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Dear editor,
I’m writing to tell you about my opinion on Chinese students going abroad for further studies at an early age.
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The plan and suggestions for its implementation will be announced in the first half of next year. It will be piloted in selected provinces and cities and promoted nationwide from 2017. A new exam and admission system will be established by 2020, according to the education ministry.
The decision has aroused a heated discussion among Shanghai educators and parents who doubted the reform would reduce the burden of learning English or if the substitute test could reflect a student’s English skills and help students learn English better.
“The reform shows China is learning from the West to give students more test-taking chances. But more chances might become more of a burden since Chinese students are likely to repeat the test until they get the highest score,” said Cai Jigang, a professor at Fudan University’s College of Foreign Languages and Literature and chairman of the Shanghai Advisory Committee for College English Teaching at Tertiary Level.
Yu Lizhong, chancellor of New York University Shanghai, where classes are in English and students are required to have a high standard of English, said the most important aspect of the reform lay in what to test and how to test.
“ As far as I see, the reform doesn’t mean English is no longer important for Chinese students after it will be excluded from the unified college entrance exam,” Yu said. “In a way, English is even more important than before since the test would only serve as reference, while every college and university, even every major, can have different requirements of a student’s English skills under a diverse evaluation system. ”
The education ministry said the reform would not affect students attending the college entrance exam over the next three years.
1. What can we learn from the first paragraph?
| A．English will become less and less important in the stage of compulsory education. |
| B．It has been 30 years since English became one subject of national college entrance exam. |
| C．China’s once-in-a-lifetime exam system is unacceptable at all. |
| D．The system that tests are held several times does more good than once-in-a-lifetime exam system. |
| A．the new exam and admission system will make no difference |
| B．English shouldn’t be removed from China’s college entrance exam |
| C．the reform may accomplish the very opposite |
| D．Western educational system does not apply to China |
| A．Students needn’t lay a good foundation during the period of high school. |
| B．Whether students should study hard English may depend on their major. |
| C．Students can constantly strive for perfection only in their major. |
| D．English must be close to full mark. |
| A．To advise students not to devote themselves to English. |
| B．To call on Education Department to remove English from “Gaokao”. |
| C．To support the act of Ministry of Education. |
| D．To encourage students to do as they have planned. |
Using a web camera equipped in Jennifer’s Los Angeles apartment, the monitor in Phoenix tracked how frequently her eyes moved from the computer screen and listened for the secret sounds of a possible helper in the room. Her Internet access was locked-remotely-to prevent Internet searches, and her typing style was analyzed to make sure she was who she said she was: Did she enter her student number at the same speed as she had in the past? Or was she slowing down?
In the battle against cheating, this is the cutting edge and a key to encourage honesty in the booming field of online education. The technology gives trust to the entire system, to the institution and to online education in general. Only with solid measures against cheating, experts say, can Internet universities show that their exams and diplomas are valid-that students haven’t just searched the Internet to get the right answers.
Although online classes have existed for more than a decade, the concern over cheating has become sharper in the last year with the growth of "open online courses." Private colleges, public universities and corporations are jumping into the online education field, spending millions of dollars to attract potential students, while also taking steps to help guarantee honesty at a distance.
Aside from the web cameras, a number of other high-tech methods are becoming increasingly popular. Among them are programs that check students’ identities using personal information, such as the telephone number they once used.
Other programs can produce unique exam by drawing on a large list of questions and can recognize possible cheaters by analyzing whether difficult test question are answered at the same speed as easy ones. As in many university classes, term papers are scanned against some large Internet data banks for cheating.
1. Why was Jennifer watched in an online exam?| A．To correct her typing mistakes. |
| B．To find her secrets in the room. |
| C．To prevent her from slowing down. |
| D．To keep her from dishonest behaviors. |
| A．advanced technique | B．sharpening tool |
| C．effective rule | D．dividing line |
| A．they can attract potential students | B．they can defeat academic cheating |
| C．they offer students online help | D．they offer many online courses |
| A．checking the question answering speed |
| B．producing a large number of question |
| C．scanning the Internet test question |
| D．giving difficult test question |
| A．The Advantages of Online Exams |
| B．The High-tech Methods in Online Courses |
| C．The Fight against Cheating in Online Education |
| D．The War against the Booming of Online Education |
So parents matter. But it is also revealed in researches that parents, of all backgrounds, don’t need to buy expensive educational toys or digital devices for their kids in order to give them an advantage. They don’t need to drive their offspring (子孙，后代)to enrichment classes or test-preparation courses. What they need to do with their children is much simpler: talk.
But not just any talk. Recent research has indicated exactly what kinds of talk at home encourage children’s success at school. For example, a study conducted by researchers at the UCLA School of Public Health and published in the journal Pediatrics found that two-way adult-child conversations were six times as potent in promoting language development as the ones in which the adult did all the talking. Engaging in this reciprocal（双向的) back-and-forth gives children a chance to try out language for themselves, and also gives them the sense that their thoughts and opinions matter.
The content of parents’ conversations with kids matters, too. Children who hear talk about counting and numbers at home start school with much more extensive mathematical knowledge, report researchers from the University of Chicago. While the conversations parents have with their children change as kids grow older, the effect of these exchanges on academic achievement remains strong. Research finds that parents play an important role in what is called “academic socialization” — setting expectations and making connections between current behavior and future goals. Engaging in these sorts of conversations has a greater impact on educational accomplishment.
1. Parents are even more important than schools because ______.
| A．parental involvement makes up for what schools are not able to do |
| B．teachers and students themselves do not put in enough effort |
| C．parental involvement saves money for schools and the local government |
| D．students may well make greater achievements with parents' attention |
| A．educational toys are unaffordable nowadays |
| B．digital devices can give children an advantage |
| C．some parents believe in enrichment classes |
| D．talking with children is a very simple task |
| A．powerful | B．difficult | C．necessary | D．resistant |
| A．Parents order their children to stop playing video games. |
| B．Parents discuss with their children the possible future career. |
| C．Parents lecture their children on getting too low marks on tests. |
| D．Parents introduce colleges around the US to their children. |
These days, college applicants are applying to more colleges because online and common applications make the process easier.
For many families, the most important thing colleges can do is show them the money, especially this year; the weak economy makes parents nervous.
| A．Besides, top colleges are facing changes in the population. |
| B．What contributes to it? |
| C．But a mistake can be costly if it happens. |
| D．But top colleges ignore them. |
| E．They have international students who know English. |
| F．It can mean several acceptances to choose from. |
| G．They cannot afford college as planned. |
6 . I recently heard a story about a famous scientist who had made several very important medical breakthroughs (突破). He was being interviewed by a reporter who asked him
He responded that it all came from a(n)
When his mother came in,
Indeed, he did. After a few minutes, his mother said, “Robert, whenever you make a mess like this, eventually you have to restore everything to its proper order. So, how would you like to do that? We could use a sponge(海绵), a towel or a mop. Which do you prefer?” He chose the sponge.
His mother then said, “ You know, what we have here is a
This scientist then said that it was at that moment that he knew he didn’t need to be
| A．why | B．what | C．when | D．how |
| A．capable | B．able | C．creative | D．original |
| A．coincidence | B．experience | C．incident | D．conflict |
| A．carry | B．bring | C．remove | D．fetch |
| A．fell | B．lost | C．escaped | D．dropped |
| A．rather than | B．instead of | C．other than | D．in place of |
| A．picture | B．mass | C．map | D．mess |
| A．rarely | B．happily | C．frequently | D．angrily |
| A．got | B．suffered | C．done | D．received |
| A．jump | B．play | C．enjoy | D．lay |
| A．failed | B．successful | C．fantastic | D．painful |
| A．strong | B．tiny | C．thin | D．weak |
| A．get it | B．put it | C．try it | D．make it |
| A．controlled | B．possessed | C．occupied | D．grasped |
| A．example | B．teaching | C．lesson | D．instruction |
| A．anxious | B．nervous | C．fearful | D．afraid |
| A．situations | B．opportunities | C．occasions | D．turns |
| A．after all | B．above all | C．first of all | D．in all |
| A．do | B．finish | C．go | D．work |
| A．worthy | B．costly | C．valuable | D．interesting |
As a writer, I know about winning contests – and about losing them. I know what it is like to work hard on a story only to receive a rejection letter from the publisher. I also know the pressure of trying to live up to a reputation created by previous victories. What if she doesn’t win the contest again? That’s the strange thing about being a parent. So many of our own past scars and destroyed hopes can resurface in our children.
A revelation (启示) came last week when I asked her, “Don’t you want to win again?” “No,” she replied, “I just want to tell the story of an angel going to first grade.”
I had just spent weeks correcting her stories as she spontaneously (自发地) told them. Telling myself that I was merely an experienced writer guiding the young writer across the hall, I offered suggestions for characters, conflicts and endings for her tales. The story about a fearful angel starting first grade was quickly “guided” by me into the tale of a little girl with a wild imagination taking her first music lesson. I had turned her contest into my contest without even realizing it.
Staying back and giving kids space to grow is not as easy as it looks. Because I know very little about farm animals who use tools or angels who go to first grade, I had to accept the fact that I was co-opting my daughter’s experience.
While stepping back was difficult for me, it was certainly a good first step that I will quickly follow with more steps, putting myself far enough away to give her room but close enough to help if asked. All the while I will be reminding myself that children need room to experiment, grow and find their own voices.
1. What do we learn from the first paragraph?
| A．A lot of amusements compete for children’s time nowadays. |
| B．Children have lots of fun doing mindless activities. |
| C．Rebecca is much too busy to enjoy her leisure time. |
| D．Rebecca draws on a lot of online materials for her writing. |
| A．She was constantly under pressure to write more. |
| B．Most of her stories had been rejected by publishers. |
| C．She did not quite live up to her reputation as a writer. |
| D．Her road to success was full of pain and frustrations. |
| A．She believed she possessed real talent for writing. |
| B．She was sure of winning with her mother’s help. |
| C．She wanted to share her stories with readers. |
| D．She had won a prize in the previous contest. |
| A．trying not to let her daughter enjoy her own life |
| B．trying to get her daughter to do the thing as the author wished |
| C．making sure that her daughter would win the contest |
| D．helping her daughter develop real skills for writing |
Many may not expect to hear the words of the old Chinese saying in these modern times—with parents wealthier and better educated than they have ever been—but experts say they still ring true.
Today, it seems, Chinese parents are more likely to send their children to pre-college military academies in the United States in the hope that some tough love will pave the way to success.
“Good education doesn’t mean letting your child enjoy privileges, especially our boys,” said Song Wenming, an entrepreneur (企业家) in Jinhua, East China’s Zhejiang province. “They should be raised in tough conditions to know what to fight for in the future.”
In August, Song sent his 17-year-old son to Valley Forge Military Academy (VFMA) in Pennsylvania. And he is far from alone, even though it takes a lot of money - around $48,000 per year —to send a child to a strict military school.
Statistics shows that an increasing number of Chinese students have been registering with such academies.
A few years ago, there were no Chinese students at Valley Forge. Today, there are 28. “All of the Chinese students at Valley Forge came from wealthy families, some of them were spoiled,” said Jennifer Myers, director of marketing and communications at the school.
Song’s only son, Song Siyu, had a rocky start during his first six weeks at the school. The teenager said he went to the school voluntarily but did not expect it to be as difficult.
Now, three months later, he has perfected the art of taking a bath in 35 seconds, finishing a meal without looking at his food, and making his bed with precision. He can even take criticism, no matter how unreasonable.
“The training is hard but I know it is good for self-development of individuals,” said Song Siyu. “The endless training and scolding are just ways to build up our character, they are not personal.”
But his enthusiasm is not universal. Ten of the 13 Chinese students who joined the academy this year have transferred to other schools.
But for those who stick with it, there is a reward for all the hard work.
1. From the second paragraph, we can know the old Chinese saying _____.
| A．is out of date in modern times. |
| B．is disagreed by rich parents. |
| C．is still worth trusting. |
| D．is deeply believed by better educated parent. |
| A．Song sent his only son to military school, so he feels lonely. |
| B．Song is the only one who sends his child to military school. |
| C．There are other people sending their children to military school besides Song. |
| D．The fee of the military school is so high that only Song can afford it. |
| A．taking a bath in a short time | B．having his meal with his eyes closed |
| C．taking unreasonable criticism | D．improving his character |
| A．10 | B．13 | C．15 | D．25 |
| A．It’s likely that more and more Chinese students will attend VFMA. |
| B．Most Chinese parents approve of educating their children by beating and cursing nowadays. |
| C．Song Siyu had no difficulty in adjusting to the life at VFMA. |
| D．Most Chinese students support the way of education at VFMA. |
9 . Four Habits to Help You Succeed
We will want to succeed, whether it’s in losing weight or learning the guitar. For those who have tried and failed, success seems difficult to understand. Why does one person succeed where another person fails?
1. Identify your core (核心) values.
Finding your core values is in line with creating inner motivation.
2. Pick a goal and focus on it.
Choose one goal to start something large enough that will give you a sense of achievement, while adjusting well to your core values. Focus is key here.
3. Set a deadline for success.
Set a date for success. Identify when you hope to achieve your goal.
4.
Failure can’t be avoided when you take risks. Many people give up far too early. Use failure. Treat it as a good thing, and march on!
| A．The more focused you are on one goal, the higher chance you have of success. |
| B．Make the right decision. |
| C．I’ve made a list of four habits to help you set goals and achieve them. |
| D．Stick to your goal. |
| E．Keep it realistic, while not giving you too much time. |
| F．Sit and reflect on what you value most. |
| G．Push yourself to be courageous, and take that next step. |
10 . Children start out as natural scientists, eager to look into the world around them. Helping them enjoy science can be easy; there’s no need for a lot of scientific terms or expensive lab equipment. You only have to share your children’s curiosity (好奇). Firstly, listen to their questions. I once visited a classroom of seven-year-olds to talk about science as a job. The children asked me “textbook questions” about schooling, salary (薪水) and whether I liked my job. When I finished answering, we sat facing one another in silence. Finally I said, “Now that we’re finished with your lists, do you have questions of your own about science?”
After a long pause, a boy raised his hand, “Have you ever seen a grasshopper (蚱蜢) eat? When I try eating leaves like that, I get a stomachache. Why?”
This began a set of questions that lasted nearly two hours.
Secondly, give them time to think. Studies over the past 30 years have shown that, after asking a question, adults typically wait only one second or less for an answer, no time for a child to think. When adults increase their “wait time” to three seconds or more, children give more logical (符合逻辑的), complete and creative answers.
Thirdly, watch your language. Once you have a child involved in a science discussion, don’t jump in with “That’s right” or “Very good”. These words work well when it comes to encouraging good behavior (行为). But in talking about science, quick praise can signal that discussion is over. Instead, keep things going by saying “That’s interesting” or “I’d never thought of it that way before”, or coming up with more questions or ideas.
Never push a child to “Think”. It doesn’t make sense, children are always thinking, without your telling them to. What’s more, this can turn a conversation into a performance. The child will try to find the answer you want, in as few words as possible, so that he will be a smaller target (目标) for your disagreement.
Lastly, show; don’t tell. Real-life impressions of nature are far more impressive than any lesson children can learn from a book or a television program. Let children look at their fingertips through a magnifying glass (放大镜), and they’ll understand why you want them to wash before dinner. Rather than saying that water vaporates (蒸发), set a pot of water to boil and let them watch the water level drop.
1. According to the passage, children are natural scientists, and to raise their interest, the most important thing for adults to do is _______.| A．let them see the world around |
| B．share the children’s curiosity |
| C．explain difficult phrases about science |
| D．supply the children with lab equipment |
| A．any questions |
| B．any problems |
| C．questions from textbooks |
| D．any number of questions |
| A．ask them to answer quickly |
| B．wait for one or two seconds after a question |
| C．tell them to answer the next day |
| D．wait at least for three seconds after a question |
| A．The second and third. |
| B．The fourth and fifth. |
| C．The fifth. |
| D．The seventh. |
| A．tell their children stories instead of reciting facts |
| B．offer their children chances to see things for themselves |
| C．be patient enough when their children answer questions |
| D．encourage their children to ask questions of their own |
