Honeybee Workshop Comes to Coles Elementary School in Scotch Plains

To start off the morning, all students grades one through four were brought into the auditorium where leader of "Dancin' with the Honeybees," Cliff Sunflower, got all students to be a part of his demonstration in some way.

Sunflower had students demonstrate a beehive from the queen bee down to the worker bees. Any student that was not up front as part of the beehive ended up being a flower.

Following the morning performance, both the fourth and third graders were brought in separately at 1:40 p.m. and 2:20 p.m.

During the fourth grade workshop, Sunflower explained to the students the importance of honeybees, having the fourth graders chant, "The bees help to make the food."

He said to the audience, "if the bees die and don't pollenate, what happens"?

The students cried, "WE DIE!"

After explaining the importance of saving the honeybees, Sunflower let the students break up into groups and explore the different stations.

The two most popular stations were the honey tasting station and the live bees behind glass.

Students also loved trying on the beekeeper gear and holding up bee goggles to their eyes.

Sunflower encouraged the students to explore the stations and come back to him with an idea for a project to save the bees.

The ideas ranged from a petition to save the bees, creating a house for bees, a flower garden, posters, videos, songs and more.

For the end of the presentation, each student and teacher was given a slice of honeycomb and a wick to create their own beeswax candle.

When holding the honeycomb to the light the students all said, "whoaaaaa!"

The kids were probably singing, "save the bees, food for us!" for the rest of the school day, because they all were participating and singing the songs under Sunflower's direction.