2020 年公共英语四级考试阅读模拟试题 5
When one looks back upon the fifteen hundred years that
are the life span of the English language, he should be able
to notice a number of significant truths. The history of our
language has always been a history of constant change—at times a slow, almost imperceptible change, at other times a
violent collision between two languages. Our language has
always been a living growing organism, it has never been
static. Another significant truth that emerges from such a
study is that language at all times has been the possession
not of one class or group but of many.『At one extreme it
has been the property of the common, ignorant folk, who have
used it in the daily business of their living, much as they
have used their animals or the kitchen pots and pans.』①
At the other extreme it has been the treasure of those who have respected it as an instrument and a sign of civilization, and
who have struggled by writing it down to give it some
permanence, order, dignity, and if possible, a little beauty.
As we consider our changing language, we should note here
two developments that are of special and immediate importance
to us. One is that since the time of the Anglo-Saxons there
has been an almost complete reversal of the different devices
for showing the relationship of words in a sentence. Anglo-
Saxon (old English) was a language of many inflections.
Modern English has few inflections. We must now depend
largely on word order and function words to convey the
meanings that the older language did by means of changes in
the forms of words. Function words, you should understand,
are words such as prepositions, conjunctions, and a few
others that are used primarily to show relationships among other words. A few inflections, however, have survived. And when some word inflections come into conflict with word order, there may be trouble for the users of the language, as we shall see later when we turn our attention to such maters as WHO or WHOM and ME or I. The second fact we must consider is that as language itself changes, our attitudes toward
language forms change also. 『The eighteenth century, for example, produced from various sources a tendency to fix the language into patterns not always set in and grew, until at
the present time there is a strong tendency to restudy and
re-evaluate language practices in terms of the ways in
which people speak and write. 』②
1.In contrast to the earlier linguists, modern
linguists tend to .
A. attempt to continue the standardization of the
language
B. evaluate language practices in terms of current speech rather than standards or proper patterns
C. be more concerned about the improvement of the language than its analysis or history
D. be more aware of the rules of the language usage
2.Choose the appropriate meaning for the word
“inflection ” used in line 4 of paragraph 2.
A.Changes in the forms of words.
B.Changes in sentence structures.
C. Changes in spelling rules.
D. Words that have similar meanings.
3.Which of the following statements is not mentioned
in the passage?
A. It is generally believed that the year 1500 can be
set as the beginning of the modern English language.
B. Some other languages had great influence on the English language at some stages of its development.
C. The English language has been and still in a state of relatively constant change.
D. Many classes or groups have contributed to
the development of the English language.
4.The author of these paragraphs is probably a(an) .
A. historian
B. philosopher
C.
anthropologist D.
linguist
5.Which of the following can be best used as the title
of the passage?
A. The history of the English language.
B. Our changing attitude towards the English language.
C. Our changing language.
D. Some characteristics of modern English.
-
Vocabulary
1.span n.跨度，范，一段，期
2.imperceptible adj.感不到的，察不到的，极微的
https://www.doczj.com/doc/592663817.html,anism n.生物体，有机体
4.possession n.有，占有，土，地
5.ignorant adj.无知的
6.folk n.人，民族
7.permanence n.永久，持久
8.Anglo-Saxons n. 盎格—撒克，盎格—撒克人，地道的英国人
9.reversal n.倒，反向，逆
10.inflection n.尾化
11.preposition n.前置，介
12.conjunction n.合，关，接
13.in terms of根据，按照，用??的，在??方面
句解析
①
【解析】“ who”引非限制性定从句，修“ the common, ignorant folk ”。“ much as”引状从句。“ kitchen pots and
pans”意“ 碗瓢盆”。
【译文】一方面它是那些普通人甚至无知民众的财产，他们每天
都像使唤他们的牲畜和锅碗瓢盆一样用着语言。
②
【解析】此句为一个复合倒装句。“ until ”引导一个并列句，前一句的主语是“ a tendency ”，“ to fix the language into
patterns not always set in and grew”作“ tendency”的定语，第二句的主语也是“ a tendency ”，“ to ”后面的句子作“ tendency ”的定语，“ in which ”引导的定语从句修饰“ ways”。
【译文】例如在 18 世纪一种产生于各种来源的趋势把语言固定在
一个不常使用和不利于语言发展的模式中，而到了当今，主流是要反复研究、评价人们说话、写作中的语言实践。
答案与详解
【短文大意】本文主要讲述英语演变过程的一些特点，指出了古
英语与现代英语的不同，以及语言学家对待语言形式的态度的变化。
1.B
细节题。根据题干回原文中定位，阅读文章时注意首末段及各段
开头的句子，这往往都是考点所在。这篇文章讲的主要是英语语言演
变的一些特点，指出了古英语与现代英语的不同，以及语言学家态度
的转变。本题问的正是现代语言学家与早期语言学家不同的倾向。根
据文章末尾 The eighteenth century, for example, produced from various sources a tendency to fix the language into patterns
not always set in and grew, until at the present time there
is a strong tendency to restudy and re-evaluate language
practices in terms of the ways in which people speak and
write.现代语言学家倾向于根据人们说和写的方式评价语言实践，而
不是像早期的语言学家根据一定的模式评价语言。选项 B 符合文章的意思。
2.A
词汇题。要根据上下文的信息判断单词的意思。文章在第二段中
间再次提到 inflection 时说， A few inflections, however, have survived. 后面文章又举了 WHO/WHOM和ME/I 为例说明 inflection ，这是一篇关于语言学的文章，从例子能够看出inflection 的意思应该是“单词的变形”，选项 A 准确。
3.A
细节题。根据文章的内容，选项A“普遍认为 1500 年是现代英语的起点”在文章中没有提及，故为准确答案。文章第二句说The history of our language has always been a history of constant
change - at times a slow, almost imperceptible change, at
other times a violent collision between two languages. 我们语言的历史是一个持续变化的历史——在一些时间里缓慢得几乎难以察
觉，在另一些时间里则是两种语言的激烈碰撞。由此能够推断一些其
他的语言对英语的发展有重大影响，选项 B 符合文章的意思。
4.D
词汇题。此题考查考生的推测水平和词汇量，文章讲述的是英国
语言演进的具体细节，最适当的答案应该是D。作者很可能是一位语言学家。 A答案 ( 历史学家 ) 和 C答案 ( 人类学家 ) 也能够有点迷惑性。 B答案( 哲学家 ) 是最不符合的。
5.C
主旨题。本文从各个方面谈及英语作为一种语言的发展变化，但并
不是讲述英语的历史。所以选项 A不对，选项 C作为文章的题目最为贴切。选项 B 仅仅文章阐述的一个方面，不够全面。文章是在谈到
英语的持续变化的时候谈到了现代英语的一些特点，所以选项 D也失之
于片面。
2洛基英语，中国在线英语教育领导品牌 2007.12阅读第一篇 Passage One Questions 57 to 61 are based on the following passage. In this age of Internet chat, videogames and reality television, there is no shortage of mindless activities to keep a child occupied. Yet, despite the competition, my 8-year-old daughter Rebecca wants to spend her leisure time writing short stories. She wants to enter one of her stories into a writing contest, a competition she won last year. As a writer I know about winning contests, and about losing them. I know what it is like to work hard on a story only to receive a rejection slip from the publisher. I also know the pressure of trying to live up to a reputation created by previous victories. What if she doesn’t win the contest again? That’s the strange thing about being a parent. So many of our own past scars and dashed hopes can surface. A revelation (启示) came last week when I asked her, “Don’t you want to win again?”“No,”she replied, “I just want to tell the story of an angel going to first grade.” I had just spent weeks correcting her stories as she spontaneously (自发地) told them. Telling myself that I was merely an experienced writer guiding the young writer across the hall, I offered suggestions for characters, conflicts and endings for her tales. The story about a fearful angel starting first grade was quickly “guided”by me into the tale of a little girl with a wild imagination taking her first music lesson. I had turned her contest into my contest without even realizing it. Staying back and giving kids space to grow is not as easy as it looks. Because I know very little about farm animals who use tools or angels who go to first grade, I had to accept the fact that I was co-opting (借用) my daughter’s experience. While stepping back was difficult for me, it was certainly a good first step that I will quickly follow with more steps, putting myself far enough a way to give her room but close enough to help if asked. All the while I will be reminding myself that children need room to experiment, grow and find their own voices. 注意：此部分试题请*考试&大在答题卡2上作答。 57. What do we learn from the first paragraph? A) A lot of distractions compete for children’s time nowadays. B) Children do find lots of fun in many mindless activities. C) Rebecca is much too occupied to enjoy her leisure time. D) Rebecca draws on a lot of online materials for her writing. 58. What did the author say about her own writing experience? A) She was constantly under pressure of writing more. B) Most of her stories had been rejected by publishers. C) She did not quite live up to her reputation as a writer. D) Her way to success was full of pains and frustrations.
大学英语四级模拟题四 Part One Reading Comprehension (2’×10 = 20’) Directions: There are 2 passages in this section. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A), B), C) and D). You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the centre. Passage One Air pollution can spread from city to city. It even spreads from one country to another. Some northern European countries have had “black snow”from pollutants that have traveled through the air from other countries and have fallen with the snow. So air pollution is really a global problem. Air pollution can kill babies, older people, and those who have respiratory（呼吸的）diseases. As found in cities, air pollution increases the risks of certain lung diseases. Air pollution can cause both airplane and car accidents because it cuts down visibility （能见度）. There are other possible health dangers from air pollution that we don’t know much about. For example, scientists are trying to find out whether chemicals that reach us from the air may cause changes in our cells. These changes might cause babies to be born with serious birth defects. Scientists are trying to learn how all the many chemicals are apt（易于的）to take into our bodies from air, water, food, and even medicines act together to affect our health and the way our bodies work. That is another reason why it is so important to begin to control pollution now instead of waiting until we learn all the answers. Air pollution costs us a lot of money. It corrodes（腐蚀）our buildings. It damages farm crops and forests. It has a destructive effect on our works of art. The cost of all this damage to our government is great. It would be much more worthwhile, both for us and for the government, to spend our tax dollars on air pollution control. 1. Air pollution may lead to airplane accidents because . A. it may cause pilots to be ill B. engines may fail from the air-borne dirt C. visibility is reduced D. it brings a lot of black snow 2. Scientists are trying to find a link between pollution and . A. intelligence levels B. birth problems C. man’s behavior D. the nervous system 3. Scientists have not yet determined . A. all of the effects of pollution on the human body B. how pollution can be controlled successfully C. when the atmosphere first became polluted D. how some snow becomes black 4. The author suggests that before air pollution becomes more serious, . A. factories will be forced to stop operating B. buildings should be protected C. the earth will begin to grow colder D. more money should be spent to solve the problem 5. We can conclude that . A. civilization may be ruined if pollution is not controlled B. pollution is more serious in Europe than it is in America C. most people do not know that pollution is a serious problem D. we should learn all the answers before we begin to control pollution Passage Two Stiletto heels could be banned from the workplace because of health and safety reasons, according to British Trade Union bosses. The Trade Union Congress, predominantly male, has proposed a motion arguing that high heels are disrespectful to women while they also contribute to long term injuries. They propose instead that women wear “sensible shoes”with an inch heel limit in an attempt to avoid future foot and back pain as well as injuries. The motion is due to be debated at next month’s conference. The motion states: “Congress believes high heels may look glamorous on the Hollywood catwalks but are completely in appropriate for the day-to-day working environment. Feet bear the burden of daily life, and for many workers prolonged standing, badly fitted footwear, and in particular high heels can be a hazard. Around two million days a year are lost through sickness as a result of lower limb disorders. Wearing high heels can cause long-term foot problems and also serious foot, knee and back pain and damaged joints. Many employers in the retail sector force women workers to wear high heels as part of their dress code. More must be done to raise awareness of this problem so that women workers and their feet are protected.” Nadline Dorries, the Tory Member of Parliament, however criticized the motion and said the extra height heels give women can help them when in the workplace. “I’m 5ft 3in and need every inch of my Christian Louboutin heels to look my male colleagues in the eye,”she said. “If high heels were banned in Westminster, no one would be able to find me. The Trade Union leaders need to get real, stop using obvious sexist tactics by discussing women’s
对此内容进行投票:(0)(0)
Calculate for a moment what could be done with even a part of those hours. Five thousand hours, I am told, are what a typical college undergraduate spends working on a bachelor's degree. In 10,000 hours you could have learned enough to become an astronomer or engineer. You could have learned several languages fluently. If it appealed to you, you could be reading Homer in the original Greek or Dostoyevsky in Russian. If it didn't, you could have walked around the world and written a book about it. The trouble with television is that it discourages concentration. Almost anything interesting and rewarding in life requires some constructive, consistently applied effort. The dullest, the least gifted of us can achieve things that seem miraculous to those who never concentrate on anything. But Television encourages us to apply no effort. It sells us instant gratification(满意). It diverts us only to divert, to make the time pass without pain. Television's variety becomes a narcotic(麻醉的), nor a stimulus. Its serial, kaleidoscopic (万花筒般的)exposures force us to follow its lead. The viewer is on a perpetual guided tour: 30 minutes at the museum, 30 at the cathedral, 30 for a drink, then back on the bus to the next attraction—except on television., typically, the spans allotted arc on the order of minutes or seconds, and the chosen delights are more often car crashes and people killing one another. In short, a lot of television usurps(篡夺;侵占) one of the most precious of all human gifts, the ability to focus your attention yourself, rather than just passively surrender it. Capturing your attention—and holding it—is the prime motive of most television programming and enhances its role as a profitable advertising vehicle. Programmers live in constant fear of losing anyone's attention—anyone's. The surest way to avoid doing so is to keep everything brief, not to strain the attention of anyone but instead to provide constant stimulation through variety, novelty, action and movement. Quite
大学英语四级阅读理解试题及答案.
————————————————————————————————作者：————————————————————————————————日期： 2
3 大学英语四级阅读理解试题及答案（四） 十六 Trees should only be pruned when there is a good and clear reason for doing so and , fortunately,the number of such reasons is small. Pruning involves the cutting away of obergrown and unwanted branches, and the inexperienced gardener can be encouraged by the thought that more damage results from doing it unnecessarily than from leaving the tree to grow in its own way. First, pruning may be done to make sure that trees have a desired shape or size. The object may be to get a tree of the right height, and at the same time to help the growth of small side branches which will thicken its appearance or give it a special shape. Secondly, pruning may be done to make the tree healthier. You may cut diseaed or dead wood, or branches that are rubbing against each other and thus cause wounds. The health of a tree may be encouraged by removing branches that are blocking up the centre and so preventing the free movement of air. One result of pruning is that an open wound is left on the tree and this provides an easy entry for disease, but itis a wound that will heal. Often there is a race between the healing and the desease as to whether the tree will live or die, so that there is a period when the tree is at risk. It should be the aim of every gardener to reduce which has been pruned smooth and clean, for healing will be slowed down by roughness. You should allow the cut surface to dry for a few hurs and then paint it with one of the substances available from garden shops produced especially for this purpose. Pruning is usually without interference from the leaves and also it is very unlikely that the cuts yu make will bleed. If this does happen,it is, of course,impossible to paint them properly. 1.Pruning should be done to ______. a.make the tree grow taller
洛基英语，中国在线英语教育领导品牌 Model Test 1 Part One Listening Comprehension Section A Directions： In this section, you will hear 10 short conversations. At the end of each conversation, a question will be asked about what was said - Both the conversation and the question will be spoken only once. After each question there will be pause. During the pause, you must read the four choices marked A）, B）, C）and D）, and decide which is the best answer. Then mark the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet with a line through the centre. Example： You will hear： You will read： A） At the office. B） In the waiting room. C） At the airport. D） In a restaurant. From the conversation we know that the two were talking about some work they had to finish in the evening. This is most likely to have taken place at the office. Therefore, A） At the office is the best answer. You should choose [A] on the Answer Sheet and mark it with a single line through the centre. 1. A） She is not interested in the article. B） She has given the man much trouble. C） She would like to have a copy of the article. D） She doesn't want to take the trouble to read the article. 2. A） He saw the big tower he visited on TV~ B） He has visited the TV tower twice. C） He has visited the TV tower once. D） He will visit the TV tower in June. 3. A） The woman has trouble getting along with the professor. B） The woman regrets having taken up much of the professor's time. C） The woman knows the professor has been busy. D） The woman knows the professor has run into trouble. 4. A） He doesn't enjoy business trips as much as he used to. B） He doesn't think he is capable of doing the job. C） He thinks the pay is too low to support his family, D） He wants to spend more time with his family. 5. A） The man thought the essay was easy. B） They both had a hard time writing the essay. C） The woman thought the essay was easy. D） Neither of them has finished the assignment yet. 6. A） In the park. B） Between two buildings C） In his apartment. D） Under a huge tree. 7. A） It's awfully dull. B） It's really exciting.
大学英语四级阅读理解模拟题 The most frightening words in the English language are, "Our computer is down. " You hear it more and more when you are on business. The other day I was at the airport waiting for a ticket to Washington and the girl in the ticket office said, "I' m sorry, I can' t sell you a ticket. Our computer is down. " "If your computer is down, just write me out a ticket. " "I can' t write you out a ticket. The computer is the only one allowed to do so. " I looked down on the computer and every passenger .was just standing there drinking coffee and staring at the black screen. Then I asked her, "What do all you people do?" "We give the computer the information about your trip, and then it tells us whether you can fly with us or not. " "So when it goes down, you go down with it. " "That' s good, sir. " "How long will the computer be down?" I wanted to know. "I have no idea. Sometimes it' s down for 10 minutes, sometimes for two hours. There' s no way we can find out without asking the computer, and since it' s down it won' t answer us. "
大学英语四级考试模拟试题
大学英语四级考试模拟试题 Model Test Five Part ⅠListening Comprehension Directions: This section is designed to test your ability to understand spoken English. You will hear a selection of recorded materials and you must answer the questions that accompany them. Choose the correct answer---A, B, C or D, and then, mark your answer by writing the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet. Section A (C) 11. A) He will only be available in the afternoon. B) It’s not his office hour. C) He doesn’t have time. D) He is too tired after class. (A) 12. A) The woman insists on going out. B) The woman doesn’t like watching TV. C) The man promised her a gift on her birthday. D) The man is too tired to go out. (B) 13. A) There are too many courses offered to
Passage1 Reading leadership literature, you’d sometimes think that everyone has the potential to be an effective leader. 读领导文学，你有时会认为每个人都有可能成为一个有效的领导者。 I don’t believe that to be true. In fact, I see way fewer truly effective leaders than I see people stuck in positions of leadership who arc sadly incompetent and seriously misguided about their own abilities. 我不相信这是真的。事实上，我认为真正有效的领导者的方式比我看到的人都陷在领导的职位上，遗憾的是他们自己的能力不称职，严重误导了他们。 Part of the reason this happens is a lack of honest self-assessment by those who aspire to（追求）leadership in the first place. 对产生这种现象的原因一部分是由那些渴望缺乏诚实的自我评估（追求）放在首位的领导 We've all met the type of individual who simply must take charge. Whether it's a decision-making session, a basketball game, or a family outing, they can't help grabbing the lead dog position and clinging on to it for dear life. They believe they're natural born leaders. 我们都遇到了个人的类型，他们必须负责。无论是决策会议，篮球比赛，还是家庭外出，他们都不能不抓住领导的狗的地位，并紧紧抓住它，因为亲爱的生命。他们相信他们是天生的领袖。 Truth is, they're nothing of the sort. True leaders don't assume that it's their divine（神圣的）right to take charge every time two or more people get together. Quite the opposite. A great leader will assess each situation on its merits, and will only take charge when their position, the situation, and/or the needs of the moment demand it. 事实是，他们没有什么样的。真正的领导者不认为这是他们的神圣（神圣的）负责每次两个或两个以上的人在一起吧。恰恰相反。一个伟大的领导者会对每一个情况进行评估，并在他们的位置、情况和/或需要的情况下，只会负责。 Many business executives confuse leadership with action. They believe that constant motion somehow generates leadership as a byproduct. Faced with any situation that can’t be solved by the sheer force of activity, they generate a dust cloud of impatience. Their one leadership tool is
最牛英语口语培训模式：躺在家里练口语，全程外教一对一，三个月畅谈无阻！ 洛基英语，免费体验全部在线一对一课程：https://www.doczj.com/doc/592663817.html,/ielts/xd.html（报名网址）Passage Three Questions 31 to 35 are based on the following passage. Material culture refers to what can be seen, held, felt, used -what a culture produces. Examining a culture’s tools andtechnology can tell us about the group’s history and way of life. Similarly, research into the material culture of mus ic can help us to understand the music-culture. The most vivid body of material culture in it, of course, are musical instruments. We cannot hear for ourselves the actual sound of any musical performance before the 1870s when the phonograph (留声机) was invented, so we rely on instruments for important information about music-cultures in the remote past and their development. Here we have two kinds of evidence: instruments well preserved and instruments pictured in art. Through the study of instruments, as well as paintings, written documents, and so on, we can explore the movement of music from the Near East to China over a thousand years ago, or we can outline the spread of Near Eastern influence to Europe that resulted in the development of most of the instruments in the symphony orchestra（交响乐）. Sheet music（乐谱）or printed music, too, is material culture. Scholars once defined folk music-cultures as those in which people learn and sing music by earrather than from print, but research shows mutual influence among oral and written sources during the past few centuries in Europe, Britain, and America. Printed versions limit variety because they tend to standardize any song, yet they stimulate people to create new and different songs. Besides, the ability to read music notation（乐谱）has a far-reaching effect on musicians and, when it becomes widespread, on the music-culture as a whole. One more important part of music’s material culture should be singled out: the influence of the electronic media-radio, record player, tape recorder, television, and videocassette, with the future promising talking and singing computers a nd other developments. This is all part of the “information revolution”, a twentieth-century phenomenon as important as the industrial revolution was in the nineteenth. These electronic media are not just limited to modern nations; they have affected music-cultures all over the globe. 31. Research into the material culture of a nation is of great importance because ____. A) it helps produce new cultural tools and technology B) it can reflect the development of the nation C) it helps understand the nation’s past and present D) it can demonstrate the nation’s civilization 32. It can be learned from this passage that ____. A) the existence of the symphony was attributed to the spread of Near Eastern and Chinese music