March 28, 2024

Extinct bird provides learning opportunity for students

Somehow, the Jasper County Conservation Office managed to celebrate an extinct animal’s anniversary and create a lesson plan to teach local sixth graders about art, biology, history and the environment during a special field trip on Wednesday.

“Sept. 1 was the 100th anniversary of the passenger pigeon’s extinction,” JCCO naturalist Katie Cantu said.

With that significant marking in mind, JCCO partnered with the Carroll County Conservation Office and the Centre for Arts & Artists to educate the sixth-grade class of Woodrow Wilson Elementary School on the now-extinct bird and others like it.

Students began the day at the Newton DMACC auditorium, where they watched the “Lost Bird Project” documentary.

“We thought that would be neat thing to show,” Cantu said.

The film focuses on five birds that have been driven to extinction. In the documentary, there was a scene that showcased five bronze sculptures of the extinct birds, and Cantu took inspiration from that to get the CAA involved.

“Newton is more of an art community, and I worked with Linda Klepinger (CAA executive director) and we started planning out having some displays and some other things to go along with it,” Cantu said.

Sixth-grader Anthony  Moran said watching the video was his favorite part because it informed him and his classmates about the problems that exist due to animal extinction.

“We have to stop destroying habitats of animals and hunting endangered species,” Moran said.

After watching the documentary, students learned about barnyard owls and peregrine falcons from Matt Wetrich, a naturalist with CCCO, who brought live birds along with him for his presentation. Wetrich said he enjoyed working with the students and felt this was a great way to teach them about his job and environmental responsibility.

“They were very interested, so I was impressed with that and very glad to see that,” Wetrich said. “They were very into it and respectful listeners, and they had lots of great questions. In fact, they had more questions than we had time for.”

Time did run short for Wetirch, as the students and staff made the short walk over to CAA. While there, they learned a poem about the passenger pigeon, learned a little history on sculpting from Herman Deaton, toured the facility and created their own birds to be hung outside of DMACC.

A number of the students seemed to be affected by the film and the facts from the other lessons they had learned throughout the day. Tess Brunsmann, another Woodrow student, even offered a solution to the extinction issue.

“We could stop using certain chemicals and start warning people about stuff,” Brunsmann said. “There is a bunch of birds that went extinct, and there were some people trying to help and a bunch that weren’t because they were over-hunting and doing stuff that led to the birds going away and not coming back.”

Cantu said she was glad they could find a way to highlight this important anniversary and still find a way to educate and entertain the students.

“We wanted kind of a tribute, and we wanted it to be educational and meaningful. I thought it tied in really well with Newton and our art and everything like that too,” Cantu said.

Contact Senior Staff Writer Ty Rushing at (641) 792-3121 ext. 6532 or at trushing@newtondailynews.com.