IPS/Butler University Laboratory School

          We have been incorporating our praying mantis into our reading, writing, and math. Today, we started our day by reading the book, “Manuelo the Playing Mantis,” a story about a praying mantis that wants to make music. Some of our friends have been writing about bugs in Writer’s Workshop, and yesterday, we solved a math problem about our new pet, Cinderella Lightning McQueen. I talked about how many crickets I put in Cinderella’s terrarium and how many were left. Then I asked students to figure out how many crickets Cinderella had eaten. After that, I gave students this story problem…”There were 10 crickets in the bag. Miss Estridge took out 3 crickets to give to Cinderella Lightning McQueen. How many crickets are in the bag now?” Student were put into pairs and asked to solve the problem using unifix cubes. They did a wonderful job solving this math problem. As we continue to learn more about praying mantids and other insects, I will continue to try to incorporate that information into our learning.