Bug Inquiry

with Ms. Graham's Grade One Class

Students began investigating the bugs they discovered in our outdoor garden/classroom. They returned indoors with one outstanding question-"why we even have bugs, if they bite us, sting us and cause us frustration every day?"

We were learning about the needs of plants and animals as part of the grade one science curriculum. So we diverged and began an inquiry into bugs.

The questions of the children:

I documented the questions that students brought to the group after reading, observing, and discussion among themselves. Some of their questions were…

Do wasps die when they use their stinger?

Are bugs useful to us?

Why do we have bugs, anyway?

Why do we need walking sticks?

Why do crickets sing?

Why do we have worms?

Why do we have dragonflies?

Why are there ants?

Why are their red ants and black ants?

Why do bees make honey?

What are bugs?

What do caterpillars eat?

Students began bringing in books from home, the school library, Edmonton Public Library and from my own collection. Many children went home to investigate the web (quote; "There must be a bugs.com site"). They researched their own questions with their primary "I wonder…" being "Why do we even have bugs?"

After knowledge gathering through reading, writing, more questioning, discussing in small and large groups, observing in the garden, sketching their observations, and watching Discovery TV at home, students brought all their facts to the "Scientists of the rectangular carpet" (a knights -of -the -round -table type of inquiry group).

The discussion soon turned to loftier issues such as "if ants wreck our picnic, don’t I have a right to squash them?" Using reasoned arguments based on the facts that their research had given plus a growing admiration and respect for creatures that they had previously often squashed, there was a lot of talk about "moral dilemmas"

Out of these research sessions, children were soon discussing

the rights of bugs,

did they in fact have rights

comparing their lives to ours

comparing ourselves to the giants in fairy tales of the bugs

our judgment of bugs as lesser beings on earth

After two shortened weeks of investigation, the students discovered the answers to several of their questions. They concluded that

bugs

help us every day

make us silk thread

make us honey

eat stuff we don’t want like garbage, dead things, other bugs, poop, paper and dead animals

clean our water

put us to sleep with their singing (crickets)

crawl on our arms (ladybugs, caterpillars, worms)

give us pleasure.

 

Conclusion:

With their bank of knowledge, their understanding of other creatures purpose here on the earth, the children now are excited to see a bug, run to protect it from other children, acknowledge that we couldn’t live with out bugs. As one student told the principal today,

"If we didn’t have bugs, the earth would be covered over with poop and we wouldn’t be able to live!"