Mānuka Enterprise · Years 7–8 · 60–70 min
Lesson 2: Te Pī — Pollination, Ecosystems & Beekeeping
Lesson 1 ended with the plant. The plant produces nothing saleable without an insect that was not here 200 years ago — and that insect is now managed like livestock.
Te Whakatakotoranga | Run of show
Tirohanga Whānui | What this lesson is doing
This is the unit's primary-sector lesson, and the honeybee makes it unusually concrete: an animal that is farmed, that can be moved by truck to wherever the flowering is, that gets sick, and whose sickness is a business cost.
The lesson also carries a genuine ecological complication rather than a tidy story. Honeybees are introduced. They are essential to this industry and they compete with native solitary bees. Both facts are true and students should leave holding both, because Lesson 3's Triple Bottom Line asks them to weigh exactly this kind of tension.
You'll need
- Photographs of a hive frame, a European honeybee, and a native solitary bee (ngaro huruhuru) for contrast.
- Whiteboard space for the hive-as-economy model in Act 1.
- If a local beekeeper will visit or take a phone call, that is worth more than anything on this sheet. Ask early.
Do Now — Who does the work? 7 min
What it is: A quick prediction that gets the division of labour on the board before any correction.
Run it
- Write the three roles (1 min): queen · worker · drone.
- Students predict in pairs (4 min): what does each one do, and which does the most work? Most classes assume the queen manages the hive.
- Take predictions, correct nothing yet (2 min). Act 1 does the correcting, and the surprise is better if the wrong guess is on the board first.
Act 1 — The hive as an economy 15 min
What it is: Students map hive roles onto economic roles, which makes the caste structure memorable and previews the sector language of Lesson 3.
Run it
- Build the table together (8 min). Give the biology; ask students for the economic parallel before you fill the third column.
| Role | What it actually does | Economic parallel |
|---|---|---|
| Queen | Lays the eggs. Does not direct the hive. | ______ |
| Worker | Female. Forages, builds comb, feeds larvae, guards, cleans — different jobs at different ages. | ______ |
| Drone | Male. Mates. Does not forage. | ______ |
- The correction that matters (3 min): nobody is in charge. The hive allocates labour without a manager, by age and by signal. Ask whether an economy could work that way, and hold the disagreement — it comes back in Lesson 3 when students meet a worldview that does not put a single owner at the centre either.
- Name the sector (4 min): beekeeping produces a raw material. Ask which sector that is, and what the secondary and tertiary steps would be for a jar of honey. Extraction and packing are secondary; the shop and the export agent are tertiary.
Act 2 — Two kinds of bee 14 min
What it is: A comparison that refuses the easy story about introduced species.
Run it
- Establish the two (4 min): the European honeybee (Apis mellifera) was introduced to Aotearoa in the 1800s, lives in a managed colony, and produces surplus honey that people can harvest. Aotearoa's native bees are mostly solitary — a single female makes a nest in bare soil, and they make no harvestable honey.
- Pairs complete the comparison (7 min):
| Question | Honeybee | Native solitary bee |
|---|---|---|
| Native or introduced? | ______ | ______ |
| Lives alone or in a colony? | ______ | ______ |
| Can it be farmed? | ______ | ______ |
| Who benefits from it? | ______ | ______ |
- Hold the tension (3 min): "Honeybees make this industry possible AND they compete with native bees for the same flowers. Is bringing them here something we should be glad about?" Do not resolve it. Record the arguments — Lesson 3 gives students the framework to weigh exactly this.
Watch for: the reflex that introduced = bad. Push back gently — this introduced species underwrites an export industry and pollinates most of the country's fruit. The honest position is that it is both, which is harder and more useful.
Act 3 — What varroa costs 16 min
What it is: A threat traced from parasite to hive to business, so students see a biological fact become an economic one.
Run it
- Introduce varroa (4 min): Varroa destructor is a mite that feeds on honeybees and their developing brood, weakens the colony and spreads viruses. It reached Aotearoa in 2000 and is now established. Colonies that are not actively treated generally do not survive it.
- Build the consequence chain in pairs (8 min): from mite arrives in a hive to the effect on the beekeeper's business. Expect: weaker colonies → less honey per hive → cost of treatment every season → time spent inspecting → colonies lost and replaced → higher price per jar.
- The question that lands it (4 min): "Who pays for varroa?" Follow it along the chain — the beekeeper first, then the packer, then whoever buys the jar. A biological problem becomes a price. That is the whole of economics in one example.
Kaiako note: treatment specifics change as resistance develops, so avoid teaching a particular product. The durable point is that management is continuous and costly, not that a named chemical fixes it.
Synthesise — Draw the supply chain so far 8 min
Run it
- Each pair draws the chain (5 min): from mānuka flower to a jar, with every step they now know. Mark on it, in a different colour, every point where something could go wrong.
- Compare two pairs' diagrams (3 min). The risk marks are the interesting part — most land on the flowering window, the mite, and the weather.
Hands forward to Lesson 3: keep the diagram. Lesson 5 extends it to the export market, and Lesson 3 asks who along it should be sharing in what the jar sells for.
Exit ticket 4 min
On a slip:
- Which sector is beekeeping, and why.
- One argument for honeybees in Aotearoa and one against.
- Name one point on your supply chain where the whole thing could fail.
Reading these: a student who cannot produce the "against" in question 2 has taken the comfortable half of the lesson. That is worth a follow-up, because Lesson 3 depends on being able to hold two true things at once.
Ngā Huarahi Ako | Differentiation
Tautoko / Support
- Pre-fill the economic-parallel column with three options to match rather than generate.
- Give the varroa chain as cut-up strips to order instead of writing.
- Allow the supply chain to be drawn rather than labelled.
Toitoi / Extension
- Hives get trucked to the flowering. Work out what that adds to the cost of a jar and what it means for a beekeeper who cannot afford a truck.
- Find out what native solitary bees need to nest, and whether a school ground could provide it.
Te reo Māori
- Kupu: te pī (the bee) · miere (honey) · ngaro huruhuru (native bee) · pua (flower).
- Note for students: Aotearoa had pollinators long before honeybees. The word for bee is not a word for a European insect.
Mātauranga Māori | A resource with obligations attached
Hives sit on land. In practice that means an arrangement with whoever holds the land, and where that is Māori land it is a relationship rather than a transaction — access to the flowering in exchange for a share, employment, or a say in how the whenua is managed.
Worth asking the class directly: if a beekeeper's hives sit on iwi land and the honey sells for a high price overseas, who should the money go to, and why? There is no clean answer, and Lesson 3 gives them the vocabulary to argue it properly.
Hononga Marautanga | Curriculum
The economy is made up of different sectors: o the primary sector involves getting raw materials, such as fishing, farming, and mining o the secondary sector involves manufacturing goods o the tertiary sector involves providing services, such as retail, education, and healthcare.
Te Mātaiaho (2025) · Social Sciences · Phase 3 · Economic Activity · statement id 13917
Students place beekeeping in the primary sector by argument rather than by being told, then trace the same jar of honey through the secondary step (extraction, packing) and the tertiary step (retail, export agents) in the supply-chain diagram. The varroa chain shows the cost of a primary-sector risk travelling all the way to the shelf.
Sources and checking
- Varroa in Aotearoa: Ministry for Primary Industries and Apiculture New Zealand publish current status and management guidance. Treatment advice changes as resistance develops — check before teaching specifics.
- Native bees: Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research publishes species information and nesting requirements, which the extension task uses.
- No honey-yield or hive-count figures are quoted here. They vary by season and region; get them live from MPI or Apiculture NZ if your class wants them.