Listen to part of a lecture in a biology class.
(female) We all know that insects like to eat plants. But some plants are able to develop ways to protect themselves from insects. Today I’m gonna talk about some ways plants defend themselves.
Now, some plants have physical features that prevent insects from landing on them. Like the passion plant, for ex ample, its leaves hav e little spiky hairs all over them. They’re like spikes, sticking out of the plant that are so numerous and dense that they prevent insects from landing on the leaves. Basically there’re just no room for the insects to land. And since insects can’t land on the leaves they can’t eat them. So the little hairs serve as a physical feature that help protect passion plant from insects.
All right! But other plants protect themselves using chemical defenses, like the potato plant. The potato plant is able to release a chemical throughout its leaf system whenever an insect attacks it, starts eating the leaf. So, say an insect starts eating a potato plant’s leaf, that will cause the plant to react by releasing a chemical throughout its leaf system. The insect swallows this chemical as it eats. And this chemical discourages the insect from wanting to eat more of the plant. How? Well, the substance makes the insect feel full, like it’s already had enough to eat. The insect no longer feels hungry so it stops eating the plant. So, b y emitting this chemical, the potato plant protects itself from insects.
托福TPO9口语task6题目Question:
Using points from the lecture, explain how the passion plant and the potato plant defend themselves from insects.
托福TPO9口语task6答案解析：
1. Reading key
(1.1) Main idea: two defensive strategies used by plants agains hungry insects
(1.2) Strategy 1: physical defense
(1.2.1) Example: passion fruit.
(1.2.2) Dense spiky little hair all over; that make it very difficult for the insects to land on them; no landing spots= no way to eat it
(1.3) Strategy 2: chemical defense
(1.3.1) Example: potato plant
(1.3.2) When being eaten by insects, it will emit a chemical that makes the insect feel full; the insect will stop eating it because it doesn’t feel hungry anymore
托福TPO9口语task6范文：
In the lecture, the professor talks about the two ways plants protect them from being eaten by insects. The first is that they use physical features that make it hard for insects to land on them. Passion plants have spiky hairs all over them, no room is left for insects to land on the leaves in order eat them. The second kind of defense is chemical. Take the potato plant for example, it can release a chemical from its leaf system when being eaten by insects. The insect swallows this chemical which makes it feel full, like it’s already had enough to eat. Because the insect doesn’t feel hungry any longer, it stops eating the plant.