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Looking for a unique approach to learning for your kids? This book will do just that:
Put on your pretending hat and crack open the cover to learn firsthand what it's like to survive as a firefly.
This book will be your handbook, little larva, as you embark upon your new life and let your personality shine through.
Your guide on this journey is a wizened general, who, at a year and a half old, has plenty of experience to pass on to you regarding everything you need to know in order to grow and develop into a full-grown, blinking beetle.
While following this fun, narrative tale, the reader will discover plenty of firefly facts without even realizing there's learning going on!
You'll learn about the life cycle:
Or the steps involved in finding food...or what the adult's body looks like:
Or even the definition of fancy technical terms, like bioluminescence:
At the end of your training, you'll be given a little quiz:
Then, if you still need a bit of help remembering all that you've learned, there's even a great glossary in the back of the book to highlight the most important facts:
We were really excited to explore the subject of fireflies a bit more, so we did a few activities to go along with the book.
First, we were inspired to make our own fireflies. We started by just drawing our own beetles using bright neon highlighters:
Then we remembered we had a few glow sticks, so we created a firefly out one of those and a plastic egg.
For the firefly, we took a plastic Easter egg, stuck two pieces of pipe cleaner into the little holes on one end, glued a couple of googly eyes on, drew on a mouth with a permanent marker, then cut some tissue paper to glue on for wings.
We snipped six little sections of pipe cleaner to glue on for legs and then he was almost ready to go.
My plan had been to fill the inside of the egg with a wadded-up glow stick (we had a small one meant for a bracelet), but then I didn't realize my own He-Man strength and snapped the stick right in two, smearing my hands with who-knows-what kind of chemical and ruining my idea.
I ended up just slathering all that glowing goop over the bum-end of our firefly and then we set him on the bathroom counter and turned out all the lights.
Gv had been most intrigued by how the fireflies blink to communicate. This led to a discussion about Morse Code and our using a chart and pom poms to create our own Morse Code messages:
This book was not only fun to read, but led to so many fun activities as well. And Gv can't wait until this summer when we head back to our camping spot, since we see a ton of lightning bugs there every night!
Grab your own copy of the book here and help your child learn more about this fascinating beetle!
Does your child enjoy learning new facts, but likes having fun at the same time? I'd love to hear! Either leave a comment below or email me at lisah
ealy (at) outlook (dot) com.
Put on your pretending hat and crack open the cover to learn firsthand what it's like to survive as a firefly.
This book will be your handbook, little larva, as you embark upon your new life and let your personality shine through.
Your guide on this journey is a wizened general, who, at a year and a half old, has plenty of experience to pass on to you regarding everything you need to know in order to grow and develop into a full-grown, blinking beetle.
 |
| I love how the "instructor" in this book has such an identifiable personality - I totally read the entire thing in an R. Lee Ermey voice! |
While following this fun, narrative tale, the reader will discover plenty of firefly facts without even realizing there's learning going on!
You'll learn about the life cycle:
 |
| This looks just like any average classroom I've ever seen! |
Or the steps involved in finding food...or what the adult's body looks like:
 |
| I love all the great diagrams! -- and how fun are these illustrations? |
Or even the definition of fancy technical terms, like bioluminescence:
 |
| The author turns learning vocabulary terms into a game with these hidden fun facts scattered throughout the book! |
At the end of your training, you'll be given a little quiz:
 |
| Oooh, such a tricky question! |
Then, if you still need a bit of help remembering all that you've learned, there's even a great glossary in the back of the book to highlight the most important facts:
 |
| This glossary is great for helping parents and teachers guide learners in further discovery based on the book! |
We were really excited to explore the subject of fireflies a bit more, so we did a few activities to go along with the book.
First, we were inspired to make our own fireflies. We started by just drawing our own beetles using bright neon highlighters:
 |
| Gv and I drew our little fireflies and then colored their bums in with fluorescent highlighter. |
Then we remembered we had a few glow sticks, so we created a firefly out one of those and a plastic egg.
 |
| What a cute little critter! |
For the firefly, we took a plastic Easter egg, stuck two pieces of pipe cleaner into the little holes on one end, glued a couple of googly eyes on, drew on a mouth with a permanent marker, then cut some tissue paper to glue on for wings.
We snipped six little sections of pipe cleaner to glue on for legs and then he was almost ready to go.
My plan had been to fill the inside of the egg with a wadded-up glow stick (we had a small one meant for a bracelet), but then I didn't realize my own He-Man strength and snapped the stick right in two, smearing my hands with who-knows-what kind of chemical and ruining my idea.
I ended up just slathering all that glowing goop over the bum-end of our firefly and then we set him on the bathroom counter and turned out all the lights.
 |
| It all ended fine, but if only I'd been gentler in wrapping that little glow bracelet inside the egg, Gv would have had hours of fun playing with her lightning bug! |
Gv had been most intrigued by how the fireflies blink to communicate. This led to a discussion about Morse Code and our using a chart and pom poms to create our own Morse Code messages:
 |
| We decided white pom poms would be the dots, yellow the dashes. Can you figure out what her message says? (It's the opposite of arrivederci, but in English) |
This book was not only fun to read, but led to so many fun activities as well. And Gv can't wait until this summer when we head back to our camping spot, since we see a ton of lightning bugs there every night!
Grab your own copy of the book here and help your child learn more about this fascinating beetle!
 |
| You can't help but have fun learning all about fireflies with this silly book! |
Does your child enjoy learning new facts, but likes having fun at the same time? I'd love to hear! Either leave a comment below or email me at lisah
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