阅读部分：
一、考试时间：2014年9月4日(周四)
二、考试概述：
本次考试文章出现了两旧一新，属于中等难度。第一篇文章讲述的超市模式的诞生，是旧题，题材属于事物的发展史。第二篇文章讲述的植物净水系统，也是旧题。值得注意的是，这两套经典旧文在12年的2月25日曾考过，也是以Passage1和2的顺序出现。
第三篇论述语言的灭绝，虽是机经中没有的新文，但也是旧题材。拯救频临灭绝的语言的真题可参考剑4Test2Passage1.本次考试没有出现较难的科研文章，考生普遍反应阅读难度不大。
本次考试涉及的题型有：判断(是非及对错)，填空(选词摘要填空，句子，图表)，配对(段落信息)，单选和多选。题型比较多样，其中选词填空考到了两次，建议考生们在平时练习时不要忽略此类题型。
三、文章简介：
Passage 1: 超市的诞生
Passage 2: Natural purification system植物净水系统
Passage 3: Disappearing Language
四、篇章分析：
Passage 1:
| 文章内容 | 主要讲超市模式的诞生和发展。一个人对超市的design和innovation, 把超市分成了3个区域以便来提高效率。第一部分主要讲自主购物商店的产生过程。一个人14岁失业后就去当clerk了，发现用传统方式卖东西的效率太慢，就创办了自己的自主购物的商店。商店分3个区域，一个是结账的地方，一个是自己选商品的地方，还有一个是只有工作人员才能进入的地方.后来这个人又发现降低商品的价格可以吸引更多的顾客，最后还开了连锁店。 |
| 题型分布及参考答案 |
1. 段落信息配对5道（NB有复选) 2. 句子填空4道 3. 单选题4道 参考答案： 1. 段落信息配对 在supermarket之前的购物情况A 发明者关于超市的布局规划 E 顾客购物的问题E 2.填空 Clerk Customer Public area后面的区域的名字是：stock Lobby Gallery 3. 选择 发明超市的人的motivation是：profit 关于Piggly Wiggly 超市：12 months updated 发明超市的人今天还被记得，最主要是因为：remembered by超市的名字 |
| 相关拓展 | 关于事物的发展史，剑桥真题中出现不少可以借鉴。如：C5T1P1：Johnson’s Dictionary 讲述约翰字典的发展历史。C5T2P3：The Birth of Scientific English 讲述科技英语的诞生。C6T3P1：电影的发展史。C8T1P1：A Chronicle of Time Keeping 计时器的发展史。 |
Passage 2:
| 文章内容 | 文章主要讲绿色植物净化水的装置。用自然的方式来净化水在很早之前就存在。利用芦苇的根系来吸收过滤污水中的杂质，可以起到净化水源的作用。这种装置乡下用比城里用更适合，并且提到了两种净化装置horizontal flow和down flow，分别说了他们的advantages。之后还进行对比，这两种装置的基底厚度是一样的，但down flow有三层。 |
| 题型分布及参考答案 |
1. 判断题4道（YES/NO/NOT GIVEN) 2. 图表填空3道 3. 摘要填空4道（wordlist） 4. 多选题 2道 部分答案： 1.判断题 传统治理应该在urban area使用No A开头的海藻对净化水是有用的Not Given 用植物治理污染.新栽培的植物是更好的No（因为原文说，要很多年长好了根部才可以治理污染） 2.图表填空 从上到下应该是films, sand, gravel 3.摘要填空 关于down flow和horizontal flow这两种净水系统的优劣对比：down flow 的优点是处理污染程度更高的水，缺点是多层以及不能同时，一次完成净化；horizontal 。 4. 多选 natural flow的好处，attractive（看起来美观）和low cost |
| 相关拓展 |
本文属于对植物的研究和植物的作用，有以下词汇常在此类话题中出现： 1. vegetation n. 植物，草木 vegetative adj. 植物的 2. purify v. 净化 3. nutrient n. 养分，养料 4. reproduce v. 繁殖 → reproduction n. 5. absorb v. 摄取，吸收 → absorption n. 6. intake n. 摄取 7. organic adj. 有机的 → organism n. 有机体，微生物 8. oxidate v. 氧化 oxidise v. 氧化 9. degrade v. 降解 → degradation n. 10. community n. 群落 11. inhabit v. 栖息 12. horizontal adj. 水平的 13. maintenance n. 维持，保持 14. pollinate v. 授粉 15. fertilise v. 授粉 16. scent n. 香味，气味 17. gene n. 基因 18. evergreen adj. 常绿的 19. retain v. 保持 20. annual ring n. 年轮 21. cease v. 停止 22. toxic adj. 有毒的 23. noxious adj. 有毒的 24. bitterness n. 苦味 25. erode v. 侵蚀，腐蚀 → erosion n. 侵蚀 26. commercial adj. 商业的，贸易的 27. threaten v. 危及，威胁 28. extract v. 提取 29. substitute v. 替代 30. dye n. 染料 31. harvest v. 收获，收成 32. mature v. 成熟 33. reap v. 收割，收获 34. acidic adj. 酸性的 35. moisture n. 潮湿，湿气 36. stem n. 茎干，茎 37. function n. 功能，作用 |
Passage 3:
| 文章内容 | 世界上的大部分人说的语言其实是少数的几种语言，而绝大部分的语言是由极少部分人说的，很少的人说的语言面临着灭绝。某教授做了一个project，要到一个地区去帮助他们挽救自己的语言。 | |
| 题型分布及参考答案 |
1. 摘要填空5道（Wordlist） 2. 判断题3道（TRUE/FALSE/NOT GIVEN） 3. 单选题6道 部分答案： 1. 摘要填空 Minority, extinction, funding, significance, difference 2. 判断题 在选择领域之前，语言学家和人类学家都会仔细考虑False（原文说是随机的） 原文中讲了一种语言是快灭绝的，和别的任何语言都没有相似之处 Not given 那个地方的学校缺少投入语言研究的资源Not given 3. 单选题 第一道的定位词是PhD 第二道是第七段里面的 第三道关于Globalization作者的观点：全球化既有好处也有坏处 第四道关于他的项目的前景是：这个项目将不会阻止一些语言消失 第五道语言快灭绝的民族该怎么做：他们应该不仅仅依靠于外界，而要自己去记录他们的语言，让自己的语言存活下来。 |
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| 相关拓展 |
C4T2P1：Lost for words In the Native American Navajo nation, which sprawls across four states in the American south-west, the native language is dying. Most of its speakers are middle-aged or elderly. Although many students take classes in Navajo, the schools are run in English. Street signs, supermarket goods and even their own newspaper are all in English. Not surprisingly, linguists doubt that any native speakers of Navajo will remain in a hundred years' time. Navajo is far from alone. Half the world's 6,800 languages are likely to vanish within two generations—that's one language lost every ten days. Never before has the planet's linguistic diversity shrunk at such a pace. 'At the moment, we are heading for about three or four languages dominating the world,' says Mark Pagel, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Reading. 'It's a mass extinction, and whether we will ever rebound from the loss is difficult to know.' Isolation breeds linguistic diversity: as a result, the world is peppered with languages spoken by only a few people. only 250 languages have more than a million speakers, and at least 3,000 have fewer than 2,500. It is not necessarily these small languages that are about to disappear. Navajo is considered endangered despite having 150,000 speakers. What makes a language endangered is not just the number of speakers, but how old they are. If it is spoken by children it is relatively safe. The critically endangered languages are those that are only spoken by the elderly, according to Michael Krauss, director of the Alassk Native Language Center, in Fairbanks. Why do people reject the language of their parents? It begins with a crisis of confidence, when a small community finds itself alongside a larger, wealthier society, says Nicholas Ostler, of Britain's Foundation for Endangered Languages, in Bath. 'People lose faith in their culture,' he says. 'When the next generation reaches their teens, they might not want to be induced into the old traditions.' The change is not always voluntary. Quite often, governments try to kill off a minority language by banning its use in public or discouraging its use in schools, all to promote national unity. The former US policy of running Indian reservation schools in English, for example, effectively put languages such as Navajo on the danger list. But Salikoko Mufwene, who chairs the Linguistics department at the University of Chicago, argues that the deadliest weapon is not government policy but economic globalisation. 'Native Americans have not lost pride in their language, but they have had to adapt to socio-economic pressures,' he says. 'They cannot refuse to speak English if most commercial activity is in English.' But are languages worth saving? At the very least, there is a loss of data for the study of languages and their evolution, which relies on comparisons between languages, both living and dead. When an unwritten and unrecorded language disappears, it is lost to science. Language is also intimately bound up with culture, so it may be difficult to preserve one without the other. 'If a person shifts from Navajo to English, they lose something,' Mufwene says. 'Moreover, the loss of diversity may also deprive us of different ways of looking at the world,' says Pagel. There is mounting evidence that learning a language produces physiological changes in the brain. 'Your brain and mine are different from the brain of someone who speaks French, for instance,' Pagel says, and this could affect our thoughts and perceptions. 'The patterns and connections we make among various concepts may be structured by the linguistic habits of our community.' So despite linguists' best efforts, many languages will disappear over the next century. But a growing interest in cultural identity may prevent the direst predictions from coming true. 'The key to fostering diversity is for people to learn their ancestral tongue, as well as the dominant language,' says Doug Whalen, founder and president of the Endangered Language Fund in New Haven, Connecticut. 'Most of these languages will not survive without a large degree of bilingualism,' he says. In New Zealand, classes for children have slowed the erosion of Maori and rekindled interest in the language. A similar approach in Hawaii has produced about 8,000 new speakers of Polynesian languages in the past few years. In California, 'apprentice' programmes have provided life support to several indigenous languages. Volunteer 'apprentices' pair up with one of the last living speakers of a Native American tongue to learn a traditional skill such as basket weaving, with instruction exclusively in the endangered language. After about 300 hours of training they are generally sufficiently fluent to transmit the language to the next generation. But Mufwene says that preventing a language dying out is not the same as giving it new life by using it every day. 'Preserving a language is more like preserving fruits in a jar,' he says. However, preservation can bring a language back from the dead. There are examples of languages that have survived in written form and then been revived by later generations. But a written form is essential for this, so the mere possibility of revival has led many speakers of endangered languages to develop systems of writing where none existed before. Questions 1-4 Complete the summary below. Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer. Write your answers in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet. There are currently approximately 6,800 languages in the world. This great variety of languages came about largely as a result of geographical 1……. But in today’s world, factors such as government initiatives and 2…… are contributing to a huge decrease in the number of languages. One factor which may help to ensure that some endangered languages do not die out completely is people’s increasing appreciation of their 3……. This has been encouraged through programmes of language classes for children and through ‘apprentice schemes, in which the endangered language is used as the medium of instruction to teach people a 4……. Some speakers of endangered languages have even produced writing systems in order to help secure the survival of their mother tongue.’ Questions 5-9 Look at the following statements (Questions 5-9) and the list of people in the box below. Match each statement with the correct person A-E. Write the appropriate letter A-E in boxes 5-9 on your answer sheet. NB You may use any letter more than once. 5 Endangered languages cannot be saved unless people learn to speak more than one language. 6 Saving languages from extinction is not in itself a satisfactory goal. 7 The way we think may be determined by our language. 8 Young people often reject the established way of life in their community. 9 A change of language may mean a loss of traditional culture.
Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading Passage 1? In boxes 10-13 on your answer sheet write YES if the statement agrees with the views of the writer NO if the statement contradicts the views of the writer NOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this 10 The Navajo Language will die out because it currently has too few speakers. 11 A large number of native speakers fail to guaranteen the survival of a language. 12 National governments could do more to protect endangered languages. 13 The loss of linguistic diversity is inevitable. |
