NOV20

Classroom lesson · Wildlife · 🇰🇮 Kiribati

Phoenix Islands Protected Area

One of the largest marine reserves on the planet

Photo · Wikimedia Commons

What is it?

The Phoenix Islands Protected Area is a huge stretch of protected ocean in the middle of the Pacific, belonging to Kiribati. It covers about 408,000 square kilometres of sea — roughly the size of California — and UNESCO has named it a World Heritage Site because of its extraordinary underwater wildlife. Almost every creature that lives in a healthy coral reef can be found here.

Tell me more

A marine protected area is like a national park, but underwater. Instead of protecting forests and mountains, it protects coral reefs, fish, sharks, and the tiny creatures that make the whole ocean food chain work. In the Phoenix Islands, fishing is strictly limited so that sea life can thrive without being disturbed.

The reefs here are some of the most untouched in the world. Scientists who visit by research boat describe seeing fish so unafraid of humans that they swim right up to the divers. Massive schools of tuna, rays gliding across sandy floors, and dozens of species of shark all share this watery wilderness.

Eight small islands and atolls dot the protected area, but most of them are completely uninhabited — no people live there at all. This means the land and sea have stayed wild for a very long time. The few scientists who do visit call it one of the last truly pristine ocean environments on Earth, and Kiribati is very proud to be its guardian.

In the classroom

Walk your class through this in 15 minutes.

Talk together

Discussion prompts

  1. 01Why might it help coral reefs to have areas where fishing is limited? What do you think would happen if every part of the ocean were fished heavily?
  2. 02A World Heritage Site is something so special that the whole world agrees to help look after it. Can you name other World Heritage Sites you have heard of?
  3. 03Scientists say the fish in the Phoenix Islands are unafraid of humans. What does that tell us about how rarely people visit?
  4. 04If you were a fish in a marine reserve, what would be the best things about living there?
Try this

Classroom activity

Create a 'marine reserve passport' booklet (four folded sheets of paper). On the cover, draw the Phoenix Islands from above. Inside, draw and label six sea creatures you might find there — include at least one type of coral, one fish, one ray or shark, and one other animal. Add one fun fact about each creature.

More about Kiribati

Other things that make Kiribati special

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