The best way to teach your children about endangered animals is to get hands on! Check out these 10 fun sea turtle facts for kids plus how to make your own sea turtle craft that floats!
My kids, like almost every other kid on Earth, love animals. They even love the gross ones because, well, they don’t know they’re gross yet. And they really love the ones they don’t see often – like sharks, pandas, monkeys, and sea turtles. Oh yes, sea turtles have always been fascinating to both of my girls. I think cute little Crush from Finding Nemo played a big part in that.
To get our conversation about sea turtles going, we decided to make some of our own. This floating sea turtle craft is so easy, but so fun for the kiddos to make and then play with after.
All you need to make these fun floating friends is:Foam-Sheets, 50-Pack, Rainbow Colors
- Green Craft Foam
- Plastic Containers from applesauce or fruit cups
- Googly Eyes [optional]
- Craft Paint
- Glue
Let your children paint the plastic cups any shades of blue or green. While they’re painting, print out this template then trace your seat turtle onto green craft foam. Once the painted cups are dry, glue them onto your foam turtles.
These turtles will actually float, which makes them a ton of fun especially in the bath tub or even in a water table like we did!
Another thing my girls love is learning about their favorite animals. Sophia’s favorite type of books are animal nonfiction books. And they’re both always amazed at fun facts which is what inspired me to share these sea turtle facts.
10 Fun Sea Turtle Facts for Kids
1. Sea Turtles have been on Earth for more than 220 million years.
Yes million years. That means that sea turtles were around when dinosaurs roamed the Earth!
2. Sea Turtles can live to be 100 years old.
3. Sea Turtles have a form of GPS.
Ok, maybe not exactly like the navigation systems we have in our cars, but sea turtles do use vibration to know where they’re going. They also have excellent eyesight and sense of smell.
4. Females return to the beach where they were born to lay their own eggs.
See… that GPS must work pretty well because this means they may travel hundreds of miles to return to the beach where they hatched.
5. Only 1 in 1,000 baby sea turtles survive.
Once the females lays her eggs, she leaves and the eggs stay on land for 2 months alone before they hatch. This makes the eggs extremely vulnerable. Once hatched, the baby sea turtles must find their way to the ocean and avoid predators like crabs and birds during their slow trek to the ocean. Those flippers are made for swimming not walking, which makes them very slow and a bit clumsy [as seen in the Disney movie, Moana when baby Moana helps one make it safely]!
6. Sea turtles lay 100-200 eggs at a time.
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7. Sea turtles don’t need a supply of fresh water. They get their water intake from the food they eat.
8. Unlike land turtles, sea turtles can’t hide their heads and legs inside their shell, which makes them much more vulnerable to predators in the ocean.
9. There are 7 types of sea turtles.
Sea Turtles are classified into these seven types: Green, Hawksbill, Leatherback, Flatback, Loggerhead, Kemp Ridley and Olive Ridley. The fastest type are the leatherbacks who have been known to swim at over 20 miles per hour. Green sea turtles are the world’s largest species of hard-shelled sea turtle, with most weighing about 300 to 400 pounds. The biggest type of sea turtle is the loggerhead that can weigh as much as 1,000 pounds and the smallest being the Olive Ridley that can be as small as 100 pounds at full grown size.
10. 6 out of 7 types of Sea Turtles are endangered.
There used to be millions of sea turtles in the ocean, but now there are only thousands. The main reasons that these beautiful creatures have become endangered is due to: poaching, loss of nesting or feeding areas, ocean pollution and weather changes caused by global warming.