With this caterpillar craft I wanted to use an opportunity to talk about Caterpillar Metamorphosis.
Mofosis what?
(That's what I heard when I told my daughter about it.)
Believe me, it's so much easier to explain the process of caterpillar turning into a beautiful butterfly (that flies) with the visual demonstration.
And, no, we don't have a caterpillar on hand. But what we did was - we made one out of egg carton. Then we made a cocoon out of an plastic soda bottle. Of course there had to be a butterfly involved in this too.
To make egg carton caterpillar that turns into a butterfly you will need:
- egg carton
- plastic soda bottle (I used 2 liter one)
- some carton to make the butterfly
- decorations (jewels, "pipe cleaners", buttons, googly eyes, etc)
- paper clips (for caterpillar's legs)
- paint
- scissors
- glue
The video I made for this egg carton caterpillar craft will show you how we did it.
And if you child is like mine you will get a lot of questions about butterflies (after they come out of the transformation).
I am not embarrassed anymore so I will say it: I have to google answers to my 5 year-old child's questions. So I found a great page with some very simple answers about butterflies. For example, how would I know answer to this question:
How long is a butterfly's tongue?
(I didn't even think they had one)
Update:
It's been few weeks since we made this craft and my daughter still pulls it out of the cabinet to play with the egg carton caterpillar, butterfly and the cocoon. She shows it to her friends and explains the caterpillar metamorphosis in her own words my creating new stories every time.
It's a great educational activity that turned into a multiple-time storytelling and a recycled craft that cost us $0 to make. Plus, I found out that some butterflies have their tongues as long as their bodies.
I guess, you learn something every day!
Enjoy Caterpillar-ing!
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