What About Bugs?

As children tell you what they know about bugs, write down what they say on bug cutouts. Use the quotes to create a web of knowledge on a bulletin board in your room. At the end of the theme refer back to the quotes and see if they children have learned anything different or new.

Assess

participates in group discussion

Not All Spiders Spin 

Show pictures of many different kinds of spiders and be sure and include spiders that do not spin webs. Talk about ways that other spiders catch prey.

Assess

participates in group discussions

Ant Colony

Pour out about 15-20 cotton balls onto the floor in the middle of circle time. Set a cup down for each child.
Have them get one cotton ball at a time and put it in their own cup. Count how long it takes to fill up their cups. Then pour the cotton balls back onto the floor and have all the children help fill up one cup, still picking up only one cotton ball at a time while the teacher counts. Compare how long it took. Talk about why ants work together to gather food.

Assess

works well with others

responds to suggestions of others

Caterpillar Explore

Bring a live caterpillar to group. Place it in a large bug jar or aquarium with leaves and water.
Talk about how to caterpillar moves. Try to get it to eat and then pass around a leaf that the caterpillar has eaten off of to show the way that it eats. Keep the caterpillar only if you are able to keep it supplied with fresh leaves every day and water.

Assess

recognizes feelings of others
recognizes what another may need or want

Community Web

Sit in a circle. Teacher holds a ball of yarn. Hold the end. Say a child's name, then roll the ball across the circle to that child. That child holds part of the string and rolls the ball to another child. Keep holding and rolling until the yarn goes back and forth across the middle to make a web.

        Assess

works as a member of a group

Rhyming Flowers

Glue pictures to flower cutouts and write the names of the pictures on the flowers as well. Hang the flowers on the wall or place them on the floor in a large space.
Children take turns listening to a word and flying a bee puppet or cutout to the flower with the picture that rhymes with that word. Older children may enjoy flying their bee to a flower and making up a rhyming word to it.

Assess

identifies rhyming words

Bug Bodies

Name bug body parts and compare to human body parts. Talk about what each part is for. Compare different pictures of insects and spiders.

Assess

uses new vocabulary

asks questions

speaks in complete sentences

Pesky Pests

Cut a one-inch square in the center of a new flyswatter. Write one letter on each fly cutout and tape them to the wall.
Say a letter to one child and have them take the flyswatter and swat the fly with that letter so that the letter ends up in the square cutout.

Assess

recognizes letters

Bug Movements

Have pictures of bugs.
Children take turns choosing a picture randomly and moving like that bug.

Assess

aware of how the body moves

Bee Language

Explain that bees communicate by dancing because they are deaf (can't hear). They dance and shake to tell other bees where they found the best flowers. Play a lively song and have each child take turns dancing like bees.

Assess

participates in movement acitivities