JennyC
03-26-2004, 03:14 PM
(Or our Unschooling Day)
We read a story the other day saying that honeybees, when they emerge from the hive in the spring, have to do the most work of their year with the least amount of food resources available to them.
The story ended with the suggestion that if you enjoy honey, leave a bit out for the bees to eat...as a special thankyou treat for all their hard work.
So, yesterday, we left out a cup of honey. This was a mistake because there was nowhere for the bees to land other than in the honey. One bumblebee got trapped a la the LaBrea Tarpits, but we got him out and slowly all the honey drained off of him.
Today, we tried again, but this time, we smeared honey on the trees and garden fencing near flowers that would attract the bees normally.
After about 15 minutes, the honey smears were covered in honey bees. It was awesome! It happened so fast that the children didn't lose interest and we spent a long time talking about bees...how they and other flower flies pollenate flowers which leads to more flowers, fruits and vegetables, etc.
Eli had a huge number of questions that we are still assembling the answers for. Much of the time I don't immediately know what he is asking me, but we find out together either by looking in books or on the Internet. This teaches him valuable research skills for the future. We also keep a list of questions to look up when we go the library.
Anyhow, we found lots of kid-friendly information at
http://www.honey.com/kids/facts.html
And are looking for more, but I digress.
After we watched the bees eating the honey (I know I'd never seen a bee tongue before), we spent about half an hour on the swingset spelling bee-related terms like "bee", "buzz", "honey", "fly", "wings", "sting" etc. before coming inside to eat some freshly-baked bread with, you guessed it, HONEY!
Eli keeps running out to check on the bees and is very eager to learn a whole lot more about bees...which I think is **** cool...especially considering we didn't have to do anything for this project other than spread honey and watch what happened.
We are going to do some bee art projects when Schuyler wakes up...I think we will draw and do some clay modeling...who knows? We'll see what the day brings us...now, I wish I had some beeswax to model with, but that'll save for another day.
Jennifer.
PS - FTR, I wouldn't recommend smearing honey anywhere too near your house or kitchen door. It also attracts lots of other insects...most notably - ANTS!
We read a story the other day saying that honeybees, when they emerge from the hive in the spring, have to do the most work of their year with the least amount of food resources available to them.
The story ended with the suggestion that if you enjoy honey, leave a bit out for the bees to eat...as a special thankyou treat for all their hard work.
So, yesterday, we left out a cup of honey. This was a mistake because there was nowhere for the bees to land other than in the honey. One bumblebee got trapped a la the LaBrea Tarpits, but we got him out and slowly all the honey drained off of him.
Today, we tried again, but this time, we smeared honey on the trees and garden fencing near flowers that would attract the bees normally.
After about 15 minutes, the honey smears were covered in honey bees. It was awesome! It happened so fast that the children didn't lose interest and we spent a long time talking about bees...how they and other flower flies pollenate flowers which leads to more flowers, fruits and vegetables, etc.
Eli had a huge number of questions that we are still assembling the answers for. Much of the time I don't immediately know what he is asking me, but we find out together either by looking in books or on the Internet. This teaches him valuable research skills for the future. We also keep a list of questions to look up when we go the library.
Anyhow, we found lots of kid-friendly information at
http://www.honey.com/kids/facts.html
And are looking for more, but I digress.
After we watched the bees eating the honey (I know I'd never seen a bee tongue before), we spent about half an hour on the swingset spelling bee-related terms like "bee", "buzz", "honey", "fly", "wings", "sting" etc. before coming inside to eat some freshly-baked bread with, you guessed it, HONEY!
Eli keeps running out to check on the bees and is very eager to learn a whole lot more about bees...which I think is **** cool...especially considering we didn't have to do anything for this project other than spread honey and watch what happened.
We are going to do some bee art projects when Schuyler wakes up...I think we will draw and do some clay modeling...who knows? We'll see what the day brings us...now, I wish I had some beeswax to model with, but that'll save for another day.
Jennifer.
PS - FTR, I wouldn't recommend smearing honey anywhere too near your house or kitchen door. It also attracts lots of other insects...most notably - ANTS!