Firefly Glowstick Games

When we studied fireflies, we learned that each species uses a distinctive flash pattern to identify themselves and attract mates. So, to demonstrate this, we went over to our church gym (because it was a nice big space to run in, and because we couldn't find a place where it would be pitch dark in our house) and I brought glowsticks in three color pairs: two pinks, two blues, two greens. I gave one glowstick to each child. Then we turned out the lights, and the children that had matching colors had to find each other by flashing and waving their lights.

It was surprisingly fun. They had fun locating their "mates," but then they came up with all kinds of other firefly games too--races and relays and so forth. The glowsticks gave off just enough light that you could (mostly) avoid running into walls, but it was dark enough that everyone was laughing and squealing and having near-collisions. Good times.

Glowsticks are a pretty good representation of a firefly's bioluminescence, since they are both "cold" light created by chemical reactions. We so wish we had fireflies around here, because we love them! But at least some of us have finally have seen them in real life, when we went to Montreal last summer. And maybe someday we'll really get lucky and see some here in Utah!

Firefly mates finding each other

Fireflies starting a race

Ladybug Models

Ladybugs are so cute that it's easy to find crafts featuring them! People have ladybug birthday parties, etc., and there are all kinds of cute ideas. I was looking for one that had some degree of accuracy and not ONLY cuteness! This ladybug was a combination of a couple of other crafts I saw (chiefly this darling birthday party invitation) and it's a good illustration of the most prominent feature of the order coleoptera, which ladybugs and other beetles belong to: their hard shell-like outer wings which protect the thin inner wings. Coleoptera means "sheath wing," and in ladybugs, the red and black outer wings (or yellow and black, or whatever) are the "sheath," and the clear inner wings are the ones they use for actual flying.

These paper ladybugs have a colored outer wing, with clear wings (we used waxed paper) underneath and then their colored thoraxes and abdomens underneath that. Some of the children made legs, antennae, and probosces out of pipe cleaner, too.

As I mentioned elsewhere, we had fun making a larger number of "crafts" than usual during this unit. I leaned more toward the younger grades when choosing activities, because those types of resources were easy to find, and for Junie and Daisy's sake (and Marigold always wanted to join in too). But it surprised me how much the older boys enjoyed working on this type of thing as well. They would often spend quite a lot of time coloring or gluing and making everything just right. I think they found it kind of satisfying, and they seemed quite (quietly) proud of their finished projects.

I let the children use any colors they wanted for their ladybugs, since in real life they do come in a rainbow of colors!

Daisy wore her beetle shirt many, many of the days during this unit. She liked to accessorize with her dragonfly and butterfly hair clips as well. Here she is posing with her "I'm big" expression (she told me).

I liked Malachi's tiny ladybug, too.