I've Got A Little Light And I'm Gonna Let It Shine!
Do you study fireflies? I think you'll enjoy the following activities!
Click on the link to view/download the entire Firefly Packet or click on the separate links below.
Almost every night that my husband Daniel and I are out walking with our puppy, Chloe, we are amazed at the “dance of the fireflies”.
As a child I enjoyed catching “lightning” in a jar and then letting these amazing insects go before they died. I was simply fascinated at their ability to illuminate.
Firefly Art:
1. Print off my “You light up my life with LOVE.” bookmark, color it and leave it in a special place for that special someone to find. Click on the link to view/print the firefly bookmark.
2. Run off copies of my wax paper winged firefly. Students cut out their brown firefly and glue a yellow "glow" tip to the end. Add wiggle eyes with glue dots. Cut a black pipe cleaner in 1/2. Make it into a V. Scotch tape the V to the back of the firefly. Curl each end around a pen to make antennae. Accordion fold an 11x5 sheet of wax paper, round the edges, fold in the middle and staple to the center of the firefly. Cute as is, or hot glue to a clothespin.
Click on the link to view/print wax paper-winged firefly.
3. Buy a package of Popsicle sticks that look like ice cream spoons. Paint the rounded side with neon yellow paint and then a coat of glow-in-the-dark paint. Paint the upper part light brown.
Add wiggle eyes and tissue paper wings. If you twist a ½ piece of pipe cleaner around the middle and make it into a ring, you’ve just made yourself a finger puppet; or hot glue a clothespin to the back, add a magnet and hang on your refrigerator to leave love notes to light up someone’s life!
4. Print off my template and make a firefly keepsake jar by dipping your index finger in bright yellow paint, and then making firefly bodies by pressing your fingerprint all over your bug jar.
Let the prints dry and then brush on glow-in-the-dark paint with a Q-tip. Add wings with a white pencil or crayon. Put an aluminum foil lid on the top and you have “lightning in a jar!”
Click on the link to view/print the firefly keepsake jar templates.
This is a great activity to do after reading 10 Flashing Fireflies. I only put 7 fireflies in this blue Ball Jar, but if you do this as a follow up to that story, have children do 10 fingerprint fireflies.
5. Cut 5x7 rectangles of yellow construction paper. Cut out the template of my firefly out of cardstock and trace around it with a yellow crayon on the yellow construction paper. Place a Dixie cup of diluted black tempera paint in the middle of the table. You should have enough tempera so that the paper will get covered, but enough water so that the water-paint mixture will bead up on the waxed crayon and reveal the firefly and not paint opaquely over it.
Have children “wash” paint over their entire middle of their paper.
I do this activity after I read Eric Carles’ book The Very Lonely Firefly. I tell my students: “OK let’s go find some more firefly friends for this firefly.” I ask them: “When do fireflies come out?” They respond: “At night.” So I tell them: “The sun is shining on this paper. It is bright yellow. You have to make night come by painting it black, so that the fireflies will come out.”
They are amazed to see their firefly appear!
6. For an adorable firefly bulletin board done with Christmas lights click on the link.
Firefly Language Arts Activities:
Firefly Bibliography: "What do we see in the summer night? Ten flashing fireflies burning bright!" Click on the link to view/print other firefly books that I recommend. I've highlighted in yellow my favorites. Click on the link to view/print a copy of my firefly bibliography.
{amazonWS:itemId=1558586741}
123 Count Fireflies With Me: Read, trace, write, count, and then cut and glue the group of fireflies to the matching numbered boxes. Have students use a yellow bingo dot marker to fill in the appropriate amount of dots in the squares.
For an easy reader counting booklet click on the link. Firefly counting booklet.
Don’t be “bugged” by the –ight words! Get a jump-start for fall and study them with my cute lightning bug flashcards. Click on the link to view/print them. Make the cards even more fun, by painting the letters with glow-in-the-dark paint! Firefly flashcards
Click on the link to view/print a firefly fan book of trace and write the firefly vocabulary words & a firefly life cycle fan book. Firefly Fan Books
Cut out the strips, punch a hole in the middle of the bottom. Put the pages together with a brass brad so they unfold like a fan and you have a cute way to review words and science!
Click on the link to TRACE and put the -ight words in ABC order. Firefly skill sheet.
Print off my lightning bug silly story poem, hang it in your room, turn off the lights and pretend you’re a lightning bug and read it in the dark by pointing at each word with a flashlight. Firefly story poem + notes home.
Click on the link to make a firefly class book.
Click on the link for my firefly prose poem. For another cute lightning bug poem click on the link.
Math Practice:
If you’re teaching summer school and doing fireflies with your students, or home schooling, clink on the link to view/print a firefly graph.
123-Count fireflies with me skill sheet. Click on the link to view/print firefly counting skillsheets + an addition subtraction skill sheet.
For a firefly life cycle wheel, click on the link.
For a fact sheet on fireflies and a firefly to label and color, click on the link. Firefly stuff
For a "bright student" firefly certificate of praise, click on the link.
For some awesome firefly photographs of real fireflies, click on the link.
I hope you enjoy these fun firefly activities, and I hope you get to see some real fireflies this summer!
As always, if you have a firefly activity you do with your children, I’d enjoy hearing from you. diane@teachwithme.com
Feel free to PIN anything you feel might help or interest others.
Until next time try saying this tongue twister: Fifty-four fireflies friskily flitted frantically from the frog’s ferocious feast!
