Taking flight

Late last week, students at Orléans Wood Elementary School shipped out a package of 52 paper butterflies to Mexico, each adorned with a translated Spanish message and colourfully decorated with everything from the monarch’s orange and black to happy faces to Canadian and Mexican flags. The quiver of monarchs are expected to arrive at schools near the country’s monarch sanctuaries by November.

The by-mail journey mimics the actual flight of monarch butterflies each fall from North America thousands of miles down to the Central American nation, explains teacher Mary Ash, as part of the Journey North program, an online science education initiative. Hundreds of schools across Canada and the U.S. and more than 60,000 students have done the same, she continues, with Mexican students sending back the same paper butterflies this spring “after taking care of them all winter.”

Ash – who teaches Grades 4 to 6 students at Orléans Wood – explains though she’s taught students about monarchs each year since 2004, a similar project done previously at nearby Convent Glen Elementary School inspired her to try the same.

The journey of the monarchs is built into every aspect of learning in the classroom, she says, including studying their flight path, life cycle, social issues in Mexico and environmental concerns surrounding protection of sanctuaries there. They also care for and tend to their own butterflies at the school, Ash continues, watching them evolve and grow. “Kids are fascinated with wildlife in general,” she suggests. “They can connect with it right away.”

For Grade 6 students Sarah Pledgedickson and Matthew Webster, watching a butterfly grow in their classroom was one of the project’s most interesting features. “Watching the butterfly come out of the chrysalis” is his favourite part, Matthew explains, even though one of their in-school butterflies didn’t make it. “And how they get all the way to Mexico, never doing that ever before in their lives.” “We got to hold them and feed them,” Sarah adds. “It was a lot of fun.”

As for the paper versions they sent along, “I hope they see it and it’s unique and there’s no other butterfly like that,” Matthew says, motioning to the zigzag orange-and-black design of his own paper creation. “I hope my translation is correct,” continues Sarah. “It would be really cool if someone (at Orléans Wood) got back the butterfly they made.”

The lessons students take away from participating in the symbolic migration and other monarch-related activities are also varied, Ash recounts, including environmental protection and a deeper connection with students down south. “Many of them want to go and visit the sanctuaries in Mexico,” she adds, also pointing to the inspiration gained by learning about that long, arduous journey taken by such small creatures. “It’s bringing in that partnership.” For more information on Journey North, visit www.learner.org/jnorth