Teaching Kids About Hatching Baby Chicks

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Jessica Anderson: We’d like to thank our sponsor for this episode, Brinsea. That’s B R I N S E A, chick incubation specialists. They’ve been focusing on egg incubator design continuously since 1976, resulting in egg incubators, chick brooders, and incubation accessories. They offer unparalleled practicality, reliability, superior hatch rates, and healthy chicks. Innovation you can trust.

Kenny Coogan: Good day, everyone. I am Kenny Coogan and joining me is Ann Accetta-Scott. Ann homesteads in Tennessee and regularly contributes to Backyard Poultry magazine. [00:02:00] Today, we are talking about teaching kids about hatching chicks. Welcome to the podcast, Ann. And I know that we caught you mid morning chores, which is very exciting.

Ann Accetta-Scott: Yeah, it’s a busy time up until two o’clock in the afternoon.

Kenny Coogan: Can you tell the listeners some of the animals that you have on your homestead and farm?

Ann Accetta-Scott: Well, we are a truly fully functioning farm. Not only do we feed ourselves, we take our our provisions and sell it out to our local community as well, too.

So we raise non GMO fed, pasture raised chickens and holiday turkeys. We also do raw milk off the property CSA packages, you can purchase a half or a whole hog from us. The only thing we do not sell that we raise is our beef and our lamb. Those are just for private consumption only, unless you are part of the CSA package. And then at that point, it rotates between what we have available to add into the CSA.

[00:02:58] Why Teach Kids About Hatching Baby Chicks?

Kenny Coogan: So today we’re going to be [00:03:00] talking about teaching kids about hatching chicks. And hatching chicks is a exciting time for everyone, adults and children. And having kids help is a great social, emotional, and scientific journey.

And I was a middle school agriculture and FFA advisor for many years, and I know that you can sneak in a lot of lessons when you’re teaching kids about hatching chicks. So, Ann, what ages do you like to include kids in helping out with hatching chicks?

Ann Accetta-Scott: Well, when we did it at the Hardison Mill School down in Columbia, Tennessee, the ages there were anywhere from basically second grade up until sixth grade.

So it’s a one room schoolhouse. So that’s how we function in that. But if you are talking on a private level, we’ve been hatching chicks for the last 10 years on our homestead. And so that our children, Lola is, I guess Lola started our last of seven and 16 next month. So [00:04:00] for, since she was six years old, but that doesn’t exclude toddlers from coming to learn and see as well as, you know, up until maybe your last child who’s 14, 15, 16, is responsible for making sure the incubator’s running properly. So at any age, basically.

Kenny Coogan: And why should we teach kids about hatching chicks?

Ann Accetta-Scott: It’s part of the lifestyle that we live, right? If we’re homesteading or if we’re farming or have a farmstead or anything like that our lifestyle dictates that in order to continue with having the ability to have fresh eggs or a meat production or whatever the case is, that we want them to see from the start to the finish, you know, especially if you don’t have a broody hen. So if you don’t have a broody hen you are going to need to utilize an incubator, and we want the understanding that we are still going to be sufficient, you know, in that sense of being able to raise what we want on our homespace, but especially if you, [00:05:00] you know, are just hatching for laying production and things like that.

[00:05:04] Age-Based Activities for Kids When Hatching Baby Chicks

Kenny Coogan: Now, earlier you mentioned, you know, 14 to 16 year olds helping with the incubator, and then you also mentioned some preschoolers observing. So what are some tasks or jobs that kids can do while watching or waiting for the eggs to hatch?

Ann Accetta-Scott: Prior to this journey of homesteading, prior to 10 years ago, I was a preschool teacher at a Christian private preschool. And so that age ranged from basically two and a half on up. Okay. So of course the two and a half year olds didn’t participate much, but we’re talking about the basically anywhere from 4 to 5 year old. At the time, we only brought the little, a little incubator into the preschool classrooms. So they had to check the humidity level. They had to check to make sure the eggs rotated based on the Xs that we marked on each egg. And then from there, they had to fill the humidity water tank just make sure, of the water tank, to make sure that a [00:06:00] humidity level within the incubator was completely filled, especially if we left during the weekend, right, to come back to school to make sure that everything was okay on that.

So they did have tasks in every single day, each, each child rotated through the tasks. And then from there, the pre schoolers, right? The basically preschool, the pre k kids, had a journal that they would actually document in regards to no eggs hatched, you know, everything still looks good. We candled, we threw away one egg or whatever the case is. So they, they had to document their whole entire journey of whatever they were hatching, whether it was quail or chicks or ducklings, it was a journey process.

Kenny Coogan: You mentioned The kids were checking the eggs with X’s. Can you talk a little bit about how you marked the eggs and how they would know what side is up?

Ann Accetta-Scott: Anything can go wrong with an incubator. We all know that, right? So we want to make sure that the rotating mechanism, that if you have one that you’re not manually rotating, but if you have one that [00:07:00] actually has an automatic rotator in it, is moving efficiently, so you always want to mark one side of your egg with an X. We use a black Sharpie to do that. And then every day they would come in to make sure that the egg was actually rotating. So if the X was on top one day, then before they would leave, they need to make sure that throughout their time that the X was in a different position. So that was part of their journal, journaling process to know that they heard. I mean, they could hear that the rotator moves. So they would be like, they would all stop and look up from what they were doing and just hold their breaths a little bit. And then the group that was supposed to journal it at that time would just get up and go make sure that it moved properly. So, you know, kids are, kids are one of those things that they take ownership so strongly if you give it to them. And that is the key to, to anything, incubating eggs, especially, because that’s a big responsibility, right?

Kenny Coogan: Yes, it is. And I like how you mentioned that journal because If you have four year olds, they’re not going to be taking copious notes, but I could [00:08:00] imagine you printing out a chart for each of them, and they could even have like a happy/sad sticker or an X and an O sticker, and they could just be filling out that chart.

All right. Now, are there any books or internet resources that you’d like to use as a supplement? Or, you know, as a go-to to teach kids about hatching chicks or the parts of an egg, because, like I mentioned, I was teaching middle school, 12 to 14 year olds, and I would say, 5 percent or less knew if the albumen or the yolk turned into the chick.

Ann Accetta-Scott: You don’t get to open up an egg, like a fresh egg, and look at it and go, Oh, here’s the identifying factor of what it is and what’s going to happen. So I think that with in regards to books. You know, there are a couple of books out there. I mean, realistically, if you pick up any chicken keeping book at this point in time, it is very detailed.

I mean, there’s, there’s got to be over 30 or 40 [00:09:00] chicken keeping books out there right now that actually will break it down for you. And that’s just chicken keeping, whether it’s keeping chickens naturally or, or just a basic book on chicken keeping, whatever the case is. The, the key to it is though, is that when working with the younger children, right, the ones that are really wanting to be like their 10 year old sister, it’s that, it’s the ability to show them photos, right, of what the book is about.

There is nothing that I know of that reaches truly pre K. Okay, so if you go to pre K, there’s there’s hardly anything. If you’re lucky, you can print out a coloring worksheet or something like that, and then make that your group discussion in regards to how you’re going to do it, especially if you like homeschool, right? That could be part of your homeschooling curriculum as you go forward. But just about any book that you can pick up anywhere: Tractor Supply, Amazon, you know, any online bookstore at this point in time will definitely show you the anatomy of the egg and the progression of from the day that you collected that egg out of the nesting box and [00:10:00] decided to incubate it to hatch day.

And it even teaches you, like all those books now teach you, like what, what was the problem? Like, like what happens when the chick is shrunk wrapped into the egg because the membrane dried out on it, you know, things like that. So any book, pick a book, they all have it in there.

[00:10:17] Egg-Hatching Curriculum for Hatching Baby Chicks

Kenny Coogan: Alright, so speaking of the development of the eggs, are there some favorite go-to scientific lessons or topics that you like to include while teaching kids about hatching eggs?

Ann Accetta-Scott: I think that the best thing to do is to either create a chart for your family, right? If you’re homeschooling. Or if like for us, when I taught preschool. Create that chart in something like that. And then go, you can go online and just print out coloring sheets, print out anatomy sheets, print out all the things that you need, and you go from that direction and move forward.

I think that if there, there is a lesson from a woman who has created, I think, probably one of the best [00:11:00] curriculums. But even if you don’t homestead, I would suggest you get this because– homeschool– because of the simple fact that she’s really good. But she has a, basically, it’s a homeschool curriculum for people who homeschool. And one of her lesson plans in this particular workbook, you get a workbook of all the lesson plans that you could do for the year and kind of thing like that, is egg incubation. And I mean, they reach every single age level. So even if your children are attending a public school, right, and you’re homesteading, I’m going to tell you, this book is ideal. Because you sometimes, you know, we get busy in our lives and we’re like, our children are doing everything but sometimes we’re rushing through things. We don’t realize that our children are like missing key elements.

So if you’re incubating eggs and your children go to a public school, it doesn’t have an FFA because our public school in Washington state didn’t have an FFA. And so with things like that, I think that as a parent, you could turn around and go, Hey, we’re going to incubate eggs this summer. And you know what, this is what we’re going to do. And then that [00:12:00] child who still goes to a public school can still participate and see the process and learn the process of how it goes, not just from, Oh, I took this egg, put it in the incubator. oh, a chick came out, right? There’s so much more to it.

Kenny Coogan: Yeah. And I’m coming from the middle school level and in middle school science, they learn about embryology, the study of embryos, not just of chicks, but of mammals and reptiles, and comparing and contrasting those is like an easy connection if you’re hatching, you know, eggs at home. And also, the high school level, you can talk about fertilization and elementary through high school, you should be talking about the parts of an egg, the parts of a chick, duckling, biology, lots of things. And then you had mentioned, you know, even the preschoolers were noting the humidity, and that’s a great physical science lesson. Humidity, temperature of water, and how those things are affected each other.

Ann Accetta-Scott: The easiest way to do that is to have them go stand in the sun. How do you feel when you’re standing in the sun? Do you feel hot? Are [00:13:00] you sweating? What’s going on? Right? And then you come in and you explain, okay, this is what happens with the humidity level inside of the incubator. What does it do? Do you feel moist when you’re standing outside? Well, inside the egg, when the humidity level is here, this is what you’re feeling.

And I think that, I think that with hatching and whether you’re an adult or a child that, that wants to venture on this journey is, is that, it is absolutely incredible when you hold a life, right, basically in, in the palm of your hands, not realistically, but, you know, that you are, like, waiting for hatch day. I’ve been doing this 10 years, and any time I incubate, I, like, am, like, a nervous Nelly in regards to hatch day because it’s like, oh my gosh, is it going to be viable? How much am I going to get? Did I just waste my time? Whatever the case is. But I think that the hardest incubation for me is waterfowl, right?

So waterfowl is, is one of the ones that, you know, you have to put a little bit more focus on. Well, I’ll say this, the incubators that I had prior [00:14:00] to the incubator that I have now, I had to really pay attention to, because humidity levels on waterfowl shift so drastically, right? And so, like, with, when I was hatching goose eggs, I would have to, like, I literally would take them out and dip them in water twice a day because my humidity level would not balance properly.

But the incubator that I have now is so efficient that you put the eggs in there, you set it, you walk by it a couple of times, and you’re like, still holding. This is great. Don’t have to touch it again after that. I’m good to go. So I think that all of that depends on that. But, you know, you, you, you teach a lesson that’s so valuable to anybody, whether it’s an adult or a child, you know, it’s, it’s sustainability. It’s our life. It’s what we achieve to do.

Kenny Coogan: When you were talking about the waterfowl and you also had mentioned quail, I was thinking a great comparative anatomy lesson would be between all those different types of poultry.

Ann Accetta-Scott: Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think that with it said, you know, when you, when you’re [00:15:00] putting this itty bitty quail egg in there to a massive goose egg in there, right? You know, you turn around and you’re like, okay, so what’s the same in regards to anatomy of the internal anatomy, especially right, to that, because they could see externally what the difference is. But when you turn around and you say, okay, I’m going to put in, how do we handle this? What do we do from this point? You know, and then, you know, brooder temperature is completely different for each animal and what we need to do with it. And so, I think that there is really when it comes to this, the whole aspect of it is, is that this could be one lesson plan that’s an everyday work in progress, right?

Every day there’s something, you will teach something every day. And what happens with children is, is that they, they get ownership of it, right? It’s no longer, Hey, we hatch chicks. It’s, Hey, I hatch chicks, you know, and things like that. And so we start learning that process a little bit more and it, it totally shifts to adult [00:16:00] being responsible for teaching our children to our children, taking ownership and saying, okay, mom, we didn’t check the incubator before we went to bed. Where are we at? What are we doing? Kind of thing like that. So I think that that plays, that factor into it, and I think it’s just beneficial. But I think it’s also important for them to know that quail eggs, chicken eggs, duck eggs, and geese eggs would incubate at different times, different humidity levels, right? And, you know, what your anticipation is for where, what happens through that process.

Kenny Coogan: A big push all across the country is PBL, Project Based Learning, and this is like an easy project where you could just come up with so many charts and graphs. You can also, we didn’t even mention graphing, you know, you could be graphing the temperature every day as a big chart.

Ann Accetta-Scott: Oh, absolutely. I’ll just give an example. My ewes just lambed, right? But because I didn’t do intentional breeding this year because I was traveling a lot, I had a general base [00:17:00] idea of when my ewes were going to lamb. But then at that point, you don’t have the exact date. So externally, I can look at a couple of things to identify that. But however, when you’re putting an egg in there and all of a sudden hatch day comes on this particular day and they’re not hatching, you know, people are like, what did I do wrong?

Immediately. It’s it’s children are like, Mommy, what happened? What what’s going on? What, you know, or asking their teachers. And it’s like, well, this is the level of just being patient and nature doing nature. Let’s give it a good couple of days and see what happens after that. But they’re like, no, you know, you said an egg hatches on this date.

And how do you teach a child? Like, wait, let’s back up a little bit. Sometimes due dates are based on… right? And so you’re teaching them the anticipation of nature has to fulfill nature in order to move forward and do what it needs to do. But then of course, then we have to teach that some eggs aren’t viable, right? And then you’re, you’re answering the question of, well, did it die? You know, you know, what happened? And things like that. And then [00:18:00] you have to resort to, you know, we, we candled it. It looked great on this day before we went into lockdown. And then, you know, there are some children that will say, you know, I want to see what happened. And then there are some children that don’t want to see at all. Right? So the child that wants to see what happened, take the egg outside, go ahead away from it where you don’t want it to be in case right? It stinks, you know, and stuff like that. But then, you know, you’re having that conversation of, you know, from viable life to death at that point, right?

And that’s a conversation that, depending on your child and depending on what you’re comfortable with, but that is a conversation that we as homesteaders and farmers want to teach our children, right? That anticipation and expectation of things that live do die.

Kenny Coogan: So we’re going to talk a little bit more about those emotional lessons that you can implement after the break. But first, I wanted to finish up with the science based or the science themed lessons.

When you were talking about you had, you [00:19:00] allowed the, the sheep to, you know, freely breed. I was thinking some other great lessons for hatching chicks is genetics, Punnett squares, phenotypes, like the physical traits, genotypes, what are their genes.

Ann Accetta-Scott: Yeah, I agree with you. Look, I’m a big believer in barnyard mixes. I really am. I, I, I love my barnyard mixes because then we start switching egg color, right? We start switching feather patterns. We start switching, you know, the temperaments even of a bird, right? So I’m, I’m a big believer in barnyard mixes. However, I do have certain breeds that I want to keep true. So if you are, if your family is teaching, you know, like sustainability on barnyard mixes, then you’ve got to sit down and break it down, right? Egg color, size of the production of the bird, the feather pattern at that point, how to identify, you know, if it’s auto, if the breed is auto sexing, how can we determine at that point, like, what we’re looking for, you know, for. You know, like a Welsh Harlequin duck is auto sexing, right? And there’s certain [00:20:00] chicken breeds that are as well, too. So teaching them that aspect of it all, I think that the anticipating the anticipation of them going, Oh, this, we put all Black Copper Marans eggs in there, and this is going to come out looking this way. Oh, no, this brooder has barnyard mixes. So let’s see what we get. So then you leave the incubator, and then you go forward to documenting from this chick into egg production laying phase of it came out with photos looking like this, and we’re documenting and we’re changing and we’re this and we’re that, and then you know this is what you’re going to get. Maybe a horrible, horrible production and egg laying or a beautiful bright blue egg, you know what I mean?

So those are things that we teach them for like longevity purposes, right? And so every flock needs to be freshened, but then that’s another topic. We went from incubating to hatching to, you know, your flock still needs to be freshened or else we still have crossbreeding happening. You know what I [00:21:00] mean? So it can go on forever.

Kenny Coogan: Yes, it could. I love a vocabulary and I would love to teach the students about heterosis, hybrid vigor. About, you know, you breed this one and this one and then are they going to have a better egg production than their parents or less? This is like a long term lesson now.

Ann Accetta-Scott: Yes, absolutely. How many houses do you need if you’re going to breed true, you know, back to all.

Kenny Coogan: Oh, and then in math class, you could talk about poultry math, about how you think you’re going to start with three chicks, but then you end up with 25.

Ann Accetta-Scott: Absolutely. Never, never project small, but never project large, because every year you’ve got to do something, and it just goes from 5 to 25 in a blink of an eye.

[00:21:45] Social Lessons for Kids While Hatching Chicks

Kenny Coogan: Another thing that you could implement while teaching kids about hatching eggs is some social lessons. Are there any specific social lessons that come to mind?

Ann Accetta-Scott: Well, if you are participating in 4-H, [00:22:00] right? That’s, that’s the biggest social lesson you’re going to get in that sense, right? So if you, I mean, you could show, you know, your Cornish crosses, of course. But if you’re showing your own private purebred stock, that is going to be one of the things that is absolutely fantastic. But then the other aspect of it is, too, is that, let me give you an example. Lola sold eggs in Washington as her own business. Okay, so we, all we did was take her to buy her feed, which she had to buy herself. And then I took her to deliver her eggs and we delivered them in town. We didn’t live in town. And so with her, she had to budget for feed. She had a budget for material costs. She had a budget for gas because I didn’t charge her for my time, but I did charge her for her gas. And then anything else that she net after that was profit to her.

Okay, so that took this child who was social to begin with outside to be a business person to say, okay, this is what I need to sell my eggs for, feed costs went up and things like that. And she was out in her community [00:23:00] pitching egg sales to other people. And then on top of that, her friends were like, well, how do you have so much money? And she was in elementary school. How do your friends have so much money? She goes, I sell eggs. She goes, what do you do? Well, I guess we do chores, but my mom doesn’t pay us. You know what I mean? So she’s teaching them that you should get a business, you know, so it helps. It does help social aspect of it.

Kenny Coogan: Very good. Another social lesson I was thinking for little kids is when the chicks are hatching and there’s a pecking order being established. You could talk about, Oh, you know, why do you think this one is bullying this one? What could we do as a classroom to be nicer to one another?

Ann Accetta-Scott: Yeah, that’s a good idea. Those are, yeah, no, I didn’t think about that, but that’s a good idea.

Kenny Coogan: All right, we’re going to take a quick break to hear a word from our sponsor. And when we return, we’re going to talk about some emotional lessons that can be implemented while teaching kids about [00:24:00] hatching chicks.

[00:24:01] Brinsea Midroll Ad

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[00:24:36] How to Address Chick Incubation Problems with Kids

Kenny Coogan: We’re back with Ann Accetta-Scott, contributor to Backyard Poultry Magazine. So Ann, how can listeners help kids get comfortable with learning something new or when a problem happens when incubating or hatching?

Ann Accetta-Scott: I think the key point is, is that patience is a virtue, right? We are, we have to teach our children to be patient through the whole [00:25:00] process.

I think that, you know, the anticipating of the calendar markdown of when hatch day is going to be being, you know, the, the frustration that nothing was viable, right? The frustration that something had died, the, the sorrow that now, what do you do with a potential chick that did not hatch, right? And things like that.

I think that, the, the problem solving aspect of it is, is that for us, for Justin and I, as parents, right, we needed our children to understand the life and death cycles of things. And then on top of that, if you were going to sell your, your chicks that hatch, right, that your children understand that you can’t keep 26 more chickens and that, you know, you did this for a reason. Or, you know, a bird dies or whatever the case is. And how do you manage that emotionally?

I will say this. The longer you do this, the easier it does become for your children. Because then that anticipation has been taught. They have time to absorb it. They have time to live the lessons of it. And then from there, you turn around and you you, you continue. And then [00:26:00] what happens is, is that, you know, it goes from just incubating eggs to other farm animals at that point in time. Like, are they responsible for other larger livestock and things like that? I think that with the whole aspect of the start to finish project, right, from the gathering the egg for incubation, then turning around to having a chick hatch to brooding and stuff like that. I think that it’s probably one of the hardest lessons that children are going to learn in life, other than, like you said, of being bullied or being not understood and things like that. I think that this lesson is so nice because it’s in, it’s in your home, where you can guide along a lot better emotions and things like that for your children. So, I mean, maybe I just went off topic of your question, but, oh no? Okay.

Kenny Coogan: Yeah, that’s good. I was, I was just jotting down that I think I agree with you that this lesson or teaching kids about hatching eggs is so impactful. I [00:27:00] bet you could ask a handful of adults and all of them would remember when they were in elementary school and they hatched chicks, and then they were allowed to take a couple of ducklings home over the weekend, and they were, you know, responsible for that. And then that empowered them or engaged them so much that they became, you know, farmers or homesteaders when they were older.

Ann Accetta-Scott: Definitely. I mean, even it’s a lesson for adults too, right? I mean, nothing worse than you checking an egg and it was fully formed and it didn’t hatch. So, and that’s, that’s a hard one to explain to children. You know, that’s, that’s, that was, that’s a hard one. That’s a hard one for children, especially. So, yeah.

Kenny Coogan: And yes, nature will hatch the eggs when, when it deems appropriate. So, you know, 21 days and 12 hours or just on the verge of 22 days. I was thinking when you were mentioning, you know, marking down the calendar to hatch day. If you are doing this in a classroom, you should try to plan [00:28:00] to have them hatch during the week because I can only imagine the confusion. You leave Friday and you come Monday, and then you have chicks running around, and the kids are like, did you just buy these?

Ann Accetta-Scott: I, the very first time we did it at the school, I counted wrong, and I get there off by like two days. I don’t know how I did that. So yes, it’s been done. You will make a mistake and you will learn a very valuable lesson in the faces that are like, well, when did they hatch? And you’ll see their faces. So yes, make sure you count appropriately and double count, even triple count, your dates before you set your eggs. Absolutely.

Kenny Coogan: You can have the students double check your counting.

Ann Accetta-Scott: They’ll probably count better than you do at the moment in time.

Kenny Coogan: Thank you so much, Ann, for talking to us today about teaching kids about hatching chicks. And we encourage our listeners to implement this at their homestead [00:29:00] or at their school, or, you know, just share this information with their teacher friends.

Ann Accetta-Scott: Yes, absolutely.

Kenny Coogan: Thank you, Ann. Have a great day.

Ann Accetta-Scott: Thank you. Bye

[00:29:12] Podcast Credits and Brinsea Post-Roll Ad

Jessica Anderson: Thanks for joining us for this episode of Mother Earth News and Friends. To listen to more podcasts and get connected on our social media, visit www.MotherEarthNews.com/Podcast. You can also email us at Podcast@OgdenPubs.Com with any questions or suggestions. Our podcast production team includes Jessica Anderson, Kenny Coogan, and Alyssa Warner.

Music for this episode is “Hustle” by Kevin MacLeod.

The Mother Earth News and Friends podcast is a production of Ogden Publications.

Thanks again to Brinsea, our sponsor for this Mother Earth News and Friends podcast episode. You too can experience the Brinsea difference and maximize your hatch rates with Brinsea [00:30:00] incubators that monitor temperature and humidity and are made of antimicrobial materials.

Brinsea ships worldwide and provides stellar customer support to answer all your questions. Hatch your chicks with Brinsea, the leader in innovative incubation research. Learn more at Brinsea.com. Again, that’s www.Brinsea.com

Until next time, don’t forget to love your Mother.

About Ann Accetta-Scott

Ann Accetta-Scott has a small family farm on 42 acres in southern Middle Tennessee and raises poultry, dairy and beef cows, sheep, hogs, and rabbits for meat. The farm also offers hands-on workshops and community events pertaining to living a homesteading lifestyle. She is an educator and encourages everyone to seek a more sustainable lifestyle. Ann is also the face behind the website A Farm Girl in the Making and contributes to Backyard Poultry magazine regularly.

Learn More About Hatching Baby Chicks and Chicken Care

• Candling and Embryos
• Intro to 4-H Showmanship and Poultry Projects
• Caring for Chicks with Dalia Monterroso

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