2015年12月大学英语四级考试真题及解析(卷二)
Q: What is the man probably going to do?
7.【题干】Question 6
【选项】
A.The way to the visitor’s parking.
Q: What are the speakers talking about?
10.【题干】Questions 9 to 12 are based on the conversation you have just h
A.It is more difficult to learn than English.
M: Sure. It's in Lot C, over that way.
Q: What does the woman want to know?
8.【题干】Question 7
【选项】
A.He regrets missing the classes.
B.He plans to take the fitness classes.
B.It is used by more people than English.
C.It will be as commonly used as English.
D.It will eventually become a world language.
【答案】B
【解析】Q: What does the man say about Chinese?
W: Sure. It's actually the most impressive one I've seen on that topic.
Q: What do we learn about the speakers?
3.【题干】Question 2
【选项】
A.At a gift shop.
B.At a graduation ceremony.
D.He is not interested in any part-time jobs.
【答案】C
【解析】M: Mike told me yesterday that he'd been looking in vain for a job in the art gallery.
W: Really? If I remember right, he had a chance to work there but he turned it down.
C.The woman should have informed him earlier.
D.He will be unable to attend the birthday party.
【答案】D
【解析】W: Would you like to come to Susan's birthday party tomorrow evening?
W: Why is that?
M: Well, partly because English speakers have travelled a lot. They bring back words with them, so English really does have an international vocabulary.
Q: What does the man mean?
9.【题干】Question 8
【选项】
A.How to work efficiency.
B.How to select secretaries.
C.The responsibilities of secretaries.
D.The secretaries in the man’s company.
M: Well, first of all, it has a very international vocabulary. It has many German, Dutch, French, Spanish and Italian words in it. So speakers of those languages will find many familiar words in English. In fact, English has words from many other languages as well.
W: And what's the other advantage of English?
M: It's that English grammar is really quite easy. For example, it doesn't have dozens of different endings for its nouns, adjectives and verbs, not like Latin, Russian, and German for example.
W: Hi, Leo. Why do you say English will become the world language?
M: Well, for one thing, it's so commonly used. The only language that is used by more people is Chinese.
2015年12月大学英语四级考试真题及解析(卷二)
Part I Writing
1.【题干】Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay commenting on the saying "Learning is a daily experience and a lifetime mission." You can cite examples to illustrate the importance of lifelong learning. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words.
W: Why is English spoken by so many people?
M: It's spoken in many countries of the world because of the British Empire. And now, of course, there's influence of America as well.
【答案】D
【解析】W: I really admire the efficiency of your secretaries.
M: Our company selects only the best. They have a heavy workload and we give them a lot of responsibilities.
W: Why is that?
M: Well, it's quite interesting actually. It's because of the French. When the French ruled England, French was the official language and only the common people spoke English. They try to make the language as simple as possible, so they made the grammar easier.
C.He is looking forward to a better life.
D.He has benefited form exercise.
【答案】D
【解析】W: You look great now that you've taken those fitness classes.
M: Thanks. I've never thought better in my life.
Part II Listening Comprehension
Section A
2.【题干】Question 1
【选项】
A.They admire the courage of space explorers.
B.They enjoyed the movie on space exploration.
Q: What does the woman say about Mike?
5.【题干】Question 4
【选项】
A.Susan has been invited to give a lecture tomorrow.
B.He will go to the birthday party after the lecture.
W: Many students find English a difficult language to learn.
M: Oh, all languages are difficult to learn. But English does have two great advantages.
W: What are they?
M: I'm going to give a lecture tomorrow. I wish I could be in two places at the same time.
Q: What does the man mean?
6.【题干】Question 5
2015年12月大学英语四级考试真题及解析(卷二
2015年12月大学英语四级考试真题及解析(卷二) Part I Writing1.【题干】Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay commenting on the saying "Learning is a daily experience and a lifetime mission." You can cite examples to illustrate the importance of lifelong learning. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words.Part II Listening ComprehensionPartⅢReading ComprehensionSection AScholars of the information society are divided over whether social inequality decreases or increases in an information-based society. However, they generally agree with the idea that inequality in the information society is_____(37)different from that of an industrial society. As informatization progress in society, the cause and structural nature of social inequality changes as well.It seems that the information society_____(38)the quantity of information available to the members of a society by revolutionizing the ways of using and exchanging information. But such a view as a_____(39)analysis based on the quantity of information supplied by various forms of the mass media. A different_____(40)is possible when the actual amount of information_____(41)by the user is taken into account. In fact, the more information_____(42)throughout the entire society, the wider the gap becomes between "information haves" and "information have-nots," leading to digital divide.According to recent studies, digital divide has been caused by three major_____(43): class, sex, and generation. In terms of class, digital divide exists among different types of workers and between the upper and middle classes and the lower class. With_____(44)to sex, digital divide exists between men and women. The greatest gap, however, is between the Net-generation, _____(45)with personal computers and the Internet, and the older generation,_____(46)to an industrial society.37.【题干】_____【选项】A.accustomed习惯的通常的B.acquired 取得C.assembly 集合D.attribute 把…归于E.champions 冠军F.elements 原理，元素G.expands 扩大H.familiar 熟悉的I.flows 流动J.fundamentally 从根本上地K.interpretation 解释L.passive 被动的M.regard 把..看作，与…有关N.respectively 分别地O.superficial 表面的，肤浅的【答案】J38.【答案】G39.【答案】O40.【答案】K 41. 【答案】B 42.I 43.F 44.M 45.A 46.DSection BJoy：A Subject Schools LackBecoming educated should not require giving up pleasureA)When Jonathan Swift proposed, in 1729, that the people of Ireland eat their children, he insisted it would solve three problems at once: feed the hungry masses, reduce the population during a severe depression, and stimulate the restaurant business. Evan as a satire(讽刺), it seems disgusting and shocking in America with its child-centered culture. But actually, the country is closer to his proposal than you might think.B)If you spend much time with educators and policy makers, you'll hear a lot of the following words: "standards,""results,""skills,""self-control,""accountability," and so on. I have visited some of the newer supposedly "effective" schools, where children shout slogans in order to learn self-control or must stand behind their desk when they can't sit still.C)A look at what goes on in most classrooms these days makes it abundantly clear that when people think about education, they are not thinking about what it feels like to be a child, or what makes childhood an important and valuable stage of life in its own right.D)I'm a mother of three, a teacher, and a developmental psychologist. So I've watched a lot of children-talking, playing, arguing, eating, studying, and being young. Here's what I've come to understand. The thing that sets children apart from adults is not their ignorance, nor their lack of skills. It's their enormous capacity for joy. Think of a 3-year-old lost in the pleasures of finding out what he can and cannot sink in the bathtub, a 5-year-old beside herself with the thrill of putting together strings of nonsensical words with her best friends, or an 11-year-old completely absorbed in a fascinating comic strip. A child's ability to become deeply absorbed in something, and derive intense pleasure from that absorption, is something adults spend the rest of their lives trying to return to.E)A friend told me the following story. One day, when he went to get his 7-year-old son from soccer practice, his kid greeted him with a downcast face and a sad voice. The coach had criticized him for focusing on his soccer drills. The little boy walked out of the school with his head and shoulders hanging down. He seemed wrapped in sadness. But just before he reached the car door, he suddenly stopped, crouching(蹲伏)down to peer at something on the sidewalk.His face went down lower and lower, and then, with complete joy he called out," Dad. Come here. This is the strangest bug I've ever seen. It has, like a million legs. Look at this. It's amazing." He looked up at his father, his features overflowing with energy and delight. "Can't we stay here for just a minute? I want to find out what he does with all those legs. This is the coolest ever."F)The traditional view of such moments is that they constitute a charming but irrelevant byproduct of youth-something to be pushed aside to make room for more important qualities, like perseverance(坚持不懈), obligation, and practicality. Yet moments like this one are just the kind of intense absorption and pleasure adults spend the rest of their lives seeking. Human lives are governed by the desire to experience joy. Becoming educated should not require giving up joy but rather lead to finding joy in new kinds of things: reading novels instead to playing with small figures, conducting experiments instead of sinking cups in the bathtub, and debating serious issues rather than stringing together nonsense words, for example. In some cases, schools should help children find new, more grown-up ways of doing the same things that are constant sources of joy: making art, making friends, making decisions.G)Building on a child's ability to joy, rather than pushing it aside, wouldn't be that hard. It would just require a shift in the education word's mindset(思维模式). Instead of trying to get children to work hard, why not focus on getting them to take pleasure in meaningful, productive activity, like making things, working with others, exploring ideas, and solving problems? These focuses are not so different from the things in which they delight.H)Before you brush this argument aside as rubbish, or think of joy as an unaffordable luxury in a nation where there is awful poverty, low academic achievement, and high dropout rates, think again. The more horrible the school circumstances, the more important pleasure is to achieving any educational success.I)Many of the assignments and rules teachers come up with, often because they are pressured by their administrators, treat pleasure and joy as the enemies of competence and responsibility. The assumption is that children shouldn't chat in the classroom because it hinders hard work; instead, they should learn to delay gratification(快乐)so that can pursue abstract goals, like going to college.J)Not only is this a boring and awful way to treat children, it makes no sense educationally, Decades of research have shown that in order to acquire skills and real knowledge in school, kids need to want to learn. You can force a child to stay in his or her seat, fill out a worksheet, or practice division. But you can't force the child to think carefully, enjoy books, digest complex information, or develop a taste for learning. To make that happen, you have to help the child find pleasure in learning-to see school as a source of joy.K)Adults tend to talk about learning as if it were medicine: unpleasant, but necessary and good for you. Why not instead think of learning as if it were food-something so valuable to humans that they have evolved to experience it as a pleasure?L)Joy should not be trained out of children or left for after-school programs. The more difficult a child's life circumstances, the more important it is for that child to find joy in his or her classroom. "Pleasure" is not a dirty word. And it doesn't run counter to the goals of public education. It is, in fact, the precondition.47.【题干】It will not be difficult to make learning a source of joy if educators change their way of thinking.【答案】G【解析】Building on a child's ability to joy, rather than pushing it aside, wouldn't be that hard. It would just require a shift in the education word's mindset(思维模式).48.【题干】What distinguishes children from adults is their strong ability to derive joy from what they are doing.【答案】D【解析】The thing that sets children apart from adults is not their ignorance, nor their lack of skills. It's their enormous capacity for joy49.【题干】Children in America are being treated with shocking cruelty.【答案】A50.【题干】It is human nature to seek joy in life.【答案】F【解析】Human lives are governed by the desire to experience joy.51.【题干】Grown-ups are likely to think that learning to children is what medicine is to patients.【答案】K【解析】Adults tend to talk about learning as if it were medicine: unpleasant, but necessary and good for you.52.【题干】Bad school conditions make it all the more important to turn learning into a joyful experience.【答案】L【解析】The more difficult a child's life circumstances, the more important it is for that child to find joy in his or her classroom.53.【题干】Adults do not consider children's feelings when it comes to education.【答案】C【解析】A look at what goes on in most classrooms these days makes it abundantly clear that when people think about education, they are not thinking about what it feels like to be a child, or what makes childhood an important and valuable stage of life in its own right.54.【题干】Administrators seem to believe that only hard work will lead children to their educational goals.【答案】I【解析】Many of the assignments and rules teachers come up with, often because they are pressured by their administrators, treat pleasure and joy as the enemies of competence and responsibility.55.【题干】In the so-called "effective" schools, children are taught self-control under a set ofstrict rules.【答案】B【解析】I have visited some of the newer supposedly "effective" schools, where children shout slogans in order to learn self-control or must stand behind their desk when they can't sit still.56.【题干】To make learning effective, educators have to ensure that children want to learn.【答案】J【解析】You can force a child to stay in his or her seat, fill out a worksheet, or practice division. But you can't force the child to think carefully, enjoy books, digest complex information, or develop a taste for learning. To make that happen, you have to help the child find pleasure in learning-to see school as a source of joy.Passage OneQuestions 57 to 61 are based on the following passage.When it's five o'clock, people leave their office. The length of the workday, for many workers, is defined by time. They leave when the clock tells them they're done.These days, the time is everywhere: not just on clocks or watches, but on cell-phones and computers. That may be a bad thing, particularly at work. New research shows that clock-based word schedules hinder morale(士气)and creativity.Clock-timers organize their day by blocks of minutes and hours. For example: a meeting from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m., research from 10 a.m. to noon, etc. On the other hand, task-timers have a list of things they want to accomplish. They work down the list, each task starts when the previous task is completed. It is said that all of us employ a mix of both these types of planning.What, then, are the effects of thinking about time in these different ways? Does one make us more productive? Better at the tasks at hand? Happier? In experiments conducted by Tamar Avnet and Anne-Laure Sellier, they had participants organize different activities-from project planning, holiday shopping, to yoga-by time or to-do list to measure how they performed under "clock time" vs "task time". They found clock timers to be more efficient but less happy because they felt little control over their lives. Task timers are happier and more creative, but less productive. They tend to enjoy the moment when something good is happening, and seize opportunities that come up.The researchers argue that task-based organizing tends to be undervalued and under-supported in the business culture. Smart companies, they believe, will try to bake more task-based planning into their strategies.This might be a small change to the way we view work and the office, but the researchers argue that it challenges a widespread characteristic of the economy: work organized by clock time. While most people will still probably need, and be, to some extent, clock-timers, task-based timing should be used when performing a job that requires more creativity. It'll make those tasks easier, and the task-doers will be happier.57.【题干】What does the author think of time displayed everywhere?【选项】A.It makes everybody time-conscious.B.It is a convenience for work and life.C.It may have a negative effect on creative work.D.It clearly indicates the fast pace of modern life.【答案】C【解析】2 New research shows that clock-based word schedules hinder morale(士气)and creativity.58.【题干】How do people usually go about their work according to the author?【选项】A.They combine clock-based and task-based planning.B.They give priority to the most urgent task on hand.C.They set a time limit for each specific task.D.They accomplish their tasks one by one.【答案】A【解析】3 They work down the list, each task starts when the previous task is completed. It is said that all of us employ a mix of both these types of planning. It is said that all of us employ a mix of both these types of planning.59.【题干】What did Tamar Avnet and Anne-Laure Sellier find in their experiments about clock-timers?【选项】A.They seize opportunities as they come up.B.They always get their work done in time.C.They have more control over their lives.D.They tend to be more productive.【答案】D【解析】They found clock timers to be more efficient but less happy because they felt little control over their lives. Task timers are happier and more creative, but less productive.60.【题干】What do the researchers say about today's business culture?【选项】A.It does not support the strategies adopted by smart companies.B.It does not attach enough importance to task-based practice.C.It places more emphasis on work efficiency than on workers' lives.D.It aims to bring employees' potential and creativity into full play.【答案】B【解析】The researchers argue that task-based organizing tends to be undervalued and under-supported in the business culture.61.【题干】What do the researchers suggest?【选项】A.Task-based timing is preferred for doing creative work.B.It is important to keep a balance between work and life.C.Performing creative jobs tends to make workers happier.D.A scientific standard should be adopted in job evaluation.【答案】D【解析】最后段the researchers argue that it challenges a widespread characteristic of the economy: work organized by clock time. While most people will still probably need, and be, to some extent, clock-timers, task-based timing should be used when performing a job that requires more creativity. It'll make those tasks easier, and the task-doers will be happier.Passage TwoQuestion 62 to 66 are based on the following passage.Martha Stewart was charged, tried and convicted of a crime in 2004. As she neared the end of her prison sentence, a well-known columnist wrote that she was "paying her dues," and that "there is simply no reason for anyone to attempt to deny her right to start anew."Surely, the American ideal of second chances should not be reserved only for the rich and powerful. Unfortunately, many federal and state laws impose post-conviction restrictions on a shockingly large number of Americans, who are prevented form ever fully paying their debt to society.At least 65 million people in the United States have a criminal record. This can result in severe penalties that continue long after punishment is completed.Many of these penalties are imposed regardless of the seriousness of the offense or the person's individual circumstances. Laws can restrict or ban voting, access to public housing, and professional and business licensing. They can affect a person's ability to get a job and qualification for benefits.In all, more than 45,000 laws and rules serve to exclude vast numbers of people from fully participating in American life.Some laws make sense. No one advocates letting someone convicted of pedophilia(恋童癖)work in a school. But too often collateral(附随的)consequences bear no relation to public safety. Should a woman who possessed a small amount of drugs years ago be permanently unable to be licensed as a nurse?These laws are also counterproductive, since they make it harder for people with criminal records to find housing or land a job, two key factors that reduce backsliding.A recent report makes several recommendations, including the abolition of most post-conviction penalties, except for those specifically needed to protect public safety. Where the penalties are not a must, they should be imposed only if the facts of a case support it.The point is not to excuse or forget the crime. Rather, it is to recognize that in America's vast criminal justice system, second chances are crucial. It is in no one's interest to keep a large segment of the population on the margins of society.62.【题干】What does the well-known columnist's remark about Martha Stewart suggest?【选项】A.Her past record might stand in her way to a new life.B.Her business went bankrupt while she was in prison.C.Her release from prison has drawn little attention.D.Her prison sentence might have been extended.【解析】第一段a well-known columnist wrote that she was "paying her dues," and that "there is simply no reason for anyone to attempt to deny her right to start anew."63.【题干】What do we learn from the second paragraph about many criminals in America?【选项】A.They backslide after serving their terms in prison.B.They are deprived of all social benefits.C.They receive severe penalties for committing minor offenses.D.They are convicted regardless of their individual circumstances.【答案】B【解析】第二段Unfortunately, many federal and state laws impose post-conviction restrictions on a shockingly large number of Americans, who are prevented form ever fully paying their debt to society.64.【题干】What are the consequences for many Americans with a criminal record?【选项】A.They remain poor for the rest of their lives.B.They are deprived of all social benefits.C.They are marginalized in society.D.They are deserted by their family.【答案】C【解析】第四段Many of these penalties are imposed regardless of the seriousness of the offense or the person's individual circumstances. Laws can restrict or ban voting, access to public housing, and professional and business licensing. They can affect a person's ability to get a job and qualification for benefits.65.【题干】What does the author think of the post-conviction laws and rules?【选项】A.They help to maintain social stability.B.Some of them have long been outdated.C.They are hardly understood by the public.D.A lot of them have negative effects on society.【答案】D【解析】倒数第二段These laws are also counterproductive, since they make it harder for people with criminal records to find housing or land a job, two key factors that reduce backsliding.66.【题干】What is the author's main purpose in writing the passage?【选项】A.To create opportunities for criminals to reform themselves.B.To appeal for changes in America's criminal justice system.C.To ensure that people with a criminal record live a decent life.D.To call people's attention to prisoner's conditions in America.【解析】呼吁美国司法体系的改革。
2015年12月英语四级真题(卷二)
2015年12月英语四级真题（卷二）Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay commenting on the saying “Listening is more important than talking.”You can cite examples to illustrate the importance of listening. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words。
For many Americans, 2013 ended with an unusually bitter cold spell. November and December（36） early snow and bone-chilling temperatures in much of the country, part of a year when, for the first time in two（37）, record-cold days will likelyturn out to have outnumbered record-warm ones. But the U.S. was the exception; November was the warmest ever （38）, and current data indicates that 2013 is likely to have been the fourth hottest year on record.Enjoy the snow now, because （39）are good that 2014 will be even hotter, perhaps the hottest year since records have been kept. That’s because, scientists are predicting, 2014 will be an EI Niuo year.EI niuo, Spanish for “the child”, （40） when surface ocean waters in the southern Pacific become abnormally warm. So large is the Pacific, covering 30% of the planet’s surface, that the（41 ）energy generated by its warming is enough to touch off a series of weather changes around the world. EI Ninos are （42）with abnormally dry conditions in Southeast Asia and Australia. They can lead to extreme rain in parts of North and South America, even as southern Africa（43） dry weather. Marine life may be affected too; EI Ninos can （44 ） the rising of the cold, nutrient-rich （营养丰富的）water that supports large fish （45）,and the unusually warm ocean temperatures can destroy coral(珊瑚).今年在长沙举行了一年一度的外国人汉语演讲比赛。
2015年12月英语四级考试真题(第二套)
2015年12月大学英语四级考试真题(第2套)Part I Writing(30 minutes)Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay commenting on the saying"Learning is a daily experience and a lifetime mission. " You can cite examples to illustrate the importance of lifelong learning. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words.____________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________Part II Listening Comprehension ( 30 minutesSection ADirections: In this section, you will hear 8 short conversations and 2 long conversations. At the end of each conversation, one or more questions will be asked about what was said. Both the conversation and the questions will be spoken only once. After each question there will be a 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 Answer Sheet I with a single line through the centre.1. A. The agenda for the board of directors' meeting.B. The details of the meeting to be held next week.C. The reason for the man's absence from the meeting.D. The time for the man's visit to the woman's company.2.A. At a travel agency. B. At a department store.C. In a library.D. In a post office.3.A. He cannot hear the woman's call. B. He cannot get through to New York.C. He cannot recall the phone number.D. He cannot find a public phone nearby.4.A. Watch a movie with the woman. B. Revise his thesis in the office.C. Do some shopping with Jane.D. Discuss his thesis with Prof. Hudson.5. A. He just cannot work properly without a watch.B. He has no idea where he can buy a gold watch.C. He still does not know where he left his watch.D. He is not sure what went wrong with his watch.6.A. He forgot all about what he said. B. He slipped and hurt his head.C. He was sorry for being off sick last week.D. He thought the woman's car had been sold.7.A. She should try to catch an earlier bus.B. She is absent from his class too often.C. She is always making excuses for being late.D. She should come up with a better excuse.8.A. He is going to help the woman out.B. He has to move out of the building soon.C. He is on his way to see a real estate agent.D. He will stay with the woman's brother.Questions 9 to 11 are based on the conversation you have just heard.9.A. From the wanted cohunn. B. From some of her friends.C. From a telephone directory.D. From a television commercial.10.A. She received full-time education abroadB. She graduated from an open university.C. She finished her secondary school.D. She studied in a vocational college.11.A. She is a shorthand-typist. B. She works as a tour guide.C. She is a policewoman.D. She teaches an evening class. Questions 12 to 15 are based on the conversation you have just heard.12.A. It provides him with career opportunities.B. It helps enlarge his customer network.C. It has been off and on for ten years.D. It was interrupted for four years.13.A. Individualized service. B. Traditional setting.C. Home-made beer.D. Social games.14.A. The quality of beer. B. The atmosphere.C. The owner's attitude.D. The right location.15.A. It is a rather tough job. B. It is a profitable business.C. It helps old people kill time.D. It makes retirees feel useful. Section BDirections: In this section, you will hear 3 short passages. At the end of each passage, you will hear some questions. Both the passage and the questions will be spoken only once. After you hear a question, you must choose the best answer from the four choicesmarked A , B ,C. and D. Then mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 1 with a single line through the centre.Passage OneQuestions 16 to 18 are based on the passage you have just heard.16.A. It is becoming increasingly popular. B. It helps the user to escape reality.C. It gives rise to serious social instability.D. It hurts a person and those around them.17.A. They use drugs just for fun. B. They take drugs to get high.C. They use drugs as medicine.D. They keep drug use a secret.18. A. It is quite common in entertainment circles.B. It is the cause of various social problems.C. It is hard to get rid of.D. It is fatal to the user.Passage TwoQuestions 19 to 22 are based on the passage you have just heard.19.A. Taking up exercises after recovery. B. Producing tasty healthy frozen food.C. Finding new ways to cure heart disease.D. Going on a diet upon leaving the hospital.20.A. It was carefully tested with consumers.B. It was promoted by health organizations.C. It was disapproved by many diet experts.D. It was highly expected by the general public.21.A. Competitive price. B. Low expectations.C. Vigorous promotion.D. Unique ingredients.22. A. It was suggested by the firm's vice-president.B. It matches the food's dark green packaging.C. It has a positive implication for consumers.D. It tricks the elders into impulse purchasing.Passage ThreeQuestions 23 to 25 are based on the passage you have just heard.23.A. It is practiced in most of the states.B. It will be abolished sooner or later.C. It has drawn a lot of criticism from overseas.D. It has to be approved by the Supreme Court.24. A. Whether the practice should be allowed to continue in future.B. Whether there should be a minimum age limit for execution.C. What type of criminals should receive it.D. What effect it might have on youngsters.25. A. The court sentenced him to life in prison for killing two friends.B. The governor changed his death sentence to life in prison.C. He was the first minor to be executed in South Carolina.D. He was sentenced to death for a crime he committed as a minor.Section CDirections: In this section, you will hear a passage three times. When the passage is read for the first time, you should listen carefully for its general idea. When the passage isread for the second time, you are required to fill in the blanks with, the exact words you have just heard. Finally, when the passage is read for the third time, you should check what you have written.Some people borrow money and "forget" to pay it back.Large loans are seldom the issue; they are usually treated as business26, with the terms spelled out on paper. But many women suffer27over problems like Carol's "My friend Ginny is always28cash," she says. "I hate to recall how often I've ' loaned' her a dollar or two for a drink or a movie. Each loan is so small I'd feel really cheap making a big deal out of it; still, I do29the fact that she never pays me back. "Carol admits to being "too30or something" to demand repayment, but she has resolved to stop lending money to Ginny. "The last time she asked for five dollars to pay for her dry cleaning, I just told her I couldn't31it. "Another woman suggests a bolder32. "When somebody refuses to repay a loan, I 33 by requesting one myself," she says. "'I left home without my wallet,' I'll say. 'Can you lend me enough to cover lunch?' Then, when the money is safely in hand, I am struck by a sudden 34 Why, this is exactly the amount I loaned you last week ! How 35! Now you won't have to repay me'" She says it works like a charm.Part III Reading Comprehension(40 minutes)Section ADirections: In this section, there is a passage with ten blanks. You are required to select one word for each blank from a list of choices given in a word bank following the passage. Read the passage through carefully before making your choices. Each choice inthe bank is identified by a letter. Please mark the corresponding letter for each item on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre. You may not use any of the words in the bank more than once. Questions 36 to 45 are based on the following passage. For many Americans,2013 ended with an unusually bitter cold spell. Late November and December36early snow and bone-chilling temperatures in much of the country, part of a year when, for the first time in two37, record-cold days will likely turn out to have oumumbered record-warm ones. But the U. S. was the exception: November was the warmest ever38, and current data indicates that 2013 is likely to have been the fourth hottest year on record. Enjoy the snow now, because39are good that 2014 will be even hotter, perhaps the hottest year since records have been kept. That's because, scientists are predicting,2014 will be an El Nifio Year. El Nino, Spanish for "the child",40when surface ocean waters in the southern Pacific become abnormally warm. So large is the Pacific, covering 30% of the planet's surface, that the41energy generated by its warming is enough to touch off a series of weather changes around the world. El Ninos are42with abnormally dry conditions in Southeast Asia and Australia. They can lead to extreme rain in parts of North and South America, even as southern Africa43dry weather. Marine life may be affected too: E1 Ninos can44the rising of the cold, nutrient-rich ( 营养丰富的）water that supports large fish45, and the unusually warm ocean temperatures can destroy coral ( 珊瑚).A. Additional I. logicallyB. Associated J. occursC. bore K. populationsD. Chances L. realizeE. Communicated M. reduceF. Decades N. SawG. experiences O. SpecificH. globallySection BDirections: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived. You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragraph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2.How to Eat WellA. Why do so many Americans eat tons of processed food, the stuff that is correctly called junk (垃圾. and should really carry warning labels?B. It's not because fresh ingredients are hard to come by. Supermarkets offer more variety than ever, and there are over four times as many farmers' markets in the U. S. as there were 20 years ago. nor is it for lack of available information. There are plenty of recipes (食谱), how-to videos and cooking classes available to anyone who has a computer, smart phone or television. If anything, the information is overwhelming.C. And yet we aren't cooking. If you eat three meals a day and behave like most Americans, you probably get at least a third of your daily calories (卡路里. outside the home. Nearly two-thirds of us grab fast food once a week, and we get almost 25% of ourdally calories from snacks. So we're eating out or taking in, and we don't sit down－or we do, but we hurry.D. Shouldn't preparing－and consuming－food be a source of comfort, pride, health, well－being, relaxation, sociability? Something that connects us to other humans? Why would we want to outsource(外包. this basic task, especially when outsourcing it is so harmful?E. When I talk about cooking, I'm not talking about creating elaborate dinner parties or three－day science projects. I'm talking about simple, easy, everyday meals. My mission is to encourage green hands and those lacking time or money to feed themselves. That means we need modest, realistic expectations, and we need to teach people to cook food that's good enough to share with family and friends.F. Perhaps a return to real cooking needn't be far off. A recent Harris poll revealed that 79% of Americans say they enjoy cooking and 30% "love it"; 14% admit to not enjoying kitchen work and just 7% won't go near the stove at all. But this doesn't necessarily translate to real cooking, and the result of this survey shouldn't surprise anyone: 52% of those 65 or older cook at home five or more times per week; only a third of young people do.G. Back in the 1950s most of us grew up in households where Morn cooked virtually every night. The intention to put a home-cooked meal on the table was pretty much universal. Most people couldn't afford to do otherwise.H. Although frozen dinners were invented in the '40s, their popularity didn't boom until televisions became popular a decade or so later. Since then, packaged, pre-preparedmeals have been what's for dinner. The microwave and fast-food chains were the biggest catalysts ( 催化剂), but the big food companies--which want to sell anything except the raw ingredients that go into cooking－made the home cook an endangered species.I. Still, I find it strange that only a third of young people report preparing meals at home regularly. Isn't this the same crowd that rails against processed junk and champions craft cooking? And isn't this the generation who say they're concerned about their health and the well－being of the planet? If these are truly the values of many young people, then their behavior doesn't match their beliefs.J. There have been haft－hearted but well-publicized efforts by some food companies to reduce calories in their processed foods, but the Standard American Diet is still the polar opposite of the healthy, mostly plant－based diet that just about every expert says we should be eating. Considering that the government's standards are not nearly ambitious enough, the picture is clear: by not cooking at home, we're not eating the right things, and the consequences are hard to overstate.K. To help quantify (量化). the costs of a poor diet, I recently tried to estimate this impact in terms of a most famous food, the burger (汉堡包). I concluded that the profit from burgers is more than offset (抵消）by the damage they cause in health problems and environmental harm.L. Cooling real food is the best defense－not to mention that any meal you're likely to eat at home contains about 200 fewer calories than one you would eat in a restaurant. M. T o those Americans for whom money is a concern, my advice is simple: Buy what you can afford, and cook it yourself. The common prescription is to primarily shop thegrocery store, since that's where fresh produce, meat and seafood, and dairy are. And to save money and still eat well you don't need local, organic ingredients; all you need is real food. I'm not saying local food isn't better; it is. But there is plenty of decent food in the grocery stores.N. The other sections you should get to know are the frozen foods and the canned goods. Frozen produce is still produce; canned tomatoes are still tomatoes. Just make sure you're getting real food without tons of added salt or sugar. Ask yourself, would Grandma consider this food? Does it look like something that might occur in nature? It's pretty much common sense: you want to buy food, not unidentifiable food like objects. O. You don't have to hit the grocery store daily, nor do you need an abundance of skill. Since fewer than haft of Americans say they cook at an intermediate level and only 20% describe their cooling skills as advanced, the crisis is one of confidence. And the only remedy for that is practice. There's nothing mysterious about cooking the evening meal. You just have to do a little thinking ahead and redefine what qualifies as dinner. Like any skill, cooking gets easier as you do it more; every time you cook, you advance your level of skills. Someday you won't even need recipes. My advice is that you not pay attention to the number of steps and ingredients, because they can be deceiving.P. Time, I realize, is the biggest obstacle to cooking for most people. You must adjust your prioritiesto find time to cook. For instance, you can move a TV to the kitchen and watch your favorite shows while you're standing at the sink. No one is asking you to give up activities you like, but if you're watching food shows on TV, try cooking instead.46. Cooking benefits people in many ways and enables them to connect with one another.47. Abundant information about cooking is available either online or on TV.48. Young people do less cooking at home than the elderly these days.49. Cooking skills can be improved with practice.50. In the mid-20th century, most families ate dinner at home instead of eating out.51. Even those short of time or money should be encouraged to cook for themselves and their family.52. Eating food not cooked by ourselves can cause serious consequences.53. To eat well and still save money, people should buy fresh food and cook it themselves.54. We get a fairly large portion of calories from fast food and snacks.55. The popularity of TV led to the popularity of frozen food.Section CDirections: 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 Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre.Passage One Questions 56 to 60 are based on the following passage.The wallet is heading for extinction. As a day-to-day essential, it will die off with the generation who read print newspapers. The kind of shopping－where you hand over notes and count out change in return－now happens only in the most minor of our retailencounters, like buying a bar of chocolate or a pint of milk from a comer shop. At the shops where you spend any real money, that money is increasingly abstracted. And this is more and more true, the higher up the scale you go. At the most cutting-edge retail stores－Victoria Beckham on Dover Street, for instance－you don't go and stand at any kind of cash register when you decide to pay. The staff are equipped with iPads to take your payment while you relax on a sofa.Which is nothing more or less than excellent service, if you have the money. But across society, the abstraction of the idea of cash makes me uneasy. Maybe I'm just old－fashioned. But earning money isn't quick or easy for most of us. Isn't it a bit weird that spending it should happen in haft a blink (眨眼). of an eye? Doesn't a wallet－that time －honoured Friday－night feeling of pleasing, promising fatness－represent something that matters?But I'll leave the economics to the experts. What bothers me about the death of the wallet is the change it represents in our physical environment. Everything about the look and feel of a wallet－the way the fastenings and materials wear and tear and loosen with age, the plastic and paper and gold and silver, and handwritten phone numbers and printed cinema tickets－is the very opposite of what our world is becoming. The opposite of a wallet is a smart phone or an iPad..The rounded edges, cool glass, smooth and unknowable as a pebble (鹅卵石). Instead of digging through pieces of paper and peering into corners, we move our fingers left and right. No more counting out coins. Show your wallet, if you still have one. It may not be here much longer.56. What is happening to the wallet?A. It is disappearing.B. It is being fattened.C. It is becoming costly.D. It is changing in style.57. How are business transactions done in big modern stores?A. Individually.B. Electronically.C. In the abstract.D. Via a cash register.58. What makes the author feel uncomfortable nowadays?A. Saving money is becoming a thing of the past.B. The pleasing Friday－night feeling is fading.C. Earning money is getting more difficult.D. Spending money is so fast and easy.59. Why does the author choose to write about what's happening to the wallet?A. It represents a change in the modern world.B. It has something to do with everybody's life.C. It marks the end of a time－honoured tradition.D. It is the concern of contemporary economists.60. What can we infer from the passage about the author?A. He is resistant to social changes.B. He is against technological progress.C. He feels reluctant to part with the traditional wallet.D. He feels insecure in the ever－changing modern world.Passage TwoQuestions 61 to 65 are based on the following passage.Everybody sleeps, but what people stay up late to catch－or wake up early in order notto miss－varies by culture. From data collected, it seems the things that cause us to lose the most sleep, on average, are sporting events, time changes, and holidays. Around the world, people changed sleep patterns thanks to the start or end of daylight savings time. Russians, for example, began to wake up about a half-hour later each day after President Vladimir Putin shifted the country permanently to "winter time" starting on October 26.Russia's other late nights and early mornings generally correspond to public holidays. On New Year's Eve, Russians have the world's latest bedtime, hitting the hay at around 3:30 am. Russians also get up an hour later on International Women's Day, the day for treating and celebrating female relatives. Similarly, Americans' late nights, late mornings, and longest sleeps fall on three－day weekends. Canada got the least sleep of the year the night it beat Sweden in the Olympic hockey (冰球) final. The World Cup is also chiefly responsible for sleep deprivation (剥夺). The worst night for sleep in the U. K. was the night of the England-Italy match on June 14. Brits stayed up a half－hour later to watch it, and then they woke up earlier than usual the next morning thanks to summer nights, the phenomenon in which the sun barely sets in northern countries in the summertime. That was nothing, though, compared to Germans, Italians, and the French, who stayed up around an hour and a haft later on various days throughout the summer to watch the Cup.It should be made clear that not everyone has a device to record their sleep patterns; in some of these nations, it's likely that only the richest people do. And people who elect to track their sleep may try to get more sleep than the average person. Even if that's the case, though, the above findings are still striking. If the most health-conscious among ushave such deep swings in our shut-eye levels throughout the year, how much sleep are the rest of us losing?61. What does the author say about people's sleeping habits?A. They are culture－related.B. They affect people's health.C. They change with the seasons.D. They vary from person to person.62, What do we learn about the Russians regarding sleep?A)They don't fall asleep until very late.B. They don't sleep much on weekends.C. They get less sleep on public holidays.D. They sleep longer than people elsewhere.63. what is the major cause for Europeans' loss of sleep?A. The daylight savings time.B. The colorful night life.C. The World Cup.D. The summertime.64. what is the most probable reason for some rich people to use a device to record their sleep patterns?A)They have trouble falling asleep.B. They want to get sufficient sleep.C. They are involved in a sleep research.D. They want to go to bed on regular hours.65. what does the author imply in the last paragraph?A. Sleeplessness does harm to people's health.B. Few people really know the importance of sleep.C. It is important to study our sleep patterns.D. Average people probably sleep less than the rich.Part TV Translation( 30 minutes )Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to translate a passage from Chinese into English. You should write your answer on Answer Sheet 2.云南省的丽江古镇是中国著名的旅游目的地之一。
2015年12月大学英语四级考试真题听力原文及参考答案(第2套)
2015年12月大学英语四级考试真题答案及详解（第2套）PART ⅠWriting思维导图学习应该是一个终生的过程Learning Should Be a Lifelong Process第一段结合谚语，引出话题：终身学习的重要性(the importance of lifelong learning)。
第二段分析终身学习对于现代社会的我们如此重要的原因。
在快速发展的信息时代，我们必须通过不断学习来紧跟时代潮流(keep pace with the times)，否则将会失去很多机会(too outdated to seize any opportunities)。
作者通过出租车司机使用打车软件增加收入和家庭主妇开网店赚钱两个例子来进一步支持自己的论点，避免说理空洞。
第三段引用谚语“活到老学到老”(it is never too old to learn)进一步呼应和深化主题、总结全文：学习无关乎年龄。
只有不断学习，才能在迅猛发展的社会中发挥自身潜能(achieve our potential)、生活得更好。
〇高分范文Learning Should Be a Lifelong Process①It is often said that learning is a daily experience and a lifetime mission. ②The saying indicates the importance of lifelong learning, which we have been lectured over and over again.③Lifelong learning is crucial to our life and career in modern society. ④Living in the Information Age, we have to keep pace with the times through ceaseless learning; otherwise, we'll be too outdated to seize any opportunities. ⑤For example, a taxi driver who learns to use a Taxi App such as Didi can make much more money than those who don't; a housewife who opens a shop online can even out-earn a white-collar worker. ⑥All of their success can be attributed to their constant learning in addition to the progress of technology.⑦As an old saying goes, it is never too old to learn. Thus, learning is an attitude regardless of age. ⑧Only through learning ceaselessly can we achieve our potential and live a better life in this rapidly developing society.〇精彩点评①开门见山，引出谚语。
2015年12月大学英语四级真题及解析第二套(1)
2015年12月大学英语四级考试真题(第2套)Part I Writing(30 minutes)Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay commenting on the saying"Learning is a daily experience and a lifetime mission. " You can cite examples to illustrate the importance of lifelong learning. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words._______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________Part II Listening Comprehension ( 30 minutes )Section ADirections: In this section, you will hear 8 short conversations and 2 long conversations. At theend of each conversation, one or more questions will be askedabout what was said. Both the conversation and the questions willbe spoken only once. After each question there will be a 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 thecorresponding letter on Answer Sheet I with a single line throughthe center.1. A. The agenda for the board of directors' meeting.B. The details of the meeting to be held next week.C. The reason for the man's absence from the meeting.D. The time for the man's visit to the woman's company.2.A. At a travel agency.B. At a department store.C. In a library.D. In a post office.3.A. He cannot hear the woman's call.B. He cannot get through to New York.C. He cannot recall the phone number.D. He cannot find a public phone nearby.4.A. Watch a movie with the woman.B. Revise his thesis in the office.C. Do some shopping with Jane.D. Discuss his thesis with Prof. Hudson.5. A. He just cannot work properly without a watch.B. He has no idea where he can buy a gold watch.C. He still does not know where he left his watch.D. He is not sure what went wrong with his watch.6.A. He forgot all about what he said.B. He slipped and hurt his head.C. He was sorry for being off sick last week.D. He thought the woman's car had been sold.7.A. She should try to catch an earlier bus.B. She is absent from his class too often.C. She is always making excuses for being late.D. She should come up with a better excuse.8.A. He is going to help the woman out.B. He has to move out of the building soon.C. He is on his way to see a real estate agent.D. He will stay with the woman's brother.Questions 9 to 11 are based on the conversation you have just heard.9.A. From the wanted cohunn.B. From some of her friends.C. From a telephone directory.D. From a television commercial.10.A. She received full-time education abroad.B. She graduated from an open university.C. She finished her secondary school.D. She studied in a vocational college.11.A. She is a shorthand-typist.B. She works as a tour guide.C. She is a policewoman.D. She teaches an evening class.Questions 12 to 15 are based on the conversation you have just heard.12.A. It provides him with career opportunities.B. It helps enlarge his customer network.C. It has been off and on for ten years.D. It was interrupted for four years.13.A. Individualized service.B. Traditional setting.C. Home-made beer.D. Social games.14.A. The quality of beer.B. The atmosphere.C. The owner's attitude.D. The right location.15.A. It is a rather tough job.B. It is a profitable business.C. It helps old people kill time.D. It makes retirees feel useful.Section BDirections: In this section, you will hear 3 short passages. At the end of each passage, you will hear some questions. Both the passage and the questions will be spoken only once. After you hear a question, you must choose the best answer from the four choices marked A , B ,C. and D. Then mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 1 with a single line through the center.Passage OneQuestions 16 to 18 are based on the passage you have just heard.16.A. It is becoming increasingly popular.B. It helps the user to escape reality.C. It gives rise to serious social instability.D. It hurts a person and those around them.17.A. They use drugs just for fun.B. They take drugs to get high.C. They use drugs as medicine.D. They keep drug use a secret.18. A. It is quite common in entertainment circles.B. It is the cause of various social problems.C. It is hard to get rid of.D. It is fatal to the user.Passage TwoQuestions 19 to 22 are based on the passage you have just heard.19.A. Taking up exercises after recovery.B. Producing tasty healthy frozen food.C. Finding new ways to cure heart disease.D. Going on a diet upon leaving the hospital.20.A. It was carefully tested with consumers.B. It was promoted by health organizations.C. It was disapproved by many diet experts.D. It was highly expected by the general public.21.A. Competitive price.B. Low expectations.C. Vigorous promotion.D. Unique ingredients.22. A. It was suggested by the firm's vice-president.B. It matches the food's dark green packaging.C. It has a positive implication for consumers.D. It tricks the elders into impulse purchasing.Passage ThreeQuestions 23 to 25 are based on the passage you have just heard.23.A. It is practiced in most of the states.B. It will be abolished sooner or later.C. It has drawn a lot of criticism from overseas.D. It has to be approved by the Supreme Court.24. A. Whether the practice should be allowed to continue in future.B. Whether there should be a minimum age limit for execution.C. What type of criminals should receive it.D. What effect it might have on youngsters.25. A. The court sentenced him to life in prison for killing two friends.B. The governor changed his death sentence to life in prison.C. He was the first minor to be executed in South Carolina.D. He was sentenced to death for a crime he committed as a minor.Section CDirections: In this section, you will hear a passage 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 exact words you have just heard. Finally, when the passage is read for the third time, you should check what you have written.Some people borrow money and "forget" to pay it back.Large loans are seldom the issue; they are usually treated as business26, with the terms spelled out on paper. But many women suffer27over problems like Carol's "My friend Ginny is always28cash," she says. "I hate to recall how often I've ' loaned' her a dollar or two for a drink or a movie. Each loan is so small I'd feel really cheap making a big deal out of it; still, I do29the fact that she never pays me back. "Carol admits to being "too30or something" to demand repayment, but she has resolved to stop lending money to Ginny. "The last time she asked for five dollars to pay for her dry cleaning, I just told her I couldn't31it. "Another woman suggests a bolder32. "When somebody refuses to repay a loan, I33byrequesting one myself," she says. "'I left home without my wallet,' I'll say. 'Can you lend me enough to cover lunch?' Then, when the money is safely in hand, I am struck by a sudden34Why, this is exactly the amount I loaned you last week ! How35! Now you won't have to repay me'" She says it works like a charm.Part III Reading Comprehension(40 minutes)Section ADirections: In this section, there is a passage with ten blanks. You are required to select one word for each blank from a list of choices given in a word bank following the passage. Read the passage through carefully before making your choices.Each choice in the bank is identified by a letter. Please mark the corresponding letter for each item on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the center. You may not use any of the words in the bank more than once.Questions 36 to 45 are based on the following passage.For many Americans,2013 ended with an unusually bitter cold te November and December36early snow and bone-chilling temperatures in much of the country, part of a year when, for the first time in two37, record-cold days will likely turn out to have outnumbered record-warm ones. But the U. S. was the exception: November was the warmest ever38, and current data indicates that 2013 is likely to have been the fourth hottest year on record. Enjoy the snow now, because39are good that 2014 will be even hotter, perhaps the hottest year since records have been kept. That's because, scientists are predicting,2014 will be an El Nifio Year. El Nino, Spanish for "the child",40when surface ocean waters in the southern Pacific become abnormally warm. So large is the Pacific, covering 30% of the planet's surface, that the41energy generated by its warming is enough to touch off a series of weather changes around the world. El Ninos are42with abnormally dry conditions in Southeast Asia and Australia. They can lead to extreme rain in parts of North and South America, even as southern Africa43dry weather. Marine life may be affected too: E1 Ninos can44the rising of the cold, nutrient-rich ( 营养丰富的）water that supports large fish45, and the unusually warm ocean temperatures can destroy coral ( 珊瑚).A. Additional I. logicallyB. Associated J. occursC. bore K. populationsD. Chances L. realizeE. Communicated M. reduceF. Decades N. SawG. experiences O. SpecificH. globallySection BDirections: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived. You may choose a paragraph more than once.Each paragraph is marked with a letter.Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2. How to Eat WellA. Why do so many Americans eat tons of processed food, the stuff that is correctly called junk (垃圾. and should really carry warning labels?B. It's not because fresh ingredients are hard to come by. Supermarkets offer more variety than ever, and there are over four times as many farmers' markets in the U. S. as there were 20 years ago. nor is it for lack of available information. There are plenty of recipes (食谱), how-to videos and cooking classes available to anyone who has a computer, smart phone or television. If anything, the information is overwhelming.C. And yet we aren't cooking. If you eat three meals a day and behave like most Americans, you probably get at least a third of your dally calories (卡路里. outside the home. Nearly two-thirds of us grab fast food once a week, and we get almost 25% of our dally calories from snacks. So we're eating out or taking in, and we don't sit down－or we do, but we hurry.D. Shouldn't preparing－and consuming－food be a source of comfort, pride, health, well－being, relaxation, sociability? Something that connects us to other humans? Why would we want to outsource(外包. this basic task, especially when outsourcing it is so harmful?E. When I talk about cooking, I'm not talking about creating elaborate dinner parties or three－day science projects. I'm talking about simple, easy, everyday meals. My mission is to encourage green hands and those lacking time or money to feed themselves. That means we need modest, realistic expectations, and we need to teach people to cook food that's good enough to share with family and friends.F. Perhaps a return to real cooking needn't be far off. A recent Harris poll revealed that 79% of Americans say they enjoy cooking and 30% "love it" ; 14% admit to not enjoying kitchen work and just 7% won't go near the stove at all. But this doesn't necessarily translate to real cooking, and the result of this survey shouldn't surprise anyone: 52% of those 65 or older cook at home fiveor more times per week; only a third of young people do.G. Back in the 1950s most of us grew up in households where Morn cooked virtually every night. The intention to put a home-cooked meal on the table was pretty much universal. Most people couldn't afford to do otherwise.H. Although frozen dinners were invented in the '40s, their popularity didn't boom until televisions became popular a decade or so later. Since then, packaged, pre-prepared meals have been what's for dinner. The microwave and fast-food chains were the biggest catalysts ( 催化剂), but the big food companies--which want to sell anything except the raw ingredients that go into cooking－made the home cook an endangered species.I. Still, I find it strange that only a third of young people report preparing meals at home regularly. Isn't this the same crowd that rails against processed junk and champions craft cooking? And isn't this the generation who say they're concerned about their health and the well－being of the planet? If these are truly the values of many young people, then their behavior doesn't match their beliefs. J. There have been haft－hearted but well-publicized efforts by some food companies to reduce calories in their processed foods, but the Standard American Diet is still the polar opposite of the healthy,mostly plant－based diet that just about every expert says we should be eating. Considering that the government's standards are not nearly ambitious enough, the picture is clear: by not cooking at home, we're not eating the right things, and the consequences are hard to overstate.K. To help quantify (量化). the costs of a poor diet, I recently tried to estimate this impact in terms of a most famous food, the burger (汉堡包). I concluded that the profit from burgers is more than offset (抵消）by the damage they cause in health problems and environmental harm.L. Cooking real food is the best defense－not to mention that any meal you're likely to eat at home contains about 200 fewer calories than one you would eat in a restaurant.M. To those Americans for whom money is a concern, my advice is simple: Buy what you can afford,and cook it yourself. The common prescription is to primarily shop the grocery store, since that's where fresh produce, meat and seafood, and dairy are. And to save money and still eat well you don't need local, organic ingredients; all you need is real food. I'm not saying local food isn't better; it is. But there is plenty of decent food in the grocery stores.N. The other sections you should get to know are the frozen foods and the canned goods. Frozenproduce is still produce; canned tomatoes are still tomatoes. Just make sure you're getting real food without tons of added salt or sugar. Ask yourself, would Grandma consider this food? Does it look like something that might occur in nature? It's pretty much common sense: you want to buy food,not unidentifiable food like objects.O. You don't have to hit the grocery store daily, nor do you need an abundance of skill. Since fewer than haft of Americans say they cook at an intermediate level and only 20% describe their cooking skills as advanced, the crisis is one of confidence. And the only remedy for that is practice. There's nothing mysterious about cooking the evening meal. You just have to do a little thinking ahead and redefine what qualifies as dinner. Like any skill, cooking gets easier as you do it more; every time you cook, you advance your level of skills. Someday you won't even need recipes. My advice is that you not pay attention to the number of steps and ingredients, because they can be deceiving.P. Time, I realize, is the biggest obstacle to cooking for most people. You must adjust your prioritiesto find time to cook. For instance, you can move a TV to the kitchen and watch your favorite shows while you're standing at the sink. No one is asking you to give up activities you like, but if you're watching food shows on TV, try cooking instead.46. Cooking benefits people in many ways and enables them to connect with one another.47. Abundant information about cooking is available either online or on TV.48. Young people do less cooking at home than the elderly these days.49. Cooking skills can be improved with practice.50. In the mid-20th century, most families ate dinner at home instead of eating out.51. Even those short of time or money should be encouraged to cook for themselves and their family.52. Eating food not cooked by ourselves can cause serious consequences.53. To eat well and still save money, people should buy fresh food and cook it themselves.54. We get a fairly large portion of calories from fast food and snacks.55. The popularity of TV led to the popularity of frozen food.Section CDirections: There are 2 passages in this section. Each passage is followed by some questions orunfinished 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 Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the center.Passage One Questions 56 to 60 are based on the following passage.The wallet is heading for extinction. As a day-to-day essential, it will die off with the generation who read print newspapers. The kind of shopping－where you hand over notes and count out change in return－now happens only in the most minor of our retail encounters, like buying a bar of chocolate or a pint of milk from a comer shop. At the shops where you spend any real money, that money is increasingly abstracted. And this is more and more true, the higher up the scale you go. At the most cutting-edge retail stores－Victoria Beck ham on Dover Street, for instance－you don't go and stand at any kind of cash register when you decide to pay. The staff are equipped with iPads to take your payment while you relax on a sofa.Which is nothing more or less than excellent service, if you have the money. But across society, the abstraction of the idea of cash makes me uneasy. Maybe I'm just old－fashioned. But earning money isn't quick or easy for most of us. Isn't it a bit weird that spending it should happen in haft a blink (眨眼). of an eye? Doesn't a wallet－that time－honoured Friday－night feeling of pleasing, promising fatness－represent something that matters?But I'll leave the economics to the experts. What bothers me about the death of the wallet is the change it represents in our physical environment. Everything about the look and feel of a wallet－the way the fastenings and materials wear and tear and loosen with age, the plastic and paper and gold and silver, and handwritten phone numbers and printed cinema tickets－is the very opposite of what our world is becoming. The opposite of a wallet is a smart phone or an iPad..The rounded edges, cool glass, smooth and unknowable as a pebble (鹅卵石). Instead of digging through pieces of paper and peering into corners, we move our fingers left and right. No more counting out coins. Show your wallet, if you still have one. It may not be here much longer.56. What is happening to the wallet?A. It is disappearing.B. It is being fattened.C. It is becoming costly.D. It is changing in style.57. How are business transactions done in big modern stores?A. Individually.B. Electronically.C. In the abstract.D. Via a cash register.58. What makes the author feel uncomfortable nowadays?A. Saving money is becoming a thing of the past.B. The pleasing Friday－night feeling is fading.C. Earning money is getting more difficult.D. Spending money is so fast and easy.59. Why does the author choose to write about what's happening to the wallet?A. It represents a change in the modern world.B. It has something to do with everybody's life.C. It marks the end of a time－honoured tradition.D. It is the concern of contemporary economists.60. What can we infer from the passage about the author?A. He is resistant to social changes.B. He is against technological progress.C. He feels reluctant to part with the traditional wallet.D. He feels insecure in the ever－changing modern world.Passage TwoQuestions 61 to 65 are based on the following passage.Everybody sleeps, but what people stay up late to catch－or wake up early in order not to miss－varies by culture. From data collected, it seems the things that cause us to lose the most sleep, on average, are sporting events, time changes, and holidays.Around the world, people changed sleep patterns thanks to the start or end of daylight savings time. Russians, for example, began to wake up about a half-hour later each day after President Vladimir Putin shifted the country permanently to "winter time" starting on October 26.Russia's other late nights and early mornings generally correspond to public holidays. On New Year's Eve, Russians have the world's latest bedtime, hitting the hay at around 3:30 am. Russians also get upan hour later on International Women' s Day, the day for treating and celebrating female relatives. Similarly, Americans' late nights, late mornings, and longest sleeps fall on three－day weekends. Canada got the least sleep of the year the night it beat Sweden in the Olympic hockey (冰球. final.The World Cup is also chiefly responsible for sleep deprivation (剥夺). The worst night for sleep in the U. K. was the night of the England-Italy match on June 14. Brits stayed up a half－hour later to watch it, and then they woke up earlier than usual the next morning thanks to summer nights, the phenomenon in which the sun barely sets in northern countries in the summertime. That was nothing, though, compared to Germans, Italians, and the French, who stayed up around an hour and a haft later on various days throughout the summer to watch the Cup.It should be made clear that not everyone has a device to record their sleep patterns; in some of these nations, it's likely that only the richest people do. And people who elect to track their sleep may try to get more sleep than the average person. Even if that's the case, though, the above findings are still striking. If the most health-conscious among us have such deep swings in our shut-eye levels throughout the year, how much sleep are the rest of us losing?61. What does the author say about people's sleeping habits?A. They are culture－related.B. They affect people's health.C. They change with the seasons.D. They vary from person to person.62, What do we learn about the Russians regarding sleep?A)They don't fall asleep until very late.B. They don't sleep much on weekends.C. They get less sleep on public holidays.D. They sleep longer than people elsewhere.63. what is the major cause for Europeans' loss of sleep?A. The daylight savings time.B. The colorful night life.C. The World Cup.D. The summertime.64. what is the most probable reason for some rich people to use a device to record their sleeppatterns?A)They have trouble falling asleep.B. They want to get sufficient sleep.C. They are involved in a sleep research.D. They want to go to bed on regular hours.65. what does the author imply in the last paragraph?A. Sleeplessness does harm to people's health.B. Few people really know the importance of sleep.C. It is important to study our sleep patterns.D. Average people probably sleep less than the rich.Part TV Translation( 30 minutes )Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to translate a passage from Chinese into English. You should write your answer on Answer Sheet 2.云南省的丽江古镇是中国著名的旅游目的地之一。
四级真题2015年12月第二套
D) He was sentenced to death for a crime he committed as a minor.
第四部分听写（2016年不再考此题型，同学们依然可以做一下，测下自己的听力效果）
B) He cannot get through to New York.
C) He cannot recall the phone number.
D) He cannot find a public phone nearby.
4.
A) Watch a movie with the woman.
B) Revise his thesis in the office.
B) It helps enlarge his customer network.
C) It has been off and on for ten years.
D) It was interrupted for four years.
13.
A) Individualized service.
B) Traditional setting.
听力题
1.
A) The agenda for the board of directors' meeting
B) The details of the meeting to be held next week.
C) The reason for the man's absence from the meeting
23.
A) It is practiced in most of the states.
2015年12月大学英语四级真题试卷(二)(题后含答案及解析)
2015年12月大学英语四级真题试卷（二）(题后含答案及解析)题型有：1. Writing 2. Listening Comprehension 3. 4. Reading Comprehension 5. TranslationPart I Writing1．For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay commenting on the saying “Learning is a daily experience and a lifetime mission. “You can cite examples to illustrate the importance of lifelong learning. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words.正确答案：Learning Should Be a Lifelong Process It is often said that learning is a daily experience and a lifetime mission. The saying indicates the importance of lifelong learning, which we have been lectured over and over again. Lifelong learning is crucial to our life and career in modern society. Living in the Information Age, we have to keep pace with the times through ceaseless learning: otherwise, we’ll be too outdated to seize any opportunities. For example, a taxi driver who learns to use a Taxi App such as Didi can make much more money than those who don’t: a housewife who opens a shop online can even out-earn a white-collar worker. All of their success can be attributed to their constant learning in addition to the progress of technology. As an old saying goes, it is never too old to learn. Thus, learning is an attitude regardless of age. Only through learning ceaselessly can we achieve our potential and live a better life in this rapidly developing society.Part II Listening ComprehensionSection A听力原文：W: Hello, Mr. Harrison, thanks for calling. Now, when would it be good for you to visit our company? M: Well. In fact, I can come almost any time next month. And probably toward the end of a week would be best for me. Q: What are the speakers talking about?2．A．The agenda for the board of directors’ meeting.B．The details of the meeting to be held next week.C．The reason for the man’s absence from the meeting.D．The time for the man’s visit to the woman’s company.正确答案：D解析：女士询问男士什么时候方便到她所在的公司参观，男士说下个月几乎任何时间都行，可能接近周末的时间最好。
15年12月四级真题答案第二套
15年12月四级真题答案第二套Directions:Write an essay commenting on the saying “Learning is a daily experience and a life mission.”You can cite examples to illustrate the importance of lifelong learning.CET420151202.mp3 来自GDUTICE 00:0026:24 Section A Directions: In this section, you will hear 8 short conversations and 2 long conversations. At the end of each conversation, one or more questions will be asked about what was said. Both the conversation and the questions will be spoken only once. After each question there will bea 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 Answer Sheet I with a single line through the centre. 1. A. The agenda for the board of directors' meeting. B. The details of the meeting to be held next week. C. The reason for the man's absence from the meeting. D. The time for the man's visit to the woman's company. 2.A. At a travel agency. B. At a department store. C. In a library. D. In a post office. 3.A. He cannot hear the woman's call. B. He cannot get through to New York. C. He cannot recall the phone number. D. He cannot find a public phone nearby. 4.A. Watch a movie with the woman. B. Revise his thesis in the office. C. Do some shopping with Jane. D. Discuss his thesis with Prof. Hudson. 5. A. He just cannot work properly without a watch. B. He has no idea where he can buy a gold watch. C. He still does not know where he left hiswatch. D. He is not sure what went wrong with his watch. 6.A. He forgot all about what he said. B. He slipped and hurt his head. C. He was sorry for being off sick last week. D. He thought the woman's car had been sold. 7.A. She should try to catch an earlier bus. B. She is absent from his class too often. C. She is always making excuses for being late. D. She should come up with a better excuse. 8.A. He is going to help the woman out. B. He has to move out of the building soon. C. He is on his way to see a real estate agent. D. He will stay with the woman's brother. Questions 9 to 11 are based on the conversation you have just heard. 9.A. From the wanted cohunn. B. From some of her friends. C. From a telephone directory. D. From a television commercial. 10.A. She received full-time education abroad. B. She graduated from an open university. C. She fmished her secondary school. D. She studied in a vocational college.11.A. She is a shorthand-typist. B. She works as a tour guide. C. She is a policewoman. D. She teaches an evening class. Questions 12 to 15 are based on the conversation you have just heard. 12.A. It provides him with career opportunities. B. It helps enlarge his customer network. C. It has been off and on for ten years. D. It was interrupted for four years.13.A. Individualized service. B. Traditional setting. C. Home-made beer. D. Social games. 14.A. The quality of beer. B. The atmosphere. C. The owner's attitude. D. The right location. 15.A. It is a rather tough job. B. It is a profitable business. C. It helps old people kill time. D. It makesretirees feel useful. Section B Directions: In this section, you will hear 3 short passages. At the end of each passage, you will hear some questions. Both the passage and the questions will be spoken only once. After youhear a question, you must choose the best answer from the four choices marked A , B ,C. and D. Then mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 1 with a single line through the centre. Passage One Questions 16 to 18 are based on the passage you have just heard. 16.A. It is becoming increasingly popular. B. It helps the user to escape reality.C. It gives rise to serious social instability.D. It hurts a person and those around them. 17.A. They use drugs just for fun. B. They take drugs to get high. C. They use drugs as medicine. D. They keep drug use a secret.18. A. It is quite common in entertainment circles. B. It is the cause of various social problems. C. It is hard to get rid of. D. It is fatal to the user. Passage Two Questions 19 to 22 are based on the passage you have just heard. 19.A. Taking up exercises after recovery. B. Producing tasty healthy frozen food. C. Finding new ways to cure heart disease. D. Going on a diet upon leaving the hospital. 20.A. Itwas carefully tested with consumers. B. It was promoted by health organizations. C. It was disapproved by many diet experts. D. It was highly expected by the general public. 21.A. Competitive price. B. Low expectations. C. Vigorous promotion. D. Unique ingredients. 22. A. It was suggested by the firm's vice-president. B. It matches the food's dark green packaging.C. It has a positive implication for consumers.D. It tricks the elders into impulse purchasing. Passage Three Questions 23 to 25 are based on the passage you have just heard. 23.A. It is practiced in most of the states. B. It will be abolished sooner or later. C. It has drawn a lot of criticism from overseas. D. It has to be approved by the Supreme Court.24. A. Whether the practice should be allowed to continue in future. B. Whether there should be a minimum age limit for execution. C. What type of criminals should receive it. D. What effect it might have on youngsters. 25. A. The court sentenced him to life in prison for killing two friends. B. The governor changed his death sentence to life in prison. C. He was the first minor to be executed in South Carolina. D. He was sentenced to death for a crime he committed as a minor. Section C Directions: In this section, you will hear a passage 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 exact words you have just heard. Finally, when the passage is read for the third time, you should check what you have written.Some people borrow money and "forget" to pay it back. Large loans are seldom the issue; they are usually treated as business（26）, with the terms spelled out on paper. But many women suffer（27）over problems like Carol's "My friend Ginny is always28cash," she says. "I hate to recall how often I've ' loaned' her a dollar or two for adrink or a movie. Each loan is so small I'd feel really cheap making a big deal out of it; still, I do（29）the fact that she never pays me back. "Carol admits to being "too（30）or something" to demand repayment, but she has resolved tostop lending money to Ginny. "The last time she asked for five dollars to pay for her dry cleaning, I just told her I couldn't（31）it. "Another woman suggests a bolder（32）. "When somebody refuses to repay a loan, I（33）byrequesting one myself," she says. "'I left home without my wallet,' I'll say. 'Can you lend meenough to cover lunch?' Then, when the money is safely in hand, I am struck by a sudden（34）Why, this is exactly the amount I loaned you last week ! How（35）! Now you won't have to repay me'" She says it works like a charm.Section A Directions: In this section, there is a passage with ten blanks. You are required to select one word for each blank from a list of choices given in a word bank following the passage. Read the passage through carefully before making your choices.Each choice in the bank isidentified by a letter. Please mark the corresponding letter for each item on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre. You may not use any of the words in the bank more than once. Questions 36 to 45 are based on the following passage. For many Americans,2013 ended with an unusually bitter cold te November and December（36）early snow and bone-chilling temperatures in much of the country, part of a year when, for the firsttime in two（37）, record-cold days will likely turn out to have oumumbered record-warm ones. But the U. S. was the exception: November was the warmest ever（38）, and current data indicates that 2013 is likely to have been the fourth hottest year on record. Enjoy the snow now, because（39）are good that 2014 will be even hotter, perhaps the hottest year since records have been kept. That's because, scientists are predicting,2014 will be an El Nifio Year. El Nino, Spanish for "the child",（40）when surface ocean waters in the southern Pacific become abnormally warm. So large is the Pacific, covering 30% of the planet's surface, that the（41）energy generated by its warming is enough to touch off a series of weather changes around the world. El Ninos are（42）with abnormally dry conditions in Southeast Asia and Australia. They can lead to extreme rain in parts of North and South America, even as southern Africa（43）dry weather. Marine life may be affected too: E1 Ninos can（44）the rising of the cold, nutrient-rich ( 营养丰富的）water that supports large fish（45）, and the unusually warm ocean temperatures can destroy coral ( 珊瑚). A. Additional B. Associated C. bore D. Chances E. Communicated F. Decades G. experiences H. globally I. logically J. occurs K. populations L. realize M. reduce N. Saw O. Specific Section B Directions: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it.Eachstatement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraphfrom which the information is derived. You may choose a paragraph more than once.Each paragraph is marked with a letter.Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2. How to Eat Well A. Why do so many Americans eat tons of processed food, the stuff that is correctly called junk (垃圾. and should really carry warning labels? B. It's not because fresh ingredients are hard to come by. Supermarkets offer more variety than ever, and there are over four times as many farmers' markets in the U. S. as there were 20 years ago. nor is it for lack of available information. There are plenty of recipes (食谱), how-to videos and cooking classes available to anyone who has a computer, smartphone or television. If anything, the information is overwhelming.C. And yet we aren't cooking. If you eat three meals a day and behave like most Americans, you probably get at least a third of your dally calories (卡路里. outside the home. Nearly two-thirds of us grab fast food once a week, and we get almost 25% of our dally calories from snacks. So we're eating out or taking in, and we don't sit down－or we do, but we hurry.D. Shouldn't preparing－and consuming－food be a source of comfort, pride, health, weli－being, relaxation, sociability? Something that connects us to other humans? Why would we want to outsource(外包. this basic task, especially when outsourcing it is soharmful? E. When I talk about cooking, I'm not talking about creating elaborate dinner parties or three－day science projects. I'm talking about simple, easy, everyday meals. My mission is to encourage green hands and those lacking time or money to feed themselves. That means we need modest, realistic expectations, and we need to teach people to cook food that's good enough to share with family and friends.F. Perhaps a return to real cooking needn't be far off. A recent Harris poll revealed that 79% of Americans say they enjoy cooking and 30% "love it" ; 14% admit to not enjoying kitchen work and just 7% won't go near the stove at all. But this doesn't necessarily translate to real cooking, and the result of this survey shouldn't surprise anyone: 52% of those 65 or older cook at home five or more times per week; only a third of young people do.G. Back in the 1950s most of us grew up in households where Morn cooked virtually every night. The intention to put a home-cooked meal on the table was pretty much universal. Most people couldn't afford to do otherwise.H. Although frozen dinners were invented in the '40s, their popularity didn't boom until televisions became popular a decade or so later. Since then, packaged, pre-prepared meals have been what's for dinner. The microwave and fast-food chains were the biggest catalysts ( 催化剂), but the big food companies--which want to sell anything except the raw ingredients that go into cooking－made the home cook an endangered species.I. Still, I fmd itstrange that only a third of young people report preparing meals at home regularly. Isn't this the same crowd that rails against processed junk and champions craft cooking? And isn't this the generation who say they're concerned about their health and the well－being of the planet? If these are truly the values of many young people, then their behavior doesn't match their beliefs. J. There have been haft－hearted but well-publicized efforts by some food companies to reduce calories in their processed foods, but the Standard American Diet is still the polar opposite of the healthy,mostly plant－based diet that just about every expert says we should be eating. Considering that the government's standards are not nearly ambitious enough, the picture is clear: bynot cooking athome, we're not eating the right things, and the consequences are hard to overstate. K. To help quantify (量化). the costs of a poor diet, I recently tried to estimate this impact in terms of a most famous food, the burger (汉堡包). I concluded that the profit from burgers is more than offset (抵消）by the damage they cause in health problems and environmental harm. L. Cooldng real food is the best defense －not to mention that any meal you're likely to eat at home contains about 200 fewer calories than one you would eat in a restaurant. M. To those Americans for whom money is a concern, my advice is simple: Buy what you can afford,and cook it yourself. The common prescription is to primarily shop the grocery store, since that's where fresh produce,meat and seafood, and dairy are. And to save money and still eat well you don't need local, organic ingredients; all you need is real food. I'm not saying local food isn't better; it is. But there is plenty of decent food in the grocery stores. N. The other sections you should get to know are the frozen foods and the canned goods. Frozen produce is still produce; canned tomatoes are still tomatoes. Just make sure you're getting real food without tons of added salt or sugar. Ask yourself, would Grandma consider this food? Does it look like something that might occur in nature? It's pretty much common sense: you want to buy food,not unidentifiable foodlike objects. O. You don't have to hit the grocery store daily, nor do you need an abundance of skill. Since fewer than haft of Americans say they cook at an intermediate level and only 20% describe their cooldng skills as advanced, the crisis is one of confidence. And the only remedy for that is practice. There's nothing mysterious about cooking the evening meal. You just have to do a little thinking ahead and redefine what qualifies as dinner. Like any skill, cooking gets easier as you do it more; every time you cook, you advance your level of skills. Someday you won't even need recipes. My advice is that you not pay attention to the number of steps and ingredients, because they can be deceiving. P. Time, I realize, is the biggest obstacle to cooking for most people. You must adjust your priorities to find time to cook. For instance, you can move a TV to the kitchen andwatch your favorite shows while you're standing at the sink. No one is asking you to give up activities you like, but if you're watching food shows on TV, try cooking instead. 46. Cooking benefits people in many ways and enables them to connect with one another. 47. Abundant information about cooking is available either online or on TV. 48. Young people do less cooking at home than the elderly these days. 49. Cooking skills can be improved with practice. 50. In the mid-20th century, most families ate dinner at home instead of eating out. 51. Even those short of time or money should be encouraged to cook for themselves and their family. 52. Eating food not cooked by ourselves can cause serious consequences. 53. To eat well and still save money, people should buy fresh food and cook it themselves. 54. We get a fairly large portion of calories from fast food and snacks. 55. The popularity of TV led to the popularity of frozen food. Section C 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 Answer Passage One The wallet is heading for extinction. As a day-to-day essential, it will die off with the generation who read print newspapers. The kind of shopping－where you hand over notes and count out change in return－now happens only in the most minor of our retail encounters, like buying a bar of chocolateor a pint of milk from a comer shop. At the shops where you spend any real money, that money is increasingly abstracted. And this is more and more true, the higher up the scale you go. At the most cutting-edge retail stores－Victoria Beckham on Dover Street, for instance－you don't go and stand at any kind of cash register when you decide to pay. The staff are equipped with iPads to take your payment while you relax on a sofa. Which is nothing more or less than excellent service, if you have the money. But across society, the abstraction of the idea of cash makes me uneasy. Maybe I'm just old－fashioned. But earning money isn't quick or easy for most of us. Isn't it a bit weird that spending it should happen in haft a blink (眨眼). of an eye? Doesn't a wallet－that time－honoured Friday－night feeling of pleasing, promisingfatness－represent something that matters? But I'll leave the economics to the experts. What bothers me about the death of the wallet is thechange it represents in our physical environment. Everything about the look and feel of a wallet－theway the fastenings and materials wear and tear and loosen with age, the plastic and paper and gold andsilver, and handwritten phone numbers and printed cinema tickets－is the very opposite of what ourworld is becoming. The opposite of a wallet is a smartphone or an iPad..The rounded edges, coolglass, smooth and unknowable as a pebble (鹅卵石). Instead of digging through pieces of paper andpeering into corners, we move our fingers left and right. Nomore counting out coins. Show yourwallet, if you still have one. It may not be here much longer. 56. What is happening to the wallet? A. It is disappearing. B. It is being fattened. C. It is becoming costly. D. It is changing in style. 57. How are business transactions done in big modern stores? A. Individually. B. Electronically. C. In the abstract. D. Via a cash register. 58. What makes the author feel uncomfortable nowadays? A. Saving money is becoming a thing of the past. B. The pleasing Friday－night feeling is fading. C. Earning money is getting more difficult. D. Spending money is so fast and easy. 59. Why does the author choose to write about what's happening to the wallet? A. It represents a change in the modern world. B. It has something to do with everybody's life. C. It marks the end of a time－honoured tradition. D. It is the concern of contemporary economists. 60. What can we infer from the passage about the author? A. He is resistant to social changes. B. He is against technological progress. C. He feels reluctant to part with the traditional wallet. D. He feels insecure in the ever－changing modern world. Passage Two Everybody sleeps, but what people stay up late to catch－or wake up early in order not to miss－varies by culture. From data collected, it seems the things that cause us to lose the most sleep, on average, are sporting events, time changes, and holidays. Around the world, people changed sleep patterns thanks to the start or end of daylight savings time. Russians, for example, began to wake upabout a half-hour later each day after President Vladimir Putin shifted the country permanently to "winter time" starting on October 26.Russia's other late nights and early mornings generally correspond to public holidays. On New Year's Eve, Russians have the world's latest bedtime, hitting the hay at around 3:30 am. Russians also get up an hour later on International Women's Day, the day for treating and celebrating female relatives. Similarly, Americans' late nights, late mornings, and longest sleeps fall on three－day weekends. Canada got the least sleep of the year the night it beat Sweden in the Olympic hockey (冰球. final.The World Cup is also chiefly responsible for sleep deprivation (剥夺). The worst night for sleep in the U. K. was the night of the England-Italy match on June 14. Brits stayed up a half－hour later to watch it, and then they woke up earlier than usual the next morning thanks to summer nights, the phenomenon in which the sun barely sets in northern countries in the summertime. That was nothing, though, compared to Germans, Italians, and the French, who stayed up around an hour and a haft later on various days throughout the summer to watch the Cup. It should be made clear that not everyone has a device to record their sleep patterns; in some of these nations, it's likely that only the richest people do. And people who elect to track their sleep may try to get more sleep than the average person. Even if that's the case, though, the above findings are still striking. If the mosthealth-conscious among us have such deep swings in our shut-eye levels throughout the year, how much sleeg are the rest of us losing? 61. What does the author say about people's sleeping habits? A. They are culture－related. B. They affect people's health. C. They change with the seasons. D. They vary from person to person.。
2015年12月英语四级考试答案（卷二完整版）
2015年12⽉英语四级考试答案（卷⼆完整版）提⽰：考试采取"多题多卷"模式，试题顺序不统⼀，请依据试题进⾏核对。
Part I Writing 1.【题⼲】Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay commenting on the saying "Learning isa daily experience and a lifetime mission." You can cite examples to illustrate the importance of lifelong learning. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words. 【答案】 Undoubtedly, learning is a daily experience and lifetime mission. For instance, Madam Curie, who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity and became the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, was known for her persistence in learning. Several reasons, both social and individual, could account for the importance of constant learning. Firstly, in an age of ruthless and relentless competition, only by learning constantly can we bring our potential and ability into full play and catch up with the times. Secondly, learning does not only help us acquire knowledge, but also enriches our lives and broadens our horizons. Thirdly, science and technology change with each passing day. Without constant learning, it would be impossible for us to update our knowledge. Accordingly, it is constant learning that really matters in achieving success in modern society. In my humble opinion, it is high time that parents and teachers made joint efforts to encourage children to read more books instead of playing computer games all day. Part II Listening Comprehension Section A 2.【题⼲】Question 1 【答案】B 3.【题⼲】Question 2 【答案】A 4.【题⼲】Question 3 【答案】C 5.【题⼲】Question 4 【答案】D 6.【题⼲】Question 5 【答案】B 7.【题⼲】Question 6 【答案】A 8.【题⼲】Question 7 【答案】D 9.【题⼲】Question 8 【答案】D 10.【题⼲】Questions 9 to 12 are based on the conversation you have just heard. Question 9 【答案】B 11.【题⼲】Question 10 12.【题⼲】Question 11 【答案】A 13.【题⼲】Questions 12 to 15 are based on the conversation you have just heard. Question 12 【答案】C 14.【题⼲】Question 13 【答案】B 15.【题⼲】Question 14 【答案】D 16.【题⼲】Question 15 【答案】C Section B 17.【题⼲】Passage One Question 16 【答案】B 18.【题⼲】Question 17 【答案】A 19.【题⼲】Question 18 【答案】D 20.【题⼲】Passage Two Question 19 【答案】B 21.【题⼲】Question 20 【答案】D 22.【题⼲】Question 21 【答案】C 23.【题⼲】Question 22 【答案】A 24.【题⼲】Passage Three Question 23 【答案】B 25.【题⼲】Question 24 【答案】B 26.【题⼲】Question 25 27.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】heavenly 28.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】fascinating 29.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】made up of 30.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】Now and then 31.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】combine with 32.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】generally 33.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】characteristics 34.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】phenomenon 35.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】naked 36.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】relatively 37.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】J 38.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】G 39.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】O 40.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】K 41.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】B 42.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】I 43.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】F 44.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】M 45.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】A 46.【题⼲】_____ 【答案】D 47.【题⼲】It will not be difficult to make learning a source of joy if educators change their way of thinking. 【答案】G 48.【题⼲】What distinguishes children from adults is their strong ability to derive joy from what they are doing. 【答案】D 49.【题⼲】Children in America are being treated with shocking cruelty. 【答案】A 50.【题⼲】It is human nature to seek joy in life. 【答案】F 51.【题⼲】Grown-ups are likely to think that learning to children is what medicine is to patients. 【答案】K 52.【题⼲】Bad school conditions make it all the more important to turn learning into a joyful experience. 【答案】L 53.【题⼲】Adults do not consider children's feelings when it comes to education. 【答案】C 54.【题⼲】Administrators seem to believe that only hard work will lead children to their educational goals. 【答案】I 55.【题⼲】In the so-called "effective" schools, children are taught self-control under a set of strict rules. 【答案】B 56.【题⼲】To make learning effective, educators have to ensure that children want to learn. 【答案】J 57.【题⼲】What does the author think of time displayed everywhere? 【答案】C 58.【题⼲】How do people usually go about their work according to the author? 【答案】A 59.【题⼲】What did Tamar Avnet and Anne-Laure Sellier find in their experiments about clock-timers? 【答案】D 60.【题⼲】What do the researchers say about today's business culture? 【答案】B 61.【题⼲】What do the researchers suggest? 【答案】D 62.【题⼲】What does the well-known columnist's remark about Martha Stewart suggest? 【答案】A 63.【题⼲】What do we learn from the second paragraph about many criminals in America? 【答案】B 64.【题⼲】What are the consequences for many Americans with a criminal record? 【答案】C 65.【题⼲】What does the author think of the post-conviction laws and rules? 【答案】D 66.【题⼲】What is the author's main purpose in writing the passage? 【答案】B 67.【题⼲】云南省的丽江古镇是中国的旅游⽬的地之⼀。
2015年度12月大学英语四级考试真命题第2套
2015年12月大学英语四级考试真题(第2套)Part I Writing (30 minutes)Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay commenting on the saying “Listening is more important than talking.”You can cite examples to illustrate the importance of listening. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words。
PartⅡListening Comprehension (30minutes)Section ADirections: In this section, you will hear three news reports. At the end of each news report, you will hear two or three questions. Both the news report and the questions will be spoken only once. After you hear a question, you must choose the best answer from the four choices marked A) B) C) and D).Then mark the corresponding letter on. Answer Sheet 1 with a single line through the centre. Questions 1 and 2 will be based on the following news item.1.What did NASA's Constellation Programme originally plan to do?A) To set up a moon colony by 2020.B) To send astronauts again to the moon by 2020.C) To continue the current shuttle missions till 2020.D) To create more jobs for NASA till 2020.2.What is the major reason for NASA's Constellation Programme to becanceled?A) There were import space missions.B) The space agency lacked funding for the programme.C) The current shuttle missions would continue.D) Congress failed to pass President Obama's budget. Questions 3 and 4 will be based on the following news item.3.What is the percentage of common shares of Blackberry does Fairfax hold?A) 10% B) 20% C) 40% D) Unknown4.According to this passage, what is the most likely or direct reason that is said for Blackberry being ailing?A) The economic crisis happening around the world.B) The stiff competition from other companies.C) The unwise decisions made by the company's managing team.D) Their smart phones are not well produced.Questions 5 to 7 will be based on the following news item.5.Why were the fishing crew stranded on Oct.10th?A) They went to a remote area B) Their fishing boats collided C) They tried to repair their boats D) They decided to stay in the boats.6.How did they survive during those three months?A) On supplies they brought with them.B) On supplies sent to them by rescue teams.C) On supplies left at the military base.D) Not mentioned in the passage.7. How were the crew rescued eventually?A) By helicopter. B) By boat.C) By radio contact. D) By a search team.Section BDirection: In this section，you will hear two long conversations. At the end of each conversation, you will hear four questions. Both the conversation and the questions will be spoken only once. After you hear a question, you must choose the best answer from the four choices marked A),B),C) and D). Then mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 1 with a single line through the centre.Conversation OneQuestions 8 to 11 are based on the conversation you have just heard.8. A) He has taught Spanish for a couple of years at a local school.B) He worked at the Brownstone Company for several years.C) He owned a small retail business in Michigan years ago.D) He has been working part-time in a school near Detroit.9. A) He prefers a full-time job with more responsibility.B) He is eager to find a job with an increased salary.C) He likes to work in a company close to home.D) He would rather get a less demanding job.10. A) Sports. B) Travel.C) Foreign languages. D) Computer games.11. A) when he is supposed to start work.B) What responsibilities he would have.C) When he will be informed about his application.D) What career opportunities her company can offer. Conversation TwoQuestions 12 to 15 are based on the conversation you have just heard.12. A) Bring him up to date on the current situation in Milan,B) Inform him of the arrangements for his trip in Italy.C) Fetch the documents signed by Mr. Gartner.D) Accompany Mr. Gartner to the Linate airport.13. A) About 8:30. B) About 6:30.C) About 5:30. D) About 4:15.14. A) Mr. Gartner from Milan.B) Gianni Riva at Megastar.C) The company’s sales representative.D) Gavin from the Chamber of Commerce.15. A) Travel agent. B) Business manager.C) Secretary. D) Saleswoman.Section CDirections: In this section, you will hear three passages. At the end of each passage, you will hear some questions. Both the passage and questions will be spoken only once. After you hear a question. you must choose the best answer from the four choices marked A),B),C)and D).Then mark the corresponding letter on answer Sheet1 with a single line through the center.Passage OneQuestions 16 to 19 are based on the passage you have just heard.16. A) It is lined with tall trees. B) It was widened recentlyC) It has high buildings on both sides. D) It used to be dirty and disorderly.17. A)They repaved it with rocks B)They built public restrooms on itC) They beautified it with plants D) They set up cooking facilities near it18.A)What makes life enjoyable B）How to work with toolsC) What a community means D) How to improve health19. A) They were obliged to fulfill the signed contractB) They were encouraged by the city officials’praiseC) They wanted to prove they were as capable as boysD) They derived happiness from the constructive workPassage TwoQuestions 20 to 22 are based on the passage you have just heard.20. A) The majority of them think it less important than computersB) Many of them consider it boring and old-fashionedC) The majority of them find it interestingD) Few of them read more than ten books a year21. A) Novels and stories C) History and science booksB) Mysteries and detective stories D) Books and culture and tradition22. A) Watching TV C) Reading magazinesB)Listening to music D）Playing computer gamesPassage ThreeQuestions 23 to 25 are based on the passage you have just heard.23. A) Advice on the purchase of carsB) Information about the new green-fuel vehiclesC) Trends for the development of the motor carD）Solutions to global fuel shortage24. A) Limited driving range B) Huge recharging expensesC) The short life of batteries D) The unaffordable high price25. A) They need to be further improvedB) They can easily switch to natural gasC) They are more cost-effective than vehicles powered by solar energyD) They can match conventional motor cars in performance and safetyPart III Reading Comprehension (40 minutes)Section ADirections：In this section, there is a passage with ten blanks. You are required to select one word for each blank from a list of choices given in a word bank following the passage. Read the passage through carefully before making your choices. Each choice in the bank is identified by a letter. Please mark the corresponding letter for each item on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre. You may not use any of the words in the bank more than once.Questions 26 to 35 are based on the following passage.For many Americans, 2013 ended with an unusually bitter cold spell. Late November and December 26 early snow and bone-chilling temperatures in much of the country, part of a year when, for the first time in two 27 , record-cold days will likely turn out to have outnumbered record-warm ones. But the U.S. was the exception：November was the warmest ever 28, and current data indicates that 2013 is likely to have been the fourth hottest year on record.Enjoy the snow now, because 29 are good that 2014 will be even hotter, perhaps the hottest year since records have been kept. That’s because, scientists are predicting, 2014 will be an EI Nino year.EI Nino, Spanish for “the child”, 30 when surface ocean waters in the southernPacific become abnormally warm. So large is the Pacific, covering 30％of the planet’s surface, that the 31 energy generated by its warming is enough to touch off a series of weather changes around the world. EI Ninos are 32 with abnormally dry conditions in Southeast Asia and Australia. They can lead to extreme rain in parts of North and South America, even as southern Africa 33 dry weather. Marine life may be affected too：EI Nino can 34 the rising of the cold, nutrient-rich(营养丰富的) water that supports large fish 35 , and the unusually warm ocean temperatures can destroy coral(珊瑚).Section BDirections：In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived. You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragraph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2.How to Eat WellA) Why do so many Americans eat tons of processed food, the stuff that is correctly called junk(垃圾) and should really carry warning labels?B) It’s not because fresh ingredients are hard to come by Supermarkets offer more variety than ever, and there are over four times as many famers’markets in the U.S. as there were 20 years ago. Nor is it for lack of available information. There are plenty of recipes(食谱), how-to videos and cooking classes available to anyone who has a computer, smartphone or television. If anything the information is overwhelming.C) And yet we aren’t cooking. If you eat three meals a day and behave like most Americans, you probably get at least a third of your daily calories(卡路里) outsides the home. Nearly two-thirds of us grab fast food once a week, and we get almost 25% of our daily calories from snacks. So we’re eating out or taking in, and we don’t sit down—or we do, but hurry.D) Shouldn’t preparing—and consuming—food be a source of comfort, pride, health, well-being, relaxation, sociability? Something that connects us to other humans? Why should we want to outsource(外包) this basic task, especially when outsourcing it is so harmful?E) When I talk about cooking, I’m not talking about creating elaborate dinner parties or three-day science projects. I’m talking about simple, easy, everyday meals. My mission is to encourage green hands and those lacking time or money to feed themselves. That means we need modest, realistic expectation, and we needto teach people to cook food that’s good enough to share with family and friends.F) Perhaps a return to real cooking needn’t be far off. A recent Harris poll revealed that 79% of Americans say they enjoy cooking and 30% “love it”; 14% admit to not enjoying kitchen work and just 7% won’t go near the stove at all. But this doesn’t necessarily translate to real cooking and the result of this survey shouldn’t surprise anyone; 52% of those 65 or older cook at home five or more times per week; only a third of young people do.G) Back in the 1950s most of us grew up in households where Mom cooked virtually every night. The intention to put a home-cooked meal on the table was pretty much universal. Most people couldn’t afford to do otherwise.H) Although frozen dinners were invented in the 40s, their popularity didn’t boom until televisions became popular a decade or so later. Since then packaged, pre-prepared meals have been what’s for dinner. The microwave and fast-food chains were the biggest catalysts(催化剂),but the big food companies—which want to sell anything except the raw ingredients that go into cooking—made the home cook an endangered species.I) Still, I find it strange that only a third of young people report preparing meals at home regularly. Isn’t this the same crowd that rails against processed junk and champions craft cooking? And isn’t this the generation who say they’re concerned about their health and the wee-being of the planet? If these are truly the values of many young people, then tier behavior doesn’t match their beliefs.J) There have been half-hearted but well-publicized efforts by some foodcampaigns to reduce calories in their processed foods, but the Standard American Diet is still the polar opposite of the healthy, mostly plant-based diet that just about every expert says we should be eating. Considering that the governments standards are not nearly ambitious enough, the picture is clear: by nor cooking at home, we’re not eating the right things, and the consequences are hard to overstate.K) To help quantify(量化) the costs of a poor diet, I recently tried to estimate this impact in terms of a most famous food, the burger(汉堡包). I concluded that the profit from burgers is more than offset(抵消) by the damage they cause in health problems and environmental harm.L) Cooking real food is the best defense —not to mention that any meal you’re likely to eat at home contains about 200 fewer calories than one you would cat in a restaurant.M) To those Americans for whom money is a concern, my advice is simple; Buy what you can afford, and cook it yourself. The common prescription is to primarily shop the grocery store, since that’s where fresh produce, meat and seafood, and dairy are. And to save money and still eat well you don’t need local organic ingredients; all you need is real food. I’m not saying local food isn’t better, it is. But there is plenty of decent food in the grocery stores.N) The other sections you should get to know are the frozen foods and the canned goods. Frozen produce is still produce; canned tomatoes are still tomatoes. Just make sure you’re getting real food without tons of added salt or sugar. Askyourself, Would Grandma consider this food? Does it look like something that might occur in nature? It’s pretty much common sense: you want to buy food, not unidentifiable foodlike objects.O) You don’t have to hit the grocery store daily, nor do you need an abundance of skill. Since fewer than half of Americans say they cook at an intermediate level and only 20% describe their cooking skills as advanced, the crisis is one of confidence. And the only remedy for that is practice. There’s nothing mysterious about cooking the evening meal. You just have to do a little thinking ahead and redefine what qualifies as dinner. Like any skill, cooking gets easier as you do it more; every time you cook, you advance your level of skills. Someday you won’t even need recipes. My advice is that you not pay attention to the number of steps and ingredients, because they can be deceiving.P) Time, I realize, is the biggest obstacle to cooking for most people. You must adjust you priorities to find time to cook. For instance, you can move a TV to the kitchen and watch your favorite shows while you’re standing at the sink. No one is asking you to give up activities you like, but if you’re watching food shows on TV, try cooking instead.36. Cooking benefits people in many ways and enables them to connect with one another.37. Abundant information about cooking is available either online or on TV.38. Young people do less cooking at home than the elderly these days.39. Cooking skills can be improved with practice.40. In the mid-20th century, most families ate dinner at home instead of eating out.41. Even those short of time or money should be encouraged to cook for themselves and their family.42. Eating food not cooked by ourselves can cause serious consequences.43. To eat well and still save money, people should buy fresh food and cook it themselves.44. We get a fairly large portion of calories from fast food and snacks.45. The popularity of TV led to the popularity of frozen food.Section CDirections：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 Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre.Passage OneQuestions 46 to 50 are based on the following passage.The wallet is heading for extinction. As a day-to.day essential, it will die off with the generation who read print newspapers. The kind of shopping--where you hand over notes mad count out change in return—now happens only in the most minor of our retail encounters, like buying a bar of chocolate or a pint of milk from a comer shop. At the shops where you spend any real money, that money is increasing abstracted. And this is more and more true, the higher up the scale yougo. At the most cutting-edge retail stores—Victoria Beckham on Dover Street, for instance--you don't go and stand at any kind of cash register when you decide to pay, The staff are equipped with iPads to take your payment while you relax on a sofa.Which is nothing more or less than excellent service, if you have the money. But across society, the abstraction of the idea of cash makes me uneasy. Maybe I’m just old-fashioned. But earning money isn’t quick or easy for most of us. Isn’t it a bit weird that spending it should happen in half a blink of an eye? Doesn’t a wallet--that time-honoured Friday-night feeling of pleasing, promising fatness—represent something that matters?But I’ll leave the economics to the experts. What bothers me about the death of the wallet is the change it represents in our physical environment. Everything about the look and feel of a wallet—the way the fastenings and materials wear and tear and loosen with age, the plastic and paper and gold and silver, and handwritten phone numbers and printed cinema tickets--is the very opposite of what our world is becoming. The opposite of a wallet is a smartphone or an iPad. The rounded edges, cool glass, smooth and unknowable as a pebble(鹅卵石).Instead of digging through pieces of paper and peering into corners, we move our fingers left and right. No more counting out coins. Show your wallet, if you still have one. It may not be here much longer.46. What is happening to the wallet?A) It is disappearing. C) It is becoming costly.B) It is being fattened. D) It is changing in style.47. How are business transactions done in big modern stores?A) Individually. C) In the abstract.B) Electronically. D) Via a cash register.48. What makes the author feel uncomfortable nowadays?A) Saving money is becoming a thing of the past.B) The pleasing Friday-night feeling is fading.C) Earning money is getting more difficult.D) Spending money is so fast and easy.49. Why does the author choose to write about what’s happening to the wallet?A) It represents a change in the modern world.B) It has something to do with everybody’s life.C) It marks the end of a time-honoured tradition.D) It is the concern of contemporary economists.50. What can we infer from the passage about the author?A) He is resistant to social changes.B) He is against technological progress.C) He feels reluctant to part with the traditional wallet.D) He feels insecure in the ever-changing modern world.Passage TwoQuestions 51 to 55 are based on the following passage.Everybody sleeps. But what people stay up late to catch--or wake up early inorder not to miss—varies by culture.From data collected, it seems the things that cause us to lose the most sleep, on average, are sporting events, time changes, and holidays.Around the world, people changed sleep patterns thanks to the start or end of daylight savings time. Russians, for example, began to wake up about a half-hour later each day after President Vladimir Putin shifted the country permanently to “winter time”starting on October 26.Russia’s other late nights and early mornings generally correspond to public holidays. On New Year’s Eve, Russians have the world’s latest bedtime, hitting the hay at around 3：30 a.m.Russians also get up an hour later on International Women’s Day, the day for treating and celebrating female relatives.Similarly, Americans’late nights, late mornings, and longest sleeps fall on three—day weekends.Canada got the least sleep of the year the night it beat Sweden in the Olympic hockey(冰球) final.The World Cup is also chiefly responsible for sleep deprivation(剥夺).The worst night for sleep in the U.K. was the night of the England-Italy match on June 14.Brits stayed up a half-hour later to watch it, and then they woke up earlier than usual the next morning thanks to summer nights, the phenomenon in which the sun barely sets in northern countries in the summertime. That was nothing, though, compared to Germans, Italians, and the French, who stayed up around an hour and a half lateron various days throughout the summer to watch the Cup.It should be made clear that not everyone has a device to record their sleep patterns；in some of these nations, it’s likely that only the richest people do. And people who elect to track their sleep may try to get more sleep than the average person. Even if that’s the case, though, the above findings are still striking. If the most health conscious among US have such deep swings in our shut-eye levels throughout the year, how much sleep are the rest of us losing?51. What does the author say about people’s sleeping habits?A) They are culture—related. C) They change with the seasons.B) They affect people’s health. D) They vary from person to person.52. What do we learn about the Russians regarding sleep?A) They don’t fall asleep until very late. C) They get less sleep on public holidays.B) They don’t sleep much on weekends. D) They sleep longer than people elsewhere.53. What is the major cause for Europeans’loss of sleep?A) The daylight savings time. C) The World Cup.B) The colorful night life. D) The summertime.54. What is the most probable reason for some rich people to use a device to record their sleep patterns?A) They have trouble falling asleep. C) They are involved in a sleep research.B) They want to get sufficient sleep. D) They want to go to bed on regularhours.55.What does the author imply in the last paragraph?A) Sleeplessness does harm to people’s health.B) Few people really know the importance of sleep.C) It is important to study our sleep patterns.D) Average people probably sleep less than the rich.Part IV Translation (30 minutes)Directions：For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to translate a passage from Chinese into English. You should write your answer on Answer Sheet 2.中国父母往往过于关注孩子的学习，以至于不要他们帮忙做家务。