What Students Learn From Their Big Bear Bald Eagle (And Real Life) Teachers

Bald eagles occasionally interrupt story time at Troth Street Elementary School.

Two laptops perched atop a bookshelf are a window from this Jurupa Valley school library to a bald eagle nest 70 miles away in Big Bear.

For the last three years, librarian Doris Sanchez and her students have been among tens of thousands of people who watch Jackie and Shadow try to foster the next generation of California bald eagles.

Sanchez welcomes the students' questions at any time.

“If they have a chance of learning something they might not know, it's time to stop and do that,” Sanchez said. “You can always get back to the stuff you have to do, like reading that story.”

For Sanchez, and for educators around the country, the 24/7 stream is an opportunity to pique students' interest in subjects including science, math, reading, writing, and art. Inevitably, teachers and students alike become personally invested in the ups and downs of the eagles' journey.

“It's kind of this dance between the emotions of what that might bring up in them and then trying to observe the science,” said Ali Campbell, a fifth grade teacher in Montclair, N.J.

The livestreaming era

The nonprofit Friends of Big Bear Valley raised $10,000 to install a solar-powered nest camera in 2015.

Retired special education teacher Jeanette Tabor lives in Big Bear and started playing the livestream for her students soon after it was established.

“It was a wonderful opportunity to, um, to not only explore something exciting, but it was connected with our community,” Tabor said.

Throughout the day, the students tuned in to the eagle interactions on screen.

“It was really exciting to see what the chicks were doing,” Tabor said. “Whether it was the parents feeding them or if they happen to catch them pooping over the side of the nest — I don't know if you want to include that.”

Tabor tailored the lessons to students’ abilities and goals. For example, cutting yarn into pom-pom eagle chicks was both a cute craft and fine motor skill practice.

In 2018, the year Jackie laid her first clutch of eggs in the nest, Tabor’s class turned their observations into a story.

“The eggs hatched and we saw two baby eagles who were little, fuzzy, and gray,” reads the three paragraph story written by 12 students.

“One night it was very cold, windy and rainy, and one of the babies died. We were really sad.”

Tabor remembered breaking the news to the students.

“I think as an adult, you always want to shelter children from as much as you can,” Tabor said. “But I needed to tell them that … yes, we're sad, but yes, it is what happens, you know, it's part of our lives.”

Then Stormy, the remaining eaglet, fell from the nest.

“We did not see him for nine days,” the students wrote. Their story ended on a hopeful note: “Stormy is back in the nest now, and we watch him every day.”

Stormy went on to successfully fly — in scientific terms, fledge — from the nest.

“I was always so proud of [my students] because they would notice,” Tabor said. “I didn't have to point it out to them. They had, they were growing in their own skills of observation.”

A bald eagle education

LAist visited a third grade class at Troth Street Elementary this week to hear what they’ve learned from Jackie and Shadow. Short answer: a lot!

For example,

• That eagles are NOT mammals, said Owen Vlach. While both birds and mammals are warm-blooded and breathe air, it’s the egg-laying that sets our feathered friends apart. 
• They can move their head “far,” Eli Rodriguez said. The raptors have 14 cervical vertebrae, compared to just seven in humans, which allow them to swivel their heads 180 degrees or more. Owls, which the class also recently learned about, can rotate their noggin nearly 360 degrees. 
• Female eagles, like Jackie, are bigger than males, Miguel Bernal explained. “The mom has to be bigger because she has to sit on the eggs,” Bernal said, reflecting the leading hypothesis among scientists.

In addition to sparking scientific inquiry, the eagles are also role models.

“They're responsible,” said Dina Preciado. “They're taking care of the babies, and then not like leaving them.”

A few of the options for Troth Street Elementary students who want to learn more about bald eagles.

(

Mariana Dale

/

LAist

)

Third graders Jose Reynoso, left, and Alexis Sumba, right read a book about insects during their weekly visit to the library. Their teacher, Jackie Zamora, also streams the eagle camera in their classroom. "I think it's nice to just be able to start our morning," Zamora said. "They ask 'How are friends doing?'”

(

Mariana Dale

/

LAist

)

The students pepper Sanchez with questions during their weekly visits to the library. She’s become the school’s resident eagle expert, thanks to the history and daily summaries posted by Friends of Big Bear Valley volunteers online. Some queries (How old are Jackie and Shadow?) are easier to answer than others (Why does Shadow sabotage Jackie?).

Sanchez is the sole library employee. She manages hundreds of books, the school’s one-to-one laptop program, free Wi-Fi devices, and other teaching materials. The neighborhood surrounding the school is rural— no street lights or sidewalks. Most of the students at Troth Street Elementary are from low-income families— 88.6% qualified for free and reduced-price meals last school year.

Doris Sanchez started volunteering at the school in 1993 before starting to work in a variety of roles from office clerk to yard supervisor and now librarian. She was Jurupa Unified School District’s classified person of the year in 2017.

(

Mariana Dale

/

LAist

)

Sanchez said the livestream connects her students to the larger region. If it’s snowing on the eagles in Big Bear, they can go outside, look north and see clouds where the San Bernardino Mountains should be.

“That I could see different animals and different places,” is student Janet Galisia’s favorite part about watching the eagles.

Will this year’s eggs hatch?

To date, five of Jackie’s 14 eggs have hatched and three have fledged.

“That’s not unusual for eagles,” Sandy Steers, executive director of Friends of Big Bear Valley, told LAist earlier this month. “It’s always very hard and heartbreaking when things don’t work out the way that we would like them to, but it’s nature.”

The teachers LAist talked to were all preparing to talk about the likely scenario that none of Jackie and Shadows' three eggs hatch this year.

“These kids are pretty well versed in handling disappointment because they made it through the pandemic,” said New Jersey fifth grade teacher and former South Bay resident Ali Campbell.

She said the learning doesn’t stop because the eggs aren’t viable. Campbell’s class recently interviewed a Friends of Big Bear Valley volunteer by video chat and is working on their first non-fiction writing assignment.

Campbell acknowledges the students’ feelings of sadness and they talk about what science says about animal emotions.

“Without a doubt, someone will say, ‘Well, but Jackie did have eaglets before,’” Campbell said of her student’s optimism. “They tend to look on the bright side.”

Learn more about bald eagles: Resources for parents and teachers

LAist's Jackie Fortiér contributed to this story.