西安交大听写部分(1)

MODEL TEST ONEHobbiesIn early times, most people were too busy making a living to have many hobbies. Today as machines havereduced the amount of time they must spend on their jobs, people have more time than before for hobbies.People take up hobbies because these activities offer enjoyment, friendship, knowledge, and relaxation. Sometimes they even yield financial profit. Hobbies help people relax after periods of hard work. They providea balance between work and play, especially for workers who do the same monotonous tasks all day long.Hobbies also offer interesting activities for persons who have retired. Those who have developed hobbies never need to worry about what to do with their newly found leisure hours. Anyone can follow a satisfying hobby, regardless of his age, position, or income. A famous Canadian doctor expressed the value of hobbies by saying, "No man is really happy or safe without a hobby." (157 words)MODEL TEST TWOWind and Sea WavesIf you've ever stood on the shore of the ocean, you've seen wave after wave move toward you. Eachcomes up to the shore, breaks, and then falls back. Is there a giant machine far out at sea that creates this movement? Not at all but there is one factor which bas been hard at work. It is the wind which makes the movement we call waves. This movement continues until it runs into something, like the shore. The wavesthat reach the shoreline may have travelled thousands of miles.As a wave approaches the shore, it slows down. The water becomes more shallow. The sea bottom dragson the wave. The tops of waves crowd together. When they are too close for the wave to form properly, thewave breaks. The top of the wave spills over, and the water pushes forward onto the beach.(150 words)MODEL TEST THREELet Children Learn to Judge Their Own WorkA child learning to talk does not learn by being corrected all the time. If corrected too much, he will stop talking. He notices a thousand times a day the difference between the language he uses and the language those around him use. Bit by bit, he makes the necessary changes to make his language like other people's. In thesame way, when children learn to do all the other things, such as walking, running, climbing, and riding a bi- cycle, they learn to do them without being taught. Rather, they compare those performances with those ofmore skilled people, and slowly make the needed changes. But in school we never give a child a chance to find out his own mistakes for himself. We act as if we thought that he would never notice a mistake unless it was pointed out to him. Soon he becomes dependent on the teacher. (150 words)MODEL TEST FOURA New Need for Traffic LightsSpace is getting crowded. That's the latest worry for many scientists. About ten thousand objects are orbiting our planet now. Some are satellites that have a job to do. Other items have finished their work. Parts of rockets may have been discarded during a flight and left behind in space.This is becoming a real problem. More items in space lead to more danger. Some of the objects now float-ing through space are just a few inches in size. But they can still do harm. If they hit a spacecraft or spacelab, they might destroy it.Space agencies can now locate objects in space with a computer. Yet, accidents still happen. Someone may see that two objects seem to be very close. But they have no power to prevent the crash. Experts can only plot courses to help future rockets avoid some of the objects. (151 words)MODEL TEST FIVESportThe word "sport" first meant something that people did in their free time. Later it often meant huntingwild animals and birds. About a hundred years ago the word was first used for organized games, which is its usual meaning today. People spend their spare time playing football, basketball, tennis and many other sports. Such people play because they want to. Some people are paid for the sport they play. These people are called professional sportsmen. They may be sportsmen for only a few years, but many of them can earn a lot of money.Of course, it is only possible for a few sportsmen to earn much money in sports for individuals, like golf, tennis and motor racing. And famous stars can even get huge amounts of money from advertisements. They allow the companies to use their names or photographs and are paid for this. Sport is no longer just something for people's spare time. (157 words)MODEL TEST SIXHow to Avoid Foolish OpinionsTo avoid the various foolish opinions to which mankind is prone, no superhuman genius is required. If the matter is one that can be settled by observation, make the observation yourself. Many matters, however, areless easily brought to the test of experience. If you have passionate convictions on many such matters, thereare ways in which you can make yourself aware of your own bias.If an opinion contrary to your own makes you angry, that is a sign that you are subconsciously aware of having no good reason for thinking as you do. So whenever you find yourself getting angry about a difference of opinion, be on your guard; you will probably find that your belief is going beyond what the evidence warrants.A good way of ridding yourself of certain kinds of prejudice is to become aware of opinions held in social circles different from your own. (155 words)MODEL TEST SEVENTeaching and LearningTeaching is supposed to be a professional activity requiring long and complicated training as well as official certification. The act of teaching is looked upon as a flow of knowledge from a higher source to an empty con tainer. The student's role is one of receiving information, while the teacher's is one of sending it.There is a clear distinction assumed between one who is supposed to know and another, usually, younger person who is supposed not to know. However, teaching needn't be the province of a special group of peoplenor need it be looked upon as a technical skill. Teaching can be more like guiding and assisting than forcing in formation into a supposedly empty head. If you have a certain skill, you should be able to share it with some- one. You don't have to get certified to convey what you know to someone else or to help them in their attemptto teach themselves. (158 words)MODEL TEST EIGHTThe Use of ComputersNearly everything we do in the modern world is helped or even controlled by computers. Computers are being used more and more extensively for the simple reason that they are far more efficient than human beings. They have much better memories and can store huge amounts of information. They can collect and analyze e normous numbers of facts very quickly. This makes them suitable for all kinds of work. They can pay wages,reserve seats on planes, control machines in factories. They can even play chess, write poetry, or compose music. But perhaps the most interesting applications will be for personal use. In some countries, modified tele vision sets have been connected by telephone to a very large computer. Users dial a few numbers on the tele phone to get information from the large computer such as schedules for airplanes, information from dictiona- ries, or weather forecasts. They can also use the computer to do complicated calculations and to play games.(157 words)MODEL TEST NINELife in SpaceSome scientists say that in twenty years, there will be communities in space. These will begin because men will go to work on the moon, and send important metals back to earth. They will need somewhere to live, and so, with the help of special building machines, they will create large "ships" in space. People will be ableto live a new way of life because the ships will be large enough for all the things people need. In the middle of the ship there could be a river. On the outside of the ship the people will grow vegetables, under plastic or glass. These will grow very quickly because of the light from the sun. But perhaps the most beautiful thing about these communities is that the people inside will be able to fly, since the gravity will be very low. Perhaps when people live in places like these, they will have a better life than in the cities on earth.MODEL TEST TENForeign Language StudyThe knowledge of a foreign language is an important part of an education. A person cannot be considered truly educated if he knows only one language. Nevertheless, the importance of learning foreign languages is of- ten underestimated.English is one of the most commonly used languages in international communication. Some speakers of English mistakenly argue that it is unimportant for them to know another language for communicative purpo ses. They think that everyone else should know English. But there are still billions of people who do not speak English, and many of these people have limited educational opportunities. If English speakers do not make the effort to learn to communicate in other languages, they should not expect others to gain a knowledge of English.If there is to be world peace, the people of the world must understand each other. Communication is nec- essary to that understanding, but people cannot communicate if they do not speak the same language.(156 words)。