience and has been hands-on learning,” said Vanstone. “It has been very exciting to see the students engaged in learning, and we have been able to use this learning venture in reading, writing, science and math.”
Standard Photo by Tania Vanstone
