Now that first graders asked questions about which materials collect and drop off pollen the best, they are off in designing, testing and improving their own hand pollinators.  

Some of the problems they've run into are that the pollinators have been too large, they haven't stayed together securely, or that they don't collect enough pollen.  With enough redesigning, I am positive that everyone will be able to design a hand pollinator that collects and drops off a lot of pollen!

Now that first graders have discovered what materials are successful at picking up and dropping off pollen, they are well on their way to design hand pollinators for four very differently shaped flowers.

Since each flower is uniquely shaped, so must the hand pollinator that moves pollen that flower to another flower.  First graders are thoughtfully imagining and planning out their designs.  Pictures of the actual flowers and their models are below. 

On Thursday, real live bugs came to school for a visit!  First graders got to see and touch seven different bugs.  These bugs were:  a wolf spider, darkening beetles, millipedes, crickets, pill bugs, a ghost mantis and mealworms.  

Bugs play a critical role in agriculture as some help pollinate our crops.  Others are truly pests.  But seeing them up close gave us all a new perspective!

The only way to figure out which materials are the best at picking up and dropping off pollen is to...test them!  Using various materials, first graders used baking soda to represent pollen and performed a fair test with each material--land gentle like a bee and tap the material three times on the flower.  

They ranked how well a material could pick up and drop off pollen.  They looked for evidence on the black part of a paper flower.  Some materials picked up pollen and others did not.  Those that did pick up pollen did 

With this evidence, students will design their own hand pollinators for a unique flower, a technology that is very useful in agricultural engineering. 

Once first graders discovered that insects were missing from the pollination system, their problem solving began!

If there were no natural pollinators, then they would design some of their own. Looking at a variety of materials, students examined their properties, focusing on texture.  The classes discussed the importance of the materials to be able to pick up AND drop off pollen.  

Here's some of our favorite properties as they relate to texture:  smooth, rough, bumpy, fuzzy, hairy, soft, hard, slippery, etc.  

As we learn more about agricultural engineering, first graders are learning the important connection between insects and plants.  If a plant does not have a pollinator that matches its structure, then there is a chance that the plant won't get pollinated.  We're spending time making observations of all the pollinators with plastic models.

It's one thing to see the internal parts of a flower on a diagram, but to see it for yourself...now that's another thing!  First graders had a chance to examine a flower and its parts up close.  We pulled off the petals, saw (and tasted) where the nectar was stored, and pulled out the seeds from the base of the flower.  

Now that first grade has looked closely at flowers and their parts, they connected the relationship between flowers and insects.  Insects need flowers to get their food--nectar.  And flowers need insects to help pollinate the seeds.   What an awesome relationship between the flowers 

As agricultural engineers, it is important that first graders make detailed observations of both flowers and insects.  In order to see exactly how pollination works, we're spending time observing all the different shapes and sizes of both flowers and insects.  Some of the flowers we are observing are real, and others are artificial.  For right now, we only have artificial insects to make observations with.  Since artificial insects stay still, we'll focus our attention here first, and then move on to LIVE insects!  

We will also be watching some tulips grow!  When they're in full bloom, we'll be able to see all the parts of a flower that help with pollination.