节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2013-08-19
难易度:Medium
关键字:foundation, infant, time-consuming, lonesome, poacher
Hello, and welcome to Studio Classroom.
My name is Gabe.
And I'm Carolyn.
And you're joining us for a lesson about elephants today; actually, How to Raise
an Elephant.
I don't think many people have experienced personally raising elephants, but
we're going to learn about someone who has raised an elephant.
Now elephants are very interesting animals.
Lots of people love elephants.
I love going to the zoo and looking at the elephants and watching them interact
with each other.
They look like very friendly, big animals.
What do you know about elephants?
Carolyn, is there anything interesting you know about elephants?
Well, you said that they were big.
And in fact, they are the largest mammal on Earth.
So they are among one of the biggest animals in the world and the largest that
lives on land.
We talked before about the blue whale in the sea, and that is the biggest.
But elephants are so big, they weigh 3,200 to 5,900 kilograms, and can be as
tall as 3.3 meters.
Wow! They certainly are large animals.
Of course, a common phrase is uh, elephants never forget.
They have very good memories.
Well, there are some other facts you can find out about elephants in your
magazine on page 37.
But for now we're going to find out how to raise an elephant.
(Music).
How to Raise an Elephant.
The Jumbo Foundation aims to help large orphaned animals.
Think about caring for a baby.
Mothers can tell you all about the considerable amount of time it takes to feed,
change, comfort and care for a helpless infant.
Now what if that infant is an elephant calf?
Instead of weighing 3 to 4 kilograms at birth, he weighs 100!
And he needs to be fed every two hours, 24 hours a day for four years!
Would you want to take on that kind of responsibility?
Jenny Webb did.
She lives in the African country of Malawi.
(Music).
OK. So we know a little bit about Jenny Webb now.
But let's go back to the top of our lesson.
The title is How to Raise an Elephant.
Well, actually by now you probably know you're not going to be learning how you
can raise an elephant,
but we're learning about someone's experience when they took in an elephant. OK.
So we see here the Jumbo Foundation aims to help large orphaned animals.
Let's take a look at a word there from our Word Bank: a foundation.
What is a foundation, Carolyn?
Well, a foundation is an organization that helps to support a certain cause.
Maybe they raise money for a charity, or to improve something.
And I can think of one foundation in the U.S. called Make-A-Wish Foundation.
And they help to grant the wishes or the dreams of small children who are sick.
All right.
That's a great foundation, a great cause.
Of course another famous one is the American Red Cross, and uh, World Vision
International.
Those are different kinds of foundations.
So you don't have to have the word "foundation" in your title to be a non-profit
organization.
You could even call it a charitable foundation.
OK. This foundation aims to help large orphaned animals.
And uh, Carolyn, what is an orphaned animal?
Well, it's an animal that no longer has its parents to take care of it, so
similar to children who don't have parents being called orphans.
And it's the same for animals.
Animals can also be orphaned.
Exactly. OK.
So we begin here with the sentence - we want you to think about something, to
imagine a situation, OK? - Think about caring for a baby.
Mothers can tell you all about the considerable amount of time it takes to feed,
change, comfort and care for a helpless infant.
So now you're thinking about this in your mind, right?
That's right.
And there is so much to do when you are trying to care for a helpless infant.
And "infant" is a word from our Word Bank, so we'll look at that.
And infant is just a baby or a small child.
And they are a lot of work.
It's true.
A lot of times you might think of an infant as being between uh, being born and
12 months old, so a very small child.
And of course, "helpless" is a good way to describe infants.
They need help from the outside - their moms and dads, older brothers and
sisters - because they are helpless infants.
That's right.
So someone else does need to feed, change, comfort and care for them.
They can't do these things for themselves, so.
We are imagining this.
Imagine trying to care for this baby or this infant.
Now, what if that infant is an elephant calf?
And "calf" is the word used to describe a baby elephant.
It's true.
The word "calf" can actually be used to describe baby animals of other kinds as
well, certain other animals like... like cows, baby cows or even whales.
A baby whale is called a calf.
So instead of weighing 3 to 4 kilograms at birth like a human infant, he weighs
100, weighing 100 kilograms!
At birth! So this isn't after a while.
This is what the starting weight is of this little baby elephant calf.
Well, that would be a big challenge to take care of.
And he needs to be fed every two hours, 24 hours a day for four years.
That's right.
Whoa!
Yeah. Talk about a considerable amount of time, right?
That's a very significant amount of time, every two hours, 24 hours a day for
four years!
Would you want to take on that kind of responsibility?
That's our question here in the lesson: Would you like this kind of
responsibility?
Well, it is a very big responsibility because you know, you think of all the
time and energy it takes to take care of just a baby.
Now if you have to do that same amount of energy and same amount of time,
but actually it's even more because it's 24 hours a day every two hours.
That's... whoa! I don't know if I could do that.
Well, I don't know if I could, either, Carolyn.
Um, we have full-time jobs teaching English.
But you know, everyone's busy.
But somebody did take this responsibility.
Her name is Jenny Webb.
Jenny Webb did.
She took the responsibility.
She lives in the African country of Malawi.
All right.
So she's not an African herself, but she lives in this country of Malawi.
And the country of Malawi is southeast in Africa.
That's right.
And it sounds like they probably have a lot of elephants there.
Well, right now it is time for us to learn something with Michelle in the
Language Lab.
Hi, everyone. I'm Michelle.