Light-Up Egg Fireflies

We got this great activity from Amy, The Alpine County MHSA Wellness Coordinator at the Library Summer Reading Program "Fly Guys & Gals".

You will need:
1/2 clear plastic egg
1/2 opaque plastic egg
wax or hot glue
a battery operated tea candle
pipe cleaners
scissors
googly eyes
tissue paper

For this activity, save or purchase some plastic eggs. You will need 1/2 of them to be clear.
Place the tea candle inside so it is showing through the clear egg.

Glue on eyes, antennae, and tail. Tape on wings. We had some white tissue paper with silver glitter saved from a present in the craft cabinet. You can use any color tissue paper.

For this activity, the eyes, antennae and tail are attached with wax which was softened in the sun.
Since bees are insects that fly and make wax and the library had some wax on-hand in their craft stash, Amy set the wax in the sun to soften while she read insect stories in the park and encouraged the children to explore the material. Afterwards they were able to use the softened wax instead of glue. If you don't have wax.....hot glue will work but since it is an adult's job it doesn't allow as much child participation. Paraffin craft wax can be found at any craft store or near the canning supplies of your local grocery or drug store. Although paraffin wax isn't bees wax it is a great topic of discussion about how bees build comb out of wax to store their honey.

But since we made fireflies we don't want to leave them out...National Geographic shares how fireflies glow. They have dedicated light organs that are located under their bellies. When they take in oxygen it combines with a special substance in this organ to produce light with almost no heat. Firefly light doesn't flash constantly but when they do flash there seem to be different flashing patterns that are unique to each species. Those unique flashing patterns make great mating signals and also might be a way of warning potential predators away.  

Great books to pair with this activity:
"The Very Lonely Firefly" by Eric Carle
"Sam and the Firefly" by P.D. Eastman
"Honeymakers" by Gail Gibbons

And some corny jokes about bees and fireflies....
"How do bees brush their hair?" "With a HONEYCOMB."
"How do fireflies start a race?" "Ready, set, GLOW!"
"What to fireflies eat?" "LIGHT snacks."