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Tortugas Verdes

When I visited the Galápagos Islands in 2012, the woman who owned the “home-stay” where I lived for a month, was a local kindergarten teacher. Because I had the experience of swimming in a protected lagoon behind a large marine turtle, and I saw how the locals did not pick-up their trash (combined with tourists), I wanted the kids to value the turtles’ home too. So I made a large drawing, cut it into pieces, and each student colored its outside edges and then found its location on the wall-mounted image. But the most fun thing was asking the students if they could swim? [none!] and I revealed that the turtle hatchlings could swim almost immediately after birth! Noticeably impressed, in a single-file circle around the room, we moved our arms up/down pretending to be hatchlings swimming. I believe this type of relatable info and visceral actions, pique curiosity and embeds knowledge in our brains. (And might save some marine turtles from ingesting floating plastic bags they think are jellyfish, their favorite food!)