英语听力20篇儿

Last week, my youngest son and I visited my father at his new home.My earliest memories of my father are of a tall, handsome, successful man devoted to his work and family but uncomfortable with his children. As a child, I loved him；as a school girl and young adult, I feared him and felt bitter about him.On the first day of my visit, we did some shopping，ate on the street table，and laughed over my son's funny facial expressions. Gone was my father's critical air and strict rules. Who was this person I knew as my father who seemed so friendly and interesting to be around?The next day, my dad pulled out his childhood pictures and told me quite a few stories about his own childhood. Although our times together became easier over the years, I never felt closer to him until that moment. After so many years, I'm at last seeing another side of my father.2、Different "Styles" of DirectionsI travel a lot, and I find out different “styles” of directions every time I ask “How can I get to the post office?”In Japan, people use landmarks in their directions instead of street names. For example, the Japanese will say to travelers, " Go straight down to the corner. Turn left at the big hotel and go past a fruit market. The post office is across from the bus stop."In the countryside of the American Midwest, instead of landmarks, people will tell you directions and distances. For example, people will say, “Go north two miles. Turn east, and then go another mile.”People in Los Angeles, California, have no idea of distance on the map; they measure distance in time, not miles. “How far away is the post office?” you ask. “Oh,” they answer, “it’s about five minutes from here.” You say, “Yes, but how many miles away is it?” They don’t know.(155 words)3、Differences Between Television and Radio AnnouncersWhen television first began to expand, very few of the people who had become famous as radio announcers were able to be equally effective on television. Some of the difficulties they experienced when they were trying to adjust themselves to the new medium were technical. When working on radio, for example, they had become used to seeing on behalf of the listener. This art of seeing for others means that the announcer has to be very good at talking.In the case of television, however, the announcer sees everything with the viewer. His duty, therefore, is completely different. He is there to make sure that the viewer does not miss any pointof interest, to help him focus on particular things, and to help him understand the images on the television screen. Unlike his radio colleague, he must know the value of silence and how to use it at those moments when the pictures speak for themselves. (157 words)4、Can't"Can't" is the worst word that can be written or spoken, and can do more harm than lying. Many strong spirits have been broken by it. It springs from the lips of thoughtless people each morning and robs us of the courage we need that day. It rings in our ears like a timely sent warning and laughs when we fall by the way."Can't" is the father of weak effort, and the parent of fear and half-hearted work. It weakens the efforts of clever craftsmen, and makes people work less. It poisons the soul of a person with an illusion. It laughs at people's hopes and dreams.Whatever the goal you are seeking, keep trying, and answer by saying, "I can!" "Can't" is the enemy that is ready to ruin your will. It will only give way to courage, patience and skill. Treat it with strong and continuous hate, for once it is welcomed it can break any man. (160 words)5、Light PollutionWe usually think of pollution as a harmful waste substance that threatens the air and water. But some people have become concerned about another kind of pollution. It can be everywhere, depending on the time of day. And it is not thought of as a substance. It is light.The idea of light pollution has developed with the increase of lights in cities. In many areas, this light makes it difficult or impossible to observe stars and planets in the night sky. Light pollution threatens to reduce the scientific value of research telescopes.Light pollution is the result of wasted energy. Bright light that shines into the sky is not being used to provide light where it is needed on Earth. Lights that are brighter than necessary also cause light pollution. Recently, two Italian astronomers and an American environmental scientist created a world map of the night sky. The map shows that North America, Western Europe and Japan have the greatest amount of light pollution. (165 words)6、Town and Country Life in EnglandThere is a big difference between town life and country life in England. In the country, everybody knows everybody else. They know what time you get up, what time you go to bed and what you have for dinner. If you want help, you will always get it and you will be glad to help others.In a large town like London, however, it can sometimes happen that you have never seen your next door neighbor and you do not know his name or anything about him. People in London areoften very lonely. This is because people go to different places in the evenings and at weekends. If you walk through the streets in the centre of London on Sunday, it is like a town without people. One is sorry for old people living on their own. They could die in their homes and would not be discovered for weeks or even months.7、A Change in Women’s LifeThe important change in women’s life-pattern has only recently begun to have its full effect on women’s economic position. Even a few years ago most girls lef t school at the first opportunity, and most of them took a full-time job. However, when they married, they usually left work at once and never returned to it. Today the school-leaving age is sixteen, many girls stay at school after that age, and though women tend to marry younger, more married women stay at work at least until shortly before their first child is born. Very many more afterwards return to full-time or part-time work. Such changes have led to a new relationship in marriage, with the husband accepting a greater share of the duties and satisfactions of family life and with both husband and wife sharing more equally in providing the money, and running the home, according to the abilities and interests of each of them.8、A Popular Pastime of the English PeopleOne of the best means of understanding the people of any nation is watching what the do with their non-working time. Most English men, women and children love growing things, especially flowers. Visitors to England in spring, summer or autumn are likely to see gardens all they way along the railway lines. There are flowers at the airports and flowers in factory grounds, as well as in gardens along the roads. Each English town has at least one park with beautifully kept flower beds. Public buildings of every kind have brilliant window boxes and sometimes baskets of flowers are hanging on them.But what the English enjoy most is growing things themselves. If it is impossible to have a garden, then a window box or something growing in a pot wil l do. Looking at each other’s gardens is a popular pastime with the English.10. All About EyesToday's program is all about eyes. When it comes to relationships, people's eyes can be a window into their hearts. This means that their eyes can tell a lot about how they feel. We will tell a story about a man and woman who are teachers at the same school. The woman is interested in the man. She uses many methods to catch his eye, or get him to notice her. Once he sets eyes on her, or sees her, she might try to get him interested in her by acting playful. In other words, she might try to make eyes at him or give him the eye.Let us suppose that this man gets hit between the eyes. In other words, the woman has a strong affect on him. He wants to spend time with her to get to know her better. He asks her out on a date.She is so happy that she may walk around for days with stars in her eyes. She is extremely happy because this man is the apple of her eye, a very special person. She might tell him that he isthe only person she wants, or "I only have eyes for you."ON TIMEThe Germans have a good reputation of being on time. They are very proud of this habit. Many people say German people work like a clock. This is because they do everything according to their plans they make. They develop this good habit when they are very small. In Germany if a person often fails to keep an appointment, he is not respected, trusted and has no true friends.To fail to be punctual is a sign that you do not respect other people. It is very bad and harmful not to be punctual. If a teacher is often late for his class, it is not likely that his students will respect him. The same is true with a student. His teacher and classmates will not respect him and trust him. If a business man often fails to keep appointments or deliver goods on time, he will certainly suffer a great deal. In the end he will lose his customers and will be out of business.Unfortunately, there are still a lot of people who do not realize the importance of being punctual. Perhaps an effective way to teach them is to let them suffer. (195) LESSON 11LIVE HAPPILYRecently, China Youth did a survey to find out people’s ideas about living happily. Their findings are very interesting. There are many different ideas about living happily. There is one group whose idea about a happy life is quite different from the others. Take Xiao Shu for example. She works in a big business company. Every day she rides a bicycle to her office. Under her influence many of her colleagues and friends also do the same. She is also a leader of a group who tries to do as many good things as possible for the society. This group organizes many different kinds of activities to tell people not to waste, to protect our environment, to love animals, to eat healthy food and eat less meat.The members are all hard working, kind and polite. They travel by public transport. They eat healthy food. The clothes they wear are all made from natural fibers. Another thing they all have in common is that they don’t have a lot of desires. All of them are patient and don’t easily get excited. They are happy with what they have. (188)LESSON 12A SUPERMARKET SHOPLIFTERIt is really hard to say whether it is a sad story or an interesting one. But it is a true story. It happened on the morning of July 10th 2008 in a small chain store in Zhengzhou. A woman in her 40s was caught shoplifting. The store called the police and three minutes later two policemen arrived. She was taken to an office. The things she stole were pork, dried beef and sausages, which all together cost about 200 Yuan. She looked ashamed and guilty. The policemen told her that she had to come to the police station with them. She refused to go. For twice, she tried to kill herself by knocking her head against the wall. The policemen finally managed to calm her down.When questioned why she wanted to do that, she told the policemen her story. For two months she and her son had had no meat at all for meals because she couldn’t afford it. Like the other kids, her son needed some good food. As she didn’t know where to find the money to buy meat, she decided to steal it from the store. (191)LESSON 13A TENT HOTELAiling, aged 29, came back from San Francisco in 2002 after she had completed her university courses there. She was offered a well-paid job in Shenzhen. Soon she found that her job was too demanding and stressful. Two years later, she left the company. Before finding a new job, she decided to take a holiday in her hometown Hainan. Her house is in a small town at the foot of a hill, which is a part of Wuzhi Mountain. Looking out of the window she can see a fine view of a river and green hills covered with tall trees. After seeing the wonderful view, she felt so relaxed and peaceful. Suddenly, an idea came to her mind. This is an ideal place for people who want to escape stress and to relax. A tent hotel would be the thing to meet their needs.Wasting no time, she and her boyfriend started to plan. They rented a large piece of land to build their tent hotel. Each room is a tent. Guests live a life that people lived a century ago. They can pick fresh vegetable from the garden and make their own food. They can also go fishing or boating. Guests can completely forget about their problems and enjoy the natural beauty. (213)CHINA HIGH SPEED TRAINSJapan built the world’s first high speed rail in 1964. As high speed railways have many advantages over airplanes and super speed high ways, France, Germany and America quickly followed the Japanese example. Our country didn’t start building the high speed railway until 2005. The first high speed railway is from Beijing to Tienjin. It went to operation on the 1st of August 2008, just 8 days before the BIG EVENT. The train runs about 320 km/h. It only takes 30 minutes from Beijing to Tienjin. The second high speed railway is from Beijing to Shanghai. It is now under construction and will be put to use in 2010. By that time you can have breakfast in Beijing and lunch in Shanghai. It is estimated that the ticket is between 600 and 800 Yuan, much cheaper than the air ticket.China has planned to build 8 high speed railways, four from the east to the west and four from the north to the south. This high speed rail net work will cost altogether about 25 thousand billion Yuan to build. It needs 15 years to complete. In 15 years all the major cities will be connected by this net work. (197)LESSON 15JAPANESE SENIOR CITIZENS KEEP THEMSELVES BUSYI just came back from my first visit to Japan. The thing I found most interesting was that most taxi and coach drivers are senior citizens. I also found that parking lot attendants, street cleaners, gardeners are mostly old people. It is not unusual to be served by old waiters or waitresses in restaurants or hotels.It is not a joke to say that Japan is a country of old people, because 20 percent of its population is people over 65. Everywhere I went, I could meet people over 80. Japan is also a country that has a big shortage of laborers. It is not difficult to understand this problem. People born after the war have reached the age of retirement. Nowadays, young people marry late and many of them don’t want to have children after being married.Most healthy retired people don’t want to sit around doing nothing. They want to keep active. The Japanese government also encourages them to work. It is good for both the retired people and the country. For a lot of senior citizens, money is not the main thing. What counts is that they can feel they are still needed. (197)A RECORD-FREE CAR DRIVERThe total number of private cars in China now is over 12 million. The number of people who died in car accidents last year was over 100 thousand. No other countries in the world where there were so many people killed in car accidents. Most car accidents can be avoided if the drivers are careful and have good sense of responsibility.Zhou Chunrong is a well-respected car driver. Next year he’ll retire. He has been with his job for 42 years. He has driven many different types of motor vehicles. During the 42 years he has never violated any traffic rules. He doesn’t only use his eyes to drive but also his heart. He regards driving as an art, more than a skill. He never uses rude or dirty language with his customers and co-drivers. He is patient and has got a lovely easy-going nature. What is more, he has first-class driving skill. He never goes beyond the speed limit he is allowed to goDrivers need a good mental state. With a good mental state, drivers will be able to drive carefully. All drivers should have a moral responsibility to keep other people safe.(196)LESSON 17BICYCLES ARE COMING BACKIt used to be a quite common thing for students to ride bicycles to school in England. In 1960s, a law was passed to ensure the safety of the school children. By the law the local education authorities must provide home to school transport free of charge for the students. Since 1980 there has been a big increase in the number of students who travel to school by car. As a result, bicycles are no longer a part of the students’ everyday life.In the recent years the price of oil has been going up all the time. This is mainly because the world oil resources are disappearing fast. One solution of the problem is to bring back the bicycle. The British government advises people to switch from four wheels to two wheels. Students are encouraged to go to school by bicycle. Take the city of Bedford for example. The local government has spent about 55 million pounds on schools. Schools use the money to employ people to teach the children how to ride bicycles and how to repair them when something goes wrong. Students like bicycles because they are a cheap and healthy way to get around. (198)READINGReading is very important. People become knowledgeable through reading. Reading is a good habit. If a person doesn’t read, his mind is empty. Reading can broaden one’s mind. All successful people read.There are so many books in the world. Even if a person spends his whole life reading, he cannot read all the books. Some books are not useful. Some books are harmful. Therefore, it is quite necessary for a person to decide what to read.In order to learn more one, has to read fast. Reading fast is a skill, which is developed through reading. Many our students cannot read fast because they don’t read a lot. They only read what is given by their teacher in class. As an English language learner, he has to read as much as possible. Through reading he understands and learns how English people express their ideas. This is a very important way to learn English language. (155)LESSON 19IT HAS CHANGEDIn Britain traditionally, men are the bread-winners and women are home-makers. But this has changed. Take Mr. Sterling for example. He is 31 and his wife is 29. They have three sons aged 9, 8 and 5. Mr. Sterling has not worked since he lost his job 5 years ago. Mrs. Sterling took a full-time job a year ago. She has no time to look after the home. Mr. Sterling has to take over almost everything his wife did in the house. Every morning he takes the children to school and fetches them at five in the afternoon. He does the grocery shopping and the laundry. He plans and makes the dinner. He says he doesn’t have much free time between 7:30 am to 5:00pm. He’s quite happy to do all these. But still he hopes one day he can be working while his wife staying at home and taking care of the house. (154)。