English TestI. Skimming and Scanning (True or False Questions + Blank Filling)Directions: Read the following passage and then answer the questions. For questions 1-7, mark Y (YES) if the statement agrees with the information given in the passage, mark N (NO) if the statement contradicts the information given in the passage, mark NG (NOT GIVEN) if the information is not given in the passage. For questions 8-10, complete the sentences with the information given in the passage. (10 points)Time limit: 13分2秒Should You Be the Boss?Soul-searching questions for teachers considering administration.As a teacher, you manage the needs of 20 or more students at one time. Try handling 200, even 20,000 children—along with their teachers, parents, principals, and school boards. If that situation excites you, you may have what it takes to be a school administrator. In fact, 98 percent of all school administrators come from the teaching ranks, says Emil J. Haller, professor of educational administration at Cornell University.Opportunities are there. Most districts have a variety of administrators, from assistant principal to director of curriculum to superintendent (负责人), the person who manages all of the schools in a district.What is it like to give up the direct daily contact with children for a broader role in administration? Instructors spoke with teachers-turned-administrators to find out what teachers should ask themselves before pursuing a position in the ranks of administration.Do you have a passion for education? A desire to spread your vision?“I had a certain conviction about the learning environment for kids,” says Georgene Mais, director of elementary instruction in the 21,000-student Birdville school district, outside Fort Worth, Texas. She felt driven, she says, “to create that learning environment” for an entire campus and to be a positive influence “within the whole community.” That kind of drive motivates some teachers to leave the daily triumph of seeing that light of understanding flash in a child’s eyes. Others see administration simply as a different kind of teaching.Nancy Villarreal, an assistant superintendent in the Newark school district, with 7,800 students, in the San Francisco Bay area, believes administration is the ultimate teaching experience. “What I do gives me additional opportunities to work with adults in a broader perspective,” she says. “I’ve begun to look on all of us as learners. Some of us are adult learners;some are student learners.”As a principal you in effect keep teaching—teaching teachers. Paul Scwartz, principal in residence for the US Department of Education, says the job has been changing. “I think people are beginning to rethink the image of the principalship,”he says. “It’s becoming less a job for managers or administrators and much more involved with accountability, with issues of teaching and learning.”Sometimes educators are motivated by “a desire for change,” a desire for a new challenge, as in the case of Karen Beckers, who changed jobs several times in her career in the 2,200-student school district of Greenfield, Wisconsin. She entered administration as an elementary curriculum coordinator. When the position was eliminated due to declining enrollment, she returned to the classroom. “Those next years were probably the best of my career,” she says, because she had a deeper understanding of curriculum design. Five years later, though she was “still having a good time teaching,”she returned to administration. In 1997 she retired after 33 years as an educator—the last eight as principal.If you feel you should begin work in administration, you must be prepared for major changes, like moving. Dennis Smith, Ph.D., now superintendent of the Orange County public school district in Florida, knew that he wanted to be a principal when he began teaching in Phoenix, Arizona. After five years he became assistant principal there. A year later, at age 27, he landed his first principalship in Tucson. Next he was assistant superintendent and then took over as superintendent a year later, at age 34, in Laguna Beach, California. As superintendent, he moved from three different districts in California to his present post in Florida. His career progression went smoothly not only because he was willing and able to move but also because his spouse, a teacher, was willing and able to move with him.Will you work more days and longer hours?Although administrative positions may pay more than teaching salaries, they often require more hours on the job. Principals, for instance, work an average of 220 days a year, whereas teachers are more likely to work 180 to 185 days. In addition to school gatherings and site visits to classrooms, administrators must attend after-hours events—school board meetings and ceremonial functions.Often administrative positions require postgraduate degrees, though specific requirements vary from state to state and district to district. Most principals have master’s degrees, and many superintendents have PhDs. You may also have to brush up in other areas. For instance, former principal Beckers notes, “Many teachers who become principals have to learn a great deal about special education, and it’s extremely enriching.”Are you a very organized problem solver?Administrative positions often involve doing a lot of paperwork, such as budget reports and staff evaluations—even more than that required of teachers. You’ll need to make priorities and coordinate the diverse tasks in your new workload, along with those of your staff. Expectconstantly to shift roles, from troubleshooter (调解人) to long-range planner to diplomat. Beckers warns, “If you’re not a list maker or a time keeper, you’ll have some problems.” Principals find that if they are not careful, special events can take away from the time they need to work with teachers.Are you a team builder and a leader?Administrators are facilitators and consensus builders, but they must also give strong direction and leadership. The position of curriculum developer requires working in teams and reporting to the central office. While following the direction of your superiors, you will also want to provide teachers with a curriculum that excites them. It’s a balancing act. Dennis Smith notes that, as superintendent, he tries “to provide a clear direction for an entire school district and community.” Sometimes building the consensus means putting aside your own ideas. One of his biggest challenges, Smith says, was working with board members who fought among themselves.Career OptionsThe following positions can be found nationwide, though the descriptions may vary from district to district.SuperintendentProvides leadership for a school district; helps the school board identify goals; and keeps the entire school system and community focused on instructional needs. ($86,111)Assistant SuperintendentProvides teacher and principal support as a contact with the central office; is often involved in curriculum and instruction development. ($75,833)PrincipalSupervises staff; interacts with students; is responsible for student discipline and management; has some authority over the school’s budget. ($62,900-$72,400)Assistant PrincipalWith principal, is responsible for student discipline and management; is often involved in teacher evaluations and staff meetings with principal. ($52,300-$59,700)Director of Curriculum and/or InstructionImplements state curriculum orders; designs curriculum. Also called chairman or coordinator. ($60,209)Director of Special Education/Special ServicesImplements specific state rules and regulations with regard to special-needs students; officehas responsibility for all children with special needs. ($46,725)Other positions in your district may include...Directors and/or coordinators (and support staff) in information technology, assessment, government programs, minority teacher recruitment, student teaching, home schooling, job training, and students in hospitals.(Words: 1164)1. ( ) This passage is most probably designed for teachers who want to pursue the positionsof school administrators at different levels.2. ( ) As a basic requirement, every school administrator in the US must have some sort ofteaching experience.3. ( ) Some teachers want to become school administrators, partly because they are driven tobroaden their work to include the whole school and the community.4. ( ) School administrators are quite different from school teachers in that they are fullyinvolved in the management of adult learners rather than student learners.5. ( ) As to Karen Beckers, the best years of her career as an educator were spent as a teacherbefore serving as a principal.6. ( ) The making of a school administrator requires dedication and support of familymembers.7. ( ) School teachers are paid less in salary than principals, but their annual working hoursare a bit longer on average.8. Since school administrators have diverse duties and tasks to perform, they are constantlyexpected to _______________.9. A position that calls for teamwork and the ability to strike a balance between superiors andteachers in the setting of class material is _______________.10. At school, both principal and assistant principal are supposed to hold the responsibility for______________.II. Understanding Short ConversationsDirections: In this section you'll hear some short conversations. Listen carefully and choose the best answer to the questions you hear. (8 points)11. A. The man taking something from her.B. The man stealing from her grandmother.C. The man stealing from his grandmother.D. The man telling his grandmother that she steals.12. A. The woman doesn’t worry about important things in society.B. The woman doesn’t know what’s important in society.C. The man doesn’t consider himself part of society.D. The man doesn’t care about children saying “madam” or “sir”.13. A. The reasons why the woman is important.B. The reasons why the woman is wrong.C. The woman’s working experience.D. The woman’s work as a writer.14. A. His studies at school.B. Deaths because of war.C. Wars he has studied.D. Things he can control.15. A. Have independent thought.B. Show respect to the teacher.C. Disagree with the teacher.D. Get angry at the teacher.16. A. The company policy.B. The shop.C. The shirt.D. The service.17. A. A prison.B. A classroom.C. A big city.D. A small town.18. A. 5.B. 6.C. 2.D. 3.III. Understanding Long ConversationsDirections: In this section you'll hear a long conversation or conversations. Listen carefully and choose the best answer to the questions you hear. (10 points)Conversation 119. A. Responsibilities in the home.B. Things they do together.C. Troubles in their marriage.D. The worst day.20. A. They agreed to share the work.B. They have responsibilities.C. They are both tired.D. They are bothered by it.21. A. The state of the marriage.B. The silly things they did.C. The terrible cold she had.D. They haven’t gotten married.22. A. Go to their parents.B. Have arguments.C. Walk in the park.D. Go to the cinema.23. A. The park.B. The cinema.C. A parent’s home.D. Their home.Conversation 224. A. A young man.B. Different jobs.C. Insurance companies.D. Work issues.25. A. Find a job at a bank or insurance company.B. Have a conversation with George.C. Make a plan for the future on his own.D. Do something about his dirty, long hair.26. A. Trying to find a job.B. Smoking, eating and playing records.C. Spending time with friends.D. Figuring his future out.27. A. Travel.B. Banking.C. Office.D. Insurance.28. A. Father and daughter.B. Mother and son.C. Employer and employee.D. Husband and wife.IV. Understanding PassagesDirections: In this section you'll hear a passage or passages. Listen carefully and choose the best answer to the questions you hear. (10 points)Passage 129. A. The responsibilities of married people. B. The British sense of society.C. The masters of British family life.D. The meaning of family in Britain.30. A. Family. B. Children. C. The house. D. Duty.31. A. Start a person’s real life.B. Make a person independent.C. Start a new family.D. Support a person financially.32. A. British children have a responsibility to their parents.B. British people care more for spouses than for children.C. British men have more responsibilities than women do.D. British women have more responsibilities than men do.33. A. The wife’s parents. B. The couple themselves.C. The couple’s sisters.D. The husband’s parents.Passage 234. A. The plays of the 1930s. B. The life of a writer.C. Death of a Salesman.D. The “common man”.35. A. To speak on society and politics. B. To establish the American tradition.C. To win Tony Awards and the Pulitzer Prize.D. To cause trouble for a US senator.36. A. 1957. B. 1949. C. 1961. D. 1964.37. A. His short stories. B. His essays. C. His plays. D. His novels.38. A. Miller was known for being un-American.B. Miller once ran for Senator.C. Miller wrote the screenplay for The Misfits with his wife.D. Miller was a more productive playwright when he was younger.V. Compound DictationDirections: In this section you will hear a passage or passages three times. When the passage is read for the first time, you should listen carefully for its general idea. When the passage is read for the second time, you are required to fill in the blanks with the information you have just heard. Finally, when the passage is read for the third time, you should check what you have written. (10 points)Passage 1Times are changing, and not necessarily for the best. There was a time when parents who wanted an educational present for their children would buy a typewriter, a (39)__________ or an encyclopedia set. Now those items seem hopelessly (40)__________; this Christmas, there were a lot of personal computers under the tree. People are becoming more and more (41)__________ that computers are the key to success. Parents are (42)__________ that children be taught to use them in school as early as possible.The problem for schools is that (43)__________ it comes to computers, parents don’t always know best. Many schools are (44)__________ to parental impatience and purchasing hardware. At the same time it is clear that these schools are not ready to have any web-based course with (45)__________ educational planning.All of this has made things difficult for teachers. Teachers find themselves caught in the middle of the problem, (46)_____________________________________________________. Educators do not even agree on how computers should be used. A lot of money has been put intoresearch for computerized educational materials. The results show (47)____________________________________. Many people are trying to convince parents of this problem. (48)_____________________________________________________ to the very young.VI. Reading Comprehension (Multiple Choice)Directions: Read the following passages carefully and choose the best answer from the four choices marked A, B, C and D. (20 points)Passage 1A child who has once been pleased with a tale likes, as a rule, to have it retold in identically the same words, but this should not lead parents to treat printed fairy stories as sacred (上帝的) texts. It is always much better to tell a story than read it out of a book, and, if a parent can produce what, in the actual circumstances of the time and the individual child, is an improvement on the printed text, so much the better.A charge made against fairy tales is that they harm the child by frightening him or arousing his sadistic (施虐狂的) impulses. To prove the latter, one would have to show in a controlled experiment that children who have read fairy stories were more often guilty of cruelty than those who had not. As to fear, I think, we also need well-documented cases of children being dangerously terrified (恐惧) by some fairy story. Often, however, this arises from the child having heard the story once. Familiarity with the story by repetition turns the pain of fear into the pleasure of a fear faced and mastered.There are also people who object to fairy stories on the grounds that they are not objectively true, that giants, witches (女巫), two-headed dragons, magic carpets (魔毯), etc., do not exist; and that, instead of indulging (沉溺) his fantasies in fairy tales, the child should be taught how to adapt to reality by studying history and mechanics. I find such people, I must confess, so unsympathetic and peculiar that I do not know how to argue with them. If their case were sound, the world should be full of mad men attempting to fly from New York to Philadelphia on a broomstick (女巫乘骑的扫帚柄) or covering a telephone with kisses in the belief that it was their enchanted (中魔法的) girl-friend.No fairy story ever claimed to be a description of the external world and no sane (精神健全的) child has ever believed that it was.49. The author considers that a fairy story is more effective when it is _______.A. repeated without variationB. treated with respectC. adapted by the parentD. set in the present50. Some people dislike fairy stories because they feel that they ________.A. tempt people to be cruel to childrenB. show the primitive cruelty in childrenC. lend themselves to undesirable experiments with childrenD. increase a tendency to have sadistic impulses in children51. According to the passage great fear can be stimulated in a child when the story is ________.A. set in realityB. heard for the first timeC. repeated too oftenD. dramatically told52. The author’s mention of broomsticks and telephones is meant to suggest that ________.A. fairy stories are still being made upB. there is confusion about different kinds of truthC. people try to modernize old fairy storiesD. there is more concern for children’s fears nowadays53. Which of the following statements is TRUE according to the passage?A. Fairy stories are anything but beneficial to the growth of children.B. Fairy stories teach children the way to adapt to the society.C. No fairy story should be taken as the true description of the reality.D. No fairy story should be told to the children without modification.Passage 2Standing alone at the Browns’ party, Anna Mackintosh thought about her husband Edward, establishing him clearly in her mind’s eye. He was a thin man, forty-one years of age, with fair hair that was often untidy. In the seventeen years they’d been married he had changed very little; he was still nervous with other people, and smiled in the same embarrassed way, and his face was still almost boyish.She believed she had failed him because he had wished for children and she had not been able to supply any. She had, over the years, become neurotic (神经机能病的) about this fact and in the end, quite some time ago now, she had consulted a psychiatrist (精神病学家), Dr. Abbat, at Edward’s pleading (恳求).In the Browns’ rich drawing room, its walls and ceiling gleaming (发微光) with a metallic (金属般的) surface of imitation gold, Anna listened to dance music coming from a tape recorder and continued to think about her husband.In a moment he would be at the party, since they had agreed to meet there, although by now it was three-quarters of an hour later than the time he had promised.The Browns were people he knew in a business way, and he had said he thought it wise thathe and Anna should attend this gathering of theirs. She had never met them before, which made it more difficult for her, having to wait about, not knowing a soul in the room.When she thought about it she felt hard done by, for although Edward was kind to her and always had been, it was far from considerate to be as late as this. Because of her nervous condition she felt afraid and had developed a sickness in her stomach. She looked at her watch and sighed.54. Why did Anna feel awkward at the party?A. She came to the party too early.B. She was neglected by the host.C. She felt uncomfortable with the atmosphere of the party.D. She didn’t know anyone there.55. What made Anna feel inadequate?A. She did not make a good mother to her children.B. She was unable to satisfy her husband’s desire to have children.C. She did not get along well with her husband.D. She was unable to have a better understanding of her husband.56. As time went by, Anna started to get angry as ________.A. she found the Browns were much wealthier than they wereB. her husband was lateC. she noticed that no one was willing to talk to herD. her husband was bad-mannered in the party57. According to the passage, Edward wanted Anna to attend the party because ________.A. he wanted her to have more of a social lifeB. he tried to distract her from some unpleasant thoughtsC. he needed her supportD. he thought she would impress the Browns58. What kind of woman Anna was according to the passage?A. Sensitive and worried.B. Open and talkative.C. Imaginative and cheerful.D. Sensible and easygoing.VII. Reading Comprehension (Banked Cloze)Directions: Fill in the blanks in the following passage by selecting suitable words from the Word Bank. You may not use any of the words more than once. (10 points)Passage 1Michael Jackson achieved his fame at a very young age. He and his brothers formed the group, the Jackson Five. Their appeal was hard to (59)__________ and they quickly became superstars. Little Michael sang into the microphone and his brothers backed him up. Some sang and some were musicians and together they made great music. Even their father took part as the agent for the band. When Michael went solo (单飞), he became the most famous (60)__________ star of his generation. Unfortunately, the plot became more (61)__________ after that. The media followed Michael everywhere writing stories that (62)__________ many in the public to turn their back on him. It didn’t help that Michael (63)__________ many surgeries on his face changing his appearance. He began to shy away from the public. His chambers only saw the company of a select few. After that he was (64)__________ of sexual crimes. His attorneys (65)__________ hard to prove his innocence, but by that time, it no longer mattered what the judge decided. His lawyers could not (66)__________ the public’s notion that he was to be pitied rather than admired. The life of Michael Jackson (67)__________ how difficult life can be for a child star. Many others who have (68)__________ over fame so early have met similar fates. It really emphasizes how important a real childhood is to a person.Word BankVIII. Reading Comprehension (Short Answer Questions)Directions: Read the following passage carefully and give brief answers to the questions. (5 points)Passage 1In a family where the roles of men and women are not sharply separated and where many household tasks are shared to a greater or lesser extent, notions of male superiority are hard to maintain. The pattern of sharing in tasks and in decisions makes for equality, and this in turn leads to further sharing. In such a home, the growing boy and girl learn to accept that equality。
