Ernest Shackleton
Teaching Ideas and Resources

A guide to the resources on this website for use in planning lessons about Sir Ernest Shackleton, the Discovery, Nimrod, Endurance and Quest expeditions and the crews involved. geography, history, English

Sir Ernest Shackleton went to Antarctica no less than four times between 1901 and 1922 on voyages of adventure and exploration. The most famous of these was what was officially called the "Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition" of 1914-1917, better known by the name of the ship involved, this was the Endurance Expedition.

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Endurance Expedition - PowerPoint Presentation
Ernest Shackleton and the voyage of the Endurance - click to open or download
10.5Mb - 27 slides - Suitable for ages from 11 upwards
Alternate file types, open or download:   as a .pdf    as an .mp4

Pictures only: as a Word file  |  as a pdf
text of the presentation.

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The Crew of the Endurance Expedition

The links below lead to biography pages with pictures of each of the members of the Endurance crew. Some could be chosen and presented to a class as options so that individual students follow the links to identify with the men (there were no women) while on the expedition and then later in life. They could use what they find as the basis for a piece of writing, a condensed biography, a letter home (the only communication, though the letter wouldn't be received until after the men were rescued) a poem, thoughts about what they were missing, FaceBook page updates, Tweets etc.

Some biographies have more information than others, those with a # are suggested as being more suitable.

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The Story of the Endurance over 4 Illustrated Pages

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Tweets From the Endurance

I originally sent these on Twitter as a series of Tweets exactly 100 years after the actual events took place from the 1st of December 1914 (2014) when the Endurance left South Georgia to enter the Weddell Sea to the 3rd of September 1916 (2016) when the rescued crew arrived in Punta Arenas, Chile.

The messages are sent from an unspecified "anyman" observer amongst the crew and follow events as they happen being more frequent when more when more is happening. The diaries of some of the crew members were used as source material. e.g.

21 Nov 1915
She has gone. Lying in our tents, the Boss called "She's going!" 1.5 miles away we saw the bows down, stern in the air..

21 Nov 1915
...one quick dive and ice closed over the Endurance for ever. She was a link with the outer world our isolation is complete "She's gone boys".

6 pages:

• 1 - 1st Dec 1914 - 22nd June 1915 - South Georgia to Midwinter 1915
• 2 - 2nd July 1915 - 21st Nov 1915 - Midwinter to the sinking of the Endurance
• 3 - 23rd Nov 1915 - 8th Apr 1916 - Life on the ice
• 4 - 9th Apr 1916 - 17th Apr 1916 - Lifeboats to Elephant Island
• 5 - 18th Apr 1916 - 23rd May 1916 - Rescue mission to South Georgia
• 6 - 25th May 1916 - 30th Aug 1916 - Rescue from Elephant Island

Notable dates:

• Depart Grytviken whaling station, South Georgia - December 5th 1914
• Entered pack ice - December 7th 1914
• Endurance trapped- January 18th 1915
• Endurance crushed, ship abandoned - October 27th 1915
• Endurance sinks- November 21st 1915
• Launch boats for Elephant Island - April 9th 1916
• Boat journey to South Georgia- April 24th - May 10th 1916
• Shackleton, Worsley, and Crean reach Stromness whaling station - May 20th 1916
• Three crew members rescued from a beach on South Georgia- May 21st 1916
• Remainder of the crew rescued from Elephant Island - August 30th 1916

This is the entire story in condensed form, it is still quite a lot of reading but makes it easier to find specific events. A proportional time line could be constructed to show how much time the "events" took, compared to how much time was spent mainly waiting around with little happening.

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Shackleton's Other Expeditions

Discovery - with Robert Scott - 1901-1904

Shackleton First went to Antarctica on the prestigious and establishment backed "British Antarctic Expedition" on the ship Discovery, it had ambitious exploratory and scientific plans. He was "Third lieutenant in charge of holds, stores, provisions and deep sea water analysis.". He took part in an attempt to reach the South Pole with Scott and Edward Wilson in 1902 the party of three reached a point 480 miles from the South Pole before turning back while they still could. In 1912 Scott and Wilson were part of a party of five who succeeded in reaching the South Pole, though they would all perish on the return journey.

On the pole attempt, Shackleton suffered from scurvy and had a very difficult return journey, after return to the expedition hut on Ross Island, he was sent back home on the next available ship to recover.

The Discovery Expedition

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Nimrod - Shackleton - 1907-1909

Upon returning to England, Shackleton began to plan for his next voyage south which he would lead himself, this would be the "British Imperial Antarctic Expedition" on the ship Nimrod. Another attempt was made on the South Pole, this time there were four men in the party led by Shackleton, they came to within 97 miles of the South Pole but again had to turn back while they were still able, Shackleton was never to actually make it to the South Pole.

The NImrod Expedition

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Quest - Shackleton - 1921-1922

The Shackleton - Rowett Expedition 1921 - 1922 was to be Shackleton's last trip to Antarctica, named for himself as the leader and John Quiller Rowett the main financial sponsor. Initially it was intended to go to the Arctic, but the original sponsors pulled out. The Quest was a small and really quite unsuitable ship for the purpose, though following the fame of the Endurance expedition, Shackleton was overwhelmed by volunteers to accompany him, the eventual crew included eight old Endurance shipmates.

After a difficult journey south from England and some time-consuming unscheduled repairs in Rio de Janeiro, the original plans had to be changed due to shortness of time and so the Quest arrived at South Georgia on the 4th of January 1922. Tragically and following declining health that he had tried to conceal, Shackleton had a fatal heart attack on board the ship at harbour on the 5th of January 1922 at the age of 47, so ending the Heroic Age of Antarctic exploration.

The Quest Expedition