美国国家公共电台 NPR A New Kind Of March Madness Hits Schools

 

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

The NCAA March Madness tournament features some tough matchups - badgers¹ versus² gators, rams³ versus bulldogs, wolverines against cardinals⁴. But what if those animals actually did face off, like in nature? Who would win? Kat Lonsdorf on the NPR Ed Team found a bracket that takes that question seriously and makes it educational.

MICHELLE HARRIS: All right, you guys got your brackets out?

KAT LONSDORF, BYLINE⁵: It's first period at Wakefield High in Arlington, Va. And Miss Harris' AP environmental science class is getting right to it.

HARRIS: So we're going to jump down to the fourth seed, spidermonkey against the 12th-seeded antelope⁶ squirrel.

LONSDORF: This is March Mammal Madness round two.

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Spidermonkey better win.

LONSDORF: It's a competition playing out in hundreds of classrooms around the country and on the Internet. It puts real animals in fictional⁷ battles and uses science - a lot of it - to figure out who'd win. March Mammal Madness was created five years ago by Katie Hinde, an evolutionary⁸ biologist at Arizona State University. And now, Hinde says, there's a whole team of volunteers behind it.

KATIE HINDE: Biologists, animal behaviorists, paleoanthropologists, marine⁹ biologists.

LONSDORF: That team meets virtually every year to have a Selection Sunday of their own. They pick the animals, and they decide who's going to win, but keep the outcomes a secret. That's because a whole lot of research has to be done. Each battle is assigned to a specific scientist, who studies up and then writes a battle story based on facts. The battles are tweeted throughout the month...

HINDE: As an active play-by-play dynamic story, much like somebody watching a basketball game unfold.

LONSDORF: And the tweets link to scientific articles, videos, photos, fossil records, whatever the team can use to drop knowledge into a story. Which is why teachers, like Michelle Harris here in Virginia, have started using the brackets in class. There are heartbreaks and upsets too, like the time a snow leopard¹⁰ and a flying squirrel faced off in the rain forest. The snow leopard overheated and lost. Or the time a quokka, this cute fuzzy animal from Australia, was lured¹¹ off the playing field by a group of tourists feeding it human junk food. Sure, it's a little ridiculous. But Hinde says the point is to have fun while creating a learning opportunity.

HINDE: We really try and showcase animals that a lot of people might not have ever heard of.

LONSDORF: Animals like...

HINDE: Dhole and bandicoot and binturong and babirusa.

HARRIS: The number six seed tiger versus the number three seed, the leopard seal.

LONSDORF: At Wakefield High, senior Jordan Simpson is giggling¹² with Tiara Jones looking up the bilby, a tiny Australian marsupial¹³.

TIARA: I thought it was cute, so I picked it (laughter).

LONSDORF: You picked it going all the way?

TIARA: Yeah. I knew I had no chance. But I thought I'd give it a shot.

LONSDORF: Did it get knocked out already?

TIARA: Oh, yeah. It's gone (laughter) the first round.

LONSDORF: So your bracket was busted¹⁴ day one.

TIARA: Oh, yeah. It's done (laughter).

LONSDORF: I get it. My alma mater, the wildcats, they lost to the bulldogs. But at least they made it to round two. Kat Lonsdorf, NPR News, Washington.

(SOUNDBITE OF PORTICO QUARTET'S "RUINS")

1 badgers   

n.獾( badger的名词复数 )；獾皮；（大写）獾州人（美国威斯康星州人的别称）；毛鼻袋熊

参考例句：

• Badgers had undermined the foundations of the church. 獾在这座教堂的地基处打了洞。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• And rams ' skins dyed red, and badgers' skins, and shittim wood. 5染红的公羊皮，海狗皮，皂荚木。 来自互联网

2 versus   

prep.以…为对手，对；与…相比之下

参考例句：

• The big match tonight is England versus Spain.今晚的大赛是英格兰对西班牙。
• The most exciting game was Harvard versus Yale.最富紧张刺激的球赛是哈佛队对耶鲁队。

3 rams   

n.公羊( ram的名词复数 )；(R-)白羊（星）座；夯；攻城槌v.夯实（土等）( ram的第三人称单数 )；猛撞；猛压；反复灌输

参考例句：

• A couple of rams are butting at each other. 两只羊正在用角互相抵触。 来自辞典例句
• More than anything the rams helped to break what should have been on interminable marriage. 那些牡羊比任何东西都更严重地加速了他们那本该天长地久的婚姻的破裂。 来自辞典例句

4 cardinals   

红衣主教( cardinal的名词复数 )； 红衣凤头鸟（见于北美，雄鸟为鲜红色）； 基数

参考例句：

• cardinals in scarlet robes 身披红袍的枢机主教
• A conclave of cardinals was held to elect the new Pope. 红衣主教团举行了秘密会议来选举新教皇。

5 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

6 antelope   

n.羚羊；羚羊皮

参考例句：

• Choosing the antelope shows that China wants a Green Olympics.选择藏羚羊表示中国需要绿色奥运。
• The tiger was dragging the antelope across the field.老虎拖着羚羊穿过原野。

7 fictional   

adj.小说的，虚构的

参考例句：

• The names of the shops are entirely fictional.那些商店的名字完全是虚构的。
• The two authors represent the opposite poles of fictional genius.这两位作者代表了天才小说家两个极端。

8 evolutionary   

adj.进化的；演化的，演变的；[生]进化论的

参考例句：

• Life has its own evolutionary process.生命有其自身的进化过程。
• These are fascinating questions to be resolved by the evolutionary studies of plants.这些十分吸引人的问题将在研究植物进化过程中得以解决。

9 marine   

adj.海的；海生的；航海的；海事的；n.水兵

参考例句：

• Marine creatures are those which live in the sea. 海洋生物是生存在海里的生物。
• When the war broke out,he volunteered for the Marine Corps.战争爆发时，他自愿参加了海军陆战队。

10 leopard   

n.豹

参考例句：

• I saw a man in a leopard skin yesterday.我昨天看见一个穿着豹皮的男人。
• The leopard's skin is marked with black spots.豹皮上有黑色斑点。

11 lured   

吸引，引诱（lure的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• The child was lured into a car but managed to escape. 那小孩被诱骗上了车，但又设法逃掉了。
• Lured by the lust of gold,the pioneers pushed onward. 开拓者在黄金的诱惑下，继续奋力向前。

12 giggling   

v.咯咯地笑( giggle的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• We just sat there giggling like naughty schoolchildren. 我们只是坐在那儿像调皮的小学生一样的咯咯地傻笑。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• I can't stand her giggling, she's so silly. 她吃吃地笑，叫我真受不了，那样子傻透了。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

13 marsupial   

adj.有袋的，袋状的

参考例句：

• Koala is an arboreal Australian marsupial.考拉是一种澳大利亚树栖有袋动物。
• The marsupial has been in decline for decades due to urban sprawl from car accidentsdog attacks.这种有袋动物其数量在过去几十年间逐渐减少,主要原因是城市的扩张、车祸和狗的袭击。

14 busted   

adj. 破产了的，失败了的，被降级的，被逮捕的，被抓到的 动词bust的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• You are so busted! 你被当场逮住了！
• It was money troubles that busted up their marriage. 是金钱纠纷使他们的婚姻破裂了。