title: 佳佳英语绘本第14期 · The Desert That Learned to Rain
📚 佳佳英语绘本第14期
蓝思值：490L | 适合中高阶英语学习者
Before You Read
Story Topic: A remote village in the Atacama Desert receives an unexpected visitor who teaches them about the water cycle. Focus Grammar: 一般过去时不规则动词 & 复合句
The Story: The Desert That Learned to Rain
For three hundred years, the Atacama Desert in Chile had seen almost no rain. Scientists called it the driest place on Earth.
But on a morning in late April, the clouds came.
Not dark storm clouds. White, soft, slow clouds — the kind that had not visited in living memory. Old Senora Vargas stepped out of her small stone house and looked up. She was ninety-three years old. Her grandmother had told her this day would come.
"How did you know?" her grandson Miguel asked.
"The land remembers," she said. "Even when we forget, the land remembers."
The rain came that afternoon. It was light, just a few drops, enough to make the dry soil smell like something alive. Children ran outside with their hands open. Miguel stood beside his grandmother and watched.
"The clouds didn't bring the rain from somewhere else," Miguel said. "They brought it from here — from the ocean, from the plants, from us. We breathed it out, the trees breathed it out, the sea breathed it out. Then it came back to us."
Senora Vargas smiled. "You learned that in school?"
"I learned it everywhere," he said. "The water cycle. It goes around and around. Nothing is lost."
That night, for the first time in thirty years, the Atacama had rain in its forecast.
Word Check · 词汇表
| Word | 自然拼读 | 音标 | 中文 | English Explanation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| desert | desert | /ˈdezət/ | 沙漠 | a very dry place with sand |
| Atacama | atacama | /əˈtækəmə/ | 阿塔卡马（沙漠） | a very dry desert in South America |
| dry | dry | /draɪ/ | 干燥的 | not wet |
| cloud | cloud | /klaʊd/ | 云 | water in the sky |
| soil | soil | /sɔɪl/ | 土壤 | the top layer of earth where plants grow |
| alive | alive | /əˈlaɪv/ | 活着的 | not dead |
| ocean | ocean | /ˈəʊʃən/ | 海洋 | a very large body of salt water |
| breath | breath | /breθ/ | 呼吸 | air going in and out of your body |
| cycle | cycle | /ˈsaɪkəl/ | 循环 | something that goes around and around |
| forecast | forecast | /ˈfɔːkɑːst/ | 天气预报 | what the weather will be like |
| driest | driest | /ˈdraɪəst/ | 最干燥的 | most dry (superlative of dry) |
| visitor | visitor | /ˈvɪzɪtə/ | 访客 | a person who comes to visit |
Grammar Focus: 不规则动词过去时 & 复合句
不规则动词过去式对照表：
| 现在时 | 过去时 | 含义 | |--------|--------|------| | come | came | 来 | | see | saw | 看见 | | go | went | 去 | | learn | learned | 学习 | | stand | stood | 站立 | | say | said | 说 | | tell | told | 告诉 | | make | made | 做 | | breathe | breathed | 呼吸 | | sleep | slept | 睡觉 |
复合句练习（because / although / when）： 把两个简单句合并为一个复合句：
1. The clouds came. The ocean was warm. → The clouds came because the ocean was warm.
2. It was dry. The land was beautiful. → Although it was dry, the land was beautiful.
3. Miguel looked at the sky. He finished his homework. → Miguel looked at the sky when he finished his homework.
Critical Thinking
1. Why does Senora Vargas say "the land remembers"? 2. What do you think Miguel means when he says "nothing is lost"? 3. What is the "water cycle" in your own words?
佳佳英语绘本 · 第14期 · 蓝思值490L · 2026年5月20日发布