Resource 4: Asian Elephant Draft for Revising Model – teacher resource (Unit 1, Lesson 22)
Elephants in Danger
Why would animals as large as Asian elephants be in danger? It is the largest land animal. It is endangered. It can be as tall as 10 feet. It can weigh two to five tons. It can protect itself from every animal but one.
Size isn’t the only thing that’s big abowt the Asian elephant? This animal has the largest ears and nose of any animal on Earth. The elephant’s nose is called a trunk. The Asian elephant has some large teeth called tusks. A male elephant has two, long, curved tusks. It is easy to see that the Asian elephant is intelligent. It has learnd to do jobs that help people and tricks that amuse them
An Asian elephant doesn’t use its body the way a human would. It uses its nose, or trunk, like a hand andthe elephant scoops up dirt or water with its trunk and takes a dust bath or a shower and sometimes an elephant uses its trunk to stroke, or pet, the baby elephant. The elephant’s tusks are really teeth, but it can’t eat with them. Instead it uses the tusks to dig up plant roots. It eats 300 pounds of roots, grass, and bark each day. An elephant will also use its tusks to fight and will charge and push elephantsand with its tusks. Size may be an Asian elephant’s best feature. It can crush other animals with its weight.
With all of its advantages, the Asian elephant has one enemy – humans. Poachers hunt and kill elephants just to get their tusks which are used to make crafts or piano keys. A poacher is a hunter hoo breaks the law to kill wild animals. Humanshav harmed Asian elephants in another way. They have built farms on the elephants’ land. Then farmers kill the elephants when they eat their crops.
Asian elephants don’t live all over the world. They can only be found in a few countries in Asia. Today these elephants live in the forests and plains of Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Vietnam.
Elephants have lost their land to farmers and their lives to poachers. Reserves, land in national parks where elephants are protected from farmers and poachers, have been set aside in Asia, but it’s really not enough land. More land is needed for the endangered Asian elephant to survive in Asian countries – the only place it lives. This is all I know about the Asian Elephant.
BCPS Office of English Language Arts PreK-12July 2015