Insects, spiders, frogs

Hmm, how did that old nursery rhyme go - the one about what little girls and little boys are made of?

"What are little boys made of?
What are little boys made of?

Frogs and snails
And puppy-dogs' tails,
That's what little boys are made of"

Well, lately, some of God's creatures are finding their way into our home. In the span of about a month, we've been visited by a small brown frog, two large long legged brown spiders, a large shiny green beetle, and a brown moth.

I started catching them and temporarily place them in plastic containers for him to observe. Hey, I see it as opportunities for quick science lessons!

It is also for him to learn not to be so squeemish around them. In the past, he wasn't afraid of insects and such. That changed when he mimicked how his classmates reacted to a really large (dead) moth that the teacher showed the class. Sigh.

I didn't take a photo of the small frog. He liked observing it and since it was caught during breakfast time, I asked him if he wanted to bring it to school. He did and was quite excited. His teacher however is squeemish about frogs...so I stopped bringing such things to school in case she's also squeemish about other creepy crawlies.

Teaching him not just the names of the parts of the bugs but also observation skills, and labelling. Btw, I helped him colour and write but he added the "thorns" on one of the back legs himself.

That's the second of the large spiders to visit us. It sadly lost 4 of its legs when we found it.

He knows that insects have 6 legs, while spiders, being arachnids have 8. I borrowed that book about spiders from the library cos he was interested in spiders, after the first spider appeared in his bedroom.

I didn't take a photo of the moth. I drew a picture of the moth while he added the spots and coloured it.

Well, that's about the only science that I recently taught my son. Not much time for specific science lessons. But what little bits of science I have taught, he does seem to remember well. Just a few days ago, he saw a picture of a butterfly on a flower and kept on saying "poh-nee-shen". I didn't realise til a few seconds later that he was trying to say "pollination"! LOL