Birds seem to be just about everywhere you look. Their cheerful chirping in the mornings and nesting habits in the spring are just a couple of our favorite things about learning about birds. Teaching birds to preschoolers can be fun too. Kids can dive in to learning about their nesting habits, migration, and even the many species of birds!
Here are some fabulous resources for planning your preschool bird theme. Most of these activities are designed for kids ages 3 through 5, but many can be modified for younger and older kids as well.
WHY IT’S FUN
A bird theme is a fun way to introduce nesting, laying eggs, migration or spring. Children love to learn about the world around them and make connections with familiar topics. And chances are, they’ve seen a bird flying overhead! A bird theme is also great as it encourages you to step outside and right into nature.
WHEN TO TEACH A BIRD THEME
A preschool bird theme can be taught any time of year. You may choose to pair it with letter B activities, or when teaching about trees. We love to incorporate preschool bird theme activities during spring. This allows us to get outside and listen to the birds happily chirping as they are nesting and flying about.
TEACHING TIPS & MAJOR CONCEPTS KIDS WILL LEARN
If you’re planning a preschool bird theme there are many possibilities for incorporating meaningful early learning skills.
These are just some of the concepts kids can learn about during a bird theme:
- feathers
- nests
- nesting habits
- different species
- migration
You can also use feathers or sticks as manipulatives for many learning activities to teach math and literacy concepts.
ITEMS TO COLLECT AND REQUEST IN ADVANCE
If you get parents, friends, and family involved you can enrich the experience kids have during your preschool bird theme.
Collect or ask people to help you collect:
- bird seed
- sticks/branches
- craft feathers
- pretend bird toys
- paper rolls (to make binoculars)
You might even invite special guests (or go visit if you can) to come and share about fields and hobbies related to birds. You could include:
- an ornithologist (bird scientist)
- a bird trainer
- a bird store owner/breeder of exotic birds
PRINTABLE BIRD THEME PRESCHOOL LESSON PLANS
Save time and get right to the playful learning with our printable lesson plan sets. Each set includes over 30 playful learning activities related to the theme, and we’ve provided different versions for home preschool families and classroom teachers so all activities are geared directly toward your needs.
This pack includes editable lesson plans and hands-on activities for a week full of math, reading, & science learning activities about birds. Watch this short video to see just a few examples of the types of activities and printables included in this set:
This set includes active hands-on learning ideas and the following printables:
1) B and N Sound Sort
2) b and d Sorting Cards
3) Bird List (for phonemic awareness and other activities)
4) Bird Color Sorting Mats
5) Bird and Not Bird Sorting Cards and Activity Mats
6) 0-35 Bird Number Cards
7) Dot Counting Egg Cards
8) Bird Emergent Readers
9) Feed the Bird Math Game
10) Bird Ordering and Patterning Cards
11) A to Z Uppercase Bird Cards
12) a to z Lowercase Nest Cards
Get Your Lesson Plans
Home Preschool Bird Theme Lesson Plans
Preschool Classroom Bird Theme Lesson Plans
Also available on Teachers Pay Teachers.
INDIVIDUAL BIRD ACTIVITY IDEAS ON FANTASTIC FUN AND LEARNING
Here on Fantastic Fun and Learning we’ve shared the following ideas to go along with a preschool bird theme.
Dig right in and explore bird nests with this bird sensory bin. Children will love to pretend that their birds are nesting, search for worms, and run their fingers through the bird seed.
Grab some play dough and build bird nests with some natural materials like we did with this invitation to create bird nests with play dough.
Explore 2-D shapes with this open-ended invitation to create birds art activity.
Flex those fine motor muscles and sort by color with this fun hands-on play dough bird activity. Children will get great fine motor practice as they pinch, grasp, and push the feathers into each bird.
Head outdoors and go on an alphabet scavenger hunt for bird eggs as kids search for hidden upper and lower case letters. Match the letters and return the eggs to their nest!
Have a little one that wants to be a bird for Halloween? Check out this DIY no-sew bird costume.
Involve some pretend play and gross motor skills as your little “birdies” search for the lost alphabet eggs hidden outside with this fun ABC gross motor egg hunt. As each egg is found, the “bird” (child) must squawk out its letter name!
MORE ACTIVITIES FROM CREATIVE EDUCATORS
Check out some of these fun hands-on bird theme activities across the curriculum from some creative educators.
INFORMATIONAL YOUTUBE VIDEOS
Learn lots about birds with some great real life video footage.
Learn all about baby birds from Nat Geo Kids.
This educational video about birds explores many of their similarities and differences.
YOUTUBE SONGS
Sing this fingerplay song Five Little Birds as children watch and interact at the same time.
Get kids moving as they flap their wings and move out of the nest just like the birds from this song, Flap Your Wings Together.
Sing along and count to ten with The Bird Song, as you are introduced to many different species of birds.
OTHER ONLINE RESOURCES
Finger plays and action rhymes are a great addition to your preschool themes. Here are a few terrific options to go along with a bird theme.
Everything Preschool has a big collection of bird songs and action rhymes to have fun with. Using familiar tunes, you can sing and act out songs about black birds, robins, owls, and even penguins!
We love The Little Bird finger play song! This instructional video shows you just how to engage little ones with this song.
If you’d like to supplement your hands-on learning with some online games you might try:
Play Birds Memory at NatGeo Kids.
Learn about geese, their migrating habits, and why they fly in a “V” formation with this online game about geese.
Visit this page to play games where you feed the Hungry Birds the right kinds of foods and identify types of feathers in Feather Frenzy.
FAVORITE BIRD BOOKS
Affiliate links included.
There are a ton of wonderful books to read for your bird theme. Below are some of our favorite picture books for a bird theme.
Bring birds and their habitats to life with real photographs and nonfiction texts.
MORE BIRD BOOKS
While we don’t have a full book list about birds. Many of these children’s books about eggs will tie in nicely with a bird theme.
OTHER PROPS AND TEACHING TOOLS
Reinforce learning with these hands-on materials for your bird theme. They can be used for sensory bins, crafts, and learning activities.
FREE PRINTABLES
Step outside and go bird watching! Record each species of bird that you see on this free bird watching tally response sheet.
POSSIBLE FIELD TRIPS OR ADVENTURES
- Visit an aviary
- Go bird watching outside
WHAT NEXT?
As you wrap up your bird theme preschool activities take note of what the kids were most interested in throughout the theme. Continue on by investigating one of those concepts more in depth. Below are some possible suggestions. Themes we have printable lesson plans for include links after them.
- Eggs-Lesson plans available.
- Spring-Lesson plans available.
- Trees-Lesson plans available.
RETURN TO OUR MAIN PRESCHOOL THEME PAGE FOR MORE IDEAS TO EXPLORE
Arts and Bricks
What a lovely round-up of BIRD art and kids’ activities! I can attest that my kiddos love birds! Our home is situated on a hill with a forest backyard. We have LOTS of birdfeeders, and our kitchen windows provide excellent bird watching. Because of this, my children are always drawing and making art of birds. The Cardinals are one of their favorites! Thanks for sharing.
Elina naitini
As a kindergarten teacher this really help me alot and help give me confidence in identify my weakness and help me on what to do in doing activities for a chosen theme.
Shaunna
We are so glad to hear that our resources were so helpful to you!