Key Stage 2 programme - Minibeasts workshop

In this session, primary school students use a variety of techniques to hunt in the long grass, trees and leaf litter to find and observe a wonderful variety of creatures. The minibeasts workshop is part of a half day or full day visit that is tailored to suit the needs of your group and planned in detail prior to the visit.

Minibeast workshop at Wakehurst. Can you spot the minibeasts?

Overview

Students observe creatures in their habitats, explore how these creatures are connected and how they are adapted to life on land.

The typical 45 minutes workshop can be extended to 90 minutes so that students can look at the creatures they find in more detail using binocular microscopes.

Length: Typical workshop - 45 minutes | Extended workshop - 90 minutes.
Group size: 30 students (maximum).
Minimum supervision required: 1 adult per 8 students.
Programme cost: Part of a full day visit - fee starts at £180 | Part of a half day visit - fee starts at £130 | See our detailed pricing plan for more information.

Learning outcomes

School visits at Wakehurst support and enhance the curriculum offered in schools. We aim to give students opportunities that are difficult or impossible to create in the school environment.

As teachers ourselves, we design our sessions to match the learning outcomes in the National Curriculum. At the moment, the new government has withdrawn the changes planned for 2010/11 and will be producing new curriculum guidelines. Once they have done that, we will re-visit the learning outcomes for our sessions.

The learning outcomes shown apply to the curriculum as it is at this time. Please note that all our sessions have a cross curricular approach and are tailored to suit the educational needs of your group. This session offers students the opportunity to learn to:

collect minibeasts in a variety of terrestrial habitats
identify some of the minibeasts using simple keys
identify differences and similarities between minibeasts
explore the relationships between minibeasts.

Links with QCA/DfE schemes of work

National Curriculum Science

Sc2 Life processes and living things - Life processes; Humans and other animals; Variation and classification; Living things in their environment.

QCA Science

Unit 4B: Habitats - Using keys to identify plants and animals.
Unit 6A: Interdependence and adaptation.

Citizenship

Unit 3: Animals and us.

Book now

A typical day at Wakehurst is made up of three activities of approximately 45 minutes each, two in the morning and one after lunch.
Once you've selected the combination of workshops and trails for your group, you can make a school booking to visit Wakehurst by filling in our online form.