Practice 1 Script
Transcript Practice 1 Script
A lecture providing a concept, an issue or a
phenomenon and important aspects of it or
perspectives relating to it.
Restate contents of the lecture
What to listen
TPO 19 – Task 6
• Today, I want to talk about sea birds(主题句). Now, sea birds hunt and
eat fish and, well, their food can be hard to find because their food
source is spread out over a large expanse of water. So what sea birds
have done is that, over time, they’ve made adaptations: they’ve
developed special characteristics that help them find food.
• One adaptation involves the length of the bird’s wings. Take albatross,
for example, is a large sea bird that spends most of its life flying over
ocean waters in search of food, fish to feed itself and to carry back to
the nest for its chicks. Now, most birds flap their wings up and down
when they fly, which uses up a lot of energy, but the albatross has these
special long wings that it can hold perfectly still. It’s able to fly without
moving its wings up and down. These long wings allow it to glide or
float on the wind, and this uses very little energy. This is important
because as I said the albatross has to cover huge expanse of ocean to
locate food, sometimes up to eleven hundred miles a day. Because of its
long wings, it can glide along over the ocean using little energy as it
searches for food.
• Another important adaptation of many sea birds is an acute, highly
developed sense of smell. Take the fulmar, like the albatross, the fulmar
needs to find foods that scatter far out over the ocean, but the fulmar
has a rather unusual advantage: it has tiny tubes inside the nose holes
in its beak, and these special tube-shaped nostrils help it to pick up
scent of food. Now, this highly-developed sense of smell is especially
important because the fulmar’s main source of food, plankton, are tiny
organisms that are hard to see, but they give off a very sharp,
distinctive odor, so when fulmars are flying around looking for food,
they may not be able to see them, but they can find the plankton by
smelling them even from far away.
Using the examples of the albatross and the fulmar, explain two special adaptations
that have developed to help sea birds find food.
The professor talks about two special adaptations developed to help seabirds find food.
The first adaptation is the Length of wings. Usually, when birds fly, they have to flap
wings up and down and uses a lot of energy. Bu albatross, a kind of seabird, has
specially long wings that enable it to fly without moving wings up and down. So it can
glide and float on the wind using little energy. This is so because albatross has to
cover huge expanse of ocean to locate food. （Supporting details）
Another adaptation is acute sense of smell. Fulmar also has to find food scattered in the
ocean and its main source of food is tiny plankton. Fulmar develops tiny tubes inside
nose hole and the special tube-shape nostrils help them to pick up the scent of food.
Plankton is hard to see but it gives sharp distinctive odor. So Fulmar can find plankton
by smelling them even from far away. （Supporting details）
TPO 20 – Task 6
• When people are in difficult situations sometimes they experience
feelings of helplessness, or psychological pain. So what do they do?
They unconsciously use a strategy called, defense mechanisms, to
protect themselves psychologically from their painful emotions.
Oh, let’s say a woman has a pet dog. She’s had this dog for a long time and he’s
kept her company and guarded her for years. But one day he runs away. This
woman looks everywhere, and asks other people if they’ve seen her dog. But
she just can’t find him. Now, she feels helpless and sad because she misses her
dog. So she’ll unconsciously find ways to deal with her painful feelings. One
defense mechanism she might use is fantasy. With fantasy, the woman uses her
imagination so instead of just feeling helpless and sad about her lost dog, she
invents a happy story in her mind. She might imagine that, uh, a nice family
found him and feeds him and that he’s really happy with them. She’ll picture
the dog playing, running around, having fun. Because of this fantasy, she
doesn’t have to feel sad about her dog running away. It’s a fantasy, it’s not real,
but it keeps her pain away.
• Another defense mechanism she might use is what we call, sublimation.
Sublimation is different from fantasy because sublimation isn’t about
pretending. It’s about turning negative emotions into something useful,
practical. So, uh, the woman might start a dog training school. That way,
by training dogs, perhaps she can help prevent other people’s dogs
from running away like hers did. In other words, with sublimation as a
defense mechanism, the woman redirects her negative feelings about
losing her dog into a positive, constructive activity.
Using points and examples from the talk, describe the two defense mechanisms
mentioned by the professor.
(主旨)The professor says when people experience difficult situations, they may feel
helpless and have psychological pain. In order to psychologically protect themselves
they will unconsciously use defense mechanisms. // For example, a woman has a pet
dog for a long time. But one day the dog runs away, she looks everywhere and just
can’t find him. She feels helpless and sad. // The first defense mechanism to deal
with the pain is fantasy. She will use imagination to invent a happy story in her mind.
In the story a nice family finds the dog and feeds him well and the dog is playing,
running around, having fun so she doesn’t have to feel sad. Another mechanism is
sublimation. Sublimation turns negative emotions into something useful, practical.
The woman may start a dog training school to prevent other people’ dogs from
running away. So by using sublimation she redirects her negative feeling into a
positive, constructive activity.
TPO 22 – Task 6
• Many animals live underground, in the soil. Not just little animals like
worms but also bigger animals like mammals. Living underground has
its advantages. It protects animals from above ground predators.
However, the underground environment also presents challenges. And
animals that live underground have developed physical adaptations to
deal with them. One challenge is, well, simply how to move
underground through the dirt. Another challenge for the animal is to
protect vulnerable parts of its body from the environment that it’s
Now, moving through soil is not like moving through air or water, because soil,
earth, is thick and dense, so animals that live underground have evolved
physical features that help them move through dirt efficiently. For example, the
mole, a small, furry mammal, has really wide, super strong front feet with big
claws. The mole’s feet act like, uh, like shuffles, so it can dig through dirt. The
claws cut into the dirt, loosen it up, and once the dirt is loosened up, the broad
feet throw the dirt behind the mole as it moves forward. These shuffle-like front
feet allow a mole to dig its way through the dirt astonishingly quickly.
But even for an animal that can move efficiently through the dirt, living
underground can still be problematic, because it’s easy for particles to get
caught in sensitive parts of the animal’s body, like for mammals, in their eyes, so
underground animals have developed adaptations to prevent this. Again, let’s
take the example of the mole. To begin with, moles have tiny eyes and these
eyes are covered with a thin skin, a protective membrane that’s actually got
hair on it. These hairs protect the mole’s eyes from dirt particles. So as the mole
goes digging through the dirt with its head push forward, the dirt particles
come into contact with the hairy membrane covering the mole’s tiny eyes. And
the particles just slide by. Don’t get caught in the mole’s eyes. So the eyes, the
mole’s sensitive parts, are protected.
Using the example of the mole, explain two different types of underground
(主旨)The professor talks about two physical adaptations of mole for living underground.
One adaptation is used to deal with the challenge to move underground. Moles have
wide super strong front feet with big claws that allow moles to dig through the dirt
and so to move through thick, dense soil efficiently. Using the shovel-like front feet,
the mole loosens up the soil and throws the dirt behind as it moves forward.（
Details）Another adaptation is used to protect their sensitive parts of body. Moles
have developed the hairy membrane on their tiny eyes. The hairy membrane can
prevent particles from going into moles’ eyes, the most sensitive parts. And So when
mole is digging through the dirt, dirt particles will just slide by its eyes.（Details）
TPO 23 – Task 6
• Now, plants, like animals, and like us for that matter, need nutrients,
substances that provide nourishments, to survive, thrive and grow. We
get our nutrients from the food we eat. Plants, though, most plants
anyway, absorb their nutrients from the soil, right, through their root
systems? OK, but there are plants that don’t get their nutrients from
the soil. The places they grow the soil is bad. So they get their nutrients
from insects instead, from trapping and digesting insects. They are
called carnivorous plants.
Carnivorous plants capture insects in different ways. They have different
trapping mechanisms: active traps and passive traps. A plant with an active
trap, a good example is the Venus flytrap. The Venus flytrap actually moves to
capture its prey or parts of it anyway. Its leaves, it has special leaves that are
hinged in the middle the two halves of the leaves open and close sort of like a
mouth to catch insects. And on these leaves is sweet nectar that attracts
insects. Insects like the sweet stuff. And when they get lured in and land on the
leaf, wham! The leaf springs shut. It’s an active trap. And the insect springs it so
to speak. The leaf quickly closes to form a little cage, trapping the insect
between the leaves. The Venus flytrap is then able to digest the insect and get
But other carnivorous plants, their methods are passive. They don’t have any
moving parts to trap things. They have passive traps, like the sundew plant. The
sundew plant also produces sweet nectar that attracts insects. Its leaves are full
of little hairs that secrete sweet substance. But what happens when insects land
on sundew’s leaves to get the sweet nectar? Well, unfortunately for the insects,
the hairs on the leaves also produce a super sticky glue-like substance. So an
insect get stuck and can’t fly away. It basically get glued there allowing the
sundew to digest it and absorb nutrients.
Using the example of the Venus flytrap and the sundew, describe two ways that
carnivorous plants get their nutrients.
(主旨)In the lecture, the professor talks about two ways carnivorous plants capture
insects. The first way is active trap. For example, Venus flytrap has some parts that
can move to catch the prey its leaves are hinged in the middle and the two parts of
the leaves look like a mouth. Also its leaves have sweat nectar on them to attract the
insects. When insects are attracted by the nectar and land on the leaves, the leaves
spring shut and form little cages. Then Venus flytrap can digest the insects and get
nutrients.（Details）The second way is passive trap. For example, the Sundew plant
has no moving parts. It also has sweet nectar on its leaves. But its leaves are full of
little hairs. When insects land on the leaves, hairs can produce super sticky glue
substance. So the insects get stuck on the leaves and then Sundew plant can digest
the insects and absorb nutrients. (Details)