Fledgling’s First Flight

Teaching Resources and Ideas

Phonological Lessons Opportunities

Use the following graphemes, depending on where the children are at within the Scope and Sequence you are following. Blends have been included as some Scope and Sequence’s include them in this way. They can of course be taught as individual phonemes and then blended when reading/decoding.

• Single graphemes – f, s, d

• Blends – fl, scr, st, squ, gr, tw, br, gl, str, cr, tr, dr, wr, pr, pl, sm

• Consonant digraphs – sh, th

• Vowel digraphs or teams oa, ea, ee

• ing, ed, er (morphological)

Language features

Alliteration – Fledglings First Flight, so self-assured, screeching and squawking and circling,

Rhyme the whole book is written in rhyme, children can identify rhyming words and you can discuss that sometimes words rhyme when we hear them but are not always spelt the same, for example – “floated with ease….up past his knees” or “shriek /beak”

Simile – “heart like a drum”

Personification – “a smile crossed his beak”

Focus on one (or more) of the vocabulary words

Beseeched - ask (someone) urgently and fervently to do something.
Over prickles and thorns, they crawled and beseeched, "Stay still baby bird (Akiaki) we are trying to help"

Dappled - marked with spots or rounded patches.
He stretched his dappled wings to give it a try.

Declaring - say something in an emphatic manner.
Declaring that they wanted to lend a hand.

Distraught - very worried and upset.
Mother seagull (Whaea akiaki) distraught, she feared for his life

Engulfed - to surround or cover something completely.
Engulfed in the leaves, his joy abruptly ended.

Fledgling - a young bird that has just fledged, or started to fly, because it has wing feathers that are large enough for it to be able to fly. Red-billed gulls fledge at around 37 days old!
Fledgling (Kōhungahunga) took a deep breath and glanced at the sky

Implore - to beg someone desperately to do something.
The adults implore, "it's easy, fly up here!"

Screeching - give a loud, harsh, piercing cry.
Screeching and squawking and circling around,

Self-assured - confident in your own abilities or character.
They rode on the breeze, so self-assured.

Squawking - when a bird makes a loud, harsh noise.
Screeching and squawking and circling around,

Focus on Māori kupu

Akiaki - red-billed seagull, a grey-and-white gull found mainly on the coast, with pearly-grey back and wings, except for black wingtips, with small white patches.

Harakeke - New Zealand flax, an important native plant with long, stiff, upright leaves and dull red flowers. Found on lowland swamps throughout Aotearoa/New Zealand. It has straight, upright seed pods. This is a general name for the harakeke leaf, and the plant itself, but each different variety has its own name.

Kōhungahunga - to be young, a fledgling (See explanation of a fledgling).

Ngā huruhuru - the plural for hair, feathers, or bristles.

Ngā pakeke - to be grown up, an adult.

Te moana - open sea, open waters, the ocean.

Tēnā koe - (Speaking to one person) thank you.

Wahine - a woman, female, lady, and/or wife.

Whaea - a mother, aunt, or aunty.

Descriptions (oral or written)

• Describe the fledgling

• Describe the setting

• Describe the mother

• Describe the human who helped

• Extend to focus on feelings and actions into a retell

• The lady (author) saved a bird, explain if this is a good act or if you should let nature be? Why/Why not?

• Think of some words to describe the act of saving the bird - (kind, kindness, happy, compassionate, caring, thoughtful, scary etc.)

Writing and Research Ideas

• Smugglers Cove – what might happen there?

• Where is it?

• Who are smugglers?

• What might they smuggle?

• The birds of Smugglers Cove (Whitewash Reserve)

• Red billed gulls

• Black backed gulls

• Pigeons

• Cormorants

• Swallows

• Should humans help animals in distress?

• Write the story from the Fledgling’s point of view.

• What can we learn from this story/event?

Story Structure

Setting – On the cliffs overlooking the ocean. Specifically Smugglers Cove, Christchurch, although this is not mentioned in the story as such.

Characters – Main characters are the Fledgling, the mother gull and the woman who rescues the Fledgling.

Problem – The Fledgling is just learning to fly and lands deep in a flax bush and cannot get out!

Plan – The Fledgling needs to be rescued somehow, or he might not survive.

Actions – The woman tries to rescue the baby bird but needs to get the help of her neighbours.

Ending – The Fledgling is free and is happy to see the mother bird. The mother bird comes back to thank the woman who rescued her baby!