Turning the Eggs

We finished the last of our weather projects today and are going to dive right into our chick life cycle unit. This will be our culminating science unit for first grade and is such a fun way to end the year! Last Wednesday we put 12 eggs in our incubator and the kids have been taking turns working as "Official Egg Turners," turning the eggs three times each day, as the mother hen would, to make sure that the chicks inside develop properly. We have learned that the eggs need to be treated very carefully and kept in the closed incubator at 100.5 degrees for about 21 days in order to hatch. Each day two children very carefully turn the eggs inside the incubator early in the morning, at lunch time, and during dismissal time. Other than these turn times we leave the eggs alone, though our incubator has a clear lid so we can peek in! Tomorrow we will "candle" the eggs for the first time, meaning that we will turn out the classroom lights and shine a bright light through each egg, one at a time, in order to see the developing embryo inside. Sort of like a chick ultrasound! We will candle the eggs three times over the next two weeks and should be able to watch the embryo inside getting bigger. Below are some photos of the Official Egg Turners hard at work. On your child's egg turning day he/she will bring home a badge that says, "I turned an egg today. Ask me how" so that you will know to ask all about it!

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