The speaking strategies in this unit are using photos in discussions. It is vital to provide information before starting to speak. Only after students get enough input can they give their opinions and reasons. If possible, play some video clips about Asian elephants and orangutans so that students may have a good knowledge of the endangered animals.

Show the following on the PowerPoint or print them as handout.

ASIAN ELEPHANT

　　Many experts believe there is now no future for the Asian elephant outside protected areas. With the possible exception of parts of India, elephant populations have declined substantially in all countries during the past few decades. Even in India, the species has lost ground in the northeast; while in the south poaching for ivory threatens the genetic viability of the population. Historically, the major causes for the decline of the Asian elephant have been capture for domestication and loss of habitat in the face of the expanding human population. Even today, unsustainable capture (often illegal) persists in some countries, while human expansion continues to reduce and fragment the forest habitat, constricting elephant populations to small numbers which cannot survive in the long-term. Asian elephants are now extinct in West Asia, Java, and most of China, but they still occur in isolated populations scattered across 13 Asian countries. However, most of these populations are threatened by habitat loss, poaching, and conflict with humans. Habitat loss and human-elephant conflict, which are often intimately linked, are the biggest threats.

　　The population of Asian elephants today stands at between 25,600 and 32,750 in the wild with an additional 15,000 in captivity. The Asian elephant is listed as endangered on IUCN's Red List of Threatened Animals and is also on Appendix I of CITES, meaning that international commercial trade is not allowed.

ORANGUTAN

　　Everything orangutans need is in the trees. Their favorite food is fruit, especially figs, and they seem to know what fruit is ripe in what part of the forest at what time. They will occasionally eat insects or small mammals, but tend to be herbivores most of the time. They get their water from where rainfall collects on leaves and in the holes of trees. Orangutans even sleep in the trees. They build a new platform nest from leaves and branches each night and sleep 40 to 60 feet off of the ground!

Orangutans live only on islands of Borneo and Sumatra. Unfortunately, these highly intelligent red apes are now extinct in much of Asia. Farming, logging, and the burning of the forest have destroyed 80 percent of