Butterflies are Free

At the end of the lesson on Anne Frank, I had my students do a project based on the poem "I Never Saw Another Butterfly." A young man in the Terezin ghetto wrote this poem shortly before he was deported to Auschwitz. The Holocaust Museum in Houston is collecting handmade butterflies for an exhibit honoring the 1.5 million children who perished in the Holocaust, so I thought part of the project could be having the students create a butterfly to send to the museum. For the most part, they responded very positively to this project. Furthermore, many of their butterflies were very well made. I was generally quite pleased with the project as a whole.

A colleague had her classes make some butterflies as well, and I went by her room to pick them up to be delivered to the museum next week. Most of her students' butterflies were also quite lovely, but I must say there were also some real standouts. The three that win the "I Wouldn't Send This to the Holocaust Museum if you Paid Me" Award:

1. A series of small butterflies, all emblazoned with the words, "I LUV AJ."
2. A collage butterfly featuring ads for Juicy Couture and Apple Bottom jeans.
3. A butterfly with a human body wearing a black T-shirt that said "HOOTERS."