Activity 1: Egg and spoon

Activity type: Moving bodies

Skills: Problem-solving

Outcome: Outcome 1: Children have a strong sense of identity - Children develop their emerging autonomy, interdependence, resilience, and agency.

Resources:

different-sized and shaped spoons
wooden eggs (or other unbreakable eggs) in an egg carton
rope or markers
second empty egg carton
activity card.

Activity Description

Children choose a spoon and an egg and try to balance the egg in the spoon down the course to the far end. Do teaspoons work? What about a soup ladle? Can you carry more than one egg? Is it easier if you use two spoons?

Activity Set Up

Set up the activity with one egg carton filled with eggs at one end, a short course marked out by markers or a rope on the ground, and the second empty egg carton set up at the other end. Place the activity card at the first full egg carton to help scaffold the activity.

Activity 2: Nesting eggs

Activity type: Creation

Skills: Foundational numeracy

Outcome: Outcome 5: Children are effective communicators - Children begin to understand how symbols and pattern systems work.

Resources:

egg and nest printable
colouring materials (pencils, crayons, markers, etc)
scissors
glue sticks.

Activity Description

Children pick and choose colours and patterns to decorate their eggs. They practice their cutting skills and cut out the eggs to glue into their nest. Educators can talk to students about why they chose their colours and help them identify patterns and symbols they used in decorating their eggs.

Activity Set Up

Set up a table with chairs, placing the art supplies and printouts in the middle of the table. You might like to do an example (egg-sample?) to scaffold the children’s activity.

Activity 3: Reading nests

Activity type: Quiet time

Skills: Foundational literacy

Outcome: Outcome 5: Children are effective communicators - Children engage with a range of texts and gain meaning from these texts.

Resources:

blankets
cushions
books about eggs, nests, birds, reptiles, platypus or echidnas! We recommend:
- Chickens aren’t the only ones (Ruth Heller)
- Emus under the Bed (Leann J Edwards)
- Paddles the Platypus (Eva-Marie Welsh)
- Hunwick’s Egg (Mem Fox).

Activity Description

Set up one or more reading nests. Use blankets to make the outside edges of the nest and add cushions to be the eggs. Set up each nest with a stack of books

Activity Set Up

Activity 4: Natural nests

Activity type: Nature time

Skills: Problem-solving

Outcome: Outcome 4: children are confident and involved learners - Children develop a growth mindset and learning dispositions such as curiosity, cooperation, confidence, creativity, commitment, enthusiasm, persistence, imagination and reflexivity.

Resources:

a range of natural materials such as grasses, leaves, sticks, feathers, stringy bark off gum trees, she-oke needles and paperbark (collected from the ground/dead trees – alive trees need their bark and leaves!)
eggs (wooden eggs, blown eggs, paper clay eggs)
small cardboard boxes (the bottom of milk cartons work well, and you can use the rest of the carton to protect seedlings in the garden).

Activity Description

Children can use the materials to make a small nest inside their cardboard box for their egg. They can think about different materials and how they fit together and what would be the most snug home for a baby. Set aside a place where students can put their finished nests.

Activity Set Up

On a blanket or table, set up the natural materials, the boxes, the eggs and an example nest.

Activity 5: Whose egg?

Activity type: Busy hands

Skills: Science understanding, Foundational numeracy

Outcome: Outcome 2: Children are connected with and contribute to their world - Children become socially responsible and show respect for the environment.

Resources:

egg and animal cards - pre-cut (You might like to laminate these if you’re planning on using them again!).

Activity Description

Children match up the eggs with the babies inside. They can explore the different shapes and how they can rotate the cards to make the shapes line up. They can also explore the different types of sizes of eggs. The animals are:

Australian emu
short-beaked echidna
tokay gecko
Port Jackson shark
lesser-spotted dogfish (a type of shark)
golden apple snail
monarch butterfly
chicken
diamond python
common frog
Indian myna

Activity Set Up

Print out the eggs and animals, cut out the shapes and laminate (for repeated use!). Set up the table with the eggs covering the animals, so children can pick them up and explore which animals are inside the eggs. Children can also mix the cards up and match the animal to their egg based on the shape of the card.

Activity 6: Hatching time

Activity type: Imagination

Skills: Social-emotional learning

Outcome: Outcome 1: Children have a strong sense of identity - Children learn to interact in relation to others with care, empathy and respect

Resources:

large egg (white/brown sheet, cushions, large box and pegs)
animal dress-ups e.g. wings, masks, feathers, etc.

Activity Description

Children can dress up and crawl inside the egg and pretend they are a baby animal hatching out for the first time. Some children might pretend to be the animal parents taking care of the newly hatched babies. They might be birds, lizards, sharks or butterflies!

Activity Set Up

You can make a large egg by stacking cushions around a cardboard box, wrapping it with a brown or white sheet and securing it with pegs. You could also use an egg chair or even a fabric swing (like a certain blue dog!)

Set the dress-ups out nearby and make sure there is some room for children to move around and pretend to be animals.

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