Super STAAR

Supporting Lessons

Life Cycles of Mealworms, Waxworms, Silkworms and Painted Lady Butterflies (Insects Module): FOSSWEB (website) - Investigate and record the unique stages of various insects.  Use No. 31–48 reproducible sheet.

Life Cycles of Mealworms, Waxworms, Silkworms and Painted Lady Butterflies (Insects Module)
FOSSWEB, www.fossweb.com

The Life Cycle of a Butterfly: The Children’s Butterfly Site (website) – Students hear a reading of the book, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and use their bodies to demonstrate and represent the stages of a butterfly’s metamorphosis.

The Life Cycle of a Butterfly
The Children’s Butterfly Site, www.kidsbutterfly.org

Elaboration Lessons and Extensions

Flour Beetles: University of Kentucky Department of Entomology (website) - Observe the behavior and life stages of flour beetles, design and implement an investigation into flour beetle food preferences, and record and graph investigation data over a period of several months.

Flour Beetles
University of Kentucky Department of Entomology, www.uky.edu

Butterflies in Space: BioEd Online (website) - Create classroom habitats for painted lady butterflies and observe their life cycle. Do real science in your classroom by asking questions about butterfly behavior and comparing the behaviors of your ground-based butterflies to those of the “butterflynauts” that flew on the International Space Station.

Butterflies in Space
BioEd Online, www.bioedonline.org

Monarch Butterflies: PBS Teachers (website) - Students raise Monarch butterflies, tag individual butterflies and learn about the Monarch butterflies’ yearly migration.

Monarch Butterflies
PBS Teachers, www.pbs.org/teachers

Ladybug Learning: Lost Ladybug Project (website) - Download the “Lost Ladybug Toolkit for Grades K-2.” Unit One covers the ladybug beetle life cycle. Other units cover insect biology, how to collect ladybugs, and a project to document the locations of different ladybug species.

Ladybug Learning
Lost Ladybug Project, www.lostladybug.org

Assessment Ideas

Life Cycle of Butterflies and Moths: The Children’s Butterfly Site (website) - The butterfly life cycle has four separate stages that look completely different and serve different purposes. To assess your students’ understanding of these unique stages, print out the stages of an insect’s life cycle and have students put the stages in order and explain each one.

Life Cycle of Butterflies and Moths
The Children’s Butterfly Site, www.kidsbutterfly.org

Ladybug Life Cycle: Earth’s Birthday (PDF) - Use this worksheet to assess your students’ understanding of the life cycle of a ladybug.

Ladybug Life Cycle
Earth’s Birthday, earthsbirthday.org

Literature Connections

The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Carle, Eric (ISBN-13: 978-0399226236)

A Ladybug’s Life. Himmelman, John (ISBN-13: 978-0516263533)

Monarch Butterfly. Gibbons, Gail (ISBN-13: 978-1430109433)

Mealworms. Schaffer, Donna (ISBN-13: 978-0736832960)

Crickets. Hall, Margaret (ISBN-13: 978-0736850957)

Ladybugs. Ashley, Susan (ISBN-13: 978-0836840629)

Additional Resources

Hatch Your Own Praying Mantises: Education.com (website) - Create a habitat and hatch praying mantises. Care for the insects, and observe the unique stages of the praying mantis life cycle.

Hatch Your Own Praying Mantises
By Peggy Ashbrook, Education.com