Week of May 3, 2026 – May 9, 2026
by Kaylen Iorio, Environmental Educator
Spring feels like it’s finally here. The blue, cloudless skies allow the sun to shine down on blooming flowers where you can find pollinators busy at work. Each year, I feel a pep in my step during the spring. The awakening and bustling world inspires a positive drive in me. I love observing birds hurriedly building nests to house their eggs and freshly hatched turtles beelining to the nearest stream. This season brings opportunities to learn, explore, and discover.
Currently, Nature in the City educators are in second grade classrooms teaching students about pollination. In my experience, students are eager to retell their experiences with bees, often sharing that they got stung, chased, or are frankly scared of them. I let them know that the bees are really not interested in humans whatsoever, they’re mainly focused on visiting flowers. And the flowers, I tell them, are relying on the bees to visit them. I tell them about this special relationship between pollinators, like bees and butterflies, and flowers and how each organism needs each other to survive. Flowers provide food for the pollinators and pollinators spread the flowers’ pollen in order to help flowers make seeds. The second graders sit with this. They usually have a lot to share now, “So, if bees and butterflies don’t exist, flowers and plants won’t either?”, asks one second grader. I nod in agreement. Their entire perspective on bugs has shifted. They aren’t these buzzing, icky creatures flying around anymore, they are creatures of great importance to these second graders now!
As we venture outside for our schoolyard exploration, I am thrilled to see how excited students are to explore. I’m not sure if it’s the spring time inspiration I am feeling or if it’s a newfound appreciation for bugs and flowers, but boy are these second graders beyond excited to find pollinators and flowers in their schoolyard. What I find the most impactful is how, with new information that broadened their perspective on nature, these students are able to explore an area that they’ve seen hundreds of times like it’s an area they’ve never experienced before. They may have walked passed dandelions for a few weeks now, but are suddenly overjoyed to tell me they can see the pollen on the flower through their magnifying glass! They may have run from a bee or swatted it away, but now they’re exclaiming with enthusiasm that they saw one buzzing about! What a magical thing to be a part of.
I wish everyone the joy of discovery that these second graders have been experiencing this spring.