Desert View Students Grasp Nature in Their Own Hands

Desert View Christian School student Kierianna Chavez holds a hummingbird in her hand while Sierra Ferrier watches. Another student listens to the wild heartbeat of the hummingbird.

Every year as the hummingbirds migrate, Stacy Peterson, a member of the National Hummingbird Research Group, bands the birds so the group can track their migration throughout the Americas. Stacy banded 149 hummingbirds in 2003.

Peterson lets the students of Desert View Christian School help do the catching, charting and, of course, holding of the birds and hearing their hearts beat. After Peterson finishes with a bird, he places the bird in a child’s hand so the child can feel one of God's smallest birds before the bird flies away.

Featured in: July 2004

Author