Directions: In this part, you will have 15 minutes to go over the passage quickly and answer the questions on Answer sheet 1. For questions 1-7,choose the best answer from the four choices marked A)，B)，C)and D). For questions 8-10,complete the sentences with the information given in the passage.

　　Small Schools Rising

　　This year's list of the top 100 high schools shows that today, those with fewer students are flourishing.

　　Fifty years ago, they were the latest thing in educational reform: big, modern, suburban high schools with students counted in the thousands. As baby boomers(二戰(zhàn)后嬰兒潮時期出生的人) came of high-school age, big schools promised economic efficiency. A greater choice of courses, and, of course, better football teams. Only years later did we understand the trade-offs this involved: the creation of excessive bureaucracies(官僚機構)，the difficulty of forging personal connections between teachers and students.SAT scores began dropping in 1963;today,on average,30% of students do not complete high school in four years, a figure that rises to 50% in poor urban neighborhoods. While the emphasis on teaching to higher, test-driven standards as set in No Child Left Behind resulted in significantly better performance in elementary(and some middle)schools, high schools for a variety of reasons seemed to have made little progress.

　　Size isn't everything, but it does matter, and the past decade has seen a noticeable countertrend toward smaller schools. This has been due ,in part ,to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which has invested $1.8 billion in American high schools, helping to open about 1,000 small schools-most of them with about 400 kids each with an average enrollment of only 150 per grade, About 500 more are on the drawing board. Districts all over the country are taking notice, along with mayors in cities like New York, Chicago and San Diego. The movement includes independent public charter schools, such as No.1 BASIS in Tucson, with only 120 high-schoolers and 18 graduates this year. It embraces district-sanctioned magnet schools, such as the Talented and Gifted School, with 198 students, and the Science and Engineering Magnet,with383,which share a building in Dallas, as well as the City Honors School in Buffalo, N.Y., which grew out of volunteer evening seminars for students. And it includes alternative schools with students selected by lottery(抽簽)，such as H-B Woodlawn in Arlington, Va. And most noticeable of all, there is the phenomenon of large urban and suburban high schools that have split up into smaller units of a few hundred, generally housed in the same grounds that once boasted thousands of students all marching to the same band.

　　Hillsdale High School in San Mateo, Calif, is one of those, ranking No.423-among the top 2% in the country-on Newsweek's annual ranking of America's top high schools. The success of small schools is apparent in the listings. Ten years ago, when the first Newsweek list based on college-level test participation was published, only three of the top 100 schools had graduating Classes smaller than 100 students. This year there are 22. Nearly 250 schools on the full ,Newsweek list of the top 5% of schools nationally had fewer than 200 graduates in 2007.

　　Although many of Hillsdale's students came from wealthy households, by the late 1990 average test scores were sliding and it had earned the unaffectionate nickname (綽號) "Hillsjail. " Jeff Gilbert. A Hillsdale teacher who became principal last year, remembers sitting with other teachers watching students file out of a graduation ceremony and asking one another in astonishment, "How did that student graduate?"

　　So in 2003 Hillsdale remade itself into three "houses," romantically named Florence, Marrakech and Kyoto. Each of the 300 arriving ninth graders are randomly(隨機地) assigned to one of the houses. Where they will keep the same four core subject teachers for two years, before moving on to another for 11th and 12th grades. The closeness this system cultivates is reinforced by the institution of "advisory" classes Teachers meet with students in groups of 25, five mornings a week, for open-ended discussions of everything from homework problems to bad Saturday-night dates. The advisers also meet with students privately and stay in touch with parents, so they are deeply invested in the students' success."We're constantly talking about one another's advisers," says English teacher Chris Crockett. "If you hear that yours isn't doing well in math, or see them sitting outside the dean's office, it's like a personal failure." Along with the new structure came a more demanding academic program, the percentage of freshmen taking biology jumped from 17 to 95."It was rough for some. But by senior year, two-thirds have moved up to physics," says Gilbert "Our kids are coming to school in part because they know there are adults here who know them and care for them."But not all schools show advances after downsizing, and it remains to be seen whether smaller schools will be a cure-all solution.

　　The Newsweek list of top U.S. high schools was made this year, as in years past, according to a single metric, the proportion of students taking college-level exams. Over the years this system has come in for its share of criticism for its simplicity. But that is also its strength: it's easy for readers to understand, and to do the arithmetic for their own schools if they'd like.

　　Ranking schools is always controversial, and this year a group of 38 superintendents(地區(qū)教育主管)from five states wrote to ask that their schools be excluded from the calculation."It is impossible to know which high schools are 'the best' in the nation, "their letter read. in part. "Determining whether different schools do or don't offer a high quality of education requires a look at man different measures, including students' overall academic accomplishments and their subsequent performance in college. And taking into consideration the unique needs of their communities."

　　In the end, the superintendents agreed to provide the data we sought, which is, after all, public information. There is, in our view, no real dispute here, we are all seeking the same thing, which is schools that better serve our children and our nation by encouraging students to tackle tough subjects under the guidance of gifted teachers. And if we keep working toward that goal, someday, perhaps a list won't be necessary.

　　注意：此部分試題請在答卡1上作答.

　　1. Fifty years ago. big. Modern. Suburban high schools were established in the hope of __________.

　　A) ensuring no child is left behind

　　B) increasing economic efficiency

　　C) improving students' performance on SAT

　　D)providing good education for baby boomers

　　2. What happened as a result of setting up big schools?

　　A)Teachers' workload increased.

　　B)Students' performance declined.

　　C)Administration became centralized.

　　D)Students focused more on test scores.

　　3.What is said about the schools forded by the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation?

　　A)They are usually magnet schools.

　　B)They are often located in poor neighborhoods.

　　C)They are popular with high-achieving students.

　　D)They are mostly small in size.

　　4.What is most noticeable about the current trend in high school education?

　　A)Some large schools have split up into smaller ones.

　　B)A great variety of schools have sprung up in urban and suburban areas.

　　C)Many schools compete for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation funds.

　　D)Students have to meet higher academic standards.

　　5.Newsweek ranked high schools according to .

　　A)their students' academic achievement

　　B)the number of their students admitted to college

　　C)the size and number of their graduating classes

　　D)their college-level test participation

　　6.What can we learn about Hillsdale's students in the late 1990s?

　　A)They were made to study hard like prisoners.

　　B)They called each other by unaffectionate nicknames.

　　C)Most of them did not have any sense of discipline,

　　D)Their school performance was getting worse.

　　7.According to Jeff Gilbert, the "advisory" classes at Hillsdale were set up so that students could .

　　A)tell their teachers what they did on weekends

　　B)experience a great deal of pleasure in learning

　　C)maintain closer relationships with their teachers

　　D)tackle the demanding biology and physics courses

　　8.________is still considered a strength of Newsweek's school ranking system in spite of the criticism it receives.

　　9.According to the 38 superintendents, to rank schools scientifically, it is necessary to use________.

　　10.To better serve the children and our nation, schools students to take________.

　　參考答案：

　　1. D) providing good education for baby boomers.

　　2. D) Students’ performance declined.

　　3. D) They are mostly small in size.

　　4. D) Some large schools have split up into smaller ones.

　　5. C) their college-level test participation.

　　6. B) Their school performance was getting worse.

　　7. A) maintain closer relationships with their teachers.

　　8. Simplicity

　　9. different measures

　　10. tough subjects

　　One in six. Believe it or not, that's the number of Americans who struggle with hanger To make tomorrow a little better, Feeding Action Month. As part of its 30 Ways in 30 Days program, It's asking 48 across the country to help the more than 200 food banks and 61,000 agencies in its network provide low-income individuals and families with the fuel they need to 49 .

　　It's the kind of work that's done every day at St. Andrew's Episcopal Church in San Antonio, People who 50 at its front door on the first and third Thursdays of each month aren't looking for God-they're there for something to eat, St. Andrew's runs a food pantry(食品堂)that 51 the city and several of the 52 towns. Janet Drane is its manager.

　　In the wake of the 53 .the number of families in need of food assistance began to grow. It is 54 that 49 million Americans are unsure of where they will find their next meal What's most surprising is that 36% of them live in 55 where at least one adult is working."It used to be that one job was all you needed." says St. Andrew's Drane."The people we see now have three or four part-time jobs and they're still right on the edge 56 ."

　　注意：此部分試題請在答題卡2上作答。

　　A)survive I)formally

　　B) surrounding J)financially

　　C)serves K)domestic

　　D)reviewed L)competition

　　E)reported M)communities

　　F)recession N)circling

　　G)households O)accumulate

　　H)gather

　　參考答案：

　　47. E. domestic

　　48. C. communities

　　49. O. survive

　　50. H. gather

　　51. M. serves

　　52. N. surroundings

　　53. J. recession

　　54. K. reported

　　55. I. households

　　56. F.

　　financiallyTeaching children to read well from the start is the most important task of elementary schools. But relying on educators to approach this task correctly can be a great mistake. Many schools continue to employ instructional methods that have been proven ineffective. The staying power of the “l(fā)ook-say” or “whole-word” method of teaching beginning reading is perhaps the most flagrant example of this failure to instruct effectively.

　　The whole-word approach to reading stresses the meaning of words over the meaning of letters, thinking over decoding, developing a sight vocabulary of familiar words over developing the ability to unlock the pronunciation of unfamiliar words. It fits in with the self-directed, “l(fā)earning how to learn” activities recommended by advocates (倡導者)of “open” classrooms and with the concept that children have to be developmentally ready to begin reading. Before 1963, no major publisher put out anything but these “Run-Spot-Run” readers.

　　However, in 1955, Rudolf Flesch touched off what has been called “the great debate” in beginning reading. In his best-seller Why Johnny Can’t Read, Flesch indicted(控訴)the nation’s public schools for miseducating students by using the look-say method. He said – and more scholarly studies by Jeane Chall and Rovert Dykstra later confirmed – that another approach to beginning reading, founded on phonics(語音學), is far superior.

　　Systematic phonics first teachers children to associate letters and letter combinations with sounds; it then teaches them how to blend these sounds together to make words. Rather than building up a relatively limited vocabulary of memorized words, it imparts a code by which the pronunciations of the vast majority of the most common words in the English language can be learned. Phonics does not devalue the importance of thinking about the meaning of words and sentences; it simply recognizes that decoding is the logical and necessary first step.

　　36. The author feels that counting on educators to teach reading correctly is _____________.

　　A) only logical and natural B) the expected position

　　C) probably a mistake D) merely effective instruction

　　37. The author indicts the look-say reading approach because _________________.

　　A) it overlooks decoding B) Rudolf Flesch agrees with him

　　C) he says it is boring D) many schools continue to use this method

　　38. One major difference between the look-say method of learning reading and the phonics method is _______________.

　　A) look-say is simpler B) Phonics takes longer to learn

　　C) look-say is easier to teach D) phonics gives readers access to far more words

　　39. The phrase “touch-off” (Para 3, Line 1) most probably means _____________.

　　A) talk about shortly B) start or cause

　　C) compare with D) oppose

　　40. According to the author, which of the following statements is true?

　　A) Phonics approach regards whole-word method as unimportant.

　　B) The whole-word approach emphasizes decoding.

　　C) In phonics approach, it is necessary and logical to employ decoding.

　　D) Phonics is superior because it stresses the meaning of words thus the vast majority of most common words can be learned.

　　參考答案：

　　36. C)本題的線索是第一段的第二句話，其中的relying on educators與題干中的counting on educators 完全是同樣的意思。

　　37. A) 作者先在第一段的最后一句說“l(fā)ook-say”或“whole-word”的閱讀教學方法是失敗的，第二段分析了這種方法失敗的原因，是因為它“stresses the meaning of words over the meaning of letters, thinking over decoding…”

　　38. D) 文章在最后一段談到了phonics method的特點和好處，本題線索見該段的第二句話“Rather than building up a relatively limited vocabulary of memorized words, it imparts a code by which the pronunciations of the vast majority of the most common words in the English language can be learned”，可見這種方法能使學習者獲得更大的詞匯量。

　　39. B) 本題要求利用上下文猜測單詞的意思。根據(jù)第二段的最后一句，在1963年以前，出版的東西都是教授使用whole-word的方法的，緊接著用了轉折詞however，說在1955年，Rudolf Flesch“touched off”一場爭論，因此此處的touch off必然是“引起”的意思。

　　40. C) 本題要求有較好的綜合能力才能做得既快又準。從第二段中綜合出whole-word閱讀方法的特點：強調單詞的意思、沒有decoding;由此即可知B)、D)是錯的;在文章的最后一句話，作者指出Phonics does not devalue the importance of thinking about the meaning of words and sentences，所以A)也是不對的。

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