The Very Hungry Caterpillar Kindergarten Lesson
How To Teach Days of the Week, Counting and The Butterfly Life Cycle
Mar 6, 2009
Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar [Philomel Books, 1987] details a caterpillar’s journey from egg to butterfly. The caterpillar eats more each day as he grows bigger until he finally becomes a butterfly. Kindergarten teachers can use the book to teach students the days of the week, the life cycle of a caterpillar and to count better.
Use The Very Hungry Caterpillar to Teach Days of the Week
Kindergarten students will have fun learning to recognize the days of the week after reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. After reading the story with the students, the Kindergarten teacher can highlight the days of the week words in the story with highlighting tape and add the words to the classroom word wall. The Kindergarten students can also practice spelling and reading the days of the week during calendar time.
Kindergarten teachers can also make a The Very Hungry Caterpillar classroom learning center to help kids learn the days of the week. To make the learning center the teacher glues magnets onto the back of each of the days of the week and places them on a small magnetic whiteboard. The teacher then glues magnets onto the back of pictures of each of the foods the caterpillar eats in the story. The Kindergarteners can use the Eric Carle story to match the day of the week to the correct food the caterpillar ate that day.
Use The Very Hungry Caterpillar to Teach Counting Skills
The Very Hungry Caterpillar eats more and more each day as he gets ready to turn into a butterfly. Kindergarten students can practice their counting skills by counting the number of things the caterpillar eats as the class reads the story. After reading, the students can make their own books retelling the story. The students name the number of things the caterpillar eats each day and label the page by writing one apple or four strawberries.
Use The Very Hungry Caterpillar to Teach How Caterpillars Grow Into Butterflies
Kindergarten students can learn about the life cycle of a caterpillar by reading Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar. The teacher can use the trade book to show the students how a caterpillar begins its life as an egg and eventually emerges from a chrysalis, or cocoon, as a butterfly.
After reading the story students can act out the life cycle of the butterfly using everyday props. The teacher can give the Kindergarteners a ball, a long skinny balloon, a pillow case and a large butterfly. The students can take turns showing how the caterpillar (balloon) pops out of the egg (ball) and then goes into the chrysalis pillowcase. After the pillowcase is closed up the kids can open it and pull out a pretend butterfly showing the final stage of the life cycle.
The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle can be used to teach Kindergarteners to identify and spell the days of the week using a magnetic learning center. Teachers can also help students practice their number skills by having them count the number of things the caterpillar in the story eats each day. The students can also use the story to learn about how caterpillars grow into butterflies and act out each stage the caterpillar goes through.
For more information about The Very Hungry Caterpillar lesson Kindergarten teachers can read: How To Use a Word Wall to Teach Reading Skills, Teach Kindergarten Calendar Skills, and Butterfly Life Cycle Elementary Lesson.
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