--Barron模考综合写作部分文本

Barron模考综合写作部分文本Directions: You have 20 minutes to plan, write, and revise your response to a reading passage and a lecture on the same topic. First, read the passage and take notes. Then, listen to the lecture and take notes. Finally, write your response to the writing question. Typically, a good response will require that you write 150-225 words.文本Test1Historically, schools in the United States have borrowed the European system of school organization, a system that separates students into grades by chronological age. In general, children begin formal schooling at the age of six in what is referred to as the first grade. For the most part, students progress through twelve grades; however, some students who do not meet minimum requirements for a particular grade may be asked to repeat the year.Graded schools are divided into primary grades, intermediate grades, and secondary grades. Primary education includes grades 1 through 5 or 6, and may also provide kindergarten as a preparation for first grade. Referred to as elementary school, these grades are usually taught by one teacher in aself-contained classroom. Intermediate grades begin with grade 6 or 7 and offer three years of instruction. At this level, teams of teachers may collaborate to provide subject-based classes similar to those offered in high school. Viewed as a preparation for high school, intermediate education is known as junior high school. At grade 9 or 10, secondary school begins. Classes taught by subject specialists usually last about fifty minutes to allow a student ten minutes to move to the next class before it begins at the top ofthe hour. At the end of twelve successful grades of instruction, students are eligible for a secondary school diploma, more commonly called a high school diploma.Question: Summarize the main points in the lecture, explaining how they cast doubt on the ideas in the reading passage.Test2Do computers think? It isn’t a new question. In fact, Alan Turing, a British mathematician, proposed an experiment to answer the question in 1950, and the test, known as the Turing Test, is still used today. In the experiment, a group of people are asked to interact with something in another room through a computer terminal. They don’t know whether it is another person or a computer that they are interacting with. They can ask any questions that they want. They can type their questions onto a computer screen, or they can ask their questions by speaking into a microphone. In response, they see the answers on a computer screen or they hear them played back by a voice synthesizer. At the end of the test, the people have to decide whether they have been talking to a person or to a computer. If they judge the computer to be a person, or if they can’t determine the difference, then the machine has passed the Turing Test. Since 1950, a number of contests have been organized in which machines are challenged to the Turing Test. In 1990, Hugh Loebner sponsored a prize to be awarded by the Cambridge Center for Behavioral Studies-a gold medal and a cash award of $100,000 to the designer of the computer that could pass the Turing Test; however, so far, no computer has passed the test.Question: Summarize the main points in the reading passage, and then explain how the lecture casts doubt on the ideas in the reading.Test3The design for the Sydney Opera House was selected from entries in an international competition held in 1956. From more than 230 designs submitted by major architectural firms worldwide, the committee selected a dramatic concept by Jorn Utzon, a Danish architect who was virtually unknown outside of Denmark. He described his work as more like a sculpture than a building because it appeared to change shape depending on the direction from which it was viewed. He was also very committed to organic principles, which dictated that the structure must fit in with the environment. Situated in Bennelong Point, a promontory that stretches into the harbor, Utzon drafted the curved roofs of the opera house to look like a sailing ship at full sail on the water.Clearly, the roof is the most revolutionary part of the design, which was so far ahead of the capabilities of engineering at the time that Utzon had to spend several years reworking the details for the construction of the roof sails in order to help the engineers solve the problems associated with actually building them. For example, stabilizing the shells that rose almost 200 feet high presented a serious challenge. Prestressed concrete was very new in building construction at the time that it was used to make the ribbed shells for the roof. In addition, computer technology was just catching up with the complex structural calculations and models that the architect needed for his vision to be realized.By 1966, a decade after the design was chosen, the opera house was not even near completion. It was over budget, there were problems with the engineers and the contractors, and the fate of the structure was the object of political debate; Jorn Utzon resigned from the project. Eventually completed by others, by the time that it opened in 1973, it had been under construction for 17 years. The roof alone had required almost 2200 precast concrete sections, some of which weighed 15 tons, held together by 220 miles of tensioned steel cable and covered by more than a million white glazed ceramic tiles.Question: Referring to the main points in the reading, describe the Sydney Opera House. Then, using information from both the reading and the lecture, explain why the professor classifies the building as unique.Test4The jet stream is an irregular band of wind that occurs in high altitudes at about 20,000 feet, that is, between 6 and 9 miles above the surface of the Earth. Consequently, the jet stream wanders near the top of the Earth’s troposphere, and, coincidentally, that is exactly where most of the Earth’s weather patterns occur. It is helpful to think of the jet stream like a river of air that occurs at several different locations, but in general flows from west to east over the middle latitudes. Technically, to be called a jet stream, the winds should be moving faster than 57 miles an hour, but it can have average core speeds of 190 miles per hour, and in the winter, when the jet stream is strongest, winds have been clocked at 300 miles an hour. For the most part, the winds are stronger in the winter because during the winter months the surface temperature contrasts more with the temperature in the troposphere. To put that another way, the greater the contrast in the temperature of the Earth and the atmosphere, the stronger the jet stream winds will blow.In general, there are two jet streams between the equator and the North Pole. The subtropical jet stream tends to hover around the southern border of the continental United States, whereas the polar jet stream blows over Idaho and Montana. The condition that causes these two streams is the difference in the temperature between the tropic and the arctic regions of the Earth, which tends to concentrate in small zones called fronts. It is along these fronts that storms tend to develop. The jet streams blow the storms along their path. When the jet stream is over an area, strong storms may move into it, but when the jet stream has dipped out of the area, calm, dry weather will probably be forecast.Question: Describe jet streams by using the information in the reading, and provide examples of the way that they affect air travel by drawing on the material that you heard in the lecture.Test5According to the most recent research on parenting, caretakers tend to use three strategies for disciplining children. Power includes the use of physical punishment such as a spanking or the threat of physical punishment, but parents can also demonstrate power by taking away a privilege such as using the car, attending a sporting event, or, in the case of a very young child, playing with a favorite toy. In spite of the fact that power strategies, especially severe physical punishment, can cause children to fear or even hate parents, it’s surprising that power remains the strategy used most often in disciplining children. It’s also worth noting that children who are harshly disciplined in this way tend to be hostile, defiant, and aggressive socially. Second in popularity after power is the withholding of affection. This can take the form of refusal to communicate with a child, threatening to abandon or reject the child, or otherwise treating children as though they were unworthy of love. Interesting enough, children disciplined in this way appear on the surface to be very self-disciplined, even model children who are seldom in trouble, but underneath, these same children are generally very nervous, insecure, and dependent on others to approve of and guide their evaluation of behavior. Finally, management techniques are employed for discipline. These begin with a set of rules that are clearly expressed at an age-appropriate level. To enforce the rules, parents use a combination of praise and approval with explanation and reasoning, always referring back to the rules.But regardless of the strategy, the behavior that has precipitated punishment should be clearly understood, and the consequences should be consistent. Key to any kind of discipline is a pattern ofconsistency so that children understand the relationship between the rules, their behavior, and the consequences.Question:Referring to the main points in the lecture, summarize the professor’s views on effective discipline and contrast them with the options that parents tend to use, as outlined in the reading passage.Test6The origin of life was highly speculative until a graduate student at the University of Chicago, Stanley Miller designed and conducted an empirical research project under the guidance of his graduate advisor, Harold Urey. In this classic experiment, the researchers tried to simulate the chemical evolution process that generated life. Miller and Urey took a five-liter flask half filled with water and connected it with glass tubing to another flask into which they inserted tungsten electrodes. They then mixed methane, hydrogen, and ammonia into the water in the lower flask and heated it to induce evaporation, while at the same time subjecting it to continuous electrical charges that jumped across the space between the electrodes in the upper flask. The atmosphere was cooled again so that the water could condense and trickle back into the first flask in a continuous cycle. In this way, they sought to recreate the conditions in the early atmosphere of Earth, which they speculated was probably subjected to powerful electrical storms. In about an hour, the water turned orange. At the end of the first week, they observed that almost 15 percent of the carbon was converted into organic compounds. After several weeks, the liquid in the flask clouded and then gradually turned a dark brown. When they analyzed it, Miller and Urey found that it contained a large number of amino acids, which form one of the basic structures of living organisms. They then hypothesized that the amino acids that they had created in the laboratory might be typical of the chemicalmixture of the early oceans on Earth, and further, that additional amino acids could have been added to the mixture in the early oceans by carbon enriched meteorites or comets.When the scientific result s were popularized, the mixture became known as “primordial soup.” However, much was still unknown about the process that caused the first cell to develop within the soup. The molecules produced were relatively simple organic molecules, not a complete living biochemical system. Nevertheless, the experiment established that natural processes could produce the building blocks of life without requiring life to synthesize them in the first place. The experiment served as inspiration for a large number of further investigations.Question: Summarize the main points in the reading passage, explaining how the lecture casts doubt on the ideas.Test7Solving a problem can be broken down into several steps. First, the problem must be identified correctly. Psychologists refer to this step as problem representation. For many problems, figuring out which information is relevant and which is extraneous can be difficult and can interfere with arriving at a good solution. Clearly, before a problem can be solved, it must be obvious what the problem is; however, this is not as easy as it might seem. One obstacle to efficient problem representation is functional fixedness, that is, allowing preconceived notions and even prejudices to color the facts. Most people tend to see objects and events in certain fixed ways, and by being inflexible in viewing the problem, they may be unable to notice the tools for the solution. Once the problem is identified accurately, however, the second step consists of considering the alternatives for a solution. A common way to evaluate alternatives is to write them down and then make a list of advantages and disadvantages for each solution. Here again, people may be limited by prior experiences. Often people adopt mental sets that lead them to the sameproblem-solving strategies that were successful for problems in the past. Although that can be helpful most of the time, sometimes a new situation requires a different strategy. In that case, the mental set must be abandoned, and new alternatives must be explored. This can be a difficult adjustment for some people.After the alternatives have been compared, a strategy must be selected from among them. One way to avoid becoming mired in the options is to try the best option with a view to abandoning it for another if the results are unfavorable. This attitude allows many people to move on expeditiously to the next step—action. The strategy selected must be implemented and tested. If it solves the problem, no further action is necessary, but if not, then an unsuccessful solution may actually lead to a more successful option. If the solution is still not apparent, then the cycle begins again, starting with problem identification. By continuing to review the problem and repeat the problem-solving steps, the solution can be improved upon and refined.Question: Summarize the main points in the lecture, referring to the way that they relate to the reading passage.听力脚本（Test顺序同上，每Test一篇）Professor:So what are the problems associated with the graded school system? Well, for one thing, graded schools don’t take into account the . . . the differences in academic readiness on the part of individual learners. And by that I mean that some six-year-olds are simply not socially, mentally, or even physically mature enough to begin school, but others are ready in all of those important ways by their fifth or even fourthbirthdays. And uh . . . by the time that girls and boys are in their early teens, we can see that there’s a significant difference in maturity, in . . . in physical and social maturity but . . . they’re still grouped together in intermediate grades in a graded school system.Okay, besides the obvious differences in individual readiness and maturity, the . . . the whole issue of promotion needs to be reviewed. Grade-level requirements don’t really deal with the actual learning that has occurred, uh, in a positive way. Many research studies confirm that repeating an entire year because some of the material is not learned contributes to . . . to boredom, poor self-concept, and . . . and eventually to higher drop-out rates. And since graded schools are using group expectations as measured by performance on standardized tests, this is another way to evaluate the group rather than the individual. So, what happens is that individual differences in how long it takes to learn a concept or . . . or the partial achievement of a grade-level curriculum . . . that is never addressed by the graded school system. Students who need more time to learn have to repeat material that they already know. Students who can learn at a faster rate have to wait for the new material to be presented. So, as you can see, it’s not ideal.听力路径：模考光盘所在盘符:\test1\assets\audio\MT1_WS_Lecture.mp3 Professor:$ Philosopher John Searle has challenged t he validity of the Turing Test because it’s premised on behavior rather than on thought. To prove his argument, he’s suggested a paradox, which he refers to as the Chinese Room. If a monolingual English-speaking person receives questions on a computer terminal from a Chinese person in another room, naturally the English-speaking person won’t understand the questions. However, if there’s a large reference that can be accessed, and if the reference is detailed and comprehensible, then the English speaker could, conceivably, break the code. For example, if a sequence of Chinese characters are received, the reference could indicate which sequence of Chinesecharacters would be expected in response. In other words, the behavior would be correct, although the Engl ish speaker wouldn’t be thinking at a level that included meaning. The person would be manipulating symbols without understanding them, or, as Searle suggests, the person would be acting intelligent without being intelligent, which is exactly what a computer could be programmed to do.Therefore, at least theoretically, a computer could be designed with complex input that would allow it to provide adequate behavioral output without being aware of what it’s doing. If so, then it could pass the Turing Test. B ut the test itself would be meaningless because it doesn’t really answer the most basic question about artificial intelligence, which is, can the computer think?听力路径：模考光盘所在盘符:\test2\assets\audio\ MT2_Sw_The_Turning_Test.mp3 Professor:There was only a small reference in your textbook to the Sydney Opera House, so let me make a few more remarks about it. Personally, I think it’s the masterwork of architecture in t he modern period for any number of reasons, but primarily because it’s totally unique. I mean it doesn’t really fit into any category. Sure, it’s modern, but it isn’t really part of that whole International School that was so popular at the time. Although he did take advantage of advances in structural engineering and the newer materials that had replaced masonry in the International Style buildings, and yes, even the clean geometric lines that were stripped of the ornamentation of an earlier period, but th e Opera House isn’t strictly International because it’s so imaginative and the shape completely breaks out of the skyscraper mold associated with the International Style. So is it an example of Organic architecture then? Again, I would say not. True, it has elements of the Organic School, which makes sense because Utson worked under the supervision of Frank Lloyd Wright for a time and there’s no doubt that the design fits into the surrounding environment. It’s a ship in the harbor. But then, the function that Wright insisted upon didn’t dictate the form as much asthe aesthetic shape. The purpose of the sails is to please the eye, not to contribute to the function of the spaces inside them. There’s the High Tech aspect of the project that pointed the way for architects and engineers to collaborate in the creation of fantastic structures. So in that sense, it’s a creature of the computer age, and might be considered part of the High Tech revolution among architects. But no. It’s a blend of art and architecture, engineering and technology. It’s one of the most widely recognized buildings in the world, and is still considered one of the most extraordinary and beautiful structures built in the twentieth century. I simply cannot categorize it as representative of any one school of architecture. To me, the Sydney Opera House is one of a kind.听力路径：模考光盘所在盘符:\test3\assets\audio\MT3_WS_Lecture.mp3 Professor:$ In North America, the jet stream usually separates cold air from the polar region in the north from warmer air to the south, so it’s called the polar jet stream. Okay, when it’s cold in th e United States, the polar jet stream often dips south into Texas or even as far as Mexico, and when it’s hot, the jet stream retreats into Canada. Now, think about some of the trips you may have taken across country. Did you notice that the airline schedules factor in the effect of the jet stream on flight times? For example, if you were flying from Los Angeles to New York, the flight would be more than one hour shorter than your return trip from New York to Los Angeles. Why would this be so, do you think? Well, because a particularly strong jet stream can provide a strong tailwind that moves the plane along faster as it travels with the wind, but on the way back, the plane will encounter a headwind, and it will have to travel against the wind. So the fligh t will take longer. And the plane will also consume more fuel when it’s traveling against the jet stream, and you’ll probably also feel more turbulence. Besides that, the weather for yourflight can also be affected by the jet stream because this strong current of air moves weather systems and storms around the world by pushing them forward, just like the tailwind that pushes your plane.听力路径：模考光盘所在盘符:\test4\assets\audio\MT4_WS_Lecture.mp3 Professor:$ So now let’s talk about how discipline relates to sel f-esteem. In studies of children, Coopersmith found that power and withholding of affection were associated with children who demonstrated low selfesteem, but management techniques were associated with children who exhibited high self-esteem. So, it seems that parents should use physical punishment and withholding of affection with caution, right? Well, most psychologists oppose physical punishment for children under the age of 2, and some psychologists believe that discipline should be achieved without any physical punishment for children of all ages, referencing the fact that discipline means “to teach” whereas punishment means “to harm.” Anyway, it’s generally agreed that reinforcement of good behavior is more effective than waiting for bad behavior that requires punishment. But when discipline is necessary, setting limits with negative consequences that are consistently enforced seems to promote healthy development of self-esteem in children, especially when these management techniques are supplemented with approval, attention, and affection. I mean, when parents try to catch their children in the act of doing something right and use that as a basis for positive reinforcement of their behavior.听力路径：模考光盘所在盘符:\test5\assets\audio\MT5_WS_Lecture.mp3 Professor:$ Most textbooks that have been published within the past fifty years include the Miller-Urey experiment because it was such a groundbreaking discovery at the time, and researchers honestly believed that they were on the verge of discovering the origin of life. But the current view of the Miller-Urey experiment is,let’s say, skeptical. And there are several serious objections that we really need to deal with before we move on. First, the laboratory atmosphere that Miller and Urey created was charged with continuous electrical energy, but even though the atmosphere of early Earth was subjected to frequent electrical storms, they were probably not continuous. So, some scientists argue that, although amino acids and other organic compounds may have been formed in the early history of Earth, they probably would not have been produced in the amounts seen in the experimental environment. Some scientists are also concerned about the fact that oxygen was reduced from the atmosphere in the Miller-Urey experiment. What if the premise that the mixture of gases simulated that of early Earth were false? Then, of course, everything else in the experiment is flawed.And here’s another problem. Because several meteorites have fallen to Earth since the publication of the Miller-Urey experiment, there has been interest in analyzing them for amino acid content, and amino acids have been found in them. Well, that proves that amino acids are able to survive in severe conditions in space. So what does that mean? Some scientists think that the early Earth was similar to asteroids and comets that contain amino acids so they may have been present from the moment that the Earth was formed. Others point to the possibility that organic compounds escaped from within meteorites in impact sites where they hit the surface of the newly forming planet Earth.The truth is that we just don’t know how the first cell was formed, and we really aren’t sure how that cell reorganized into larger living structures. So, although the Miller-Urey experiment is interesting, it probably does not hold the promise of unlocking the mystery of life on our planet.听力路径：模考光盘所在盘符:\test6\assets\audio\MT6_WS_Lecture.mp3 Professor:$ Now that you’ve read the article on problem solving, let’s talk about the role of breaks. We all know that taking a break is a good strategy for solving a problem, but how does a break really influence the solution? Well, some researchers feel that rest allows the brain to analyze the problem more clearly. We’re advised to “sleep on it” when a problem is difficult to solve. Okay, but what if there’s some type of incubation effect during sleep that allows the brain to continue working on a solution? Here’s what I mean. F. A. Kekule was puzzled by the structure of benzene. One night, he dreamed about a snake biting its tail while whirling around in a circle. And when he awoke, it occurred to him that the carbon atoms of benzene might be arranged in a ring. He attributed the solution of the problem directly to the dream. But Kekule’s expe rience and others like it present researchers with a dilemma because there’s disagreement about whether unconscious mental activity exists. Were the dreamers really asleep or were they relaxed but awake when they solved the problem?Two explanations have been proposed to explain why a break supports problem solving while we’re awake. One possibility is that during the break, information may appear that provides a solution. For example, Buckminster Fuller was looking at a triangle when he saw the structure of multiple triangles as the solution for constructing a geodesic dome. Of course, another possibility is much more simplistic. It could be that the value of taking a break is as basic as interfering with an ineffective pattern of thinking. By focusing on something else, we may return to the problem in a different frame of mind and think about it in a different, and more productive, way.听力路径：模考光盘所在盘符:\test7\assets\audio\ MT7_WS_Lecture.mp3范例（Test顺序同上，每Test一篇）EXThe graded school system, which groups students by age, is usually divided into primary, intermediate,and secondary grades. However, according to the lecture, there are several disadvantages to this type of system. In the first place, maturity is not considered. All students begin the first grade at six years old; however, many children are not mature enough to go to school at that age. In contrast, some younger children are ready for school before their sixth birthdays but are denied the opportunity to begin until they reach the required age of six. In addition, the disparity in the maturity of girls and boys is marked in the intermediate grades. Nevertheless, they are still scheduled for classes according to age, not maturity. Even more concerning is the problem of grade-level standards, which rely on testing to evaluate progress by age instead of by actual mastery on the part of individuals. The grade-level system is inefficient because it requires some learners to repeat concepts that they have already learned in order to master those that they still need to know. It also penalizes students who are capable of learning more material than the grade-level curriculum allows. Furthermore, research shows a correlation between lowself-esteem and drop-out rates with the requirement that students repeat a calendar year because they have not learned part of the material for their grade.ExThe Turing Test, developed in 1950, allows subjects to interact with a person or a computer in another room by speaking into a microphone or typing questions onto a computer. When they receive an answer by voice synthesizer or by text on their computer screens, subjects must determine whether they have been communicating with a computer or with a human being. If they think that they have been interacting with a person or they are unable to decide, then the computer has passed the Turing Test, proving that the machine is actually capable of higher-level thought processes similar to those of a human brain. According to the lecture, however, a machine can be programmed to produce responses that appear to be intelligent without the awareness required for thought. In John Searle’s Chinese Room, anEnglish-speaking person is able to respond to questions in Chinese by referring to source material that。