School-Age: Bugs

What a perfect time of year to talk about bugs. Flowers and trees are blooming and it is starting to warm up, so bugs are everywhere!

1. Reading
I started out by reading a nonfiction book all about bugs: "The Big Book of Bugs" by Yuval Zommer. It has huge pages, beautiful (and cute) illustrations of bugs, and just enough facts to interest kids to learn more without overwhelming them. It was a great read-aloud as long as you do not go overboard. I ended up only reading a few pages and book-talking a bunch of other bug books I had pulled for the program. 

2. Discussion/Activity
Most of the discussion actually happened while we were reading the book. The kids LOVED interjecting and telling their personal stories of experiences they have had with different bugs.

After reading, I pulled out some printed pictures so we could look at bugs 'under a microscope'. Our few tries using actual microscopes at our school-age programs have not gone well. It is one thing when you have a classroom and many microscopes for each pair of kids. But sharing two or three microscopes between 15+ kids, and many of them 2nd grade or younger, is not ideal. 

SO, instead, everyone can look at the same thing, seeing a picture of a bug 'under the microscope'. I had them guess what bug was in each picture as I showed them 10 or so different print-outs. They love these sorts of guessing games.

3. Craft
I found a wonderful Very Hungry Caterpillar craft on ABC and 123. I made my own antenna and eyes for the craft. I had my teen helpers make kits for the craft to hand out. 

The kits had:
*4 green strips of paper
*1 red strip of paper
*1 pair of caterpillar eyeballs
*1 pair of caterpillar antennas
*1 large green leaf

Notes:
It went swell again and we had HUGE numbers again at our Friday morning program. We made a boatload of back-up craft kits midway through the week since I had more than anticipated at my program earlier this week too. Having those kits made prior to the program is a life-saver so I am definitely going to keep doing so in the future. Also, having back-ups is a great idea. Busy parents do not always have time to register. It makes my life a bit of a pain since I never know how many kids to expect, but it is also fun when I have huge crowds (and have enough crafts for all of them!)!

It is the last program of this Spring session so on to planning for our Summer programs! AND Summer Reading 😱!!!