1、考研英语（阅读）模拟试卷 234 及答案与解析Part ADirections: Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D. (40 points)0 Birth, growth, decline, death: it is the usual cycle for people, companies and industries. But the story of violin-making in Cremona in northern Italy,
2、which flourished under such master craftsmen as Andrea Amati, Giuseppe Guarneri and Antonio Stradivari from the mid-16th century to the early 18th, suggests that, for industries at least, there may be life after death.Violin-making in Cremona struggled through the 19th century in the hands of a few
3、carpenters who turned out low-quality instruments. By the 1950s it had died out, says Gio Batta Morassi, a 73-year-old maestro liutaio (master violin-maker). Yet today, in workshops overlooking the citys cobbled streets, more than 100 craftsmen cut and plane maple and spruce to make string instrumen
4、tsmore than in any other European city. Cremona is once again the capital of hand-crafted instruments.A new school to train craftsmen in instrument-making opened in Cremona in 1938, though when Mr. Morassi began his studies in 1950 there were just six students on the course, of whom only one other w
5、ent on to make instruments. But this slight revival was sustained by a growing interest in Baroque music in northern Europe in the 1960s and 1970s, says Hildegard Dodel, a German who studied at the school. It created new demand for instruments made in the traditional Cremonese style.Today Italians a
6、re a minority among the schools 150 students; 30 are South Korean, 26 are Japanese, six are from China and three from Taiwan. Some will set up shop in the city: Ms Dodel worked for about ten years restoring and repairing instruments in Germany and the Netherlands before returning to open her own wor
7、kshop in Cremona in 2003.Instrument-making is not an easy life. “I often thought of giving up,“ says Francesco Toto, who moved to Cremona 17 years ago and specializes in making cellos. Wood is expensive, must be seasoned properly and is at risk from woodworm; the maple for a cello costs around 1,500
8、, for example. Mr. Toto was able to raise his prices after winning a competition, but to maintain quality he makes just four instruments a year. Violin-makers can produce perhaps seven top-quality instruments a year. (Cellos made by Cremonas craftsmen typically cost 15,000-35,000, and violins 8,000-
9、20,000.) Having come back from the dead, Cremonas instrument-makers, like many others in Italian industries, hope that an emphasis on quality, tradition and craftsmanship will keep cheaper foreign rivals at bay.1 The story of violin-making in Cremona implies the industry _.（A）may undergo revival aft
10、er a period of death（B） flourished because of the master craftsmen（C） may follow the same life cycle as people and companies（D）may experience a longer life than other industries2 From Paragraph 2, we can learn that Cremona_.（A）has more instrument workers than any other city（B） had many carpenters to
11、 make violins in the past（C） declined because of its carpenters poor handcrafts（D）once was the capital of hand-crafted instruments3 Hildegard Dodel believed that _.（A）the revival of instrument-making was slight and sustainable（B） Baroque music stimulated the revival of the instrument-making（C） peopl
12、e in Europe were fond of traditional Cremonese style（D）Baroque music increased peoples interests in violins4 Which of the following is true according to Paragraph 4?（A）Italians are less educated but more skilled even today.（B） Many students in the training school come from Eastern countries.（C） Ital
13、ians are less interested in training courses traditionally.（D）Traditional Cremonese style is not popular today.5 Many Italian industries today _.（A）have come back from the dead（B） are at risk because of the cheap foreign rivals（C） still focus on quality, tradition and craftsmanship（D）want to give up
14、 the difficult instrument-making5 Starting this month, roughly one quarter of the worlds population will lose sleep and gain sunlight as they set their clocks ahead for daylight saving. People may think that with the time shift, they are conserving electricity otherwise spent on lighting. But recent
15、 studies have cast doubt on the energy argumentsome research has even found that it ultimately leads to greater power use.Benjamin Franklin is credited with conceiving the idea of daylight saving in 1784 to conserve candles, but the U.S. did not institute it until World War I as a way to preserve re
16、sources for the war effort. The first comprehensive study of its effectiveness occurred during the oil crisis of the 1970s, when the U.S. Department of Transportation found that daylight saving trimmed national electricity usage by roughly 1 percent compared with standard time.Scant research had bee
17、n done since, during which time U.S. electricity usage patterns have changed as air conditioning and household electronics have become more pervasive, observes economist Matthew Kotchen of the University of California, Santa Barbara. But lately, changes to daylight saving policies on state and feder
18、al levels have presented investigators new chances to explore the before-and-after impacts of the clock shift.In 2006 Indiana instituted daylight saving statewide for the first time. Examining electricity usage and billing since the statewide change, Kotchen and his colleague Laura Grant unexpectedl
19、y found that daylight time led to a 1 percent overall rise in residential electricity use, costing the state an extra $9 million. Although daylight time reduces demand for household lighting, the researchers suggest that it increased demand for cooling on summer evenings and heating in early spring
20、and late fall mornings.Not all recent analyses suggest that daylight saving is counterproductive. Instead of studying the impact daylight saving changes had on just one state, senior analyst Jeff Dowd and his colleagues at the U.S. Department of Energy investigated what effect it might have on natio
21、nal energy consumption, looking at 67 electric utilities across the country. In their report to Congress, they conclude that the four-week extension of daylight time saved about 0.5 percent of the nations electricity per day, or 1.3 trillion watt-hours in total. That amount could power 100,000 house
22、holds for a year. The study did not just look at residential electricity use but commercial use as well, Dowd says. The disparities between regional and national results could reflect climate differences between states. “The effect we saw could be even worse in Florida, where air conditioning is use
23、d heavily,“ Kotchen suggests.6 According to the first two paragraphs, daylight saving _.（A）means to set the clock ahead worldwide（B） was proposed to save materials for war effort（C） leads to sleeplessness of millions of people（D）trimmed electricity usage during the oil crisis of the 1970s7 The study
24、 of the effectiveness of daylight saving _.（A）was started by the U.S. Department of Transportation（B） was initiated by Benjamin Franklin in 1784 to save electricity（C） was rarely done as the electricity usage patterns changed（D）needs to be done to help the government change its policies8 What effect
25、 did daylight saving have on the energy consumption of Indiana?（A）It saved 1.3 trillion watt-hours in four weeks.（B） It reduced demand for household lighting only in spring.（C） It resulted in an extra $9 million cost on electricity.（D）It reduced demand for cooling and heating all year around.9 Jeff
26、Dowd would most probably agree that _.（A）daylight saving has negative effects on energy saving（B） the four-week extension of daylight time saves much electricity（C） focusing on the effect of daylight saving on one state is enough（D）a comprehensive study of daylight time nationwide is unnecessary10 T
27、he text intends to tell us that _.（A）daylight saving actually contributes to nationwide electricity conservation（B） as states differ in climate, different daylight saving policies are necessary（C） whether daylight saving can save energy or not still needs further study（D）study of effectiveness of da
28、ylight saving policies should be conducted regularly10 It may not be obvious, but hearing two languages regularly during pregnancy puts infants on the road to bilingualism by birth. According to new findings in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, infants bo
29、rn to bilingual mothers exhibit different language preferences than infants bom to mothers speaking only one language.Psychological scientists Krista Byers-Heinlein and Janet F. Werker from the University of British Columbia along with Tracey Burns of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and D
30、evelopment in France wanted to investigate language preference and discrirnination in newborns. Two groups of newborns were tested in these experiments: English monolinguals (whose mothers spoke only English during pregnancy) and Tagalog-English bilinguals (whose mothers spoke both Tagalog, a langua
31、ge spoken in the Philippines, and English regularly during pregnancy). The researchers employed a method known as “high-amplitude sucking-preference procedure“ to study the infants language preferences.This method capitalizes on the newborns sucking reflexincreased sucking indicates interest in a st
32、imulus. In the first experiment, infants heard 10 minutes of speech, with every minute alternating between English and Tagalog.Results showed that English monolingual infants were more interested in English than Tagalogthey exhibited increased sucking behavior when they heard English than when they
33、heard Tagalog being spoken. However, bilingual infants had an equal preference for both English and Tagalog. These results suggest that prenatal bilingual exposure may affect infants language preferences, preparing bilingual infants to listen to and learn about both of their native languages.To lear
34、n two languages, bilingual newborns must also be able to keep their languages apart. To test if bilingual infants are able to discriminate between their two languages, infants listened to sentences being spoken in one of the languages until they lost interest. Then, they either heard sentences in th
35、e other language or heard sentences in the same language, but spoken by a different person. Infants exhibited increased sucking when they heard the other language being spoken. Their sucking did not increase if they heard additional sentences in the same language. These results suggest that bilingua
36、l infants, along with monolingual infants, are able to discriminate between the two languages, providing a mechanism from the first moments of life that helps ensure bilingual infants do not confuse their two languages.The researchers observe that, “Monolingual newborns preference for their single n
37、ative language directs listening attention to that language“ and that, “Bilingual newborns interest in both languages helps ensure attention to, and hence further learning about, each of their languages.“ Discrimination of the two languages helps prevent confusion. The results of these studies demon
38、strate that the roots of bilingualism run deeper than previously imagined, extending even to the prenatal period.11 The purpose of the experiments in Paragraph 2 is to find out _.（A）infants sucking reactions to language stimulus（B） language likings and discerning ability of infants（C） childrens abil
39、ity to alternate between two languages（D）infants sucking preference between different languages12 In the “high-amplitude sucking-preference procedure“, stronger language preference is shown by_.（A）more sucking behaviors（B） greater speech attentiveness（C） more exposure to that language（D）longer sucki
40、ng time13 According to Paragraph 3, language learning of an infant _.（A）begins before it comes into the world（B） is decided by its mothers language preference（C） is influenced by its lingual environment before birth（D）depends on its language preference before birth14 Which of the following is true o
41、f bilingual newborns?（A）They have a preference between the two languages.（B） They only notice a new language.（C） They have more advantage than monolingual newborns.（D）They can distinguish between the two languages.15 Bilingual newborns interest in both languages is helpful because it enables them to
42、 _.（A）focus on and better study both languages（B） keep the two languages apart（C） obtain longer listening attention（D）find out the roots of bilingualism15 Few men who find themselves cast as heroes early in life continue to command universal esteem till the end. Sir Edmund Hillary was one. To be the
43、 first to reach the top of the worlds highest mountain ensured international celebrity and a place in history, but the modesty of a slightly awkward New Zealand beekeeper never departed him. Nor was mountaineering, or indeed beekeeping, his only accomplishment.Two views are often expressed about his
44、 life. One is that conquering Everest was everything. No one would play down the role of Tenzing Norgay, the Sherpa who reached the peak with him, possibly even before him; their partnership was like that of Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire. But it was Sir Edmund who first struggled his way up a crack
45、 in the 12-metre (40-foot) rockface that had to be overcome after the south summit if the real one was to be achieved, and below which only oblivion awaited.News of the British-led expeditions triumph on May 29th 1953 reached the world through a report in the London Times four days later. The Times,
46、 a sponsor of the expedition, had used an elaborate code to trick any rivals monitoring the radio waves. Its scoop was indeed a coup: June 2nd was the day of Queen Elizabeths coronation, at which her majesty was crowned.Sir Edmund was a man of action. After Everest came more expeditions in Nepal, a
47、race to the South Pole and further adventures in the Antarctic, the Himalayas and India But for some onlookers neither these nor even the Everest expedition was especially remarkable: fitness and physical courage are all very well, they argued, but the worlds highest peak was simply waiting to be sc
48、aled, and a steady traffic nowadays makes its way to the top unnoticed, except for the litter it leaves.Both the indifferent and the awe-struck, however, agree that Sir Edmunds other life was wholly admirable, and he himself said he was prouder of it than of anything else. This was his tireless work
49、 for the Sherpas, of whom he had become so fond. Through his efforts, and those of Tenzing, hospitals, clinics, bridges, runways and nearly 30 schools have been built in the Solo Khumbu region of Nepal just south of Everest. If New Zealand claimed Sir Edmunds loyalty, Nepal, and especially its Sherpas, could surely claim his heart.16 Which of the following is true of Sir Edmund Hillary?（A）He never left the awkward New Zealand beekeeper.（B） He is the first person to reach the top of Everest.（C） Neither mou
