Outdoor Hour Challenge #22 Butterflies

“If children are terrified of bugs, it’s usually because they caught the fear of adults around them.”
Charlotte Mason in Modern English, volume 1 page 58

Spending time outdoors at this time of the year usually brings us into contact with a butterfly or two. I know for our family we just about every day see some sort of butterfly in the garden. Little white ones, little bluish-gray ones, and big Tiger swallowtails frequent the many flowers and bushes we have blooming in our yard.

Let's take this week to start looking for butterflies to learn about and talk about in our nature journals. If you have never learned about the life-cycle of a butterfly, check your local library for a good book on the topic. The Handbook of Nature Study describes the cycle with words but it is much more interesting to have a picture book that illustrates the most interesting of life-cycles.


Another way to study butterflies is to purchase a kit to hatch your own. This is the perfect way to observe each of the stages of life that the butterfly goes through.


Outdoor Hour Challenge #22
Focus on Insects-Butterflies

1. This challenge starts the beginning of our mini-focus on insects. Read in the Handbook of Nature Study the introduction to insects, pages 294-300. The Black Swallowtail and the Monarch Butterflies are specifically covered in the Handbook of Nature Study. You can read over those sections before your outdoor time in case you encounter those particular butterflies and to give you ideas for observing any sort of butterfly that you may have in your local area.

2. Use your 10-15 minutes of outdoor time to look for insects and in particular butterflies. Spotting butterflies might need to be done as you go about your daily activities and then taking the opportunity to do your observations at that time. Don’t be discouraged if you don’t see a butterfly this week but look at this as an ongoing challenge as the summer progresses.

Here is a link to an article on how to attract and catch/release butterflies.
How to Catch Butterflies
http://www.ehow.com/how_2070424_catch-butterflies.html

3. After you have your outdoor time, provide an opportunity for working on a nature journal entry. You might consider drawing a butterfly and labeling its parts as a way of narration of the points you have discussed this week. If you found a different kind of insect, you can make a nature journal entry for that one as well.

4. If you observe more than one kind of butterfly this week, make sure to start a list of butterflies in your nature journal. I like to keep a running list in the back of my nature journal. Keep adding to your list of other insects as well.



5. Post an entry on your blog sharing your experiences and then share the link with the Outdoor Hour Challenge Blog Carnival.

 
You may be interested in more insect challenges listed here on the Handbook of Nature Study:
#23 Moths
#24 Crickets
#25 Housefly
#26 Ladybirds/Aphids
#27 Bees
#28 Dragonflies/Damselflies
Monarch Butterflies

Winter Wednesday - Winter Insect Study
Ants (Spring)
Mosquito
Moths and Fireflies
Crickets, Grasshoppers, and Katydids
Leaf-Miners and Leaf-Rollers

Collections: Pressing Flowers: Outdoor Hour Challenge #6

We have had a busy week and although we have been outside everyday, we haven't really cracked the Handbook of Nature Study at all. Some weeks our nature study is like that but then we will make up for it other weeks.

The boys have been busy weeding the garden and my youngest even planted a few spinach seedlings hoping that they will make it through until the weather really warms up.

We have been busy birdwatching because our feeders are still full of birds. I think some of the birds are nesting and we will be putting out some things for them to nest with. We saw this idea for a bird nesting project and we are going to give it a try and keep you posted.

Our focus area is garden flowers so we took a trip to the Home Depot to see what we could add to the garden. Guess what they picked? Marigolds. Lots of marigolds.

We also picked up a few packets of seeds: Sunflower (Mammoth), Peas, and Green Beans (Kentucky Wonders). We are going to wait a bit before we put the seeds into the garden because we are still having a little frost each morning.

My son decided that for his collection he would like to press garden flowers.

We started with pansies and violets.

They are now slipped into a sheet protector and they will go into his binder. We are still working on a way of adhering them to the paper without damaging them. I will keep you posted. (in a future challenge we will be learning how to press flowers)

So that was our week, not as exciting as some but still VERY enjoyable.

Barb-Harmony Art Mom

Jerusalem Cricket: Our Outdoor Hour #2

this morning we had our official Green Hour (assignment #2) time outside in the sunshine...we had a whole weekend of rain and wind making the sunshine all the more inviting.

My son found a "huge, ugly, insect" on the pavement and he wanted me to come and share in the ugliness. I am not a bug person. I am an outdoor nature-loving person, but definitely not a bug person. I am learning to not be so disgusted by insects and usually make friends with whatever we find after learning about it. If you are squeamish, close your eyes to the photos below.



Top View

Bottom View

Here are his words for the assignment:

• Chirping
• Fascinating Alien (bug)
• Shiver cold wind

We came in and used our Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Insects and Spiders to identify the insect.

It looked like a grasshopper to my son so we turned to the section for grasshoppers, crickets, and cicadas. What do you know? It was the *first* insect in the section. Bingo! Then we turned to the page that gave the description of the Jerusalem cricket and we found that we are within the range and habitat for this insect. After reading the size and brief description, our identification was verified. This one was easy. Insects are not always that simple to put a name to. I must admit that my older son said that it looked like a potato bug. Guess what? He was right too, Jerusalem crickets are also known as potato bugs.

Here is his journal entry.


To make up for the really yucky bug photo, here is one of violets we saw growing in our lawn.


So I think we were successful this week in our assignment. I did all my reading and enjoyed it very much as expected. We actually had quite a bit of outdoor time this past week cutting a tree down in our backyard. We also identified two new birds this past week.

Looking forward to next week's assignment.
Barb-Harmony Art Mom