Springtails

These tiny animals are one of nature’s greatest success stories!

Springtails get their name from their ability to, well, spring. When they are disturbed, their tails pop out very quickly. This action sends them springing as high as 100 millimeters into the air. That’s amazing since most are only a few millimeters long!

Besides jumping, springtails have another special ability. They make the soil cleaner because they eat fungus and dead plant material. Their eating habits help reduce the levels of bad chemicals in the soil.

With more than 6,000 different species, springtails come in many shapes, sizes and colors.

These tiny insect-like creatures live in wet soil in large groups. Some areas have as many as a million springtails per acre of soil! That’s why some scientists say springtails are among the most successful animals on Earth.

In 1996 in Austria, firemen were called about a chemical spill. They arrived to find that the area on the road wasn’t chemicals, but several million springtails. Springtails often gather together on roads, snow and puddles.

They jump together in the same direction. People watching might think a giant puddle is moving!

Info Cloud
Hi, friends. Let’s pause and ponder “nature” for a minute.

What is nature exactly?

Well, nature has several definitions. It can refer to the natural physical world, or less-than-perfect human behavior. But in addition to asking what is nature, we might also want to ask who is nature.

Ah, you must be referring to Mother Nature.

We often hear about her on TV when weather men talk about the weather. Mother Nature unleashed her wrath today when tornadoes tore their way across the county.

Hmm. Or Mother Nature smiled on us today with this warm weather. This is an example of  personification, which is giving human traits to non-living things. Nature is non-living. But calling it Mother Nature is giving it a human quality.

Now there is another word that sounds a lot like nature – the word nurture.

And there’s the age old debate about nature versus nurture. Child psychologists like to debate whether nature or nurture plays a bigger role in a child’s development.

I remember studying that in college. People who subscribe to the nature theory believe that children are born to behave a certain way. How they behave is inside them already.

That’s right, Ken.

But the nurture theory maintains that children think and behave only according to how they are raised and taught.

到底什麼是 nature? 今天課文附標題講到:
These tiny animals are one of nature's greatest success stories.
這些小小生物是大自然最優秀的物種之一
所以 nature 就是大自然, 大自然也常常會用 Mother Nature 來表示,
這是 personification 的運用, 也就是以人的特質來形容非人類的經驗或概念,
英文的氣象報告就常常會提到 mother nature,
比如說: Mother Nature smiled on us with this warm weather.
自然之母今天對我們微笑, 意思就是今天出太陽了
nature 也有另一個定義, 表示先天的
兒童心裡學有一個很大的議題 nature v. nurture
nature 大自然 表示先天
nurture 養育 表示後天
也就是遺傳跟環境對兒童的影響
要注意 nature / nurture 有押韻, 這二個字在這裡都是名詞

nurture n.
/ˈnɚtʃɚ/
the education and care that you are given as a child, and the way it affects your later development and attitudes

ponder v. [= consider]
to spend time thinking carefully and seriously about a problem, a difficult question, or something that has happened
- He continued to ponder the problem as he walked home.

Grammar Gym
well 
- how something is done
- filler:
/ˈfɪlɚ/
a sound, word, or phrase (such as “um” or “you know?”) that people say during a pause when they are speaking

Hi, friends. I hope you’re all doing well today. My name is Liz. And thanks for joining me here at the Grammar Gym.

And here’s our Grammar Tip sentence for today. Springtails get their name from their ability to, well, spring. Our focus today is on the word “well.”

We normally use it to talk about how something is done, like: That was a job well done!

But in today’s sentence, “well” is a filler. Fillers are used to give the speaker time to think about an explanation. When you hear a speech, you might hear “well” used several times. So why do we see the word “well” in today’s article?

The writer starts out by trying to explain how springtails get their name, and he wants to give readers the feeling that he is talking to them. So he just writes out the word “well” into the sentence. This is a good example of creative writing.

Here are more sentences:
A: Why did you do that?
B: Well, I wasn’t paying attention.
Or,
A: Do we all have to clean the kitchen?
B: Well, you could take the trash out.

So next time when you need to pause and think of something to say, try using “well” instead. And that’s it for today. This is Liz from the Grammar Gym. See you next time.

Language Lab
pop out v.彈出, 跳出
if words pop out, you suddenly say them without thinking first
pops; popped; pop·ping
- My eyes almost popped out of my head when I heard the news.
pop out 出去
- Sam popped out to get some pizza and drinks and will be right back.

reduce v. 減少, 降低 [re字首-回來]
to make something smaller or less in size, amount, or price
- The doctor suggested Rita reduce her calorie intake to control her weight.
- The company will reduce their workforce by 20%.
公司會減少百分之二十的人力

species n. 生物的物種 [單複數拼法一樣, 字尾都有s]
a group of animals or plants whose members are similar and can breed together to produce young animals or plants
- There's hundreds of species of butterflies in Taiwan.
- This flower species is rare and can only be found in this area.

creature n. 創造物, 生物, 人 [create v.創造]
anything that is living, such as an animal, fish, or insect, but not a plant
- This creature can survive in extreme weather conditions.
- I have to keep the secret and cannot tell a single creature.


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