Birds

Birds

Birds
Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 3 to 5
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	4.38

Vocabulary

	challenging words:		factor, lays, lightweight, roundtrip, seabirds, species, tern, type, flight, stiff, journey, however, emperor, holding, narrow, travels
	content words:		Arctic Ocean

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Birds

¹     Birds are the only type of animals with feathers. Birds are warm-blooded, and most of them can fly. All birds have two wings even for the species that cannot fly, such as ostriches, kiwis, and penguins. Birds do not have teeth. Instead, they have beaks. Birds lay eggs. Most birds build nests for their eggs, and they sit on their eggs during incubation. Emperor penguins, however, do not. A mother emperor penguin lays only one egg. Her husband is in charge of incubation by holding the single egg on top of his feet under a fold of skin. There are more than 9000 different kinds of birds. Many people mistakenly think bats are birds. They are not! Bats are mammals. Eagles, puffins, and flamingos all belong to the family of birds.

²     Do birds fly simply because they have wings and feathers? No! Unique bone structure, feathers, and wings are what make birds fly. Birds have hollow, lightweight bones, and they have strong chest muscles to pull their wings up and down. Feathers are important in flight. There are three types of feathers: down feathers, body feathers, and flight feathers.

³     Down feathers are next to a bird's skin. They are small, fluffy and keep birds warm. Check your sleeping bags! A lot of them have down feathers inside to keep us warm at night. Body feathers are on top of down feathers. They are sometimes called contour feathers. Body feathers give a bird a streamlined shape. Flight feathers are strong, stiff and are on a bird's wings and tail. They help a bird fly.

Paragraphs 4 to 5:
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