Creative Writing in Science -- Life Cycle of a Butterfly

Creepy Crawlies are fascinating!  With spring and warmer days being a time to explore, we can take advantage of students' interest and do cross-curricular activities.  An example activity would be to use study of the life cycle of a butterfly as a starter for creative writing.  This is a class favorite as we create another "Growing Story."

Using visual imagery again, we combine learning about the butterfly's life cycle with imagining our lives, beginning as a caterpillar and ending as the beautiful butterfly.  With closed eyes, begin a discussion about what students imagine themselves to look like and feel like as caterpillars.  Through imagery, students examine their surroundings and decide a plan of action.  Their actions can take them through a variety of experiences as they evolve through the life cycle, usually in a fanciful manner.  Then, with eyes open and minds ready, their writing begins.

This time the story "grows" by using another sheet of paper glued or taped to the right side and more pages are added as desired.  These writing pages can be mounted on construction paper with an artistic caterpillar head at the beginning.  

This is another way to decorate the walls as the "Growing Stories" are displayed so students can share their writing skills as well as knowledge of science. The picture shows a bulletin board with the shorter stories (along with egg carton caterpillars) while the longer caterpillar stories (up to 10 segments) decorate the hallway wall.  Each caterpillar is a single story written independently by a student in the kindergarten class.