Jennifer Bové - I Wish I Was an Elephant

What if you wished you were an
elephant?
Then you became one!
Could you eat like an elephant?
Talk like an elephant?
Live in an elephant family?
And would you want to? Find out!

Where would you live?
Many elephants live in Africa
on grassy plains called savannas.
The sun shines for months at a time.
It is a hot and dry place.
Elephants move around the savanna.
They often walk for many miles
to find water and food.

Would you like to live
someplace where it is
almost always hot?

What would your family be like?
An elephant family is called a herd.
It usually has around twenty members.
The leader of the herd is a wise
and strong mother elephant.
Most of the other herd members are
female elephants, called cows.

Young elephants live in the
herd, too.
They are called calves.
Adult male elephants, called bulls,
live apart from the herd.

A mother elephant has one calf
around every five years.
The whole elephant herd is excited
when a calf is born.
They gather around the calf
to meet the new family member.
They use their trunks like hands
to gently touch and pet the baby.

As an elephant calf grows bigger,
the other elephants in the herd
help take care of the calf.
Sisters and aunts love to babysit.
Babysitters play with the calf
and protect it from danger
while Mom is busy finding food.

How would you learn to be an
elephant?
Elephant calves learn from the herd.
Older elephants show calves how to
greet others by touching trunks
and how to stick together
when danger is near.

Calves learn that helping others
and working together
are important parts of herd life.

Playing games is another way
that elephant calves learn
to get along with others.
They race, play tag, and wrestle
with friends.
When they play,
calves use their trunks a lot.
They pick up sticks
and roll rocks.

What games do
you play with your
friends?

How would you talk?
Elephants make many sounds.
They can trumpet loudly to say,
Im excited!

Adults roar to say, Stay away!
Elephants also talk by rumbling.
Rumbling is a low drumming sound
made in an elephants throat.
Rumbles are hard for humans to hear,
but elephants can hear rumbles
from several miles away.

What would you eat?
Elephants eat leaves, grasses,
and roots.
They like fruit and twigs, too.
Elephants find food by using
their keen sense of smell.
They grasp food with their trunks
and put it into their mouths.
Elephants need a lot of food,
so they eat many times each day.

What does your favorite
food smell like?

How would you wash up?
Elephants shower with their trunks.
They suck water into their trunks
and spray themselves.
They also spray one another for fun.

After washing, elephants roll in mud!
It sounds dirty,
but the mud dries on their skin
and protects them from bugs that bite.

Would you like to roll in
the mud after a bath?

How would growing up change you?
Baby elephants get bigger every day.
They grow long teeth called tusks.
Elephants use them for digging roots
and fighting predators, like lions.

When they are about
thirteen years old,
male elephants leave the herd.
Females stay with the herd for life.