Our Make-A-Book Project resulted in more monarch butterflies, more readers, more authors, and a new book to last a lifetime and a whole lot of other benefits. Below, we highlight some projects that coincided with our Make-A-Book Project. It was a busy year. Many students thought I was an official teacher, and some of the teachers thought I was an employee.
Pictured above is the incredible tile wall installed this school year at Parker Woods Montessori. This tile mosaic could last 1000 years. I hope my book lasts half that long! Below, we highlight some more projects that coincided with our Make-A-Book Project. It was a busy year. Many students thought I was an employee. I wish!
Side note: If you read all our posts about this book project, you’ll see many more great activities, like the Glow Show Art Show.
4-panel, mini-story
Mural close-up of a four-panel, mini-story created by Scott and 3 students. It goes like this:
- The mother butterfly asks the caterpillar. “If you could do anything, what would you do?”
- The caterpillar dreams of becoming a butterfly.
- She grows into a beautiful butterfly.
- Then in the last square, she gets married, has her own children, and lives happily ever after.
I hope every student who sees this asks themselves the same question. “If I could do anything, what would I do?”
Faces of Parker Woods Montessori Self-Portrait Mural
Below you’ll also see some more pictures of my garden. At the book celebration event, not only did every student get a free book, but they got a packet of seeds to help butterflies and other pollinators. So, I imagined our whole Northside neighborhood has about 500 new gardens. I planted about 3 dozen milkweed plants in my own yard. Milkweed is the only plant caterpillars eat. I also have about 5 giant butterfly bushes. These are like nectar gas stations for the monarchs on their long journey, both north to the Great Lakes and back south to Mexico. So, I counted monarchs and got up to 26 this year. I think that must mean that there were at least 260 who visited my garden and are on their way to Mexico. I think I even had one caterpillar based on a defoliated milkweed plant. So, I call this a big success.
My first year here, my front lawn was nothing but grass, and I never even saw one monarch butterfly. A few swallowtails, but no monarchs. It did take a lot of effort to terrace my yard and plant a garden instead of grass. Now I have created a whole ecosystem. Not only bees and butterflies, but earthworms and all kinds of other things. And all this has attracted a flock of orioles and so much more. I’m telling you a grass lawn is the next worst thing to a parking lot.
I’m hoping the butterfly count at Parker Woods Montessori is going just as well. I haven’t talked much about the book itself. But I have met quite a few kids, and they all said they enjoyed the story. Just getting a kid to read a book these days seems like a win. And, of course, we got about 100 student drawings in the book and about 150 honorable mentions.
And another BIG SUCCESS! We gave away 545 books to students, plus about another 60 books to teachers, libraries and other schools. Since then, I’ve met quite a few students who loved the book. One parent said that their child reads the book every night before they go to bed.
Once again, thanks to all the volunteers for making it happen!
Butterfly gardens galore
We gave a pack of native flower seeds to every family! So lots of students started their own butterfly garden. Below is a picture of mine. I raised and released 28 butterflies this year. Plus, my milkweed made home to many more. And my pollinating plants made a good pitstop for butterflies to fuel up on their migration south.
Student writing projects
Many students were inspired to begin their own projects.
Here is a clipping from the school newspaper with a story, “The life of Carson the Caterpillar.” I was surprised to see what might be called a prequel to “Mirabella the Monarch.” I was happy to see that the book project inspired these two young authors to keep the story alive.
Even more surprises
I love these kinds of serendipitous surprises. Cincinnati Public Schools liked this photograph so much that they featured it on their website homepage. It’s the students and staff of Parker Woods Montessori standing in the shape of a monarch butterfly. Notice the orange and black colors.
Acknowledgments: The mural was created by art teacher Suzanne Nall, PTO co-president and artist Kate Demske, and Rick Wolf of Wolf Custom Tile and Design.
