Monarch metamorphosis

One of the beautiful things about emergent curriculum is having flexibility in planning based on the children interests as well as the parents and teachers. One of our parents has a passion for moths and butterflies. Driving in to the schoolhouse during her week of assisting, we found her and some of the children out in the field investigating. We discovered that the fields surrounding the school were filled with milkweed, and on the milkweed the kids found beautiful monarch caterpillars. This unplanned discovery led to discussions, exploration and observation about the life cycle of caterpillars.

One of the monarch caterpillars.

Here are some different stages of the chrysalis.


Time lapse video of the butterfly emerging from the chrysalis, happening in the early hours of the morning before we arrived. Look at the top right corner to see!

Metamorphosis complete!



Exploration with clay and the life cycle of a butterfly

A few videos about butterflies.

Exploring with Clair

Clair asked if I could drive the kids out onto the property so she could explore with them and talk about the creatures and plant life that is found all around our school. We went to the creek first and found that the water had gone down significantly since our last visit even though we have had rain.
We stopped on the way back to the school to look at different fields of wildflowers and we found many little bugs, caterpillars, butterflies, cocoons and cows.

The fields were full of wildflowers and green lush grasses. Lots of flowers we could and some we couldn't identify. Lots of these little bugs This was a tiny chrysalis that was empty that one of the kids found. Clair found these two little caterpillars, but it was Violet who correctly identified them as Queen caterpillars. They are easily mistaken for Monarch caterpillars. Caterpillar that was building his cocoon. Need to identify this guy. Someone found this little inch worm and wanted me to capture it. Damon came running up to me and told me that he thought this area looked like the planet Endor and that they had a base camp at the truck! LOL. Some cool rocks with weird stuff growing on them. Andrea and Sophia There were so many baby calves and we stopped to observe them, or rather some big cows stood in front of the truck and wouldn't let us pass...

Mosaic stepping stones

Damon's grandma was in town and wanted to do a project with the kids. This has been a project we have been wanting to do with the kids for a long time, and the stepping stones will stay at the school to commemorate TerraLuz's first year.

Crowe's Nest Farm

We had a field trip to Crowe's Nest Farm. The kids got to see a demonstration of a cow being milked, a hay ride to see some buffalo and ostriches. The farm had miniature pony's, donkeys, birds, raptors, turkeys, chickens, themed gardens, a fairy garden and so much more than I can remember! Damon's grandma was in town and she got to experience a great field trip, we had so much fun and it was such a great local resource in Austin.