The Team:

Rebecca Rongstock is a doctoral student in plant ecology, biodiversity manager, and spokesperson for the Blooming Campus initiative. Everything that lives has always fascinated her. As a child, the weekly open day at the outdoor laboratory was the highlight of her week and perhaps even a source of formative experiences with organisms and natural phenomena. Together with her study friend Benjamin Haak, who is a trainee for biology and history, but also continuously pursues his training as a clown, they bring knowledge about animals and plants and pedagogical experience. In the project, they want to explore nature on the campus with children on a monthly basis!

The Project Idea:

Strictly speaking, the project is not an idea from adults for children, but from Rebecca's daughter. She was often there in the community garden "Blätterlaube" when hedgehog tunnels were built or birdseed cookies were hung on the tree for Christmas. "You do things for children in Blätterlaube, but only with adults. I'd rather do that with children!" And when the collected children of Blätterlaube stood in front of the trunk of a lime tree and said, "Look, so many firebugs," the group also had a name. The small red-black insect that likes to bask in large numbers on walls has become the namesake of the children's group because everyone knows it, but hardly anyone knows anything about this animal. It is often mistaken for a beetle, as the colloquial term "fire beetle" would suggest. But the firebugs are not the only creatures that should receive more attention in the children's project.

The project started in December 2022 with a monthly educational and nature experience program. The children have a connection to FU through their parents - here, students, alumni, scientific and non-scientific staff of the university from various departments and areas of responsibility are represented.

A new program is now to be launched that focuses more on experimentation. This requires new concepts, materials, helping hands - and heads!

The Blooming Campus has described several goals in its guidelines, including increased public relations on biodiversity issues. There are several outstanding projects at the university that address sustainability or biology topics to students in the 5th and 6th grades (student university, experimenting with insects, NatLab), but to our knowledge, the "Firebugs" are currently the only project for younger children. In addition, some content is also aimed at adult accompanying persons, and the project serves to network within the university.

Outlook:

We look forward to a new year with bread on a stick by the campfire, night hikes, and lots of discoveries and questions!

Contact:

Rebecca Rongstock - r.rongstock@fu-berlin.de