Have you heard of honeybee societies? Honeybees have developed one of the most complex communal colonies in the animal kingdom!
Introduction about Honeybees
Honeybees live on every continent, except Antarctica. The reason is, they feed on nectar and pollen from flowers. Bees have a vital role in our ecosystems. We enjoy fruits, vegetables, and delicious honey thanks to bees such as honeybees! In effect, many plants rely on honeybees for pollination, therefore; life on earth relies heavily on honeybees since plants are primary food producers in the food chain. Honeybees have an incredible organizational system that we called a honeybee society. They create societies in which each bee receives a designated role by the queen. The queen, along with drones and workers live together and collaborate to preserve their lifestyle and ensure future generations. Let’s look at the honeybees respective roles:
The Queen: unique in the beehive, she is responsible for reproduction. The queen feeds on royal jelly from birth, and can lay up to 1500 eggs per day. She will lay about 1 million eggs in a lifetime. Another interesting fact about the queen is that she has control over the gender of the bee that will emerge from each egg.
The Drone: drones are the male honeybees. Their workload is light in comparison to honeybee workers. They help the queen with reproduction to propagate the species, and go feed on the honey present in the beehive.
The Workers: workers are the female honeybees. They have an important role to perform within their 5 to 7 week lifespan. Honeybee workers go through 4 phases from birth to death. They work on cleaning the hives cells, caring for the larvae, tending the queen, foraging and storing honey, and feeding other honeybees.
Since honeybees are such helpful creatures that construct complex societies, we decided that it was important for children to learn about such phenomenon that has been going for millions of years. We created A Honeybee Society puzzle, a hand drawn puzzle comprised of large pieces, a control chart, and wooden labels. You will appreciate the realistic aspect of the graphics and care for details. We hope children will develop a strong sense of appreciation towards this endangered invertebrate, and want to discover more about honeybees.
Drone Bee 
Raw Honey
Materials
- A Honeybee Society Wooden Puzzle with Labels and Control Chart
- Life Cycle of a Bee Puzzle with Labels and Control Chart
- Life Cycle of a Bee Figurines
A Honeybee Society Puzzle and Control Chart 
How to Introduce the Materials
Our wooden puzzle, A Honeybee Society, measures 9″ x 15″. It includes all the aspects of a honeybee society. Its elongated shape provides a wide perspective of the way a honeybee hive is organized. The queen lays eggs in cells while the honeybee workers produce honey and wax, shape up cells, feed and tend the larvae. Once a larva emerges from a cell, honeybee workers immediately pamper it. Meanwhile, honeybee drones stick around to feed on honey, and wait for the queen that might need a mate.
We recommend selecting relevant literature to introduce the topic of honeybees. A storybook, along with documenting books would greatly compliment the materials and engage children.
You can use our Life Cycle of a Bee puzzle to introduce the life cycle of a bee. This way, children would understand what is happening within the beehive cells. It takes 21 days for a worker bee larva to become an adult worker. Honeybees go through complete metamorphosis, which means their morphology changes drastically from the larva stage to the adult stage.
Once children are familiar with the topic, you can use A Honeybee Society puzzle to isolate different parts of the society and explain each role. You can use the wooden labels to caption each part of the puzzle. Once the introduction is over, invite children to reconstruct the puzzle using the Control Chart. They will surely appreciate labeling the puzzle using the wooden labels!
Take the children back to the shelf where the materials will be located. You may want to leave books at their disposal as well.
Other activities can be used as follow-up or extensions (wax candle making, art, honey sampling, cooking, creating a Mason hive, planting wild flower, etc.) You may also want to research apiculture farms near you and schedule a field trip. If you are lucky, you may be able to adopt a honeybee from the farm and receive pictures of the hives!
Alison’s Montessori hopes these materials will inspire children to investigate the amazing world of honeybees!
Observing the queen 
Observing the hive
