My daughter, who is becoming as mad on science as I am brought home some photos that she thought children might like to try and figure out what made the footprints. And yes she even told me how the lesson should proceed (just like her dad!). I think this is a cool one to have a play with besides the fact it was my daughter's idea (!), because children will need the internet to help figure out what the animal was as well as starting with prior knowledge and science knowledge (the Gather and Interpret Data)... As a teacher, I'm curious as to what the children notice before opening a laptop -do they know it's a bird?, can they discount certain birds because of the footprint eg a duck because it's not webbed... Do they need some more information? If we're thinking like scientists (a squirrel moment: give the photo to the children with a story -that someone has found these 'marks' and think they could be a moa! Can they research to find out if the photographer is right), what other information would a scientist need? Would it be important to know where the photo was taken?, when? -why would this be important? When they go online, children will need to think about the websites -are they a 'reputable' site? Finally, children will need to make an explanation -so which animal made the mark? What are they basing their theory on? Can children disagree? Even better, how will they communicate their disagreements? This could become a longer session than I thought! Have a go, and see what the children think! By the way, I don't know which bird it is, but I do have an idea :-)