Malinda Martha Meets Mariposa
Malinda Martha Meets Mariposa by Marcia Trimble and illustrated by John Lund is a book for children ages 4-8 and deals with the subject of monarch butterfly metamorphosis. It is told from the point of view of Malinda Martha, who is imagining a play she wants to present to her class about the monarch butterfly. As she contemplates her project, she auditions various backyard creatures for parts in her play. Each act of the play is a stage in the development of the monarch. Malinda Martha is the star of the show, and she is on stage in various costumes. Small illustrations in the corner of the pages are realistic illustrations of the stages of the butterfly's metamorphosis. This book has some nice prose and some excellent illustrations.
There are vocabulary words in the back of the book. Other products supplement this story, such as a Milkweed Planting Songs (audio available as a free download), and various activities such as a Readers' Theater script are in a downloadable PDF format. I think this book, along with the activities, would make a great supplement to any homeschooler's science program.
Product review by Christine Hindle, The Old Schoolhouse© Magazine, LLC, March 2010