Mrs. Apple’s previous class visited our classroom to talk about their Extraordinary Ecosystem Project from last year. They shared with us that they did a problem based learning project last year. They had traveled to the Pete Dye Golf Course in French Lick. They identified the problem that there were few bees and that they felt the reason was the lack of flowering plants. Their first step in solving this problem was to create a flower plot in August of last year. They did experiments all year long to study the flowering plants they planted. Superintendent Russ Apple kept them informed of the progress of their plot by sending emails and pictures. After learning a lot about the shortage of bees, the class convinced the golf course to set up beehives to try to increase the bee population in the world.
The class was unable to return to the course at the end of the year due to weather & scheduling problems. Students asked our class to continue their project and to check on the status of the flower plot and the bees!
This year on September 1st, we visited the Pete Dye Golf Course in French Lick, Indiana. We met Mr. Apple and his crew and visited several stations on the course to learn about the ecosystem. We will talk more about those in a future blog. We visited the flower plot and found that it had lots of flowers. We noticed there were lots of black-eyed susans in the re-seeding stage. We know they are perennials so that means they will grow back next year. We found that the bees population had grown a lot. We identified three areas we want to work on this year. We noticed the flower plot had some invasive species, one called serica lespedeza. We want to find out how to get rid of it. A second problem is that we need to get the word out about the shortage of bees. Our final problem was to figure out the bees survive the winter, and do they have enough food supply.
Our focus this year will be measuring change. We want to look at changes in our flowering plot, changes in the bee population, changes in the world population of bees, and changes in research in finding a solution to the problem. If you want to learn more about our project, continue to check our blog.
The class was unable to return to the course at the end of the year due to weather & scheduling problems. Students asked our class to continue their project and to check on the status of the flower plot and the bees!
This year on September 1st, we visited the Pete Dye Golf Course in French Lick, Indiana. We met Mr. Apple and his crew and visited several stations on the course to learn about the ecosystem. We will talk more about those in a future blog. We visited the flower plot and found that it had lots of flowers. We noticed there were lots of black-eyed susans in the re-seeding stage. We know they are perennials so that means they will grow back next year. We found that the bees population had grown a lot. We identified three areas we want to work on this year. We noticed the flower plot had some invasive species, one called serica lespedeza. We want to find out how to get rid of it. A second problem is that we need to get the word out about the shortage of bees. Our final problem was to figure out the bees survive the winter, and do they have enough food supply.
Our focus this year will be measuring change. We want to look at changes in our flowering plot, changes in the bee population, changes in the world population of bees, and changes in research in finding a solution to the problem. If you want to learn more about our project, continue to check our blog.