We react to them emotionally or instinctively, rather than rationally. We are rarely neutral, or calm, or dispassionate in our encounters with insects. Insect-related language activities:

* Speaking and Listening - recall and recount painful or disturbing insect experiences. (Remember Billy Caspar and the frogspawn?)

* Descriptive writing - describe both the feelings that insects arouse in us, and close physical description of the insects themselves. (Both are beautifully modelled in An Egyptian Hornet by Algernon Blackwood.) www.sff.netpeopleDoyleMacdonaldl_hornet.htm

* Factual, research-based writing - the Internet is full of excellent source material and images for informative pieces

* Exploration of bias in writing - presenting the same insect positively as well as negatively.

“Insects in Literature” at www.kean.eduscodellaInsLit.html offers a three-page reading list, much of available electronically, which could form the basis of an insect anthology.

Harry Dodds