"The hive is like a body," the visiting beekeeper tells his rapt audience, holding up a honeycomb for all to see. "The queen is the heart." During sessions with our kindergartners and second graders, the beekeeper introduces the boys to the important roles that bees play as pollinators. The boys are surprised to learn that a bee sting can have medicinal properties. They then practice separating wax from the honey of the honeycomb, make candles with the beeswax, and taste the fresh honey. Meanwhile, seventh graders are at the East 90th Street Pier Oyster Restoration site. Monitoring oyster cages can be messy work. Mud, water, and wind converge as the boys move the cages, mount and measure the oysters, survey biodiversity, and test the East River water from which the oysters are drawn. But the boys couldn't be more focused or engaged. They are at that exciting intersection of science learning, real life experience, and purpose. After working to restore endang
There's a buzz in the classroom, a steady purr that revs every few minutes with excitement. "We're making a chair we can actually sit on; and they're going to build a vehicle!" one second grader jumps up to explain to a visitor. He points to a group of three boys huddled together working furiously on the carpet at the front of the classroom. "And they're making a mansion." All out of recycled cardboard, fasteners, and tape. The boys are working through the engineering cycle to build their own large-scale cardboard projects, collaborating in teams to create a functional structure. Active learning, motor activity, making products, teamwork and competition, all of these elements, called transitive factors, are at play in this science unit. At Saint David's, through our Teaching Boys Initiative, faculty are partnering with our resident visiting scholar Dr. Michael Reichert, renowned researcher in boys' education. Dr. Reichert and his co-research