Butterflies

Butterflies are beautiful flying insects with large scaly wings. Butterflies are found all around the world. Most butterflies live on the nectar from flowers. Butterflies are usually most active during the day. They are generally brightly colored and have smooth bodies. Butterflies undergo complete metamorphosis in which they go through four different life stages.

1. **Egg**- a butterfly starts its life as an egg, often laid on a leaf. 2.**Larva**- the larva (caterpillar) hatches from the egg and immediately begins to eat leaves and flowers. The caterpillar will lose its skin (molt) several times. It will grow several thousand times its original size. 3. **Pupa**- the caterpillar turns into a pupa (chrysalis)- this is its resting stage. 4. **Adult**- a beautiful adult butterfly will emerge form the chrysalis and begin the cycle once again. The metamorphosis animation on the right is by Tammy Steele Redwell

Watch this cute caterpillar story that Mrs. Corrieri found. It's called Katrina the Caterpillar.

Below are links to websites that will reinforce and review the information you are learning about butterflies!

[|**The Academy of Natural Sciences**] has a wonderful section called [|**Explore Butterflies**]! Students are taken on four interactive butterfly adventures with Rosa, who lives near the jungle in Costa Rica and whose father is a butterfly farmer.

The [|**Butterfly Rainforest**] which is sponsored by the [|**Florida Museum of Natural History**] offers a fun Butterfly Discovery Game that allows students to review butterfly features as they create their own butterfly. When the “new” butterfly species is complete there is a print option so they can share their discovery with others.

[|Butterfly School]- a site filled with butterfly information.

Monarch Butterflies USA- a great site filled with an abundant amount of information about monarch butterflies.

[|**Flash Classroom**]offers a very nice interactive site that offers a very nice interactive of The Life Cycle of a Butterfly. There are a few sections including an interactive to demonstrate the stages in the Life Cycle of a Butterfly.

The [|**BBC Little Animals Activity Center**]has a cute online interactive book called [|**The Buttefly Trail**]by Rachel Dawson.

[|**Paint Pictures**] from [|**Crick Web**]challenges students to replicate the color pattern of different animals and one of them is a butterfly. If the butterfly is not displayed simply click on the picture frame to change the animal selection. They also offer a game called [|**Buttefly Match**]where students can create there own butterfly pattern (Spot On Option) or try to match the spots predetermined on the butterfly (One Color and Two Colors Options).

For those of you who enjoy online jigsaw puzzles[| **BillyBear4Kids**]offers[| **several butterfly jigsaw puzzles**]to complete.

[|Flitting with Fractions]- a very fun site that asks you to catch butterflies and then identify what fraction of all the butterflies did you catch. Hint- click and drag the butterfly to the top of the jar and release when you see the red arrow


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