Fun facts
1. Did you know butterflies taste with their feet?
2. There are 10 times as many species of moths as there are butterflies
3. The largest butterflies in the world have a wingspan of 27cm (Queen Alexandra’s
birdwing butterflies)
4. Thought to have evolved from moths, the origin of the butterflies begin in the mid-
cretaceous period
Whether you have purchased our ready made craft boxes, undertake the AQA units with us or participate in our lessons and resource packs, Little Crafters Boxes is here to help you get the most out of each month's themes. We know the cost of living is increasing and so each month we’d like to help take the load off by sharing some inspiring activities to help get more bang for your buck. This July’s theme is butterflies and whilst we have provided some incredible, ready-to-go activities in our boxes we just couldn’t offer them all. Have a look through and see if any of the following get your children as excited as they do us:-
Areas of learning you could explore with this theme:-
● Symmetry - butterfly wings are almost always symmetrical
● Other patterns in nature
● Butterflies as vital pollinators
● Light - see as the butterflies do. Focus on the wavelength they can see and why.
How flowers use this to their advantage to get pollinated
● Lifecycles and links to the food chain - why is the timing of caterpillar lifecycles so
impactful? A change to introduce trophic levels and concepts of energy transfer
● Species diversity
● Migration; you could map this.
● Ecological relationships of certain species
● How do they differ to moths - classification and identification
● Anatomical study
● Habitat creation - positive and negative effects of humans. Individual and scaled
effects
● Survey methods - why is this important?
● Evolution and ecological niches
● Modern day science - how the importance of collections changes with the
development of new genetic science. Kawahara.
● Scientific methods - observation and record keeping
● Biomimicry in butterflies - particularly the morpho butterfly and how it has inspired an examination of structural colours in nanofabrication
● Anthropomorphology - the emotions of an insect. The impact of applying human traits to other living things which makes us care more.
Activity ideas
● Participate in the Big Butterfly Count 14th July - 6th August
● Quilling art - you could use them to decorate wings or make your own proboscis
● Puppet play (make your own on sticks) and role play the metamorphosis. You could
do this with existing plotlines from well known books too.
● Raise caterpillars/butterflies and create a habitat for them - you can source kits but
you can add in extra features to make it more naturalised. Consider the ethics of
these changes.
● Make your own child sized butterfly wings - imaginary play. These could be
completed with painting fabric, cardboard, cellophane, willow. Go wild and be sure to
decorate! Use elastic or even string to make them wearable or even sew into the
back of an old tshirt!
● Junk model ling / sculpting. Examples; Egg Carton Caterpillars by Balancing Home
● Painted splodge butterflies using folded paper - what lines of symmetry can you
create by folding in multiple ways
● Pull down / moving wings butterfly - simple engineering as shown wonderfully here Easy Flying Butterfly using paper/How to make a moving Butterfly/DIY for kids
● Create a butterfly garden - wildflowers/cut down on mowing/ shallow water source/leave weeds/fallen fruit / avoid pesticides / sunny sheltered positioning
● Make an observation journal; sketch and label what you see. Note down plants
visited and weather of the day. You could make links between the caterpillar and
butterfly forms.
● Create a wide array of different butterfly feeders - fruit is usually an attractive option but you could experiment as to which is visited most. You could hypothesise and find a way of recording this reliably. What time period will you choose? Are the variables consistent?
● Butterfly biscuits showing variance in shape Biscuiteers Butterflies - Afternoon
Comments