Butterfly Garden

The Red and Yellow Rooms loved getting out in the butterfly garden as part of our investigations topic this term. They worked hard as a team to pull out some very big weeds to make our garden ready for some new plants.

Gardening Discovery

We are working hard to remove the weeds in the butterfly garden.  We use our time during Discovery Time to help the butterflies.  We learnt lots about working together, persevering, using our manners, and sharing the tools.  A great start was made on the weed issue.  You should have seen the size of some of the roots we were trying to pull out!  It was a little bit like the Enormous Turnip story when we all tried to work together to pull it out.  

Heather and Tom were our Discovery Time Stars this week for showing creativity in their activities.

Compassion

We found a butterfly that wasn't very happy so we made it some sugar syrup to help give it some energy.  We used sugar and hot water and we tried to feed it from our fingers.  The butterfly didn't know what to do so we put the bowl of sugar syrup outside and took the butterfly to the garden.  We hope it enjoyed its special drink.

Buddy time with Rooms 10 and 12

At Buddy Time we showed our big buddies all about being scientists for the Monarch Butterfly Trust because we had another butterfly that needed to be tagged and released.  The Butterfly flew around the room and enjoyed landing on our big buddies who thought it was pretty cool too!

Butterfly Scientists

We are being scientists for the New Zealand Monarch Butterfly Trust.  We have to put tiny stickers onto the hind wings of any Monarch Butterflies that hatch or we see in our Butterfly garden.

The Trust is trying to find out what the Butterflies do over winter.  The little sticker has a number on it which is different for every butterfly.  We have to go onto a special website and say if it is a boy butterfly or a girl butterfly, if it flew away when we released it and if it did in what direction and we also have to tell them about the condition of the wings - whether they were new or dull.

If people see the Butterflies they can go onto a special website and tell them where and when they saw it.  They look to see where it was released from and they track it to where it has been sighted.  We are hoping that someone will see the butterflies that we released this morning and we will be able to see where they go over winter.

Butterflies, Butterflies everywhere!

Over the weekend we had 5 new butterflies hatch out of their chrysalis!  There were 2 boys and 3 girls flying around the classroom when Miss Browne arrived at school.  They really wanted to get outside, so unfortunately they had to be let go but we took photos so everyone could see them.

 And then this afternoon, when we arrived back at school after a day learning about phonics, there was another butterfly that had hatched!  It was another girl!  We have had so many butterflies hatch now, I'm not sure I know how many and how many were boys or girls.

We still have some more chrysalis waiting to hatch.  Hopefully they will wait until after the 1st of March so we can tag them and be scientists for the Monarch Butterfly Trust.

It's another girl!

This morning when Miss Browne and Miss Smit's arrived at school there was a butterfly flying around the learning spaces.  It's another girl!

A fourth butterfly

Our butterflies like to hatch once the children have left! Here is our fourth butterfly. Look carefully and see if you can tell if it is a boy or a girl.

It was so keen to leave that it was flying around the yellow room. It was tricky but we eventually got it down from the curtains and let it go outside. It LOVED the wind that was blowing and flew around outside our learning spaces for a long time before flying over towards the butterfly garden.

It is our first boy butterfly!  3 girls and 1 boy.  I wonder what our next butterfly will be?

Our third butterfly...

While we were out enjoying ourselves at the Museum and Riccarton House, we had our third butterfly hatch from its chrysalis.  Can you work out if it is a girl or a boy?  Look for the spots on the hind wings.  If there are no black spots, then it is a girl.  If there are black spots, then it is a boy.  What do you think?

That's right!  It's another girl!  That is three girls altogether so far!

Our second butterfly

Just as Miss Browne was closing the drapes in the blue room to go home, she noticed that another butterfly had hatched.  I took a photo just in case it wants to fly away in the morning and the children don't get to see it.

Look closely in the picture can you tell if it is a boy or a girl butterfly?

That's right, it is another girl!