Not your Average Worksheet on Butterfly Life Cycle

These printable butterfly colouring pages become a stunning butterfly paper craft. If you are looking for a simple butterfly art activity for preschoolers, you’re in the right place! This butterfly craft with paper is printable, easy to assemble, and beautiful!

Printable Butterfly Colouring Pages: A Butterfly Life Cycle Kids Craft

This activity is designed to be young learner friendly with thick black lines to help build confidence with coloring as it hides mistakes. For butterfly life cycle kindergarten activities, this project is quick, and beautiful. I love seeing a space filled with painted and coloured butterflies. 

Studying the Butterfly Life Cycle Stages?

These coloring pages of butterfly life cycle are fun to make and easy to prep. Use this activity to supplement a unit on the stages of the butterfly life cycle, or use it if you just want a fun spring craft. This activity uses 2 pieces of paper and can be used to fill your house with beautiful butterfly life cycle art. 

More Resources to Explore the Four Stages of a Butterfly Life Cycle

If you are interested in drawing the four stages of a butterfly life cycle with your kids, here are some directed drawings you should check out! Each directed drawing covers a different stage butterfly life cycle. The butterfly is beautiful. It is amazing to see the stages of a butterfly life cycle.

Preparing your Printable Butterfly Colouring Pages:

Start by preparing your printable butterfly coloring sheet. Print both pages for this butterfly art activity: the wings, and the wings attached to the body.

This diy butterfly paper craft  comes in three different sizes. For younger learners the larger size will be easier to cut out, but if your kids are like my nieces and nephews they will probably want to make them in every size to make a butterfly family. I have a hard time resisting making crafts when they come in a mini version too!

Color or Paint your Printable Butterfly Colouring Pages: 

The butterfly life cycle paper craft template can either be colored or painted. When coloring it is fun to practice blending shades of red, orange and yellow on the wings. It is helpful to look at photos of a monarch butterfly first to talk about how they change shades of orange. It is also helpful in observing where the white spots on the wings are too.

If painting the butterfly, to keep some of the spots white, color them with a white wax crayon before painting. The paint will roll off the wax leaving the spots white. Use a watercolor paint, so that the paint does not show on top of the black printed lines.

To give the illusion that the body is round, when coloring the body, color the center gray and then use a black pencil crayon on the edges a darker shade.

Repeat the same coloring steps on the wing page, either coloring or painting each section of the monarch butterfly’s wings.

And now we are ready to assemble your printable butterfly colouring pages!

How to Assemble the Butterfly | Paper Craft

To assemble the butterfly | paper craft, first fold each page in half along the dotted line. After the butterfly paper craft is folded, it is helpful to hold the folded page up to a window or a light source to make sure it is lined up.

Then, cut around the butterfly paper craft. Leaving a bit of white space will make cutting it out a bit easier, especially when cutting around the antennae. 

Next, fold down the wings on each side of the body. To check and see that the wings are lined up, look at the line along the bottom where the wings touch.

Finally, open the butterfly and add glue along the head and body of the butterfly. Try to avoid putting glue on the antennae so that they can be folded later on.

Close the butterfly and press gently along the body to ensure that the glue sticks.

Attaching the Wings on the Butterfly Life Cycle Craft

Now it is time to attach the top of the wings to your butterfly life cycle craft.

First, reverse the fold on the wings, so that the colored part is on the inside.

Second, apply glue to one side of your butterfly. Then lay the wing page on that side. It is helpful to leave a small 1mm space along the bottom of the butterfly paper craft where the fold is. Check out the video for an example of how this butterfly | paper craft is assembled.

Once attached, add glue to the top part of the wing page. Then close the butterfly. 

Finally, fold the antennae out a bit. And now, your printable butterfly coloring sheet has undergone metamorphosis and is now a butterfly. Your beautiful butterfly is ready to go on an adventure! I hope you found thes printable butterfly colouring pages fun and useful when exploring the life cycle and beauty of Monarch butterflies. 

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More Arts & Crafts Like this Coloring Page Butterfly Life Cycle

If you loved these coloring pages of butterfly life cycle and are looking for more fun insect crafts, check out this blog post on the Kindness Bee Craft! Or the Adorable Sloths. 

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