高等教育自学考试2012年10月英语阅读二试题.docx

绝密 考试完毕前全国2012年10月高等教化自学考试英语阅读（二）试题课程代码：00596请考生按规定用笔将全部试题的答案涂、写在答题纸上。全部题目用英文作答（翻译题除外）。选择题局部留意事项： 1. 答题前，考生务必将自己的考试课程名称、姓名、准考证号用黑色字迹的签字笔或钢笔填写在答题纸规定的位置上。2. 每小题选出答案后，用2B铅笔把答题纸上对应题目的答案标号涂黑。如需改动，用橡皮擦干净后，再选涂其他答案标号。不能答在试题卷上。I. Reading Comprehension (50 points, 2 points for each)Directions: In this part of the test, there are five passages. Following each passage, there arefive questions with four choices marked A, B, C and D. Choose the best answer and thenblacken the corresponding letter on your Answer Sheet.Passage One From time to time, we need an expert. In such situations, the Internet has been like a gift from the gods. In the old days, authorities were near at hand for expert advice: the village seamstress on how to make a buttonhole, the blacksmith on how to take care of a horses hooves, or the apothecary on what to do about warts. On the Internet, advice and answer sites are popping up all over the place, with self-proclaimed experts at the ready. Exp claims to have “tens of thousands of experts who can help you,”while the more restrained Abuzz, owned by The New York Times, limits its pitch to “Ask Anything! Real People. Real Answers.” Its said that expert sites or knowledge networks represent the latest stage in the Internets evolution, a “democratization of expertise.” However, if your question is about something other than “Who invented the light bulb?”, the answers are likely to be a wild potpourriof personal opinions. Top colleges and universities are rushing into online education, but the big news is the proliferation of a new breed of for-profit online institutions bringing Internet education to the masses.“The Internet will probably be the single most democratizing force in education,” says Columbia Business School Dean Meyer Feldberg, who envisions educational programs being routed through the net to hundreds of millions of people. The largest online institution is the University of Phoenix, with some 6,000 students today and hopes of reaching 200,000 students in 10 years. The university offers bachelors, masters, and doctoral degrees in business management, technology, education, and nursing. The university notes that its degree programs cost far less and may take some students far less time to complete. On the other hand, a Business Week survey of 247 companies found that only a handful would consider hiring applicants who earned their MBA degrees online.Whether that will change as for-profit online universities improve their offerings and graduates prove their worth-is anyones guess. The rest of the world is moving into cyberspace more slowly than the United States, and, in the developing world, the Internet has hardly penetrated at all. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan is determined to change this through the United Nations Information Technology Service, which will train large numbers of people to tap into the income enhancing power of the Internet. Annan is also proposing an Internet health network that will provide state-of-the-art medical knowledge to 10,000 clinics and hospitals in poor countries.Questions l-5 are based on Passage One.1. From the passage we may assume that the author_. A. trusts old days experts more than online ones B. believes that most of the online experts are qualified C. trusts the intelligence of large amounts of experts online D. believes that online experts can answer peoples questions better2. From paragraph 2 we can infer that the authors attitude towards experts online is_. A. excited B. neutral C. doubtful D. indifferent3. Which of the following best describes the authors opinion towards the future of online education? A. People have to wait and see. B. It is predictable in future development. C. It cannot thrive without good management. D. People believe that it is doomed from the start.4. The underlined phrase“state-of-the-art” in paragraph 6 means_. A. advanced and in large quantity B. very creative and artistic C. skillful and attractive D. very modern5. Kofi Annans United Nations Information Technology Service aims at _. A. improving UN staffs computer skill B. promoting the use of the Internet over the world C. providing medical knowledge to poor hospitals D. promoting the use of the Internet in the United StatesPassage Two Nowadays there is a remarkable consensus among educators and business and policy leaders on one key conclusion: we need to bring what we teach and how we teach into the 21st century. Right now were aiming too low. Competency in reading and math the focus of so much No Child Left Behind (NCLB) testing is the meager minimum. Scientific and technical skills are, likewise: utterly necessary but insufficient. Todays economy demands not only a high-level competence in the traditional academic disciplines but also what might be called 21st century skills. Heres what they are: Knowing more about the world. Kids are global citizens now, even in small-town America, and they must learn to act that way. Mike Eskew, CEO of UPS, talks about needing workers who are“global trade literate, sensitive to foreign cultures, conversant in different languages” not exactly strong points in the U.S., where fewer than half of high school students are enrolled in a foreign-language class and where the social-studies curriculum tends to fixate on U.S. history. Thinking outside the box. Jobs in the new economy the ones that wont get outsourced or automated “put an enormous premium on creative and innovative skills, seeing patterns where other people see only chaos,” says Marc Tucker, an author of the skills-commission report and president of the National Center on Education and the Economy. Traditionally thats been an American strength, but schools have become less daring in the back-to-basics climate of NCLB. Kids also must learn to think across disciplines, since thats where most new breakthroughs are made. Its interdisciplinary combinations design and technology, mathematics and art “that produce YouTube and Google,” says Thomas Friedman, the best-selling author of The World Is Flat.Becoming smarter about new sources of information. In an age of overflowing information and proliferating media, kids need to rapidly process whats coming at them and distinguish between whats reliable and what isnt. “Its important that students know how to manage it, interpret it, validate it, and how to act on it,” says Dell executive Karen Bruett, who serves on the board of the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, a group of corporate and education leaders focused on upgrading American education. Developing good people skills. EQ, or emotional intelligence, is as important as IQ for success in todays work place.Most innovations today involve large teams of people,” says former Lockheed Martin CEO Norman Augustine. “We have to emphasize communication skills, the ability to work in teams and with people from different cultures.”Questions 6-10 are based on Passage Two.6. The passage is mainly concerned with_. A. the No Child Left Behind program as a minimum requirement B. interdisciplinary combination for 21st century school education C. the overall competence required of a student in the 21st century D. emotional intelligence as a means to career success in the 21st century7. If the workers are global trade literate, they should be_. A. global citizens even when they are kids B. armed with foreign cultures and languages C. living in big cities rather than in small towns D. good at doing business with peoples over the world8. It can be inferred from the passage that American kids used to be strong at_. A. making interdisciplinary combinations B. social-studies courses and U.S. history C. producing YouTube and Google D. creative and innovative thinking9. What should a student in an age of exploding information do with new sources of information? A. They should guard against the wrong information. B. They should be able to tell the difference between them. C. They should know how to interpret and organize them. D. They should be able to process them and identify the reliable ones.10. According to the passage, emotional intelligence involves_. A. teamwork, cooperation skills and communication skills B. ability to deal with people from different backgrounds C. ability to make innovations as well as high intelligence D. success in todays workplace with people from many culturesPassage Three It has been two decades since the fate of a bashful bird that most people had never seen came to symbolize the bitter divide over whether to save or saw down the ancient forests of the Pacific Northwest. Yet it was not until Thursday that the federal government offered its final plan to prevent the bird, the northern spotted owl, from going extinct. After repeated revisions, constant court fights and shifting science, the Fish and Wildlife Service presented a plan that addresses a range of threats to the owl, including some that few imagined when it was listed as a threatened species in 1990. The newer threats include climate change and the arrival of a formidable feathered competitor, the barred owl, in the soaring old-growth evergreens of Washington, Oregon and California where spotted owls nest and hunt. One experiment included in the plan: shooting hundreds of barred owls to see whether that helps spotted owls recover. Even after all these years since the spotted owl became the cause célèbre of the environmental movement, it is far from clear that the plan is a solution. Advocates on both sides say it will inevitably be challenged, and both sides have expressed frustration with the Obama administration on the issue. The spotted owl is declining by an average of 3 percent per year across its range. While some populations in Southern Oregon and Northern California are more stable, some of the steepest rates of decline are here in Washington. Some study areas in the Olympic and Cascade ranges show annual declines as high as 9 percent. The listing of the spotted owl as a threatened species led to a virtual ban on logging in many older federal forests, inspiring angry lawsuits and threats of violence by rural loggers against owl advocates, who often came from urban areas. “Nothing against the bird, but its wreaked a lot of havoc in the Pacific Northwest for the past 20 years,” said Ray Wilkeson, president of the Oregon Forest Industries Council, which represents loggers, sawmills and others in the industry. “A lot of human suffering has resulted from this. Now therere new threats to the owl that may be beyond anybodys ability to control.” Although the plan does not map critical habitat the mapping process is more than a year away from completion, a fact that frustrates conservationists it proposes expanding protections for owls beyond areas currently set aside. The existing areas were outlined by the Northwest Forest Plan, which was approved a year after President Clintons Timber Conference, revised under President George W. Bush to allow more logging and reinstated by the Obama administration. The American Forest Resource Council, a timber industry group, said the plan would impose “massive new restrictions on both federal and private lands.” But supporters say it will provide more wood for mills by increasing forest thinning and restoration work to battle threats like disease and fire that could increase with climate change. The plan would provide timber companies incentives to create potential spotted owl habitat. Officials from the Forest Service and from the Bureau of Land Management, which oversee logging on federal land, expressed support for the plan. While timber advocates question protections for a bird that some say may be bound for extinction, conservationists say that it is too soon to give up on the spotted owl, and that the fight to save it has served broader benefits of the forest, from cleaner water and air to habitat for hundreds of other species, including endangered salmon. “The spotted owl is the icon,” Dr. Forsman said, “but there are a lot of other players in terms of species and protecting biodiversity in these forests.”Questions 11-15 are based on Passage Three.11. The purpose of the new government plan is to_. A. save Northern spotted owl B. save the Northwest forest C. list environmental threats to the Northern spotted owl D. list the Northern spotted owl as a threatened species12. Which (from Paras. 3, 4) of the following is NOT true? A. The number of barred owls grows fast. B. The spotted owl is hunted in the forest. C. The number of spotted owls is in decline. D. The barred owl is a newcomer to the forest.13. Who doubt about the plan? A. Only timber advocates. B. Only owl advocates. C. Advocates from both urban and rural areas. D. Both owl advocates and timber advocates.14. Conservationists feel frustrated because_. A. the new mapping of habitat in the protection for owls is slow to complete B. the new mapping of habitat for owls will extend beyond presently set areas C. the revised Northwest Forest Plan under President Obama is maintained D. President Bush revised Northwest Forest Plan and allowed more logging15. Dr. Forsman wanted to express in the last paragraph that_. A. the spotted owl is a rare species B. there are a lot of other players in the forest C. the spotted owl needs protection D. some other species are equally importantPassage Four If youve ever been pranked on April Fools Day, you may wonder how this tradition started. Well, youre not alone. No one knows for sure how April Fools Day began. But the most likely explanation has to do with the calendar.No, thats not an April Fools Day joke. People used to celebrate New Years Day on April lst. Just like today, people would have big parties to celebrate. Over time, the calendar changed and so did the date for New Years. In the 1500s, the new calendar marked New Years Day as January lst. But because there was no Internet or other means to spread the word, the news traveled slowly by word of mouth. It took a while for everyone to hear about the change, and even then some people resisted it. They continued to celebrate New Years on April lst. These people were given the nickname“April fools”. People following; the new calendar played tricks on the “April fools” by sending them on“ fools errands”. They had the “April fools” deliver invitations to big New Years celebrations that werent really going to happen. In France, “April fools” were called “Poisson dAvril”, which is French for “Ap