Students investigate how red-tailed hawks use neighborhood habitats by closely observing trees, skies, and open spaces near their school and community, along with a field trip to the San Diego Natural History Museum to study hawks and local habitats more closely. Through outdoor walks, drawing, sorting found evidence, talking with museum educators, and building simple habitat models, they gather ideas about what hawks need to live and hunt. The learning experience helps students connect animal needs to local places they know while using the question, How do red-tailed hawks use the trees, skies, and open spaces around City Heights? Students share their understanding by creating a class explanation and a visual product that shows where hawks can meet their needs nearby.

Students observe and describe how red-tailed hawks use trees for resting, skies for flying, and open spaces for hunting and finding food, including during a field trip to the Museum of Natural History. They ask questions, make simple models, drawings, and maps, and use firsthand observations, museum experiences, and photos to show what hawks need to live in their neighborhood. Students compare different places in and around City Heights and explain why some spaces help hawks more than others. Students share their ideas with others through labeled pictures, oral language, and a class display that answers the question, “How do red-tailed hawks use the trees, skies, and open spaces around City Heights?”

Students will create a class observation mural with drawings, labels, photos, and ideas gathered during a field trip to the San Diego Natural History Museum showing how hawks use trees, skies, and open spaces. They will also make simple field journals with picture notes, feather and nest sketches, museum-inspired hawk studies, and class-made maps that track where hawks might hunt, perch, and fly. By the end, small groups will build a 3D neighborhood habitat model and record a short oral presentation explaining how each space helps a red-tailed hawk meet its needs. The final products can be shared in a “Hawk Museum” for families and school visitors.

Begin with a visit to the San Diego Natural History Museum, where students look closely at red-tailed hawk displays, feathers, nests, and habitat models and talk about what hawks need to live. At the museum or back in class, invite students to act out how a hawk perches, flies, scans for food, and stays safe in different spaces. Create a large class map with drawings of trees, poles, buildings, and open areas, and ask students where a hawk could rest, hunt, and travel. Close by introducing the question, “How do red-tailed hawks use the trees, skies, and open spaces around City Heights?”

Host a “Hawk Habitat Walk” at the San Diego Natural History Museum, where children share a class mural, simple maps, and labeled models showing how red-tailed hawks use trees, skies, and open spaces around City Heights. Students can guide families and museum guests through stations with binoculars, nest models, feather sketches, and short oral explanations answering, “How do red-tailed hawks use the trees, skies, and open spaces around City Heights?” Include a short performance with movement and sound to show hawk hunting, soaring, and resting behaviors. Display photos and observation notes from neighborhood walks alongside museum exhibits so students can connect their learning to real places they studied.