Babash and Estalinda

This past week, several caterpillars have wandered into my classroom.  One day, I got the brilliant idea that I should put one in a plastic box so that my students can observe the life cycle first hand.  So, we collected the next caterpillar that came into our room, and put him in a little box with some leaves.

I found a book in our library to help explain the life cycle of a caterpillar.  Then (just for fun) I told the students that we should name our caterpillar.  I let the kids come up with three name choices, and then we took a vote.  The options were: Kenshen, Chenish, or Babash.  For those of you that might wonder if these are Creole words or Haitian names, as far as I know, they are total nonsense.  We took a vote and our caterpillar was named Babash.

The next day, the kids found another caterpillar crawling on a wall in the classroom.  We decided to put it in our box with Babash.  The kids informed me that since Babash is a boy, the new caterpillar has to be a girl.  So, they gave her the name Estalinda.

The kids have been so excited to watch our caterpillars and they are anxiously waiting for them to make a cocoon.