Free printable ocean animal cards
The sea is one of the last completely unexplored places on the earth. There are some fascinating creatures that dwell in its depths, You can use these 40 ocean animal cards to teach both children and ESL learners.
The 40 ocean animal cards include the – starfish, crab, dolphin, octopus, turtle, clownfish, seahorse, whale, lobster, clam, jellyfish, pufferfish, penguin, ray, walrus, whale shark, flying fish, oyster, reef shark, great white shark, sawtooth shark, hammerhead shark, shrimp, squid, urchin, moray eel, seal, mussel, hermit crab, horseshoe crab, sea otter, killer whale, butterfly fish, tang fish, tuna, lionfish, toadfish, sea cucumber, dugong and sailfish.
Note that there are sometimes different names given to these sea animals. For example, the pufferfish is often called a blowfish, the clam picture card could be a giant clam, there are many kinds of rays, and large shrimp are called prawns in Australia.
A killer whale can also be called an orca, there are many kinds of tang fish, which can also be called surgeon fish, as well as many kinds of tuna.
How to use the free ocean animal cards
Asides from rote learning you can use these sea animal cards to play all your favorite flashcard games. Here are a few more ideas you can try.
- Print 2 copies of the cards so that you can play memory and pelmanism/matching games. You can also do this by cutting the names of the ocean animals from the bottom of the cards.
- Print several sets to play card games. You can get creative and make your own rules for any kind of card game you like.
- Ask your students to arrange the ocean animal cards in food chains. See who can make the longest food chain!
- Use them for speaking activities where students choose a card at random and then describe the animal’s appearance, behavior, it’s diet, etc.
- You can use them to play games like taboo and who am I?
Related ocean animal activities
There are a lot of different animal resources here on ESL Vault. For ocean animals in particular you will find picture and word matching worksheets in the vocabulary section. There are some ocean word search puzzles and for older students, there are also the ocean conversation questions and the fish discussion questions.
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