Bug bites.

• Position: Eating of insects

Find out why eating bugs may be good for you--and the planet

What's in your lunch box? How about a peanut butter and caterpillar sandwich? Believe it or not, that might not be such a bad idea for many people. According to a new report, eating insects and other creepy crawlers could help solve one of the biggest problems facing the planet--world hunger.

Six-Legged Solution

The report was written by the United Nations (UN). That's a group of leaders from countries all over the globe. They try to solve the world's biggest problems.

The UN says that one out of every eight people in the world doesn't have enough to eat. As the world's population grows, so could the number of hungry people. To feed everyone, people may need to find other types of food to eat.

"There's no way we can keep up with population growth at the rate it's going by giving everyone a hamburger," says scientist David George Gordon.

The UN suggests that we should switch to chowing down on some of the 1,900 known types of edible insects in the world. These insects range from crickets to cockroaches. Scientists say bugs have just as many nutrients as most meat, such as pork or beef.

Don't Bug Out!

About 2 billion people around the world already gobble up insects. In West Africa, people toast termites over a fire. Restaurants in Japan fry grasshoppers.

But most people in the U.S. are grossed out by bugs as food. "That has to change before people are going to willingly eat them," says Gordon.

Words to Know

population: number of people in a place

edible: able to be eaten

nutrients: things animals and plants need to stay healthy

Safety First!

Not every insect is edible. Eating most kinds will make you sick. You should leave the job of identifying edible insects to the experts. Also, never eat any bugs that haven't been fully cooked.

Common Core Lesson 1: Research (w.3.8, w.3.2)

Read the article as a class. Ask students to circle the five insects mentioned in the story. Discuss what they already know about each one.

Have students pair up. Hand out the T3 skills sheet titled "Insect Detective." Instruct students to use books and/or the Internet to research the five insects mentioned in the cover story. Have each pair fill in the graphic organizer with the information they find.

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