More than 100 children from Shumen took part in the first forest pedagogy lessons this summer organized by experts from the “Shumensko Plateau” Nature Park Directorate and the Northeast State Company.
For the first time the forester educators visited the children from the kindergarten “Izvorche” in Shumen. The new lesson was on the conservation of the Lesser Spotted Eagle in Bulgaria, increasing its numbers and creating suitable sites for the species.
In July, the Northeast State Company published the booklet “Tales from the Nest”, in which the children learn in an easy-to-understand way about the life of the Lesser Spotted Eagle, how it breeds, what it feeds on and where it occurs. Each page of the booklet presents a game, in which the children take on the role of eaglets – they build nests, learn to fly, look for food, and at the end of the summer fly south just to return to Bulgaria again in the spring. Each session is two hours long, and the children must read the book themselves and apply the knowledge they receive during the games.
In the coming months, children from Dobrich, Varna and Targovishte will also take part in the eagle lesson. Teachers of pre-school groups, as well as first and second graders, can invite the forest educators from the “Shumensko Plateau” Nature Park Directorate and the Northeast State Company to visit them, learn and have fun together.
The new lesson and the booklet “Tales from the Nest” are made possible thanks to the project “Conservation Measures for the Lesser Spotted Eagle and its habitats in Bulgaria”, which is part of the EU LIFE Programme. The partners in the project are EFA, BSPB, NESC and SESC and its aim is to create new habitats for the Lesser Spotted Eagle, to protect the species and to preserve the biodiversity of the forests in Bulgaria.