25 Bee Activities For Middle School: Lesson Ideas, Movies, And Science Experiments

Bees are an integral part of our survival. They help pollinate plants that animals, including us, eat. People dislike them but bees only sting to protect themselves and the hive. Once kids learn about their importance and how to act around them, it is hoped that they will leave them alone so they can do their job. We need bees to survive, so educating ourselves and others about them is important.

1. The Case of the Vanishing Bee

What is happening to the honey bee population? This book is a great introduction to bees and why they are important. It speculates as to what is causing them to disappear and will provide some background knowledge at the same time.

Learn More: Amazon

2. Everybody Has a Job Lesson

The inside of a beehive is fascinating and each bee has a job to do. Kids will learn about life in the hive and the magic of honey bees. There are a few activities on this site, so choose as many as you’d like, and enjoy.

Learn More: Sweet Virginia

3. Wings of Life Movie

This movie is on Disney Plus. It gives students a visual of what our pollinator friends do and can be a great way to kick off a unit on bees. It’s a great way to impart some background knowledge to students, especially those in underserved communities.

Learn More: Disney

4. The Amazing World of Bees

With the lesson plan found here, kids will learn some background knowledge about bees and their unique abilities, as well as how they benefit humans. It will give students a little taste of honey bees. There is even a quiz available if you’d like to give it.

Learn More: Education World

5. Engineer a Bee

Your more creative students will love this activity. Students will be challenged with designing their bees. There are videos included to jumpstart their thinking and guiding questions to help move things along as well. They’ll need to consider how they can make their bee different from ones that already exist.

Learn More: eGFI

6. Build a Bee Habitat

How can we help with pollinator decline? Building bee habitats is one way. This lesson includes videos, an article, and then instructions for designing a habitat. Students will be able to make it from real materials or draw it out.

Learn More: Science Journal for Kids and Teens

7. Antibacterial Effects of Honey

Did you know that honey can heal you? Don’t go squirting the sticky stuff from the grocery store on your cut, but raw honey can help. Students will test other antibacterial creams, along with different types of honey, to see which possesses the best healing properties.

Learn More: Science Learn

8. The Waggle Dance

Bees use movement to communicate and what better way than through dance? The waggle dance shows other bees where to find pollen and nectar. There are many different videos showing this dance, however, I like this one because it shows the dance in real time using infrared cameras.

Learn More: BBC Earth

9. Flowers Seeking Pollinators

There are different forms of pollinators because different flowers attract different pollinators. Here students will learn about just that, along with how to present explanations with scientific data as well.

Learn More: California Academy of Sciences

10. Electronic Fieldtrip

Virtual field trips are somewhat new and make it so we can provide students with more experiences than ever before. This one isn’t a live tour but it still shows kids how to help bees. It can also be great just for teachers to get more background knowledge if needed.

Learn More: Streaming Science

11. Electrically Charged Bees

This looks scary, but it’s really not. When insects fly, friction builds up on their bodies, which in turn helps them collect pollen. This activity uses static electricity to help kids understand this concept. They’ll have a blast with balloons and learn how static electricity works.

Learn More: Homeschool Science for Kids

12. The Pollinator Game

I always loved playing Jeopardy in school. This version is an interactive way to begin pollinator education. It’s on the middle school level as well, which makes it the perfect activity to use as a unit review.

Learn More: United States Department of Agriculture Natural Resources Conservation Service

13. Construct and Manage a Bee Hotel

Here students will learn how to create and maintain bee shelters that would be used temporarily or permanently by bees. At my school, we don’t have the best outdoor space, so my students would have to find somewhere to put this, but if your school space is more conducive, they could have it there.

Learn More: Woodland Trust

14. Bee Illustrations

These drawings are amazing. Students will need to conduct some research into what bees look like so they can make their renderings look as much like real bees as possible. If you are looking for a fun activity, this surely can be.

Learn More: Small Hands Big Art

15. The Blossoming of Flower Power

This lesson plan aims to teach students the anatomy of a flower in a hands-on way. Dissection is something that intrigues many middle schoolers and here’s a way to try it in a low-stakes format.

Learn More: The New York Times

16. Bee-Free BBQ

Imagine a BBQ with only bee-free foods? Through the use of food items, it is possible to have a bee-fee BBQ. This activity should really drive home the fact that we need to have healthy pollinators in order to have all the foods we’re used to.

Learn More: Smithsonian Education

17. Killer Bees

What makes some bees more aggressive than others? It has to do with the climate they live in. The student will read about these bees and then be able to participate in a class discussion using the included questions.

Learn More: UCSD Biology Labs

18. Buzz Like a Bee

Here’s a fun activity that will get your students engineering something to sound like our pollinator hero, the bee. Students are tasked with designing something that sounds like a bee when moved through the air. They relate it to making sounds with a blade of grass, but I don’t know how many kids will even know what that is today.

Learn More: Scientific American

19. Bee Gardening

Included here are a garden layout and watering tracker sheets. Students will have to take a space and decide which plants are best to plant where in order to attract honeybees to their garden. Then they can use the watering sheet to keep track of when the garden is watered. This can be done with little cost to schools or at-home by students.

Learn More: Angi

20. Pollination Stem Activity

This physical activity will show students how bees collect pollen by simply landing on it. While it is a simple activity, it will drive home exactly what bees do in order to make some yummy, healthy honey.

Learn More: Around the Kampfire

21. The Buzz on Pollination

After watching a video, students are tasked with creating a new device to pollinate. The activity aims at showing them how we need a diversity of pollinators in order to survive and will hopefully make kids more conscious about how their actions impact the environment.

Learn More: National Inventors Hall of Fame

22. Bee Pheromones

Pheromones are used by bees to help them get back to the correct hive, as each has its own scent. This is a great resource for teachers, providing a multi-sensory lesson where kids will be able to understand exactly how this works.

Learn More: The Bee Cause

23. Bee Detective

Students will learn about colony collapse disorder (CCD) which is one reason why bee populations are declining. There are multiple resources for teachers included supporting these classroom lessons.

Learn More: Nature Lab Educator Resources

24. Literacy Activities About Bees

It is important to include some activities that are fun, but still meet standards, other than for science. Here you’ll find some literacy-based ideas, including poetry writing. It’s a great way for kids to show their newly acquired knowledge of bees through writing. The lesson PDFs are included.

Learn More: CALS Arizona

25. Honey Bee Facts and Figures

Let’s not forget about math. Using these activity sheets, kids will explore bee wing measurements, which will then relate to the included mapping activity. All the lesson PDFs are included on this link as well.

Learn More: CALS Arizona