1-2-3 Come Do Some Bee Activities With Me

My son has taken up beekeeping as a hobby and asked if I would design some educational activities he could share when he gives a talk.

Of course my answer was yes! This jumbo "Honey Bees!" packet is the result of that request.

So … I spent days reading books and articles, countless hours doing research online, plus more time watching videos.

Fascinated, I sifted through a mountain of material, sorting, consolidating and making it “kid friendly”, while designing fun “stuff” to help students learn about honey bees.

This is a comprehensive and very versatile unit.
Simply choose whatever information and activities are appropriate for your students, then “print & go”.

Don’t know anything about bees? Doesn’t matter.
It’s all in here, so you too can enjoy learning right along with your students.

I did a ton of work, so you don’t have to!

The packet includes:

* Honey bee vocabulary (54 words) with definitions & fun word work activities to practice these new science terms, with a “My Bee Words” cover for a student-made dictionary.

* A detailed explanation of each stage of the bee’s life cycle, complete with posters, worksheets, puzzles, games & crafts students can do to help reinforce these concepts.

* In depth information about the 3 types of bees (queen, drones & workers) and all of their duties, which help run a healthy hive, along with worksheets, a craft. 

There's also a quick, easy & fun assessment game to help check comprehension.

Children color, cut & glue the beehives featuring the 3 types of bees to a Popsicle stick.

The teacher reads one of 30 statements from the "Which Bee Am I?" worksheet. Students decide which bee is being described then hold it up. 

Teacher's can see at a glance who is having difficulty.  It's a fun way to review, before giving older students the quiz, where they circle a Q, D or W.

Because I like mixing language arts with science, comprehension can also be checked via a cute "What'll It Bee?" writing prompt, where students explain which type of bee they'd like to be, as well as which one they wouldn't want to "bee". 

There are also quite a few other interesting writing prompt activities which will enhance what students have learned.

* Parts of a bee worksheet-posters.

* 30 real photographs of the different honey bees, their hives, stages of their life cycle, pollination, and beekeepers. Use these (2-on-a-page) photo posters to introduce the lesson, explain things, then as a bulletin board display featuring students’ work.

You can also have older students pick one and write about it, or make a list of descriptive words.

* 52 interesting facts about bees, which are displayed on mini posters (2-on-a-page). Simply choose your favorites.

Share the information with your students, then check comprehension with the quick true or false quiz, which can be given orally to younger kiddos, who show their answers with a Popsicle stick puppet paddle.

* A class book, "If We Were Bees" ,along with several poems, plus a variety of word work activities (including rhyming) are also included. 

* Several "Life Cycle of a Bee" crafts are a super-fun way to reinforce these science terms, as well as check comprehension. 

Choose from a variety of puzzles and a flip-the-flap booklet to do as a whole group activity, then set up the rest as independent centers.

* There’s even a splash of math as well; the puzzles practice counting forwards & backwards plus skip counting.

Take that teachable moment to review ordinal numbers and the hexagon shape with the life cycle crafts, while the “roll & color” life cycle game practices graphing skills, and the honeycomb worksheets reinforce guess-timation, plus greater & less than, with another graphing extension.

The versatile bee craft practices number recognition, and also has options for upper & lowercase letter review.

I use the worksheets  as a whole group "I Spy" assessment game. Aterwards, each colorful bee looks different, and teachers can see at a glance who is having difficulty.

Younger kiddos can simply color the hexaagon shapes, while older students color the life cycle, or use the "rip & tear" pattern to help strengthen finger muscles. 

There are a variety of posters & anchor charts in the packet to use in your displays of student work. 

Besides using honeycomb cereal as a manipulative, I have students sprinkle rice on their (glue-traced) "Ee is for egg" worksheet, to help them understand the size and appearance of a honey bee's egg. 

As you can see there's a huge variety of bee activities in this jumbo packet.

I have 3 featured FREEBIES for you today.  The first one is a set of 5, bee-themed puzzles. They are used in a dice game to help reinforce number recognition and simple addition.  

The next one is a colorful anchor chart poster, which shows the parts of a honey bee. 

I've also included a picture bibliography of my favorite bee books, plus links to 8 awesome videos about bees, which are educational, short & super-interesting. 

I was absolutely fascinated learning about these industrious insects and hope you will be too.  

The 3rd one is a "Bb is for Bee" coloring page. 

Well that's it for today.  It's hot & muggy, so I won't be venturing out much. 

Wishing you a relaxing day, filled with a myriad of quiet moments.

"The hum of bees is the voice of the garden." -Elizabeth Lawrence