🐝 The Buzz About Bees: A Merge EDU Celebration of World Bee Day

Celebrate World Bee Day on May 20

Bees might be tiny, but their impact is enormous! World Bee Day on May 20 reminds us of the critical role bees play in food production, ecosystems, and biodiversity.

And Merge EDU gives you the tools to bring the hive straight to your students’ hands, without the risk of getting stung! 

🌼 Pollination and the Bee Life Cycle

With Merge Explorer and Object Viewer, your students can inspect bee anatomy and observe pollination in action—all without ever leaving the classroom.

Bee Hive

A beehive is an enclosed, man-made structure in which some honey bee species of the subgenus Apis live and raise their young. Though the word beehive is commonly used to describe the nest of any bee colony, scientific and professional literature distinguishes nest from hive. Nest is used to discuss colonies which house themselves in natural or artificial cavities or are hanging and exposed. Hive is used to describe an artificial, man-made structure to house a honey bee nest.

Object Viewer for MERGE Cube

Honey Bee Life Cycle

Honey bees develop in four distinct life cycle phases: egg, larva, pupa, and adult. The life cycle of a bee begins with laying of an egg, the development through several moults of a legless larva, a pupation stage during which the insect undergoes complete metamorphosis, followed by the emergence of a winged adult. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bee

Object Viewer for MERGE Cube

Here’s how to celebrate Bee Day with Merge EDU:

✅ Watch a bee pollinate a flower using Merge Explorer simulations

✅ Explore the bee life cycle using 3D models in Merge Object Viewer

✅ Use screen recording to make bee-focused educational videos or AR documentaries to share

Teaching Life Cycles with Augmented Reality

With pre-made activity plans and projects, life-cycle lesson prep will be easy for you, fun and immersive for students, and they’ll be able to show you their learning with the various assessment options included.

Merge EDUMerge EDU

🧠 How Hands-on Lessons with AR Make a Difference

1. Makes Invisible Processes Visible: Normally it’s difficult to get an up-close look at a bee collecting and transferring pollen from flower to flower, but with Merge EDU and a Merge Cube, every student can experience this magical process of nature up close. 

2. Supports Cross-Disciplinary Learning: Linking technology and science with art, ELA, or geography by creating posters, writing bee diaries, or mapping bee habitats around the world not only encourages remembering, but also application and creation. (link capstone bee day blog from last year)

3. Encourages Local Action: Once students learn more about bees and pollination, they can engage in extension activities, such as designing bee-friendly gardens, tracking native pollinators, or advocating for pollinator-safe practices at school or in their community. 

The Plants and the Bees

Bees are important for many reasons, one of which is that they help plants to have babies – in other words, to make new plants! When a bee lands on a flower, it picks up some pollen grains on its body. As the bee flies around, it drops the pollen off on another plant, where the pollen helps the second plant to produce seeds. Watch the bee work its magic in this animation!

Merge Explorer

Get Buzzing: Sign up for a free trial today to check out Merge EDU today, and celebrate World Bee Day with a lesson that will engage and inspire your students!! Tag @Merge on Instagram to share the excitement 🐝