Frequently, birds come into our playgrounds at Handprints, often at tea time, invading children’s space - tending to be an annoyance, educators and children chasing magpies away. With the children discussing what the birds were doing, we decided as educators to research and therefore be able to better explain the birds behaviour.

At first we were surprised when our explanation led to children wanting to feed and help the birds, but we began to recognise and explore the children’s natural ability to show kindness. As a group of educators, we explored the Biophila Hypothesis and humans genetic need to be connected with nature. We provided the birds with some seed away from the children’s eating area, as we didn’t want to magpies to become sick from eating the wrong types of food (yogurt, muffins, crackers). As time went on we created a bird house and saw a reduction in the disruptive behaviours of the birds as the children created them their own place and food. We noticed some children were aware of the birds and were carefully approaching and/or climbing in the trees to reach them and trying to engage with them. Eventually the kookaburras were allowing children to stroke their tail feathers, they had built a trusting bond with our children.

Over the coming weeks we explored how to extend our interest in caring for the birds into other mediums. From clay birds, to plant a tree day where we created the bird hotel, the visual explorations of individual birds, the journey of how and where children can take an interest was extended. Our poster is a visual representation on how an interest-based project on birds led into research by teachers into genetics and empathy, and a thorough understanding of birds was built by the children.