What You Must Know When Building Spiders with Children

I have repeated these spider lessons multiple years with different sets of children. This year I have had an epiphany! Most years I have handicapped spiders, spiders with missing legs, spiders with too many eyes, children who make the abdomen too small etc. This year I started with the legs. I modeled how to fold the legs first. Fold it down, flip it over, fold it down, flip it over, fold it down, and flip it over. I gave the children two legs to start with. This lets them have something to do to keep busy. Then I pass out more as they are working. Next, I pass out a large piece of construction paper and draw a small circle on the back to show them the wrong way to cut a spider body (abdomen). Then I show them the right way. I tell students to attach the legs to the spider when they have them all cut out. Doing it this way this year gave me a much higher rate of children with spiders that were accurately built with legs and body. Next week is my last spider lesson, so we will see how the finished products turn out!

To read more about the spider lessons go here.