Butterfly Learning at Story Time

Have you ever raised caterpillars into butterflies, and watched the magical transformation up close? I've done it many times with classes of children, and we're doing it again at the library.

A week ago we received a special package, 5 tiny little caterpillars in a jar of food, and a net home for them to grow into.  We observed the tiny creatures, and talked about what they would soon do.  (You can see that post here.)

When we returned to story time this week, we no longer had caterpillars - we had 5 magnificent cocoons!  Ms. Debbie carefully showed them to the children, then transferred them into the net home they'll soon inhabit.

We read several butterfly books, both fiction and non-fiction, and learned some great new vocabulary: proboscis, metamorphosis, life cycle, symmetry, chrysalis and more.

To follow up we painted egg carton caterpillars, and gave them pipe cleaner antennae.

We made life butterfly life cycles from pasta (risotto for eggs, rotini for caterpillars, shells for the chrysalis, and of course bow-tie noodles for the butterflies!

We practiced the concept of symmetry by decorating some lovely die-cut butterflies.

We even made a pictograph: Do you prefer caterpillars or butterflies?  Can you guess which one was the most popular?

For all the learning and fun that we had, the best is yet to come.  We're waiting for our butterflies to hatch, and then we'll take them outside, where they belong, and set them free.  If we are very lucky the life cycle will start again in the garden around our library, and we'll have butterflies all summer!