Adventures in a Messy Life

Hands on learning for active learners

  • Home page
    • Start Here
    • About Us
    • Get all of the posts now!
    • Disclosure and other blogging information
  • Homeschooling
    • Homeschool Curriculum
    • Why I homeschool (comments from a former teacher)
    • Homeschooling and the Holidays
  • History and geography
    • Ancient History Lessons
    • Modern History lessons
    • American History Lessons
    • LEGO history
  • Science
  • Bible Curriculum
  • STORE

Science Sunday: Fireflies

October 3, 2010 Ticia 9 Comments

 

This past week we’ve read about all sorts of beetles, from ladybugs to fireflies.  As soon as I realized we were studying them I tried to look up to see if there was any sort of experiment to explain how they light up.
 
I came up with nothing.  I saw lots of “go out and count how many fireflies you see,” type of thing, but we don’t really have them here in Texas.
 
So, I decided instead to have us be pretend fireflies.  This worked out super well because one of the episodes of “The Cat in the Hat Knows A Lot About That” was about fireflies so we incorporated that as well.
010
 

 
First we got our glowsticks and broke them.  Or rather the kids attempted to, and I ended up breaking them.

 

 

022 021

Then we went down to our local elementary school playground and took turns flashing our lights to signal different things.  The boys refused to flash their lights to get a girl to come to them because, and I quote “I don’t want the girl to come and eat me.”  That teaches me for telling them about how some females eat the male of their species.

 

But, they had a lot of fun flashing their lights to warn about spider webs, or other dangerous things.  I of course was the spider.  Why do I always get to be the bad guy?

 

039 038

And of course we had to try out the cool effect of waving them around in the complete darkness.

 

Seriously though the glowsticks were probably a lucky find for explaining fireflies because just like the fireflies glow it’s a chemical reaction and it doesn’t heat up like our lights do.  It’s a very efficient process as far as energy conversion goes.

 

Downside to this experiment now the kids are trying to convince me I need to let them walk around with them forever.  Oh well.

 

Have you ever had a lucky find that worked well for you?  I love finding those from time to time.

science flying creatures, observation, Science Sunday, zoology

Comments

  1. MaryAnne says

    October 3, 2010 at 11:53 am

    glow sticks are such neat things to play with! And it sounds like your kids really listened to your lessons on lightning bugs!

    Reply
  2. Debbie says

    October 3, 2010 at 2:46 pm

    I love the boys comment on the girl. We love glow sticks here too, never thought of using them in this way though.

    Reply
  3. Annette W. says

    October 3, 2010 at 5:18 pm

    Too bad you don't have fireflies…they sure are fun…though just counting them doesn't seem nearly as exciting as what you did!

    Reply
  4. Christy says

    October 4, 2010 at 1:52 am

    Hey, at least your boys will never forget that sometimes the female eats the male! Love that.

    Great experiment, and so much fun too!

    Reply
  5. LitLass says

    October 4, 2010 at 3:08 am

    We're in Texas as well. I'll have to try the glow sticks.

    Reply
  6. Elise says

    October 4, 2010 at 11:20 am

    Savvy recently received a glow stick in a party bag and since then we have bought some more glow sticks for her and Blakie – they are fun.

    Reply
  7. Raising a Happy Child says

    October 4, 2010 at 7:46 pm

    The comments about girls really make me laugh. Anna loves glowsticks – I was saving some up from July for these longer darker evenings with “I have nothing to do” moments.

    Reply
  8. Kim says

    October 5, 2010 at 12:30 am

    Oh, what fun! And I keep seeing The Cat in the Hat on other blogs. It's a great show isn't it? Except that song is permanently in my head…

    Reply
  9. littlewondersdays says

    October 5, 2010 at 1:58 am

    It sounds like a fun time. The comment of about the girls eating them is priceless and made me laugh.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Ticia Adventures in Mommydom Hi, I'm Ticia! This is the adventures of my family in life and learning. Follow along with us as we share our adventures. We're having a lot of fun and learning as we go.

Help!!!! I need to know:

Categories

 book and a movie combo

Copyright © 2023 ·