Download Clover Petal Badge Blueprint

STEM • Daisy
Badge Blueprint
Clover Petal
Purpose: This petal teaches Daisies how to be resourceful and
respect the Earth. Girls should read Clover’s story in the
Daisy Girl’s Guide to Girl Scouting.
Step 1:
Get colorful!
Clover’s friend, Lupe, has a petal-powered car. Learn how flowers get nutrients and water by doing
a fun science experiment—dyeing flowers! Talk about what science is and why it’s important. One
explanation is that it’s a way to understand the world by thinking about it and testing our guesses.
Supplies: White flower for each girl (carnations work well)
Water
Food coloring
Tall cup or glass(es)
Scissors
Paper towels (water will inevitably spill)
Talk about how flowers get water through rain and people watering them. Then discuss how a straw
works to get liquids into our bodies. How do you think a flower absorbs liquid? This experiment will
show how water gets into the flower to help it grow. An experiment is a set of steps we take to learn
new things, make discoveries or test something we think we know will happen.
Fill each cup half-full with water. Add 20 to 30 drops of food coloring to each glass—a lot of color
is better. Leave one glass with just clear water as your “control.” Cut the stems of the flowers on a
diagonal. The cut must be fresh to allow for maximum water absorption. Place a carnation in each
colored water glass and one in the plain water. The carnations will soak up the water and take on
the new colors. If the flowers are pretty dry, you may see changes within an hour.
Look at everything—the stems, leaves and even deep within the blooms for color changes.
Compare the flowers with food coloring to the ones without. These blooms really are what they
eat! What would happen to these flowers if the water became polluted? How are these flowers like
people? What happens to what we eat? How does it change us? Flowers are alive and need water
and nutrients to grow, just like us. Flowers “drink” water up through their roots into their stems,
leaves and flowers to make food.
Step 2: Learn to be resourceful.
Clover had the idea to use leftover food to make a new snack, instead of throwing it away. Being
resourceful as a Girl Scout means finding new ways to use old things. Make a collage of flowers
using old magazines or postcards. Use scissors, glue sticks, poster board or paper and old
magazines or postcards.
Step 3 on next page
Remember, girls gain confidence and leadership skills through girl-led activities. Whenever possible, let the girls take
charge when completing activities. Adult help is necessary for guidance, support and safety.
Step 3: See what all the buzz is about!
Clover’s friend, Henry, is a honeybee, and gives Clover some honey for helping take care of the
garden he buzzes around. Honeybees love flowers and rely on their pollen and nectar to survive.
The bees take these and go back to their combs to make honey. Honeybees live in wax structures
called combs, which have six-sided chambers called cells. The cells are kind of like rooms, so a
comb is like a house full of rooms. Baby bees grow in some rooms, and food is made and kept in
other rooms. Work together to create cells and a honeycomb.
Supplies: Four colors of construction paper
Real honeycomb or model, if available
Egg carton bottoms (for cells)
Butcher paper
Scissors
Cell pattern
Tape or glue
Each color of construction paper represents either bee eggs, larvae, pupae or honey. Each girl
should receive cell pattern to use as a template. Cut out a cell from your paper and write your
name on it. Count how many sides are on the cell in the pattern. These shapes are called polygons.
Add depth to the cells by cutting a strip of paper six times the length of one side. Then fold the
paper into six equal pieces (five folds) and tape the ends together. Attach this hexagon to the flat
construction paper bottom.
Attach your polygons to some butcher paper or place together on a bulletin board so that the
sides are touching. Arrange the cells so those containing eggs, larvae and pupae are grouped
together in the middle and those containing honey are toward the outside.
Once the comb is constructed, take turns telling stories or acting out what you think it would be like
growing up and living in a honeybee hive. Share what it might be like to be the stage of bee you made
(larvae, honey, etc.). As bees grow up, the hive becomes too crowded, so they develop a new queen.
The old queen flies away with half the workers to start a new home. Pretend you are scout bees and
look for a new place to live. Then come back and lead the “swarm” to the new home.
Congratulations! You have now earned the Clover Petal!
Remember, girls gain confidence and leadership skills through girl-led activities. Whenever possible, let the girls take
charge when completing activities. Adult help is necessary for guidance, support and safety.