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The Life Cycle of a Butterfly
Ngā tamariki in the Navigators & Inventors room (3–5-year-olds) having been learning about the lifecycles of animals. Recently they have taken up an interest in butterflies. They have been discussing the 4 different stages of a butterfly’s life and what happens when it undergoes complete metamorphosis. Ngā tamriki shared lots of giggles when they were learning the word, metamorphosis and had lots of fun practicing how to say it.
One of our kaiako, had lots of caterpillars at home in her garden, so she bought some into the classroom for us to watch grow and change. Our tamariki took great care of the caterpillars, giving them lots of food to eat. We even joked about sharing our morning kai and lunch with them, just like in ‘The Hungry Caterpillar’ book. Eventually, they became so big they were ready to create their cocoons. Our kaiako carefully put the cocoons in a safe space up high for tamariki to watch as they started to take shape.
Eventually they started to break through the cocoon and turn into beautiful Monarch Butterflies. Throughout this whole journey our tamariki were learning lots of different curriculum areas, including, mathematics, literacy and science. They have been drawing pictures of the different stages of the butterfly, writing about the different foods they had been eating and studying the life cycles.
This was such a fun project to do together and we all had fun learning about the life cycle of a butterfly.