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The project’s goal is to collect 1.5 million butterflies made by elementary school students throughout the country for a planned exhibition to commemorate the 1.5 million children who perished during the Holocaust.

For Dorsey’s class, the project was the culmination of a Holocaust teaching unit that also saw the students read ‘‘Number The Stars,” a novel written by Lois Lowry about a Danish family who helped a Jewish girl hide from the Nazis, and undertake a number of projects.

Before making their butterflies, students listened as Joan Nachman, the school’s guidance counselor, read a poem titled ‘‘I Never Saw Another Butterfly” by Pavel Friedmann.

Friedmann, who died in Germany at the Auschwitz concentration camp, was one of several Jewish children who left behind works of art and poetry at the Terezin concentration camp. Their works are collected in an anthology with the same title as his poem.

Once Davis had finished making his butterfly, he sat and stared at his creation and thought about what the butterfly might have represented to Friedmann.

‘‘To me, this butterfly represents freedom and justice,” Davis said. ‘‘Butterflies can go wherever they want to go and not be held up in a camp. The butterflies could see the real world and be free and the children couldn’t.”

Dorsey said the project was planned as a way for students to identify with those children who were at Terezin.

‘‘We thought this would be a way for them to relate to those children,” Dorsey said. ‘‘This is the hands-on portion that they’re getting. They’re getting an even closer look at what happened to children during that time in history.”

Nehemiah Boone wrote the word ‘‘Jewish” across his butterfly with pipe cleaners.

‘‘If I put myself in those kids’ shoes I would be very sad that I couldn’t see my parents again,” he said as he finished gluing on the letter ‘s.’

Classmates Janae Addison and Kafi Browne worked together on their butterflies, using a bumblebee as their inspiration. Both butterflies had a yellow and white motif with a touch of silver glitter.

Nachman said she would soon be sending the butterflies to the Holocaust Museum Houston with a letter explaining the class’ Holocaust unit.

‘‘We thought that since the kids already had been learning about the Holocaust, this would be a really good project for them to do as an extension to their learning,” Nachman said. ‘‘I also thought it would be kind of interesting for the kids to be part of a nationwide program and feel like they’re a part of something bigger.”

E-mail Jonathan Stein at jstein@gazette.net.