Pollination is an essential ecological function. Without pollinators, the human race and all of Earth’s terrestrial ecosystems would not survive. Over 80 percent of the world’s flowering plants require a pollinator to reproduce. Animals that assist plants in their reproduction as pollinators include species of bats, butterflies, moths, flies, birds, beetles, ants and bees.

Pollinators visit flowers in search of food, mates, shelter and nest-building materials. The secret bond of the partnership is that neither plant nor pollinator populations can exist without each other.

No prior knowledge is required.

This is a stand-alone activity.

How can we use Sphero Bolts to show how flowers are pollinated?

In this program students will:

• Identify various pollinators
• Understand the importance of pollination
• Explore the relationship between plants and pollinators (such as bees)
• Learn how to code a Sphero Bolt (pollinators) to move from one flower to another

Students will:

• Draw a pollinator (such as a bee) and animate their image using Matrix Animation on iPads with Sphero Bolts
• Use bee & bird sounds to enhance their animated pollinator on iPads with Sphero Bolts
• Move their Sphero Bolt Pollinators to pollinate various flowers around the room.

Science – Science understanding

• Living things have characteristics that distinguish them from non-living things and things that were once living, including fossils (VC2S4U01)
• Consumers, producers and decomposers have different roles and interactions within a habitat; food chains can be used to represent feeding relationships (VC2S4U03)

Science Inquiry

• Observations can be used as a basis for posing questions to identify patterns and relationships, and to predict the outcomes of investigations (VC2S4I01)

Science – Planning and conducting

• Observations, including formal measurements, can be made and recorded by following procedures to use familiar scaled instruments and digital tools as appropriate (VC2S4I03)

Science – Processing, modelling and analysing

• Data and information can be organised and represented to identify patterns and simple relationships by constructing tables, graphs and visual or physical models (VC2S4I04)

Science – Communicating

• Observations, findings and ideas can be communicated for an identified purpose and audience by using scientific vocabulary and digital tools as appropriate (VC2S4I06)

Design and Technologies – Data, information and privacy

• Use the core features of common digital tools to create, locate and communicate content, following agreed conventions for a diverse audience (VC2TDI4D03)

Digital Technologies – Creating digital solutions

• Follow, describe and represent algorithms involving sequencing, comparison operators (branching) and iteration (VC2TDI4C02)

Critical and Creative Thinking – Questions & possibilities

• Simple strategies for generating new ideas and possibilities, including repurposing or rearranging (VC2CC4Q03)