Tortoise Champions (Teacher Resource Links)

 

The Galapagos Giant Tortoise

(Science) Living things and their habitats and changes in the environment.

Outline: Familiarise your students with the history of the Galapagos giant tortoise, the gentle giants of the Archipelago. This activity begins with the history of the tortoise in Galapagos and goes on to investigate their conservation.

Click here to navigate to the Galapagos giant tortoise teaching resources.

Click here to navigate to the Galapagos giant tortoise interactive map.

The Story of Lonesome George

(Science) Living things and their habitats and changes in the environment

(Literacy) Text for guided reading.

Outline: Read the story of the famous Galapagos giant tortoise Lonesome George. Learn about the factors that led to him becoming the only sub-species of his kind and why he became a conservation icon for the Galapagos Islands.

Click here to navigate to the Lonesome George teaching resources

Science in the Field

(Science) Evolution and inheritance and adaptation.

(Geography) Understand Geographic Information Science (GIS) systems.

Outline: How can science help to conserve the population of Galapagos giant tortoises? Before we can build conservation strategies, we must have the scientific knowledge to support them.

Click here to navigate to the Science in the Field teaching resources.

Mapping and Movebank

(Numeracy) Statistics, interpreting and presenting data.

(Geography) Understanding Geographic Information Science (GIS) systems

Outline: Investigate tortoise migration data and how it is used to answer key research questions to promote understanding of species.

Click here to navigate to the Mapping and Movebank teaching resources.

Evolution in a Day – In the Land of the Giants

(Science) Evolution, inheritance and adaptation.

Outline: Within this section of evolution, look at our activity ‘In the Land of Giants.’ Investigate how these Galapagos giants have evolved to become separate species. How do some people know which island a tortoise is from just by looking at it?

Click here to navigate to the Evolution in a Day teaching resources.

Endeavours of the Española Tortoises

(Science) Living things and their habitats and changes in the environment.

(Literacy) Text for guided reading and comprehension.

Outline: Familiarise your students with the history of the tortoises of Española and their conservation story. Using a video and newspaper article, students will learn about the Captive Breeding Programme of this species and elicit information using key questions.

Click here to navigate to the Endeavours of the Española Tortoises teaching resources.

Tortoise Trackers

(Science) Living things and their habitats and changes in the environment.

(Geography) Understand Geographic Information Science (GIS) systems.

Outline: Scroll down and watch our interactive introducing the Gentle Giants of Galapagos. Play the tortoise trackers game and take the tortoise trackers quiz!

Click here to navigate to the Tortoise Trackers webpage.