The Research Behind the Tool
Experience Bees: Community Outreach Tool for Bee Conservation Efforts was published in the Journal of Extension by Mata, et al. in 2019. The team at the Center for Integrated Pest Management sought to develop and evaluate a small suite of simple activities to educate the public about the basic concepts about pollinators. The experiment involved a pre- and post-program knowledge quiz about insects, a 20-minute presentation, and a 10-minute observation activity that participants repeated three times.
They found their activity showed improved knowledge about insects and pollinators, and there was a reported increase in awareness and consideration of pollinators in their gardens and plant choice moving forward.
The datasheet developed for the 10-minute observation period contains excellent pictures and is ready-made for easy adoption and incorporation into public programming around insect pollinators for Extension professionals and Extension Master Gardener℠ volunteers, as well as public educators!
Download the Checklist Document HereAbstract
Despite the importance of bees, there is a gap in the public's understanding of them. To help address this gap, we developed the outreach tool Experience Bees, a series of simple learning and hands-on activities to teach community members about bees and their importance in our landscapes. Program evaluation showed that participants learned about bees and were more willing to consider bees when planting their own gardens, demonstrating that a suite of simple activities can have a positive impact on people's knowledge of bees and their importance. We encourage readers to use our tool and replicate our methods or to design and implement similar projects to engage their audiences in pollinator conservation.
Citation:
Mata, M. et al. (2019) Experience bees: Community outreach tool for Bee Conservation Efforts, The Journal of Extension (JOE). (Accessed: 28 July 2023).