70 NATURE STUDY LESSONS FOR PRIMARY GRADES 



Do you know what is sometimes done to chickens 

 to keep them from flying over fences? (Their wing 

 feathers on one wing are clipped.) How does this 

 hinder them from flying so high? (They cannot 

 balance themselves.) How does a chicken fly? (By 

 beating its wings against the air.) You can raise your 

 heavy body a little way from the ground by pushing 

 down on two posts driven into the ground. A bird 

 has no posts to push against, but it can press against 

 the air. That is always handy, too. [By the use 

 of a light fan, fanning downward and outward rapidly, 

 the children become conscious that there is a resist- 

 ance of the air.] 



[We do not wish to go deeply into this subject. 

 Perhaps it would be wise not to touch upon it at 

 all, but usually the interested children bring up 

 the question and force some explanation of how 

 birds jly.~\ The motions of the wings made by the 

 chicken in flying are they slow or rapid? In 

 raising its wing why does not the air above push 

 the bird back? The chicken does not raise its 

 wing straight up, it cuts through the air with the 

 front of the wing, so (showing with the fan). 



You have seen the wing of a chicken on the 

 dinner table and it looks much smaller than when 



