Earlier this week I did “bee outreach,” speaking at a local preschool about our friendly insect friends. I thought I’d be talking to about 15 kids (one of whom is a friend’s daughter.) Instead — because of the interest — I was swarmed by 60 little very cute but very wriggly, very inquisitive children.
A bee hive’s population starts out about 5,000 in the spring, and can grow by 10 times throughout the summer. Same with preschoolers. Within 20 minutes there were seemingly alot more of them, or maybe its just that they were all sitting waaaaay closer to me. Corporate execs I can handle. Non-stop sneezing / coughing / jumping-bean children? Aaaaahhhhhhhh!!
They were a wonderful group. I read them a story (Bee and Me), and did a show and tell on what’s inside a hive, what honeycomb looks and feels like, why I wear a bee suit and what it looks like.
At this part of the presentation I usually put on a hood, and then ask the kids what else I need to protect me. The hood kept falling aside, so I removed it, saying “Let’s pretend my hood is still on. What else do I need?” and waved my bare hands around.
“You need to put the hood on!” the chorus said.
“OK … let’s pretend it is on. What else do I need to cover?” I said, again waving about my bare hands.”
Again: “you need to put the hood on.”
So much for our game of pretend. I put the hood on.
I had two dozen dead bees mounted in closed, clear containers kids could see if they wanted to do so. Most kids were fascinated, and scrutinized them.
Some kids didn’t watch to hold a dead bee, even if it was inside a plastic vial. Understandable.
A couple kids asked if they were candy.
Actual honeycomb got passed through 60 sets of hot sticky hands, and actually came back looking mainly like honeycomb!
I then asked if there were any questions … and this is where things sort of fell apart.
Q: “How do you get bees?”
A: “I order them from a catalog.”
Follow-up Q: “What’s a catalog?”
Or: “My sister is allergic to bees.” And: “I once saw a bee in my house.”
One of the teachers stepped in about then and reminded the kids what a question is, and we got back on the right track with “how do bees make honey?” and “how do they get in and out of the hive?”
Those are questions I can answer. I know it is silly, but when a little boy randomly asked me “do you have an orange watch,” it stumped me.
Turns out his brother has one, in case you were wondering about that.
The relevance of that to bees? Well, that’s what I’m wondering about!
