Elephant Unit Study - LovingHomeschool.com

As an Amazon Affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no extra cost to you.

This Elephant Unit Study has all you need to learn about Elephants with your students in a fun way with videos, crafts, printables, recipes and even an interactive quiz!

The most enjoyable way to learn about something is to explore it from every angle and in different ways. With this Elephant Unit Study, your children AND you will enjoy learning about Elephants as you watch videos, read books, do crafts and printables and even make food together. Have fun!

In the printables section there is no end to keep everyone busy; find word scrambles, word searches, I spy, how many words can you find, coloring pages, a matching game and crossword puzzle.

There are also educational videos to watch, new books to check out, jokes to enjoy together and songs to learn.

Follow my Elephant Pinterest Board for dozens of ideas from all around the web! I am constantly finding new things to add so there will be new things all the time!

When is National Elephant Day?

World Elephant Day is August 12th and Elephant Appreciation Day is September 22nd.

Other Unit Studies

Seasons and Holidays

Groundhog Day Unit Study

Presidents Day Unit Study

Snow Unit Study

St Patrick’s Day Unit Study

Thanksgiving Unit Study

Valentine’s Day Unit Study

Animals

Polar Bear Unit Study

Squirrel Unit Study

Tiger Unit Study

Whale Unit Study

Facts about Elephants

Closeup of elephant putting leaves into its mouth with its trunk

There are 3 species of elephants, classified by where they live. We can tell them apart in several ways.

African savanna elephants have the largest ears. Some say they are shaped like Africa. Both males and females have tusks.

African forest elephants have large ears too but not as large as the savannah elephants and they are rounder. Both males and females have tusks.

Asian elephants have the smallest ears and are more hairy. They are also the smallest elephant. The females do not have tusks and even the males sometimes don’t have tusks. Asian elephants live in southeastern Asia in grasslands, forests and scrublands.

Asian elephants have one “finger” on the end of their trunk and African elephants have two “fingers”.

Elephants are mammals. This means that they have hair, give birth to live young and feed their babies milk.

African elephants are the largest animals on land. They can be as tall as 13 feet and weigh up to 7 tons!

The largest elephant ever recorded was 13.5 feet tall and weighed 13.5 tons!

The elephant is the only mammal that can’t jump.

Elephants have a slow pulse of 27 beats per minute while a canary has 1,000 beats per minute! That is quite a difference!

Elephants live up to 70 years in the wild and about 17 in captivity.

An adult male is called a bull.

An adult female is called a cow.

A female elephant is pregnant for 22 months before she has her baby.

A baby elephant is called a calf.

Elephants almost always have only one calf at a time. It is very rare that twins are born.

Babies are about 3 feet tall and 300 pounds when they are born.

A baby elephant can stand within 20 minutes of birth and can walk with the herd within an hour.

A family group is called a herd and can have up to 40 females plus younger ones.

The female who leads the herd is called the matriarch.

Other females who help raise the babies are called Aunties.

Females have babies about every 5 years.

A large group can also be called a parade, especially if it is on the move. One more name for an elephant group is a memory; that is fitting!

3 adult african elephants with 2 small ones standing in front of them

A young male will stay with the herd until he is 12-15 years old. He will then live mostly alone the rest of his life.

Elephants are herbivores. Herbivores eat plants. Elephants eat leaves, branches, bamboo, fruit, twigs, herbs, shrubs, bark, grass and roots.

Elephants love bananas and can peel their own!

They can eat up to 500 pounds of food a day. That is ¼ of a ton! It takes them almost all day to eat that much!

An elephant can drink up to 50 gallons of water in a day.

With all of that eating, an elephant also does a lot of pooping; up to 300 pounds of it every day!

Elephants are very smart. They are known for having a great memory.

Their brains can weigh 13 pounds!

Elephants have been known to learn more than 60 commands.

They are the only animal other than humans who grieve for the dead.

They act happy and excited when they see a friend they haven’t seen in a long time.

Elephants are smart enough to play jokes on humans.

The have emotions to cry when they are sad and squeak or trumpet when they are happy.

They have 2 white tusks that grow their entire life.

If you see an elephant with very long tusks, it is an old elephant.

Very large tusks can weigh over 200 pounds each!

They use their tusks for digging up roots, digging to find water, prying bark off of trees, lifting and fighting.

Elephants have the largest teeth on the planet; even bigger than whales!

Elephant’s tusks are made out of ivory.

several elephants of various sizes drinking water

Elephants are known for their trunks.

Trunks can get up to 7 feet long and are very strong. They can lift loads of 500 pounds!

An elephant trunk contains 150,000 muscle units; 17 actual muscles.

Their trunk can lift something very heavy but can also pick up something very small like a peanut.

They use their trunks for bringing food and water to their mouth and to greet each other, caress their young, pick up objects, trumpet, breathe and smell.

Their trunk is actually their nose and upper lip.

They also use their trunk to give themselves a bath, either with water or with a dust bath.

They use a dust bath to protect their skin from the sun and parasites.

Their trunk is also a snorkel when they swim in deep water.

Herd.org has a great article, All of your elephant trunk questions answered, with lots of information and a good video about trunks.

Elephants are also known for their large ears. African elephants have larger ears than Asian elephants.

Elephants use their ears as air conditioning. They radiate extra heat under the hot sun.

They also use them to communicate. Flapping them can either show joy or anger.

Elephant’s ears can also be used to hear sounds from far away. They can hear another elephant’s call from 2.5 miles away and sometimes up to over 6 miles away!

African Elephants are a Keystone Species.

A keystone species means they are important in keeping their environment functioning well.

They eat a lot of plants and fruits and some of that isn’t digested. As they walk many miles each day and deposit their poo as they walk, seeds from those plants are spread to grow in new areas.

They dig holes to drink water and as they do that, new underground springs are exposed so smaller animals can find water when they otherwise may not.

As they eat vegetation, trample through areas and knock down trees and shrubs, it changes the landscape so more light can reach in for more and different plants to flourish.

Elephants are Endangered!

The African elephant is vulnerable and the Asian elephant is endangered.

Elephants are hunted and killed for their ivory tusks. Some even use their meat and skin. There are laws against this but there are still poachers who hunt them.

Some elephants are killed if they come too close to human homes or buildings. They can destroy crops, fences or buildings.

Their habitats are being destroyed by humans when we build more cities and homes. If their homes are destroyed, they have nowhere to live and find food.

How Can we Help Elephants?

We can help by never buying, selling or wearing anything that is made from ivory.

Boycott circuses that mistreat elephants.

Encourage zoos to create environments like the African elephants native habitat.

**When you think you know the facts, take the interactive quiz at the bottom of the post! 😊

Videos about Elephants

All about Elephants from WWF Wild Classroom 5:27

Elephant Facts from Wildlife Crystal 7:56

Elephant Facts for Kids from Homeschool Pop 6:42

Elephants for Children: Learn All About Elephants – FreeSchool 4:28

Baby Elephants 🐘 | Disney Animals | Disney Junior

ELEPHANT SOUNDS FOR KIDS – Learn Trumpeting, Rumbling, and Roaring Sound Effects of Elephants 13:31 (At 1:55 one stands up to get a branch from a tree; cool!)

Top Ten Baby Elephants At Play – Elephantnews 3:03 So cute!

Poem

An elephant goes like this and that. (stomp feet)
He’s terribly big, (hands up high)
And he’s terribly fat. (hands out wide)
He has no fingers (wiggle fingers)
And he has no toes, (hold out your foot)
But goodness gracious, (hands to sides of face)

What a nose! (make a curling motion away from nose)

Songs

Elephant Dance Song | Maple Leaf Learning 3:52 Cute with people doing elephant actions with elephant clips and facts

Stomp! | Count To Five Preschool Song! | Super Simple Songs 3:36 For the little ones; cartoons to sing with and facts about elephants as they count

Elephants Have Wrinkles by Rock’n’Rainbow – Music for Kids by Howdytoons 2:09 Sing with the cartoon

Mr. Fun Elephant | Elephant | Animal Songs | Pinkfong Songs for Children 1:38 A mix of cartoon and video to sing with

Five Elephants Having a Wash | Nursery Rhymes for Babies by LittleBabyBum – ABCs and 123s 2:07

This Elephant Unit Study has all you need to learn about Elephants with your students in a fun way with videos, crafts, printables, recipes and even an interactive quiz!

When is National Elephant Day?

Other Unit Studies

Seasons and Holidays

Animals

Facts about Elephants

African Elephants are a Keystone Species.

Elephants are Endangered!

How Can we Help Elephants?

Videos about Elephants

Poem

Songs

Books

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no extra cost to you.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no extra cost to you.

Some Jokes

Printables

Crafts and Activities

Recipes

How to Draw Elephants

I found the facts for this post from the following sources

How much do you remember? Take your Interactive Quiz here!

Cindy

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Recommended