Have a fun time with your little critters and help them celebrate the arrival of spring using Eric Carle‘s book, THE VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLAR. This book is filled with one brilliantly colored page after another. An insatiable caterpillar literally eats his way through a week and almost everything else. In end, of course, he changes into a beautiful butterfly.

After reading the book through a time or two with your child, help him create a caterpillar puppet using a white tube sock and permanent markers. Slip a piece of construction paper or tag board inside the sock so the markings don’t go through to the other side.
To make the butterfly, use a clothes pin and tissue paper and chenille wire. Here’s a link to the San Diego Zoo’s Crafts for Kids to show you how: http://www.sandiegozoo.org/kids/craft_butterfly.html

The Zoo Crafts also has another caterpillar craft: http://www.sandiegozoo.org/kids/craft_caterpillar2.html

Or your child might like to make a string of food (that the caterpillar could eat) by clipping photos from magazines or newspaper ads. Punch holes in the foods and then string them up with days-of-the-week name tags interspersed through the pictures.

Other books by Eric Carle that you can share with your child are
THE GROUCHY LADYBUG
THE MIXED UP CHAMELEON
THE VERY BUSY SPIDER

Happy reading and crafting!