Butterflies & Life Cycle

 Set-Up

• Use attached materials to create a rotating butterfly life cycle diagram to give to students

Activity

• Remind students how butterflies act as pollinators. Then explain we are going to learn how butterflies act as pollinators. Ask students if they know how butterflies are born (most will probably not know they come from eggs). Ask what a baby butterfly is and how it’s different from an adult (caterpillar vs butterfly).
• Pass out the diagram of the butterfly life cycle. Walk students through each stage, having them color each section as you finish it.
• Have students act out the life stages in a quick game.
  • Have students sit tightly in a ball, and tell them they are butterfly eggs. 
  • Have them hatch out into larva, by transiting to sitting on their knees,
  • Tell them they are growing now, getting longer and fuller. Have students stretch out. Have them pretend to eat milkweed leaves, to help save them from predators.
  • Now tell them they are going to pupate, have them roll back into little balls. Time them for 15 seconds, because pupa needs time to transition.
  • End the pupa stage by having full adult butterflies break out. Students can stand and flap their “wings.”
  • Tell students it’s time to migrate south to Mexico for the winter, have them “fly” to the side of the room designated as South.
  • Explain they will nest here for a while to wait out winter, wait 20 seconds or so.
  • Now that winter is over, have them fly back to the North.
  • They will now lay eggs and the process starts all over again!

• Butterflies do not just appear; they go through a unique process called metamorphosis, where immature animals transform into distinctly different adult forms. Butterflies have a four-stage life cycle where they start as an egg, hatch into a larva (the caterpillar), pupate, and finally, break out as an adult.