It's spring and that means I need to share a few butterfly things!
Butterfly Handshake
Extend your right thumb and hook it with your partner’s right thumb. Stick out your fingers and then flutter them around like a butterfly.
Caterpillar Finger Play
A caterpillar crawled to the top of a tree. (Hold up right arm and wiggle left index finger up like a caterpillar.)
I think I’ll take a nap said he. (Wiggle left index finger.)
Under a leaf he began to creep, (Wiggle left index finger under right palm.)
He spun a chrysalis and went to sleep. (Make fist with right hand around left index finger.)
Spring came along, shook him and said,
"Wake up, wake up, you sleepy head.” (Shake right fist.)
Out of the leaf he spread his wings to fly, (Hook right and left thumbs together. Spread out fingers like wings.)
“Look at me! Look at me! I’m a butterfly!” (Fly fingers around.)
Here's a video my webmaster created to go with my song "The Butterfly"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=In_akp9Fxbc
Hint! Butterflies hatch from a chrysalis, a life stage made of a hardened protein. A cocoon is spun from silk and surrounds the pupa of many moths.
Baggie Butterfly
Make a butterfly by tearing up little pieces of colored tissue paper and putting them in a zip lunch bag. Gather up in the middle and twist on a pipe cleaner to make the body and antennae. Attach a string for flying.
Caterpillar Finger Play
A caterpillar crawled to the top of a tree. (Hold up right arm and wiggle left index finger up like a caterpillar.)
I think I’ll take a nap said he. (Wiggle left index finger.)
Under a leaf he began to creep, (Wiggle left index finger under right palm.)
He spun a chrysalis and went to sleep. (Make fist with right hand around left index finger.)
Spring came along, shook him and said,
"Wake up, wake up, you sleepy head.” (Shake right fist.)
Out of the leaf he spread his wings to fly, (Hook right and left thumbs together. Spread out fingers like wings.)
“Look at me! Look at me! I’m a butterfly!” (Fly fingers around.)
Here's a video my webmaster created to go with my song "The Butterfly"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=In_akp9Fxbc
Hint! Butterflies hatch from a chrysalis, a life stage made of a hardened protein. A cocoon is spun from silk and surrounds the pupa of many moths.
Baggie Butterfly
Make a butterfly by tearing up little pieces of colored tissue paper and putting them in a zip lunch bag. Gather up in the middle and twist on a pipe cleaner to make the body and antennae. Attach a string for flying.
Smoosh Painting
Cut butterfly shapes out of newsprint. Fold in half. Children drop paint with a spoon or eye dropper on one half. Fold and rub. Open to view a beautiful butterfly.
Cut butterfly shapes out of newsprint. Fold in half. Children drop paint with a spoon or eye dropper on one half. Fold and rub. Open to view a beautiful butterfly.
Materials: old sock, markers, coffee filter, food coloring, eye dropper, pipe cleaner, safety pin
Directions: Several days before doing this activity ask children to bring in an old sock from home. First, let them decorate the outside of the sock to look like a caterpillar. They can use markers, pompoms, etc.
Next, prepare a butterfly using a coffee filter. Children fold the coffee filter into eighths. Using an eye dropper, have them drop colored water onto the coffee filter. Open and dry. Scrunch up in the middle and fasten on a pipe cleaner for the body and antenna.
Turn the sock inside out and pin the butterfly inside. Children can begin the story about the butterfly by inserting their hand into the sock. For the "chrysalis," have them begin turning the sock inside out. As the butterfly emerges, the children stick their hand in the sock to reveal the butterfly.
