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SummarySkills Worksheet Snakes

World Snake Day on July 16th aims to educate the public about snakes, countering the fear and misinformation that often leads to negative attitudes towards them. Snakes play a crucial ecological role as both predator and prey, helping to maintain balance in ecosystems and even controlling pests like rodents that spread diseases. The document emphasizes that these negative perceptions hinder conservation efforts and that snakes deserve protection not only for their ecological benefits but also for their intrinsic value as living beings.

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Ramsha Umair
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35 views1 page

SummarySkills Worksheet Snakes

World Snake Day on July 16th aims to educate the public about snakes, countering the fear and misinformation that often leads to negative attitudes towards them. Snakes play a crucial ecological role as both predator and prey, helping to maintain balance in ecosystems and even controlling pests like rodents that spread diseases. The document emphasizes that these negative perceptions hinder conservation efforts and that snakes deserve protection not only for their ecological benefits but also for their intrinsic value as living beings.

Uploaded by

Ramsha Umair
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Edu21- The 21st Century School

Worksheet - Summary skills


Teaching people to hate snakes is a disaster for ecology
Did you know it’s World Snake Day on 16th July? We invite you to slither on down to join the party, meet our
snake experts and enjoy lots of fun snake-themed activities.

Humans often fear what they don’t understand. To most, snakes are a mystery. Snakes rely on their ability to
avoid detection, so we rarely see them. This leads to a void of direct knowledge that’s filled by myth and
media – portraying snakes as cold-blooded killers and focusing on how dangerous some can be. Our aim is to
tip the scales (excuse the pun), educate and encourage guests to confront their fears. During the event,
there’ll be Zoo Chats – guests can get up close to, even touch, several snake species. At 10:30 am, guests can
watch the zoo’s largest snake resident – a reticulated python – being weighed and measured. At midday,
guests can venture over to The Swamp to see and learn about recently hatched Grey-banded Kingsnake and
Jamaican Boa babies.

Though threatened by many of the same issues affecting other wildlife, including habitat loss, climate change
and disease, negative attitudes impeding efforts to address other threats may be the biggest barrier to snake
conservation.

In the United States, for example, public outcry based on fear and misinformation recently halted a
scientifically sound conservation plan for timber rattlesnakes. Another project at the same location that
involved releasing eagles was embraced by the community. Rattlesnakes are no less important than eagles.
In fact, they may help reduce the incidence of Lyme disease, which affects thousands of people each year, by
reducing the number of rodents that harbour this disease. But emotions override facts, it seems, where
snakes are concerned.

Snakes play an integral role in maintaining balance in the ecosystem – in most ecosystems on earth, snakes
can be both predator and prey. When a large prey-population attracts and sustains a large snake population,
those snakes become prey for birds, mammals and even other snakes! As predators, snakes keep prey-
populations in balance. Snakes provide an easy, environmentally friendly, free and natural pest-control
service.

But snakes are worth saving not because of what they can do for us, but because of who they are. Snakes
share many behaviours with us, behaviours we value. They have friends. They take care of their kids and even
their friends’ kids too. Want to help us change how people view and treat snakes? Visit the World Snake Day
website.

Read Text, Teaching people to hate snakes is a disaster for ecology, above and then answer Question.
According to Text, why do people have negative attitudes to snakes and why are these attitudes unfair and
unjustified?
You must use continuous writing (not note form) and use your own words as far as possible.
Your summary should not be more than 120 words.
Up to 10 marks are available for the content of your answer and up to 5 marks for the quality of your
writing.

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