1、大学英语四级（ 2013年 12月考试改革适用）模拟试卷 185及答案与解析 一、 Part I Writing 1 For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write a short essay entitled Education Fever based on the statistics provided in the chart below (Family Spending on Education in China). Please give a brief description of the chart first and the
2、n make comments on it. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words. Section A （ A） A businessman. （ B） A doctor. （ C） A full-time father. （ D） A lawmaker. （ A） Japan. （ B） The UK. （ C） The US. （ D） Australia. （ A） It will be hard to hire enough qualified teachers. （ B） British gov
3、ernment will decide to cut down educational fund. （ C） More and more students will not be qualified for graduation. （ D） Teachers pay will be restricted in England and Wales only. （ A） Offer more training to school leaders. （ B） Rethink the pay policies for teachers. （ C） Increase the number of pupi
4、ls. （ D） Reform the education system as a whole. （ A） She watched it on ABC News. （ B） She watched a video on YouTube. （ C） She witnessed it on the spot. （ D） She learned it from the fisherman. （ A） It snapped off the bait on the hook. （ B） It swung violently at the fisherman. （ C） It sank deep in t
5、he sea and escaped. （ D） It struggled hard to unhook itself. （ A） He was shocked at the sight of the white shark. （ B） He failed to get his fishing hook back from the shark. （ C） He was frightened into throwing his fishing rod away. （ D） He managed to free the white shark from the hook. Section B （
6、A） It was a custom to do so. （ B） There was flu in the city. （ C） The pollution was serious. （ D） Wearing a mask was popular. （ A） Natural disasters. （ B） Large chemical factories. （ C） Exhaust from vehicles. （ D） Large amounts of household garbage. （ A） It is not feasible. （ B） It is a sensible sol
7、ution. （ C） It will be good for health. （ D） It will cause greenhouse effect. （ A） They care much about the environment. （ B） The air pollution will disappear gradually. （ C） Their towns become more pleasant to live. （ D） It benefits their economy a lot. （ A） He closes and opens his eyes too frequen
8、tly. （ B） He didnt have enough sleep last night. （ C） He has been long staring at the computer screen. （ D） He has been doing homework about computer for hours. （ A） Lack of moisture. （ B） Exposure to radiation. （ C） Lack of sleep. （ D） Misuse of medicine. （ A） Using eye drops. （ B） Taking breaks. （
9、 C） Seeing a doctor. （ D） Keeping eyes opener. （ A） Get some sleep. （ B） Do homework till tonight. （ C） Read articles about eye problems. （ D） Drink some coffee. Section C （ A） Markets where birds like parrots are sold. （ B） Zoos where there are no experts to manage the birds. （ C） Owners who cannot
10、 handle their pets. （ D） Forests where birds get wounded. （ A） He likes changes in life. （ B） He wants the birds to enjoy more music. （ C） He tries to prevent the parrots imitating the tone. （ D） He is not sure which tone is the best. （ A） Restricting the number of visitors. （ B） Raising money for h
11、is expanding operation. （ C） Accumulating wealth for himself. （ D） Raising money to support his study. （ A） The Washington Federation of Teachers. （ B） The National Labor Union. （ C） The American Federation of Teachers. （ D） The Washington Labor Union. （ A） The influence from Asian countries. （ B） T
12、he growing competition from foreign students. （ C） The growing competition for entrance into top universities. （ D） The teachers need of extra income from the tutoring. （ A） The Federal government. （ B） Students parents. （ C） The school administrators. （ D） The Teachers Association. （ A） The changin
13、g of weather. （ B） The health of teenagers. （ C） Energy drinks and their nutrition. （ D） The danger of energy drinks. （ A） Protein. （ B） Calcium. （ C） Zinc. （ D） Vitamin. （ A） Students and housewives. （ B） Athletes and trainers. （ C） Young people and busy people. （ D） Singers and teachers. （ A） Caut
14、ious. （ B） Supportive. （ C） Opposed. （ D） Relieved. Section A 26 What do dieting and energy policy have in common? The SnackWell effect. The name comes from those tasty little cookies that are【 C1】 _as being lower in fat and sugar. But they often lead dieters to eat more of them than【 C2】 _cookies a
15、nd then wonder why theyre not losing weight. It turns out theres a SnackWell effect for energy use too and it may make it tougher for us to cut back on carbon. When【 C3】 _conscious consumers buy an energy-efficient dishwasher, for example, they may feel less guilty about【 C4】 _the machine more often
16、 and as a result may not end up saving much on their utility bills. Likewise, studies indicate that people who【 C5】 _more-energy-efficient lights lose 5% to 12% of the expected savings by leaving them on longer. Much like dieters eating too many SnackWells, we can fail in our attempts to save energy
17、 and money. So resist the【 C6】 _to raise your thermostat (恒温器 ) after you buy a more efficient furnace: lower the temperature by a degree and shave another 1% off your heating bill. But even if we do what Jimmy Carter did and wear a 70s-style sweater all winter, we may end up spending those energy s
18、avings somewhere else like on a plane【 C7】_to Bermuda A report estimated that【 C8】 _, this effect could reduce the savings from energy efficiency by 10% or more. That doesnt mean energy-efficiency measures are【 C9】 _ or that we should never go on vacation. But it does mean that cutting back on energ
19、y【 C10】 _, like dieting, is not an excuse to stuff ourselves on less guilty pleasures. A) acting E) globally I) ride M) special B) advertised F) install J) route N) urge C) consumption G) operated K) running O) useless D) environmentally H) regular L) saving 27 【 C1】 28 【 C2】 29 【 C3】 30 【 C4】 31 【
20、C5】 32 【 C6】 33 【 C7】 34 【 C8】 35 【 C9】 36 【 C10】 Section B 36 What Your iPad Knows About You A Youve finally finished the book your co-worker recommended, so what to read next? If it is 5 a,m., chances are that youre reaching for a romance novel especially if youre in Texas or Georgia. By early mor
21、ning, thrillers might start to look more appealing. And if Philip K. Dick is your favorite author, books about beer are probably more up your taste than anything about wine or liquor. B These are some of the insights from Scribd Inc. and Oyster, two startups that offer unlimited e-book rentals for a
22、 monthly subscription fee. Scribd, Oyster and Entitle Books which just launched in December are tracking reader behavior in hopes of figuring out recommendations of exactly what youll want to pick up next. C About 50% of the U.S. population owns a dedicated e-reader, according to a Pew Research stud
23、y released last month. In addition, 28% read an e-book last year, up from 23% the previous year. The services are expanding. Scribd, a San Francisco-based site that started selling monthly e-book subscriptions last October, announced this month that its app is available on Amazons Kindle Fire and Ki
24、ndle Paperwhite. After running exclusively on Apples operating system, New York-based Oyster plans to expand to Android later this year. And Entitle is considering adding an all-you-can-read feature to complement its current “book of the month“-style subscription service. Subscription services are p
25、opular because they “reduce the emotional burden“ of purchasing, says Julie Haddon, Scribd vice president of marketing. Buying a book creates pressure to finish and get your moneys worth, she adds. In addition, people might try to save money by buying a cheaper book instead of the one they really wa
26、nt. D Brian Konash, 34, who works at Web startup Squarespace in Manhattan, joined Oyster two months ago because it didnt cause the buyers sense of guilty he experienced when purchasing Kindle e-books. “Youve already paid for the service, so you can read as much as you want,“ he says. “With other mod
27、els, theres that little financial bite each time you want to buy a book and you worry that its going to be worthless.“ Mr. Konash, who has been picking books based on the sites suggestions, predicts hell read up to 10 more books a year beyond his usual 25. E An all-access subscription “lowers the ac
28、tivation energy for reading,“ says Oyster CEO Eric Stromberg. Reading often has a high “activation energy“ because theres a time gap between wanting to read a book and then actually getting your hands on it, he says. “When you can order a book and instantly get it on your tablet, you can hear about
29、the book and then read it right there,“ says Willem van Lancker, Oysters chief product officer. F “From the publishing perspective, the biggest problem is how to get people to care about a new book,“ says Otis Chandler, CEO of Goodreads, a site where people share what theyre reading and post recomme
30、ndations. Goodreads, which was acquired by Amazon in March, uses an algorithm (运算法则 ) that recommends books that users with similar taste have enjoyed. G Oyster and Scribd ask readers to rate books, what they call an “active signal.“ They also track “passive signals,“ such as the percentage of a boo
31、k that a reader finishes and the click rate, or how many people who are shown a book click through to learn more. The companies use that information among other factors to recommend books. Active signals represent what we wish we read, while passive signals are more honest, says Jared Friedman, Scri
32、bd chief technology officer. A lot of people give a 5-star rating to “The Great Gatsby,“ while they read greedily, but dont necessarily rate, thrillers like “The Da Vinci Code,“ for example. H Other findings: Self-help might be a popular market, yet only about 20% of people who start such a book fin
33、ish it. More than 80% of people who crack the pages of a mystery novel will find out who did it. People read through biographies at 20 pages per hour, while they read at three times that speed for erotica (色情作品 ). And higher “acceleration factor“ or how much readers speed up as they get closer to fi
34、nishingcorrelates with higher average rating for a book. One of the highest acceleration factors comes from Kurt Vonneguts “Cats Cradle,“ which readers start speeding through at the halfway mark, Mr. Friedman says. All three companies allow users to hide their reading behavior from other customers,
35、but users cant opt out of their behavior being collected by the company itself. Entitle, however, says it keeps track of browsing and download information only. I Personalized recommendations drive 10 times more browsing traffic than lists based on themes such as “globe-trotting memoirs“ or “bad rol
36、e models“ that copy racks at the front of bookstores, Scribds Mr. Friedman says. The company is interested in combining algorithms with lists to create a list of best sellers that someone would, based on past reading behavior, find interesting. Another possible approach is to suggest different books
37、 or genres depending on time of day to take advantage of what the company knows about time-based preferences. J The algorithm doesnt just analyze behavior signals, but “reads“ through a books text to pull out different topics, genres and subjects, says Bryan Batten, chief executive of Entitle. There
38、s also a patent-pending (申请专利中的 ) service called “if these books had a baby,“ where users can input two books and find a third with similar themes. For example, the “baby“ of Joseph Hellers “Catch-22“ and Leo Tolstoys “Anna Karenina“ is Fyodor Dostoevskys “The Brothers Karamazov“ but the product of
39、“Catch-22“ and Steve Jobs biography is a book called “Dealers of Lightning,“ about engineers at Xerox Corp. K Entitle operates on a tiered model: two books for $9.99 a month (the most popular plan), three for $14.99, and so on. For customers, the upside is being able to keep the e-books, even if the
40、y cancel the service. The services, of course, compete with the library. But libraries have had limited e-book offerings and there are often waits for the books. Robert Wolven, co-chair of the American Library Associations Digital Content Working Group, says demand has increased significantly in the
41、 past 18 months. He says he doesnt see the startups as a threat. L While libraries budget for e-books has been growing, licensing restrictions mean that popular titles often arent available, says Laura Girmscheid, research manager for the trade publication Library Journal, which recently released it
42、s fourth annual report on e-books in libraries. This, combined with holds on e-books, is the largest hurdle preventing people from using library e-books more. “Its just not convenient for instant access,“ Ms. Girmscheid says. 37 Subscribers cant stop e-book provider from collecting information about
43、 their reading behavior. 38 Due to the time gap between wanting to read a book and actually starting reading, people need high activation energy to read a paper book. 39 The biggest problem for publication is how to raise readers interests in a new book. 40 Passive signals, like click rates, are mor
44、e honest indications of reading behavior. 41 Some e-book rental websites track subscribers reading behavior so as to offer proper book recommendations. 42 Subscribers of Entitle can keep e-books they have bought even after they cancel the service. 43 Inconvenience for instant access to popular e-boo
45、ks prevents people from using library e-books. 44 About four-fifth readers of self-help books fail to complete their reading. 45 When purchasing paper books, people might give up the one they want and choose a cheaper one in order to save money. 46 Personalized recommendations are more efficient in
46、boosting books browsing rates than traditional best-sale lists based on different themes. Section C 46 A new partner pushes out two close friends on average, leaving lovers with a smaller inner circle of people they can turn to in times of crisis, a study found. The research, led by Robin Dunbar, he
47、ad of the Institute of Cognitive (认知的 ) and Evolutionary Anthropology (人类学 ) at Oxford University, showed that men find women were equally likely to lose their closest friends when they started a new relationship. Previous research by Dunbars group has shown that people typically have five very clos
48、e relationships that is, people whom they would turn to if they were in emotional or financial trouble. “If you go into a romantic relationship, it costs you two friends. Those who have romantic relationships, instead of having the typical five core set of relationships only have four. And of those,
49、 one is the new person whos come into their life,“ said Dunbar. The study, submitted to the journal Personal Relationships, was designed to investigate how people trade off spending time with one person over another and suggests that links with family and closest friends suffer when people start a romantic relationship. Dunbars team used an internet-based questionnaire to quiz 428 women and 112 men about their relationships. In total, 363 of the p
