~*~ Butterflies ~*~

Each time I take a trip to the library or I sit down and make lesson plans I try to think of something interesting, yet different for the kids to learn about. Butterflies are a hot topic at our house. Seeing how the girls outnumber the boys, there are usually ample shirts with butterflies, pretty hair clips with butterflies, or coloring books with butterflies! Here lately, Mistic has taken up "flying" to bed. She sleeps on the top bunk and when Daddy's home, he gently lifts her in the air as she flaps her hands, pretending to be a butterfly. So when I visited the library last week it was an easy decision as to what our "extra" lesson would be: Butterflies.

Our library does not usually carry a big selection on butterflies and when I checked the children's section all the books on butterflies were wordy and had few pictures. Seeing how none of the kids can read yet I knew that wouldn't do. So I visited the adult section, while there wasn't many options there were two big books that I walked away with. While they were still wordy, they had pages after pages of different kinds of butterflies. I knew this would be a hit!



We started off our lesson learning how a butterfly became a butterfly. One of the books even had lots of pictures of caterpillars, even had pictures of the eggs! The kids thought it was cool how a baby caterpillar ate its way from the inside out of its shell, then ate the rest of its shell, and then turning to leaves or flowers. Mistic was particulary amazed at the "molding" (molting) process. Just think, the poor caterpillar eats and eats and eats, only to outgrow its skin- literally! The skin splits and out comes a bigger caterpillar. This happesn 4 or 5 times! Mistic was relieved that we don't go through a molting process! Can you imagine?! We then proceeded to the cocoon stage. A neat fact that we learned was after crawling from the cocoon the butterfly hangs suspended and pumps blood into the veins of its soft, crumpled wings, which then begin to harden. After an hour or more the butterfly is ready for its first flight. The girls liked enacting this out.

I enjoyed this study and so did the girls. It was wonderful to find the kind of books that had pictures for each stage. It helped keep their attention.



The fun didn't stop there though! I logged onto one of my favorite websites: DLTK Teach and found a neat butterfly craft to do! We dug out the glitter and glue and had a blast!