The Very Lonely Firefly

For our study on "Investigating Light," one of the books we read was The Very Lonely Firefly by Eric Carle. 

After reading the book, we made fingerprint fireflies. Using yellow paint, we made fingerprints on black construction paper. Then, after it dried, we drew in the details. Here is an example of the one I made.

We also took a piece of cardboard and poked holes in it. Then, we turned off the lights and shined a flashlight through the holes to make it look like fireflies lighting up.

The kids really enjoyed this unit, especially when we turned off the lights to make shadows and paint with glow in the dark paint!

Thinky Linky Thursday: Are you afraid of the dark?

I have been letting the baby play with flashlights and tonight, we were in his playroom and I turned off the lights and realized we could have a little fun as most of his toys light up. He thought it was pretty funny. Anyways, there are so many activities you can do with children in the dark using flashlights and other things that light up. For example, for younger children, even babies, they may not understand that they are controlling the light beam coming from the flashlight. Allowing them to explore and make shadows is a great way to help them understand what light is and how it works. Using different color lights or laser pointers can also be fun and help them identify colors.

You can even talk about prisms and how light splits apart for older kids. Have a campout in a homemade tent to start your adventure and let the discovery begin! And for some gross motor, you might want to add in a game of flashlight tag.

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