Feather experiments lesson

Hi! Future Ticia 2024 here, and I’m updating this Feather experiment lesson to organize it a bit better. Way back in 2011 when I wrote it, it was perfectly acceptable to just throw a bunch of ideas at you with no organization, but now… Now people expect organization. So I’m going to organize this into a better set of science lessons for a good addition to your Birds Unit as part of the overall Flying Creatures Unit (if you use Apologia). I now return you to Past Ticia 2011.

Do you remember my post about bird ideas?  Well, I’m taking an idea from it for our experiment this week. Future Ticia 2024 back right away, and right away I discovered the blog I linked to is now private and the post I’ve referenced I’ve since deleted and redirected to a different post. I’m off to a great start.

(there are affiliate links in here)

Supplies for the feather experiments

feathers (preferably several types, we only had contour feathers, Future Ticia 2024 points out craft supplies have come further), a bag of ice, stuff to make the feathers dirty (we used peanut butter, syrup, honey, flour), supplies to clean the bird (we used paper towels, cotton cloth, towels, future Ticia 2024 would also recommend using dish soap).

Set-up: We did this in two parts.  The first observation of the feather was coupled with the ice experiment, and the second part was done later that day to clean the feather.

Feather experiment 1: Type of feather

First, observe your feather.  What type of feather is it?  What do you notice about it?

My kids all remembered what its purpose was, but were fuzzy on the name.  The older kids remembered the names.

We looked through our magnifying glass and made more observations.  It wasn’t strong enough to see the barbs, but they were able to see more details.

 And finally, we wrote it down on our observation sheet.  My kids just drew pictures, but the older kids wrote about it.

Feather experiment 2: insulation

Then they held a bag of ice (or a freezer pack in our case) and then they held it with a bag of feathers underneath.

We all agreed the feathers do quite a nice job of insulating us from the cold.  Now they understand much better why someone might have a down blanket.

Except Jeff is allergic to down, and according to Superman so is Blue Arrow, who he will grow up to be.

And then we kicked the kids out to play while we set up the next part.

Feather experiment 3: cleaning feathers from an oil spill

Future Ticia 2024 popping in, I grew up in the 80s and 90s and I feel like my childhood was dominated by constant news of oil spills and the consequences of oil spills on wildlife, and pictures of birds covered in oil. In particular, I remember hearing about the Exxon Valdez oil spill. It may not have happened as often as I remember, but it sure seemed like it was all the time in my mind.

I also very much remember hearing that Dawn soap was the thing to use to clean birds covered in oil, and how we raised money at school to help send Dawn soap to help SAVE THE BIRDS!

Yes, it had capital letters in my mind.

But, now I’ll return you to our past experiments and how apparently in my past I didn’t give them the only effective method and only let them use various different towels.

Now, I would have let them brainstorm. Maybe that’s what I did and this is what they came up with.

And then they had to clean off a bird that had been hit by pollution.  Their feathers were covered in gunk, and they all discovered that no matter how hard they tried to clean it, you couldn’t get it back to where it was.

So, we were able to bring in how God created us to be stewards of the world, and it is our responsibility to care for it to the best of our ability.

Resources about feathers

Let’s talk about what you can use to help your kids learn more about feathers.

First this came about as we read through Apolgoia Flying Creatures of the Fifth Day.

• Feathers Not Just for Flying
• Feathers, Flaps, and Flops
• How to Make a Bird

But, what I really want to find are videos on cleaning bird feathers, because that has always fascinated me, like I said, as a kid I heard so much about this.

And a second video, sorry this fascinated me as a kid.

Maybe fascinated isn’t the right word, maybe it’s one of those things I just heard a whole lot and kept hearing about nonstop so it was on my brain all the time.

Feather photo