The Best of Bugs: Designing Hand Pollinators
Science Topic: Insects and Plants
Engineering Field: Agricultural Engineering
Country: Dominican Republic
Storybook: Mariana Becomes a Butterfly
This unit helps students connect their knowledge of insects and plants to a broader understanding of the natural system of pollination. Science concepts about insects, life cycles, pollination, and natural systems are introduced and reinforced, and different aspects of agricultural engineering are explored.
Through lessons and the unit's storybook - set in and around a young girl's butterfly garden in the Dominican Republic - students learn about the importance of balance within natural and agricultural systems, and consider what can happen when this balance goes awry. Students are introduced to agricultural engineering from a broad perspective, with brief overviews of Integrated Pest Management and pollination. For the design challenge students design and improve hand pollinators to work with different model flowers.
FOSS Connection: Insects, New Plants, Structures of Life
STC Connection: The Life Cycle of Butterflies, Plant Growth and Development, Organisms
GEMS Connections: Buzzing a Hive, Ladybugs, Schoolyard Ecology
