Geography KS1/KS2: Location comparison - the remote islands of Shetland and Iqaluit in Canada

The Shetland Islands are a part of Scotland. They are surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean and the North Sea, so to get there from the Scottish mainland you need to take a plane, or a ferry.

On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, on a very large island in North America, is a city called Iqaluit. The name Iqaluit means 'The Place of Many Fish'. In winter, it gets so cold that even the sea freezes.

Christina: Hello, my name is Christina, and this is my dog, Princess, and this is my dad, and my mum and my brother, and my sister. We live in Iqaluit.

Kayla-Marie: Hi, I'm Kayla-Marie, I'm ten years old, and I live in Shetland. I live in Shetland with my mum, my dad, my big brother Craig, my little sister Shawna, and my other little sister Miley.

Kayla-Marie: In Shetland we've got lots and lots of sheep, and we've got Shetland ponies that aren't very big, but they're very hairy. I like living in Shetland because you can run everywhere, and up the hills. I like going to my Nanny and Grandad's house, because they've got a cute little sheepdog.

Christina: Living on an island is great, because most of my family live in walking distance, and I spend a lot of time playing with my cousins, and my friends and my dogs. I also love running up big hills not far from my house. From here you can see for miles and miles. When I climb the tallest hill I see everywhere, and I can see Dog Island, the town a lot of people going on the ice, skidooing. It gets so windy at the top of the hill; it almost blows me over. The sun is very beautiful.

Kayla-Marie: The best thing about living in Shetland Islands is the fact that you can go out on the boat. When we go out on the boat we fish at certain different places. We go to check on my dad's mussel lines and sometimes there's seals lying on the mussel barrels. Mussels taste like squidgy things that are really nice.

Christina: When I go fishing I catch char. We got a huge Arctic char, my mum cut it up, and I was eating the spine part. We ate it raw and it was really good. Then my parents were making stuffing, and they put that in the fish, and it took an hour and a half to make the fish in the oven, and then we ate it. We hunt walruses, beluga whales, polar bears, caribou. We eat the meat and use the bones and fur, and we don't waste anything.

Kayla-Marie: I really like music and I play the flute, the fiddle and the cello.

Christina: I just started this really cool Claymation workshop. I get to make a movie about ravens and polar bears, with animals built from different coloured clay. After, I go to the youth club and shoot some pool and play some ping-pong.

Kayla-Marie: My favourite hobbies are baton-twirling and dancing.

Christina: About eight months in the year there is snow in Iqaluit. The games that I play in the snow are hide and go seek, and we build tunnels, and we play snowball fight. I go to this big snow castle, and there's this little hiding spot that I went in, and we were playing. It looked like a mountain, with a lot of holes inside though.

Kayla-Marie: On Bonfire Night we go to our cousins' house and we have a big bonfire.

Christina: The nights are so cold in Iqaluit, sometimes minus fifty.

Kayla-Marie: Auntie Cindy, she always comes down with hot-dogs, and sweeties. There are big fireworks going up in the air and it's really cool.

Christina: During the winter it's dark most of the time. Sometimes we can see the Northern Lights. There's a legend that people say: that if you whistle they'll come down and cut off your head, and if you clap, then they dance like crazy and turn purple and green. It's very amazing.