Understanding Natural Disasters: Causes and Impacts

1. Unit 22 Environmental Protection Lesson 3 Natural Disasters

2. Objectives ■To practise reading strategies to complete texts with sentences gaps. ■To practise using the vocabulary of natural disasters. ■ To practise identifying nouns and verbs. ■To talk about disasters and aid.

3. Part I Pre-reading 1. What disasters have been threatening the lives on the earth? drought

4. In June, 2008, Australia’s Anna Creek station sold half of its 16,000 head of cattle for slaughter (屠宰) and was moving the rest to other grazing lands (牧场) in the face of the country’s worst drought in a century.

5. earthquake

6. May 12, 2008. About 70,000 people were killed and about 18,000 people were reported missing after a 8.0-magnitude earthquake struck Sichuan, China.

7. flood

8. In June, 1938, Nationalist Chinese soldiers blew up dikes (堤) around the Yellow River to stop Japanese troops from advancing. More than half a million people died in the resulting flood.

9. forest fire

10. The 1997 forest fires in Indonesia that lasted well into 1998 was probably among the two or three, if not the largest forest fire in the last two centuries of recorded history. The forest fires burning in Indonesia began to affect neighbouring countries, spreading thick clouds of smoke and haze (烟雾). By the time the 1997-98 forest fires were finally over, some 8 million hectares (公顷) of land had burned while countless millions of people suffered from air pollution.

11. hurricane

12. Oct. 26-Nov. 4, 1998. Hurricane Mitch was the deadliest hurricane to hit the Americas. It killed 11,000 in Honduras (洪都拉斯) and Nicaragua (尼加拉瓜) and left 2.5 million homeless.

13. landslide

14. On 6 December 2008, 4 people were killed, 15 people injured in a major landslide at Bukit Antarabangsa in Malaysia that buried numerous homes in the area.

15. tsunami

16. Dec. 28, 1908. Southern Italy was ravaged (毁坏，蹂躏) by a 7.2 magnitude quake that triggered ( 触发) a tsunami that hit the Messina-Reggio-Calabria area, killing 123,000.

17. typhoon

18. On August 8, 2009, Typhoon Morakot, the worst typhoon in 50 yearswhich hit Taiwan island, had claimed 461 lives and left 192 missing and 46 injured.

19. volcanic eruption

20. July 15, 1991. Mt. Pinatubo on Luzon Island in the Philippines erupted, blanketing 750 square kilometres with volcanic ash. More than 800 died.

21. 2. Which of the disasters in the Key Words do you think are: • caused by people? • made worse by people? • natural? droughts, earthquakes, floods, forest fires, hurricanes, landslides, tsunamis, typhoons, volcanic eruptions Key Words: Disasters

22. Disasters caused by people: • Disastersmade worse by people: • NaturalDisasters: forest fires hurricanes droughts, earthquakes, floods, landslides, tsunami, typhoons, volcanic eruptions, forest fires, hurricanes

23. Nature is turning on us

24. Part II Reading • Reading strategies: • Completing Texts with sentence gaps • Read the text to get the general idea. • Read a paragraph with a sentence gap and identify the topic, e.g. disasters. • Read the sentences before and after the gap and look for clues about the missing

25. sentence, e.g. is it an example of what is mentioned before? • Certain words may help you: time references (then). pronoun references (it, that), linking words (however). • Decide which sentence goes in the gap. check that it fits the sentences before and after it.

26. 1. Use the strategies to complete the gaps in the text (1-5) with these sentences (a-g). There are two extra sentences you do not need. • But evidence shows that 73.000 years ago there was a much greater eruption. • Even Europe has suffered and large areas have been under water. • That is probably not the most important factor either.

27. Third, the other bits of land you might have been able to farm are now useless. • On top of all that add global warming. • For example, the yellow river, once famous for flooding, failed to reach the sea at all for 226 days in 1997. • One answer is overpopulation. f g e a b Answers: 1. ___ 2. ___3. ___ 4. ___ 5.___

28. 2. Choose the best answer to each question according to the text. 1) The main reason why more natural disasters happen now is _______. A. that more and more people move to cities B. that volcanoes break out more frequently than before C. that earthquakes are even more dangerous than in the past D. overpopulation and mismanagement of the world’s resources Answer:D

29. 2) In the future, the biggest threat to human beings may be __________. A. volcanic eruption B. unnatural disasters C. floods and droughts D. typhoons and tsunamis Answer:A

30. 3) The threat to humans from volcanoes is even more serious because ______. A. more and more forests are destroyed by humans B. many people now live within the range of a volcanic eruption C. the population of the world is growing rapidly D. more carbon dioxide is produced by factories and vehicles Answer:B

31. 3. Read the text again and answer these questions. 1) What is the attitude of the journalist towards the future? 2) Who are most likely to be the victims of natural disasters? Pessimistic/Negative. Poor people.

32. 3) Why are there now more hurricanes, floods and droughts? 4) Why are volcanoes and earthquakes more dangerous now? Overpopulation and mismanagement of the world’s resources. Because around half the world’s population lives in cities, more than 500 million people now live within the range of volcanic eruption and an even greater number of people live at risk from earthquakes.

33. 5) What could be the biggest threat to the planet in the future? 6) What effects might this threat have? A volcanic eruption. It might send the planet into winter for years.

34. Part III Structure Analysis 1. This catastrophe is still very fresh in the minds of people worldwide who have not yet got over their separation from loved ones lost in the tsunami. 译文： 在世界各地许多人的心目中, 那场灾难仍然记忆尤新。他们还没有从海啸中丧失亲人的打击中恢复过来。

35. 结构分析： 在这个复合句中，who have not yet got over their separation from loved ones lost in the tsunami 为定语从句，修饰people 。在定语从句中，lost in the tsunami 为过去分词短语作定语，修饰ones。

36. 2. People in agriculture areas, without any means to earn their living, move to the cities, and then construct shabby homes from whatever materials they can find on poor clay soil. 译文： 农业地区的人口，因为没有办法谋生而流向城市。他们用在贫瘠的土地上用可以找到的任何材料搭建起破烂的房屋。

37. 结构分析： 在这个复合句中，without any means to earn their living 为复合结构，在句中作原因状语。whatever materials they can find 是宾语从句，在句中作介词from的宾语。

38. 3. An even greater number of people live at risk, to some degree, from earthquakes which have claimed more than 1.6 million lives in the last hundred years. 译文： 从某种程度上来说，有更多的人处在地震的危险中，在过去的几百年间地震已经夺去了160多万人的生命。

39. 结构分析： 这是一个主从复合句，an even greater number of people live at risk是主句。From earthquake是介词词组作定语修饰risk；which have claimed more than 1.6 million lives in the last hundred years是claimed的宾语从句；more than “超过”，修饰1.6 million； to some degree是插入语。

40. Part IV Summary Fill in the blanks with the information from the text. In the last decade, there are more and more disasters such as _________ , earthquakes, _________, volcanic _________ and _________ fires all over the world. Why are there so many disasters? One of the reasons is _____________. In addition, _________change and _____________ caused by the mismanagement of the floods typhoons eruptions forest over-population climate global warming

41. world’s resources can lead to the disasters or make them worse. At present, volcanoes and earthquakes are more _________. Now more than 500 million people live within the range of a volcanic eruption and it is difficult to warn people of natural disasters ____________. Earthquakes took the lives of 1.6 million people in the last hundred years. What is worse, many experts predict that the things will get _________. dangerous in advance worse

42. Part V Vocabulary Nouns or Verbs 1. Decide if the underlined words in the sentences below are nouns or verbs. Then write down their Chinese meanings. 1) a) She put her arms around me to comfort me. b) The soldiers were armed with guns. noun 手臂 verb 武装

43. 2) a) Heavy rains resulted in floods. • b) His results were not as good as he • had hoped. • a) He means well but just gets it • wrong sometimes. • b) The telephone is a means of communication. • 4. a) The children had fun sliding down the slide all afternoon. verb 导致 noun 成绩 verb 意思是; 怀(好) 意 noun 方式 noun 滑梯

44. b) Penguins slide downhill over ice on their bellies. 5) a) Be careful! Don’t slip on the wet floor. b) Write your number on this slip of paper. 6) a) What would you like on your bread roll for lunch. b) He rolled the ball across the floor to me. verb 滑行 verb 滑倒 noun 小纸条 noun 卷 verb 滚动

45. 2. Complete the sentences with the correct forms of the following words. arm, result, mean, slide, slip, roll armed 1) The ________ forces protected the city. 2) When will you get your exam __________? 3) Don broke his arm when he _______ and fell on the ice. results slipped

46. 4) I _________ what I said. 5) What would be the best ________ of advertising our products? 6) Would you like honey on your _________? 7) The house _________ down the mountain side in the flood last year. 8) The match _________ in a draw. They had 2 points each. mean means roll slid resulted

47. Part VI Speaking Work in pairs. Discuss these questions. 1) What natural disasters have happened in the last few months? 2) What do you think governments can do to help prevent natural disasters? 3) What organisations do you know that provide aid after disasters, or work for the environment? 4) What can we do to improve the environment and help victims of natural disasters?

48. Part VII Language Notes 1. A number of nations have already been in armed conflict over water... [用法点拨] arm vt.“装备；武装（= to equip; to provide）”，其过去分词armed相当于一形容词，意为“武装的”；armed conflict 意为“武装冲突”；常用的搭配有：(1) arm sb with sth 用……武装或装备某人；(非武器) 给……提供什么；

49. (2) be armed with 武装有……/备有……，如： The mob armed themselves with sticks and stones. 暴乱的群众用棍子和石块作武器。 You can arm them with basic ideas. 你可以给他们一些基本的概念。 The soldiers, armed with bows and arrows, were preparing for the next fight. 这些拿着弓箭的士兵在准备下一场战斗。

50. [拓展] 1) armed to the teeth 全副武装 2) arm复数形式arms表示“武器；兵器”。如： They took up arms and fought for the liberation of their motherland. 他们拿起武器，为解放祖国而斗争。