Teaching a butterfly unit soon, or just want a fun way to integrate science and ELA this spring? The butterfly activity ideas below are engaging and educational, ideal for upper elementary students.
There are activity ideas specifically related to a butterfly's life cycle, as well as other butterfly activity ideas.
Butterfly Life Cycle Ideas
1. Observe a Butterfly's Life Cycle
One of the most engaging ways for 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade students to learn about a butterfly's life cycle is to observe the transformation firsthand. Butterfly kits make this very easy by providing you with caterpillars and a habitat for watching the entire metamorphosis unfold. Of course, there is always a risk - sometimes larvae don't survive, and students may need help processing their disappointing. Still, nothing compares to witnessing the dramatic changes from caterpillar to butterfly in real life.
Make the experience even more meaningful by integrating science and writing. Have your upper elementary students keep daily observation journals, recording what they see and reflecting on the changes throughout each stage.
If raising live butterflies isn't possible in your classroom classroom, then have them watch this video instead. It shows the entire life cycle in detail and without any commentary, giving students a chance to simply observe.
2. Read About a Butterfly's Life Cycle
Reading books and reading passages isn't a creative activity, but it is a necessary one! Combine a reading passage with any of these other butterfly activities to help your students really solidify all of the butterfly life cycle vocabulary.
This Butterfly Life Cycle Reading Passage is ideal for upper elementary. It is a one page reading passage that includes a life cycle diagram, practice test questions, and no prep writing activities.
3. Complete a Butterfly Life Cycle Art Project
There are a huge variety of art project options, and you can assign a project that is as simple or as complex as you would like. For example, you could have students:
- fill in the Life Cycle Diagram included in this resource.
- use noodles to represent the life cycle
- make a butterfly life cycle mobile
- paint rocks to demonstrate each stage of the life cycle
- create a quadrama that shows each stage of the life cycle
- illustrate the life cycle on a paper plate
4. Write a Story from the POV of a Butterfly
After learning about the life cycle, have your students write a story from the butterfly's point of view, starting life out as an egg! This is a fun writing prompt that will reinforce what students have learned about metamorphosis and give them a change to practice using all of their butterfly vocabulary.
You might like some of these other point of view creating writing prompts.
Other Butterfly Activity Ideas
5. Compare Butterflies & Moths
6. Write a Butterfly Squiggle Story
If you've never done a squiggle drawing writing activity in your upper elementary classroom, now is the time to try!
It's simple. Provide students with a page that has a random squiggle on it. Students use that squiggle to create a butterfly drawing, and then write about their drawing!
The beauty of this activity is that all you need is a sheet of paper with a squiggle on it. But if you are looking for a little extra, this Squiggle Stories Resource includes 30 image starters as well as 9 different writing prompts so you can utilize Squiggle Drawings in your classroom all year long!
6. Learn Butterfly Vocabulary and Practice Context Clues
Upper elementary butterfly lesson plans usually cover butterfly vocabulary words related to the butterfly life cycle - things like metamorphosis, pupa, and chrysalis. But the world of butterflies is full of plenty of other rich words, like:
- wingspan
- frass
- lepidopterists
- proboscis
- bask
- crepuscular
- nectar
- exoskeleton
- molts
- ...and more
Introduce your 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade students to these words while also practicing context clues using this resource. And as an added bonus, it includes many other butterfly activities!
7. Build a Butterfly Balancer
8. Learn About an Endangered Butterfly
9. Review Main Idea While Learning About Butterflies
Integrate science and ELA by using butterfly reading passages to review main idea! 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade students need all the extra practice with this skill that they can get.
This Butterfly Resource includes no prep main idea practice using short, engaging passages about butterflies and caterpillars.
You might also like these tips for teaching main idea so students actually understand.
10. Review Symmetry
This activity allows students to get their creative juices flowing while reviewing symmetry. Simply provide students with a blank template of a butterfly and have them design their own pattern for the wings, making sure the wings are symmetrical!
For an added challenge, have students design wings that are well camouflaged to a specified habitat. Check out these instructions for more details.
11. Find the Butterfly Fib
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