The best education for both you and the children would be to get your hands on some good books about the basic care of waterfowl. If you do it before you attempt to incubate any eggs, it will probably increase your success, as well as save you all from possible dissapointment. Storey's Guide to Raising Ducks and the Book of Geese, both by Dave Holderread, as well as Domestic Duck, and Domestic Geese, both by Chris Ashton, are about the best books out there on domestic waterfowl. Your inability to hatch is not caused by any infertility with your birds, it's your management. No domestic poultry or waterfowl will hatch eggs effectively in a communal nest like you have. The books explain why, and how to manage the birds so that they will have a better chance of hatching their own eggs.

My geese are out grazing during the seasons that support it, but I also give them a bit of scratch, consisting of whole corn, wheat, and oats, before they are put away in the evening all year round, placed in a large rubber bowl. Over the years, I have noticed that their preference as to which of the grains in the scratch they eat changes according to the season. For example, during the warmer/hot months, they pick through it and eat all the wheat and oats. As fall approaches, they go more for the corn, eventually eating nothing but the corn over the winter, leaving the wheat and oats, starting the whole thing over again in the spring, gradually leaving more corn behind, eating more wheat and oats. To try to reduce waste, I gave what they left behind to the chickens, but they are on a similar schedule. But, since when I give this "refuse" to the chickens, it's just tossed either on the coop floor or on the ground in their pen, depending on the season, and if it doesn't compost/rot, it sprouts and they are happy to eat any sprouts year round. A lot does get wasted, though. So, in observing this, adjusting the wheat/corn/oat ratio in the scratch accordingly in step with the seasons seems to be a solution. The chickens DO get organic layer year round, and the geese get hay through the winter, but I get straw for bedding and nesting, this past year it was difficult to find plain straw, so I had to get "wheat straw" for bedding, and there was a substantial amount of grasses, etc., in it that they were more than happy to eat. I think the economy is affecting how/what farmers are bailing up for winter forage/bedding?

There they are!

Domestic hybrids ... note the colored head and neck. If I had to guess, I's say Rouen with some Khaki Campbell or Orpington to get the tans. And Cayuga to get the deep green/blacl The Rouen duck looks a lot like a mallard but much larger. This is what happens to the cute ducklings they sell at Easter.