This lesson asks students to think about the ways that human activities impact African animals and their habitats. After looking at pictures on the Internet and discussing the possible consequences of human activities, students will draw pictures of animals living in their natural habitats with and without the effects of human impacts. Finally, they will write captions describing their pictures. In a lesson extension, students will explore the National Geographic magazine feature Africa MegaFlyover—Charting the Last Wild Places on Earth.

Geography

Standard 8: "The characteristics and spatial distribution of ecosystems on Earth's surface"
Standard 14: "How human actions modify the physical environment"
Standard 18: "How to apply geography to interpret the present and plan for the future"

Two to three hours

• Computer with Internet access
• Drawing materials

Students will

• discuss human impacts on the environment near their homes;
• view pictures of the African savanna and rain forest and sketch these habitats on their own paper;
• view pictures of African animals and sketch them on the appropriate habitat;
• record behaviors of the animals they've sketched;
• discuss how people might affect these animals;
• draw pictures of the animals in their natural habitat with and without the effects of human impacts; and
• write captions describing their pictures.

Ask students to think about the natural environment near where they live. What does it look like outside? What types of plants and animals do they see each day? What types of plants and animals might they see at a park, forest preserve, or other nearby area with large open spaces?

Ask students to state some of the ways that people impact the lives of animals living in their area. They might mention littering, cutting down trees, chasing animals, or a number of other common human activities. Remind the class that not all human impacts on wild animals are necessarily bad. For example, some people litter, but other people help clean up the litter; and sometimes people chase animals to rescue them from harm and take them to rehabilitation centers.

Ask a student volunteer to identify Africa on a world map, and make sure the class can see where he or she is pointing.

Have students look at some pictures of the African landscape from National Geographic's Wild World Web site. Follow these directions (it may be easier to do this part as a class using a projector from one computer):

• In the "Find an Ecoregion" window, type AT0711, and click Go.
• In the new window, click on "AT0711, Terrestrial Ecoregion of the World."
• You will see a close-up map of East Africa. Click the deep pink color to the east of Nairobi.
• You will see a new window describing the "Northern Acacia-Commiphora bushlands and thickets."
• Click "More Photos" (by the small camera icon to the right of the photograph).

Have students look carefully at the photos of this East African landscape. Ask them to describe what the habitat looks like, and write their words on the board. Explain that this landscape is often referred to as the "savanna."

Have students sketch the landscape they see on this Web page.

Have students close out of the window for the "Northern Acacia-Commiphora bushlands and thickets," and repeat the above steps, typing AT0124 in the "Find an Ecoregion" window. They'll now look at pictures of the "Northeastern Congolian lowland forests."

Each student will now have one sketch of the African savanna and one of the African rain forest.

Ask students to name some African animals, and list them on the board. Explain that, much like in the area where your students live, the animals that live in Africa prefer certain environments and are impacted by the activities of people. Both of the environments they've sketched are home to many different types of animals.

Have students go to National Geographic's Creature Feature archive, or go to this Web site on one computer that all students can see.

Have students select the following African animals one at a time (to save time, have each student choose one animal from each of two categories, such as elephants and gorillas):

Savanna animals: elephants, lions, rhinoceroses, warthogs
Rain forest animals: chimpanzees, gorillas
Animals that live in both areas: hippopotamuses

For each animal they look at, ask students to do the following tasks:

• Sketch the animal over the appropriate habitat picture they've already drawn. For example, they would draw an elephant onto their savanna drawing and a gorilla onto their rain forest drawing.
• Link to "Fun Facts" and list the behaviors and characteristics that this page discusses. For example, students who draw cheetahs would list "fast runner, excellent eyesight, stalks its prey, hides in grasses."

Ask the class to brainstorm ways that people might affect the habitats, food sources, and behaviors of the animals they've seen on the Creature Feature pages. List their ideas on the board. If students find this task difficult, ask them specifically how they think the following activities might impact African animals: cutting down trees, hunting, boating, fishing, polluting the air, building towns and cities.

After students have brainstormed the above issue, pose these questions to the class to get students to think more specifically about possible human impacts on habitat and wildlife:

• How would a decrease in savanna grasses affect animals' ability to hide? If some animals could no longer hide, what might happen to them?
• If more people hunt animals like impala (a type of antelope) or warthogs, what would the predators of the impala or warthog do? Where would they get their food if their favorite food animals had been hunted by people?
• If trees are cut down in the rain forest, what happens to the animals that live there? How might this affect chimpanzees and gorillas, who are used to living in the forest?

Ask each student to choose one African animal whose picture they've seen in this lesson. Ask them to draw one picture showing that animal in its natural habitat (savanna or rain forest) without human interference. Then have them draw another picture, either on the other half of the page or on another piece of paper, showing the animal as it might be affected by one or more human activities.

In both of their pictures, students should consider how the specific animal behaviors they've listed might be impacted by changes that people could make to the habitat. For example, if they've chosen the cheetah, they might consider how its ability to hide in the bushes could be affected by human activities that change the amount or height of savanna grasses. If they've chosen the chimpanzee, they might draw a picture showing how the chimpanzee's diet could be affected if too many rain forest trees were chopped down.

Have students write sentences describing each picture.

Have students imagine that they have a chance to go to Africa and help out with the MegaFlyover project. Ask them to hypothesize the natural and human-made things they'd see from the airplane. For clues, they can use the following Web sites:

National Geographic: Africa MegaFlyover—Charting the Last Wild Places on Earth
Africa Focus
MegaFlyover: Human Footprint Map (link to "See the complete HF map" in small letters above the map of Africa)
Aerials Only Gallery (scroll down and choose one of the U.S. locations to see aerial photographs; they're all within the U.S., but they give students an idea of what things look like from a low-flying airplane)

Have students draw pictures or write paragraphs describing some of the things they'd expect to see from the plane. Then have them write paragraphs explaining how they think an airplane survey might help them assess the level of human impact on African wildlife.

National Geographic Magazine: Africa MegaFlyover—Charting the Last Wild Places on Earth
National Geographic News: Africa Explorer Takes Off on Yearlong Aerial Survey
National Geographic: Creature Feature
National Geographic: Wild World
Wildlife Conservation Society