A Chinese podcast · Same story, 4 levels
没有一只帝王蝶能飞完整趟迁徙：这段路要四代接力才能走完
No Monarch Butterfly Ever Finishes Its Own Migration — the Trip Takes Four Generations
About this story
A monarch butterfly weighs about a gram, yet monarchs cross North America every year — and no single butterfly finishes the trip. Mothers lay eggs on poisonous milkweed and die; it takes three or four generations to fly nearly 5,000 km from Mexico to Canada. Then a special autumn generation that doesn't breed lives seven to nine months and flies 4,000 km back to a Mexico it has never seen, navigating by the sun. The milkweed's poison, stored in their bodies, is why birds learn to leave them alone. Chinese listening practice at four levels. HSK 1 Chinese listening practice.
This is an HSK 1 Chinese listening episode that runs about 3 minutes. The full Mandarin script is shown with tap-for-pinyin and a line-by-line English translation, so you can listen and read at once — comprehensible input in the sense of Stephen Krashen's i+1 theory. It teaches 12 key vocabulary words such as 妈妈、女儿、天气 and walks through 3 grammar patterns, each explained in English with examples. The same news story is retold at 4 difficulty levels — use the level selector above to find the version that is challenging but still understandable for you.
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原文Read the complete story in Chinese. Reveal pinyin and English only when you need them.
English transcript reference
Do you like butterflies?
Lots of people like butterflies.
Butterflies are small, and very pretty.
Today we're talking about some very, very small butterflies.
These butterflies are small, but they can fly a very, very long way.
How long?
Five thousand kilometers.
Can one little butterfly fly five thousand kilometers?
No.
Then who flies those five thousand kilometers?
The butterfly mother, the butterfly daughter, and the daughter's daughter.
This butterfly is called the monarch.
When the weather is cold, the monarchs are all in Mexico.
When the weather gets hot, the monarchs fly north.
The butterfly mother flies part of the way, and on a kind of plant she lays lots of tiny eggs.
Then the butterfly mother dies.
Little caterpillars come out of the tiny eggs.
The caterpillars eat lots of the plant and grow big.
After a month, the caterpillars are butterflies too.
These new butterflies also fly north.
These butterflies lay eggs too, and die too.
The mother flies, the daughter flies, and the daughter's daughter flies too.
After three or four generations, the monarchs finally reach Canada.
Then the weather turns cold.
The new butterflies born now are different from their mothers.
These butterflies don't lay eggs — they just fly.
Those butterfly mothers died after a month or two.
These monarchs live seven or eight months.
These monarchs fly four thousand kilometers, back to Mexico.
These butterflies have never been to Mexico, but they know how to get there.
In Mexico, lots and lots of monarchs live together.
When the weather gets hot, the monarchs fly north again.
One monarch can't fly five thousand kilometers.
But with mothers and daughters all flying, they can finish.
And the plant the caterpillars eat is poisonous.
When the caterpillars eat this plant, they become poisonous too.
There's a kind of bird that feels sick after eating a monarch.
After that, when this bird sees a monarch, it doesn't eat it.
You're a monarch.
You know you can't finish this whole journey.
Do you fly or not?
Listen again
Try it without the transcript and notice what sounds clearer.
What vocabulary does this episode teach?
词汇HSK 1. 蝴蝶妈妈 — each mother flies part of the way, then passes it on.
HSK 1. 蝴蝶女儿，还有女儿的女儿 — the relay in family words.
HSK 1. 天气热了，帝王蝶飞去北边.
HSK 1. 天气冷的时候，帝王蝶都在墨西哥.
HSK 1. 天气热了 — the signal to fly north.
HSK 1. 你喜欢蝴蝶吗？
一只蝴蝶 — measure word 只.
飞不完 = can't finish flying; 飞得完 = can.
五千公里 — the length of the northbound trip.
下了很多小小的蛋 — 下蛋 means to lay eggs.
小蛋里有了小虫 — the caterpillar stage.
那种草有毒 — and the caterpillars keep the poison.
* beyond level超纲词
What grammar patterns appear in this episode?
语法V不完 / V不了
Cannot finish / cannot manage — the heart of the story.
一只帝王蝶，飞不了五千公里。
你知道，你飞不完这些路。
……才……
Only then — stresses how long it takes.
飞了三四代，帝王蝶才到了加拿大。
和……不一样
Different from.
这个时候的新蝴蝶，和妈妈不一样。
Proper Nouns
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