Woman: Hello. I’m Mrs. Phillips, the head librarian. You’re the new library assistant, aren’t you?
Man: Yes, I’m Robert Haskell, but please call me Bob.
Woman: All right, Bob. Let me take a few minutes to explain how the library works and what your duties will be. First, the library opens at 8:30 in the morning, so, naturally, we expect you to be here and ready to work by then.
Man: Of course.
Woman: And you can go home at 4:30 when the library closes. Now, let me explain where everything’s kept.
Man: It looks like here on the ground floor is where the reference books are.
Woman: Yes, that’s right. Up on the second floor is where the Adult Collection is, both fiction and nonfiction.
Man: And the children’s books are there, too, aren’t they? I thought I saw them in the room by the stairway.
Woman: No, those are magazines and newspapers for adults. Children’s books are up one more flight on the third floor. We’ll take a look at them later. Let me show you how we organize our work. Do you see that brown book cart over there?
Man: The one by the door?
Woman: Yes, that one. Those books have been checked in and need to go back on the shelves.
Man: OK, so the brown book cart has books to re-shelve. What about this black cart by the desk?
Woman: Those books have torn pages or damaged covers. They’re all books that need to be repaired.
Man: OK, I know how to do a lot of that. I’m pretty good at mending torn pages and covers.
Woman: That’s great because we really need help with that.
Man: And that white cart in the corner? What are those books for?
Woman: Those are old books that we’ve taken off the shelves to make room for new ones. We sell them as used books to raise money for the library.
Man: So they’re all ready to sell?
Woman: Yes, that’s right. So, now you know what to do with the books in the carts. Lets talk about our activities schedule.
Man: I understand this library has a number of interesting activities every week.
Woman: Yes, our activities are quite popular. The most popular one is Story Time for the children.
Man: Do a lot of children show up for that?
Woman: Yes, a good many. It takes place in the Children’s Room on Thursday mornings at eleven.
Man: Isn’t there a family movie night, too?
Woman: Yes, but it’s not at night anymore. We used to have Family Movies on Fridays when the library is open until nine, but now we have a different activity at that time, so we had to switch Family Movies to the weekend—Saturday afternoon.
Man: How much do you charge for the movies?
Woman: They’re all free. The movie always starts at 2:30 in the Reference Room. But you don’t have to worry about that since you don’t work on weekends.
Man: And what takes place on Friday evenings?
Woman: We’ve just started a weekly Lecture Series. We have a different speaker every week, and the lectures cover all different kinds of topics.
Man: That sounds like something I’d be interested in attending.
Woman: Good, because we’ll need your help with that. You’ll be working Friday evenings, and one of your duties will be to set up the Meeting Room on the first floor for the lecture.
Man: What time will you need that done?
Woman: Let’s say by 6:15. The lecture starts at 6:30, and the room needs to be ready well ahead of time. A lot of people arrive early.
Man: Maybe I should have the room ready by six?
Woman: That wouldn’t be a bad idea. OK, why don’t I take you upstairs and show you the rest of the collection........... (voice fades out.)
Woman: Good afternoon, and welcome to today’s show. The warm months are with us, and many of you are getting ready to plan vacation trips. To help you with that, we have a special guest today, Robert Sampson, director of the Golden Lake Resort. Robert, I understand Golden Lake is a popular place for families to spend their vacations.
Man: Yes, families enjoy spending time at Golden Lake. Many come back year after year. We have a spectacular location and fun activities for both children and adults.
Woman: Could you describe for us some of the activities available at Golden Lake?
Man: We have a lot of water activities, of course, since we’re right on the lake. We have a pleasant sandy beach for swimming. We also have canoes and sailboats available, and many of our guests enjoy boating on the lake.
Woman: I imagine water skiing would be popular among your guests.
Man: Actually, we don’t permit waterskiing in the resort area. It can be dangerous for swimmers and for the canoeists, too. We do have a great location for fishing, though, and you’ll often see guests fishing from our dock or from the canoes.
Woman: That sounds very relaxing. What about activities on land? Do you have facilities for tennis?
Man: We had tennis in the past, but the courts fell out of repair and since we found that most of our guests weren’t interested in the game, we closed the courts down. So that’s no longer an option. And, naturally, because of our location in the woods, we don’t have an adequate area for a golf course. But I’d like to let your listeners know that we’ll be adding a new activity this year. We’ve made an arrangement with a local stable, so now we’re going to have horseback riding available for our guests. We’ve created several riding trails around the lake.
Woman: That sounds lovely. Now, what about rainy days? What can your guests do when the weather’s bad?
Man: We have a games room and a crafts room. When the weather’s rainy, some of our very talented staff members offer arts and crafts classes, for all ages.
Woman: What fun. Do you offer any other classes or activities?
Man: We have a weekly schedule of evening activities, which anyone can attend if they choose. Every Sunday we show a film, always something that’s suitable for the whole family. Monday’s my favorite night because that’s dessert night. Our cook prepares a variety of desserts, and we get to taste them all.
Woman: Mmmmm. I’d like to be there for that.
Man: Yes, it’s great. We get more serious toward the middle of the week. Our discussion night is on Tuesday.
Woman: Discussion night?
Man: Yes, we discuss different current events, depending on what’s happening that week in the news. Then on Wednesdays we have lectures. We invite different experts to talk about local history or nature topics. This is actually one of our most popular evening activities. We’ve found that our guests are really interested in learning about the local area.
Woman: It sounds quite interesting.
Man: Yes, we’ve had some excellent speakers. Thursday nights are totally different because that’s when we play games. That’s especially fun for the children. The children love Fridays, too, because that’s talent show night. Everyone gets in on that, staff, guests, everyone.
Woman: It looks like you have a lot of fun at Golden Lake Resort.
Man: We do. And we end every week with big fun, with a dance on Saturday night.
Woman: Now I understand a little more why Golden Lake is such a popular place for family vacations. With such a variety of activities, there’s something for every member of the family there.
Man: There is, and I hope your listeners will consider spending their next vacation with us.
Student 1: OK, let’s go over the requirements and see what we have left to do.
Student 2: Let’s see...We have to give the professor a written summary of the information we’ve gathered on our topic: wild bird rescue and rehabilitation.
Student 1: The other written thing we have to turn in is a case study of the rehabilitation of one bird. We’ve have the information on that already.
Student 2: Right. All we have to do is write it up. What about charts and graphs? Do we need to include something like that?
Student 1: I don’t think so. They aren’t really relevant. But we do have to turn in a list of the resources we used.
Student 2: Naturally. What about videos? I heard some of the other students were doing that.
Student 1: Well, I guess that must be optional, because I don’t see it on the requirements list. OK. We should start planning our class presentation since that counts for half the grade.
Student 2: We’ve looked at lots of sources of information, but I think our best source was the interviews we did with the wildlife rehabilitators.
Student 1: Agreed. That and the journal articles. I think we have enough information from those two sources, for the presentation anyhow. The books we looked at weren’t all that helpful.
Student 2: I wonder if we should try to bring in some live birds for the presentation?
Student 1: That would be too difficult, don’t you think? But we have lots of photos of rehabilitated birds. We can show those.
Student 2: Right. OK, I think we should start by talking about how to rescue a bird. Probably first we should help people understand which birds need rescuing.
Student 1: Yeah, that’s really important because a lot of times people see a baby bird that’s all alone, or they find a bird sitting on the ground, and they think it needs to be rescued.
Student 2: And usually those are just baby birds learning to fly, so we should emphasize that people should only attempt to rescue a bird that’s clearly injured.
Student 1: For certain kinds of birds, the rescuer needs to wear protective gloves, because some of those birds have sharp claws and can tear your shirt or, worse, injure your face or some other part of your body.
Student 2: Yes. that’s an important point. OK, next, let’s tell people to put the injured bird in a box, a box with good air circulation. We should let them know that a cage isn’t necessary and a bag, especially a plastic one, could hurt the bird more.
Student 1: Another thing we need to say is that the best way to help the bird stay calm is not by petting it or talking to it, but by leaving it completely alone. Then people should take the bird to the bird rescue center as soon as possible.
Student 2: Right, and we should also point out that when they’re driving the bird to the rescue center, it’s better not to play music on the radio or talk loudly because those things just stress the bird.
Student 1: Yes, it’s better just to speak quietly while you have the bird in the car. OK, we’ve got that part covered. Next, we should talk about what happens at the rescue center.....
Lecturer: Despite its name, the Great Barrier Reef isn’t just one large coral reef. Rather, it’s a system of coral reefs that stretches along the east coast of Australia, covering an area of around three hundred thousand square kilometers. The Great Barrier Reef is composed of approximately three thousand individual reefs, which range in size from one hectare to more than ten thousand hectares each. In addition, around 600 islands are scattered throughout the area, particularly at the northern and southern ends. The reefs themselves are composed of over 400 different kinds of coral, the largest variety of corals found anywhere in the world.
Thousands of species of sea animals live in and around the reefs. All together, approximately fifteen hundred species of fish inhabit the reef area, including a number of different kinds of sharks. One of the more interesting mollusks to be found in the reefs is the giant clam. This huge shellfish can live for more than 100 years and can weigh as much as two hundred kilos. Sea mammals abound in the area, which serves as the breeding ground for certain types of whales, many of which are endangered. Over 200 species of sea and shore birds feed, roost, or nest among the reefs and islands. Many types of reptiles can also be found living among and near the reefs. Saltwater crocodiles, for example, inhabit the marshes along coastal areas. Amphibians include at least seven species of frogs inhabiting the islands of the reef.
Unfortunately, this wondrous area of the world is threatened by climate change. Rising sea temperatures have led to an effect called coral bleaching, that is, large numbers of corals dying off, especially in the shallower areas of the reef. The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority is attempting to find effective ways to deal with this issue that threatens the reef. One proposed solution involves shading the reef in certain areas to help keep the surrounding water temperatures down.