{"id":8442,"date":"2013-10-21T10:39:26","date_gmt":"2013-10-21T14:39:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.cos.ucf.edu\/?p=8442"},"modified":"2016-12-20T15:35:36","modified_gmt":"2016-12-20T20:35:36","slug":"ucf-shares-a-love-of-bugs-with-young-children","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/ucf-shares-a-love-of-bugs-with-young-children\/","title":{"rendered":"UCF Shares A Love of Bugs With Young Children"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2013\/10\/beeking-548x365.jpg\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-8443 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2013\/10\/beeking-548x365.jpg\" alt=\"beeking-548x365\" width=\"548\" height=\"365\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2013\/10\/beeking-548x365.jpg 548w, https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2013\/10\/beeking-548x365-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2013\/10\/beeking-548x365-299x199.jpg 299w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 548px) 100vw, 548px\" \/><\/a>Hojun Song, an entomologist at the\u00a0<a title=\"University of Central Florida\" href=\"http:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/\" target=\"_blank\">University of Central Florida<\/a>, loves bugs and he wants others to learn to love them, too.<\/p>\n<p>Insects play a critical role in the food chain and in keeping our environment healthy, he said. For example, honeybees are needed to pollinate crops, which humans rely on for food. Certain insects are food for fish and birds that would otherwise die without their main source of protein.<\/p>\n<p>Insects are important, and that\u2019s the message Song and 24 students in his entomology class at UCF are delivering to fifth-graders at Carillion Elementary School in Oviedo each week.<\/p>\n<p>Song, an assistant professor of biology, and his students are visiting the school every Wednesday in October to help enrich the school\u2019s science lessons. This service-learning project, which is incorporated into Song\u2019s entomology course, is designed so his students will apply the knowledge taught in the course to address community needs and to gain an appreciation for the relationship between the general public and academia. Earlier this summer, Song worked with classroom teacher Teresa Riedel to create lesson plans that deliver knowledge that aligns with the Sunshine State Standards, are hands-on and fun.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDr. Song talks about how insects are so important in our lives, like the bees,\u201d Riedel said. \u201cAnd the college students bring so much creativity and excitement. During the sessions on bees, for example, they came dressed like bees and played games with the students to get them to understand the role they play in nature.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>During another visit, Song\u2019s team took bug samples from UCF\u2019s Bug Closet to show.\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/bugcloset.cos.ucf.edu\/\">The Bug Closet\u00a0<\/a>is one of the best collections of insects in the Southern states with more than 500,000 specimens. The collection is one of the reasons Song joined UCF\u2019s biology department in 2009.<\/p>\n<p>Riedel, a long-time K-5 science teacher, said the key to getting children interested in science is to make it exciting and relevant to their everyday lives.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI tell my students that scientists are cool and curious people,\u201d Riedel said. \u201cI also tell them that scientists end up doing some pretty amazing things, travel to some interesting places, and discover many new things. Science is really exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>About 45 students join in the weekly lessons at the school. For Song, the partnership with Carillion is just the right thing to do. First, he\u2019s helping build interest in science among young children, which he hopes will result in a new generation of scientists. He\u2019s also giving his college students a productive experience by having them pass on their knowledge and enthusiasm to young children.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI enjoy doing it,\u201d Song said. \u201cIt is very important to me that we continue to educate our future scientists. What is also exciting is how much my entomology students have enjoyed the entire process of creating and preparing for lessons and engaging with the fifth-graders. This service-learning model is a very effective way to educate both college students and K-12 students.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>So far the fifth-graders have learned about the structure and function of insects and the relationship between some insects and their environment.<\/p>\n<p>Song, whose published research focuses on grasshoppers, is not sure he\u2019ll take locusts to the school, but he hopes the Carillion students get as excited about insects as he is.<\/p>\n<p>What\u2019s so fascinating about grasshoppers?<\/p>\n<p>Certain species display some rather unique characteristics, changing colors and their behavior when they are in a swarm. When alone, they are docile creatures, but once they get into a crowd, a crowd mentality kicks in, he explained.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMost people in the United States only think of locust swarms because of what they\u2019ve read in the Bible,\u201d Song said while observing grasshoppers in the lab. \u201cBut they are fairly common in other parts of the world causing millions of dollars worth of damage. We\u2019re trying to figure out why they swarm and if we can do that, we hope it will help us prevent them from doing so.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Song has a Ph.D. in Entomology from Ohio State University. He completed his undergraduate degree at Cornell University. He serves on several editorial boards and had published numerous academic articles. He runs the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/schistocerca.org\/SongLab\/\">Song Laboratory of Insect Systematics and Evolution<\/a>\u00a0and is the curator of UCF\u2019s Bug Closet. Funding from the\u00a0<a title=\"National Science Foundation\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nsf.gov\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external\">National Science Foundation<\/a>\u00a0(IOS-1253493) currently supports Song\u2019s research program.<\/p>\n<p>To find the original article, click\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/today.ucf.edu\/ucf-shares-a-love-of-bugs-with-young-children\/\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Hojun Song, an entomologist at the\u00a0University of Central Florida, loves bugs and he wants others to learn to love them, too. Insects play a critical role in the food chain and in keeping our environment healthy, he said. For example, honeybees are needed to pollinate crops, which humans rely on for food. Certain insects are [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":125,"featured_media":8443,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[34,38,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8442","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-biology-departments","category-breaking-news","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>UCF Shares A Love of Bugs With Young Children - College of Sciences News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/ucf-shares-a-love-of-bugs-with-young-children\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"UCF Shares A Love of Bugs With Young Children - College of Sciences News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Hojun Song, an entomologist at the\u00a0University of Central Florida, loves bugs and he wants others to learn to love them, too. 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