Duckling Discovery
On Tuesday 22nd March 2022, we had a very special delivery. We received six duck eggs.
Little did we know that one of the ducklings would be keen to meet us. Within minutes of arriving one of the ducklings decided to make an appearance.
On the morning of Wednesday 23rd March we came in to find that three more ducklings had hatched over night. We moved them into the brooding box as they were lovely and fluffy.
Later that day we were lucky enough to see the arrival of our fifth duckling!
Duckling hatching- time lapse
The ducklings have grow so much over the past week. They are very fluffy and extremely noisy now!
Mrs Neale took them home over the weekend and gave them their first swim, which they loved! They kept splashing each other and zooming around in the water.
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Throughout the week we have been keeping a duckling diary and observing their changes.
On Wednesday we named the ducklings. The winning names were Fluffy, Jimmy, Shelley, Chip and George.
We have done lots of learning based on the ducklings. The children have learnt that they are birds because they have wings, lay eggs and have beaks. We know that they are not mammals because they do not give birth to live young. We have also learnt that they have waterproof feathers and webbed feet. We found out that a duck lays its first egg when it is around 20 weeks old and it takes around 28 days for a duckling to develop in the egg in order to be ready to hatch.
The children are going to be using this information to write a non-chronological report.
The reception children have been weighing the ducklings in their maths lessons and discussing which one was the heaviest and which was the lightest. They also had a go at using their phonics to label the parts of a duckling.
The children have thoroughly enjoyed having the ducklings and observing their changes. They particularly loved it when they splashed and dived in the water and ran around slipping and sliding.
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We cannot believe the change in our fluffy, feathered friends. We were all very sad to see them go but we know they are off to a wonderful home on a farm where they’ll have lots of other feathered friends to waddle and splash around with. We are incredibly lucky to have had this opportunity and I know it is something the children have learnt so much from and will remember for years to come.
