Many of you likely remember reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. This book follows a ravenous caterpillar’s path until it slows down with a full belly and cocoons itself to emerge as a beautiful butterfly. Fifth Grade World Languages Teacher Christine Mayer helps students take it a step further by hosting live caterpillars on campus who munch on the leaves of a milkweed plant until they are ready to transform into monarch butterflies.
Where do monarch butterflies and World Languages intersect? Each year, millions of monarch butterflies mass migrate from the U.S. and Canada to the mountains of Mexico, where they spend the winter. Learning about the North American ecosystem is an integral part of understanding the migration patterns of the animals and how that influences the local communities and cultures.
The students learn about the life cycle from caterpillar to chrysalis to the final stage of becoming an adult butterfly.
For fifth graders, understanding the butterfly’s journey south to Mexico to spend the winter is also helpful when learning about some of the cultural aspects of the Day of the Dead. In Mexican culture, monarchs represent the souls of loved ones who have passed. Additionally, students drew their own images of monarchs and sent notes written in Spanish to students at a school in Mexico to make first-hand connections about this transformative process.
Even student gardeners got involved in this year’s process. Caroline Brauer ’29 helped introduce baby caterpillars from her home garden into the MICDS butterfly incubator. “I attract the caterpillars by planting milkweed in my garden. The butterflies arrive and lay their eggs, and then I find the caterpillars, keep them, and raise them until they are butterflies. It’s really cool to see them turn into a chrysalis and grow more and more every day until one day they are a butterfly.“
Once the monarchs reach adult stage, they are released on campus with many pollinator-friendly gardens to support them while building strength for their big journey to Mexico.
Mayer adds, “Our 5th grade students are like monarchs. They come in as former 4th graders, and we watch them grow and then fly away to 6th grade!”
Among all the fascinating processes of caterpillars and butterflies, the question that often lingers is: Does a butterfly remember being a caterpillar? Only the butterfly knows.
Check out this video to learn more about the monarch butterfly’s migration and watch a time-lapse of the transformation process.
