Unit Topic: The Galapagos Islands
Grade Level: Middle School
Basic Concepts: Myths and Legends
Content Area: Art, Language Arts, Social Studies
Time: 1 hour
The teacher will introduce the Galapagos Islands and the myth and legend that accompanies them by reading the Bishops letter and myth of the Galapagos. Discussion will follow with the students on what the differences are between a myth and a legend, followed by the students own experiences with myths and legends. Once the differences have been established, the students will pair up and create their own myth or legend about their lives, oceans, or natural occurrences to be shared with the class.
Materials: Paper, Bishops letter about the Galapagos, Myth of the Galapagos
After rereading the Bishops letter and myth of the Galapagos Islands, the students are to pick an item that was discussed in the letter or myth that created an image in their minds. Each student will work independently and then create their images out of clay or playdough. It is important that each student does not see other students work until everybody is finished, dividers may be necessary if there is not enough space. When each student is finished, students will present their items to the class and discuss why that item stuck out in their minds and how they went about creating the items.
Materials: Bishops letter about the Galapagos, Myth of the Galapagos, Clay or Playdough, Dividers (if necessary)
Assessment:
In order for the students to be successful, they must obtain a 12 on
the Project
Rubric, a score of 5 or better on the
Observation
rubric, and must complete their
personal object out of clay or playdough.
Extensions:
1. Students may create their own myths and legends to be shared amongst their classmates and collected to make a class book.
References:
Hickman, John. (1984). The Enchanted Islands: The Galapagos Discovered. ISBN # 0 -88072 -06i -i
Bishops letter
6 April 1535
Your Imperial Catholic Majesty
It seems eminently correct to allow Your Majesty to know of the progress of my trip from the time when I left Panama, which was on 23 February of the current year, until I arrived in this new town of Puerto Viejo.
The ship sailed with very good breezes for seven days, and the pilot kept near land and was had a six-day calm; the currents were so strong and engulfed us in such a way that on Wednesday 10 March we sighted an island. As on board there was enough water for only two more days, they agreed to lower the lifeboat and go on land for water and grass for the horses. Once out, they found nothing but seals, turtles, and such big tortoises that each could carry a man on top of itself, and many iguanas that are like serpents. On another day, we saw another island, larger than the first, and with great sierras. Thinking of that, on account of its size and monstrous shape, there could not fail to be rivers and fruits, we went to it, because of the distance around the first one was about four or five leagues, and around the other ten or twelve leagues. At this juncture the water on the ship gave out and we were three days in reaching the island on account of the calms, during which all of us, as well as the horses, suffered great hardship.
The boat once anchored, we all went on land, and some were given charge of making a well, and others of looking over the island. From the well there came out water saltier than that of the sea. On land they were not able to find even a drop of water for two days, and with the thirst the people felt, they resorted to a leaf of some thistles like prickly pears, and because they were somewhat juicy, although not very tasty, we began to eat of them and squeeze them to draw all the water from them and then drank it as if it were rose water.
On Passion Sunday, I had them bring on land the things necessary for saying Mass, and after it was said, I again sent the people in twos and threes, over different paths. The Lord deigned that they should find in a ravine among the rocks as much as a hogshead of water, and after they had drawn that, they found more and more. Finally, eight hogsheads were filled and the barrels and the jugs that were there on the boat, but through the lack of water we lost one man, and two days after we had left that island we lost another; and ten horses died.
From this island, we saw two others, one much larger that all which was easily fifteen or twenty leagues around; the other was medium. I tool the latitude to know where the islands were, and they are between a half-degree and a degree-and-a-half south latitude. On this second one, the same conditions prevailed as on the first; many seals, turtles, iguanas, tortoises, and many birds like those of Spain, but so silly that they do not know how to flee, and many were caught in the hand. The other two islands we did not touch; I do not know their character. On this one, on the sands of the shore, there were some small stones that we stepped on as we landed, and there were diamond-like stones and others amber-coloured. But on the whole island, I do not that there is a place where one might sow a bushel of corn, because most of it is full of very big stones, so much so, that it seems as though sometime God had showered stones; and the earth there is like dross, worthless, because it has not the power of raising a little grass, but only some thistles, the leaf of which I said we picked. Thinking that we were satisfied with the water already mentioned, although we might have filled more of our casks. But we set sail, and with medium weather we sailed eleven days without sighting land, and the pilot and the master of the ship came to me to ask where we were and to tell me there was only one hogshead of water on the ship. I tried to take the altitude of the sun that day and found that we were three degrees south latitude, and I realized that with the directions we were taking, we were becoming more and more engulfed, that we were not heading for land, because we were sailing south; I had them tack on the other side, and the hogshead of water I had divided as follows: half was given for the animals and with the other half a beverage was made which was put into the wine cask, for I held it as certain that we could not be far from land, and we sailed for eight days, all of which the hogshead of the beverage lasted, by giving a ration to each one with which he was satisfied. And when that hogshead gave out and there was no relief for us, we sighted land and we had calm for two days, during which we drank only wine, but we took heart on sighting land. We entered the bay and river of the Caraques (in Ecuador) on Friday 9 April, and we met there the people of a galleon from Nicaragua who had left eight months before, so we considered out trip good in comparison to theirs...
It is not surprising that the first visitors, with primitive sailing capacity, believed that it was not the ships but the islands themselves that were drifting, and the land which was liable to recede and disappear from human view must be enchanted.
The most meticulous eye that ever sighted the islands was that of Charles Darwin. In his diary for 16 September 1835 he wrote:
These islands at a distance have a sloping uniform outline, excepting where broken be sundry paps and hillocks; the whole black lava, where most porous, and reddish like cinders; the stunted trees show little signs of life. The blank rocks heated by the rays of the vertical sun, like a stove, give to the air a close and sultry feeling. The plants also smell unpleasantly. The country was comparable to what might imagine the cultivated parts of the Infernal regions to be.