Monday, November 17, 2014

Rainforest Adventure - Blue Morpho Butterfly

We started our day like any other day, at breakfast, only breakfast was a good hour earlier than normal.  Everyone decided to start their day bright and early.  Yay! (Note heavy sarcasm)

Might as well make the most of it though, right?

I asked them the Circle Time question, what colors have you seen on butterflies?  They started listing blue, yellow, and then Lachlan just said, every color.

They fluttered like butterflies while counting to 3, then they would stop, and go again.

After eating we got started on Mirrored Pair.  Lachlan and Peter stood facing each other and mirrored each others movements.
Earlier when we were at the table we talked about the butterflies life cycle.  I asked them both if they could remember.  I showed them the pictures on the life cycle wheel and they got everyone.  Even the chrysalis!  That's a tough word to remember.

To go along with the life cycle theme Mother Goose Time provided us with a big 11x14 paper with the life cycle of a butterfly along the bottom.  This was for the Butterfly Life Cycle Art.  We first used our finger print to represent the egg, then the side of their hand for the caterpillar, then they drew around it to make the chrysalis and lastly added their two feet as the butterfly wings.   This sounds brilliant, doesn't it?

Let's just say it was fun, but our final product doesn't look exactly like a butterfly.  Still cool, but not quite the end result I had in my head.
 We even got a paw print on the top one here.  Leo joined in.
I didn't get any pictures of the process because well, I had two kids with paint on their hands and feet, so . . . it's just not a good idea to step away.

Butterfly Shapes had us use the Shape Manipulatives (pattern blocks) to make a butterfly.  So I set them out for Peter and he got started.  He is using the life cycle paper from the art project, we had one left over.  Peter is sporting his backwards Batman pajamas.  Cool dude.
Adam was still hanging out reading a book while we worked.  He does enjoy books, first of my three to enjoy them this young.
I have not been able to get Lachlan away from his Legos lately.  It's kind of a constant.  I figure, pattern blocks-Legos, not to far off.  I sent him off to his room to make me a butterfly out of Legos.  Honestly, I didn't have any idea in my head about how he would pull it off.  He is quite creative, so I figured he would come up with something.
 Look Mom, my butterfly.  Nice work kiddo.
Peter's finished butterfly.  The hexagon at the top is his head.

Next, what has proven to be one of my favorite lessons of the last two months is the Storytelling Set.  For Butterfly Flutter I cut out all the pieces and gave them the backdrop.  While we were eating breakfast I read the Chimidyue book one more time.  Now it was Lachlan's turn to tell the story.
He got the order of things perfectly.  Chimidyue followed the butterfly into the rainforest and firs ran into the woodpecker.  He quickly got to the jaguar part because of course, that is his favorite part. 
 Here is the jaguar pouncing.
 Here Chimidyue changes into a butterfly to cross back over the river.
 Here they are, the blue morpho butterfly and Chimidyue butterfly flying over the river.
 
 The butterfly turned back into Chimidyue and went home. 
Now it was Peter's turn and he didn't quite follow the storyline of the book.  He took it to his own place and it was fun to watch.  Here is a quick clip of his story.

No comments:

Post a Comment