专四听写200篇

四级听写 1. Insects Nobody likes insects. They are annoying and sometimes dangerous. Some of them bite us and give us diseases; others bite us and give us big red spots. Some do not bite, but just fly around our heads or crawl around our houses and gardens. / Indeed, we do not like most of them except those lovely butterflies. / But insects are interesting. Firstly, they are very old animals. Three hundred and twenty million years ago, there were no man in the world, but there were insects. Today, on every square mile of land there are millions of them flying and crawling about. Secondly, insects are very adaptable to their surroundings, so that today there are about a million different species in the world. Why then do some people try to kill insects? After all, not many of them hurt us. The reason is that they eat so much of man’s food and there are so many of them. (158 words) 2. A Protest against Injustice It all started on a bus one day in 1955. A black woman was returning home from work after a long hard day. She sat near the front of the bus because she was tired and her legs hurt. But in those days, black people could sit only in the back of the bus. So the driver ordered the woman to give up her seat. But the woman refused, and she was arrested. Incidents like this had happened before. But no one had ever spoken out against such treatment of blacks. This time, however, a young black preacher organized a protest. He called on all black citizens to stop riding the buses until the laws were changed. He led the protest movement to end such injustice to the blacks. The protest marked the beginning of the civil rights movement in the United States. (146 words) 3. Foolish Tests Centuries ago, a man accused of a crime / often had to go through a strange test. / In one country, for instance, a metal bar was dropped into boiling oil. / The prisoner had to put his hand into the oil and take out the bar. / It was believed that the oil would not burn an innocent man. / If the prisoner got his hand burned, he would be found guilty of the crime he was accused of. / Another foolish method was used in Europe. / When a man was accused of a crime, he was thrown into a pool or river. / If he floated, people declared that he was guilty. / They took him out of the water and punished him. / However, if the man sank, people claimed that he was innocent. / They pulled him out of the water quickly and released him. / We do not know what would have happened / if the man had learned to swim under the water. (160 words) 4. Why Do People Want Work? People work because they need money to live. / They need money for food and clothes and to pay for their houses, flats or the rooms where they live. / People need money for 1 many different things / and they can earn money if they work. / Work makes people feel important. / Work makes them feel that they are useful. / But machines can not do many things that people used to do. / Technology is giving us more cars, roads and food but less work. / Many businessmen believe that we will soon have robots / which will work all the time. / The robots will never complain or stop work. / Some scientists think that by the year 2025 / intelligent animals will do the work that many people do now. / In tomorrow’s world, / people will need to learn new things / because life will be changing so fast. / People will have to change their ideas about work. / (152 words) 5. The Great Depression The stock market crash in October 1929 / marked the beginning of the worst economic crisis in American history. / For the first year, the economy fell very slowly. / But it dropped sharply in 1931 and 1932. / By the end of 1932, the economy collapsed almost completely. / During the three years following the stock market crash, / the American gross national product dropped by almost half. / Millions of people lost their jobs. / Tens of thousands lost their homes. / Men with wives and children begged for money on the streets. / During the next several years, / a large part of the richest nation on earth / learned what it meant to be poor. / Hard times found their way into every area and every job. / Workers struggled as factories closed. / Farmers hit with falling prices and natural disasters / were forced to give up their farms. / Businessmen lost their stores, and sometimes their homes. / All the gains of the 1920s were washed away. (154 words) 6. Learning to describe All through my boyhood and youth, I was known as an idle person, / and yet I was always busy with my own private affairs, / which was to learn to write. / I always kept two books in my pocket, / one to read, and the other to write in. / As I walked, my mind was busy / fitting what I saw with appropriate words. / When I sat by the roadside, / I would either read, / or note down the features of the scene / or write some lines of verse. / Thus I lived with words. / What I wrote was not for future use, / but was written consciously for practice. / Description was the principal field of my exercise. That was a proficiency that tempted me, and I practiced to acquire it. To anyone with sense, there is always something worth describing. (138 words) 7. Angel Falls Angel Falls, deep in the jungles of Latin America, is the highest waterfall in the world. / It is over 1,000 feet higher / than any other fall in the world. / Imagine that you are going there by plane. / For hundreds of miles you fly southeast over green plains, / mountains with forests, and high plateaus. / Suddenly you see a silver thread in the distance. / As your plane flies closer, / you see water falling over half a mile straight down the cliff. / It is such an impressive sight that you will never forget it. / No one knew about the waterfall until 1930, / when James Angel, an American pilot, / was flying over the mountains and canyons in the area. / He suddenly saw a waterfall. / The water seemed to be dropping straight out of the clouds. / In 1941 an American expedition explored and measured the falls. / From the top to the bottom, / the water falls more than 3,200 feet. / (152 words) 8. Fixing a Flat Tire I was coming home along the motorway the other night / when I heard a sudden bang. / Immediately I realized that I had a flat tire. / I managed to stop without falling off, / but I still had the problem of what to do about the tire. / With a motorbike, you have to take the wheel off, / find the hole, cover it with a little piece of rubber, / then put the whole lot hack together again. / It takes ages and you get very dirty. / As I didn't have any choice, I set to work. / It didn't take long to get the wheel off / and it wasn't too hard to remove the tire from the wheel. / Finding the hole took longer / but the fun really began / when I had to put the wheel back on the bike. / You’ve no idea how easy it is to lose / small pieces of a motorbike in the dark. / (155 words) 9. Pace of Public Speech Pace refers to how fast or how slow you speak. / If you speak too fast, you may be difficult to follow. / If you speak too slow, / you risk losing the attention of your audience. / If audience attention seems to be drifting away, / try picking up your pace. / Usually you don't know / that you have been going too fast until someone tells you so / after your speech is over. / If you are told this, guard against this mistake in the future. / In your next speech / write reminders on your note cards to slow down. / Ideally the speaker varies his or her pace. / Speaking fast and then slowing down helps keep the attention of the audience. / Also, don't forget the benefits of pausing. / A pause before or after a dramatic moment is a highly effective technique. / The next time you are watching a comedian on television, / watch how he or she uses pauses. / (154 words) 10. The Wolf and the Shepherd A wolf had long hung about a flock of sheep, / and had done them no harm. / The shepherd, however, had his suspicions, / and for a while was always on the lookout for him / as a dangerous enemy. / But as the wolf continued for a long time to follow his flock / without making any attempt to annoy them, / the shepherd began to look upon him more as a friend than an enemy. / One day the shepherd happened to have to go into the city, / so he entrusted the sheep to the care of the wolf. / The wolf saw his opportunity and fell upon the sheep and ate them up. / On his return, the shepherd saw his flock destroyed / and exclaimed: "What a fool I am! / I deserve no less for trusting my sheep to a wolf! " / The moral of the fable is: / There is more danger from a pretended friend than from an open enemy. / (159 words) 11. A Strange Man There is a story about a man who behaves very strangely. / What others like, he dislikes, / and what most people enjoy, he doesn’t care for. / He is extremely particular about selecting the correct tie to wear with his suit, / but it doesn't bother him if his shirt is dirty / or his suit isn’t pressed. / He always sees the negative side of things. / He finds fault with the best movie of the year, / but stays awake until two o’clock in the morning / watching very old movies on television. / Even his taste in food is peculiar. / He drinks warm water and cold tea, / eats raw eggs and can't stand fresh fruit. Last week his uncle died and left him a million dollars. / In his will, the old man insisted that the nephew spend / half the inheritance within the next five years. / If he didn’t, the money would be given to a university. / Everyone is anxious to know what the nephew will do. / (163 words) 12. Why Should I Take a Part-time job? The first obvious reason is the money. / I am not one of those rich kids / whose parents could give them cars as birthday presents. / My parents have worked all their lives / and saved every penny to pay my tuition and living expenses. / Although they would be willing to give me some pocket money, / if I asked, I prefer to earn it myself. / I feel good that I can in a way / lighten the burden of my parents. The second reason is the experience my part-time job provides. / Sooner or later, I'll have to enter the job market and sell myself. / And if I am to sell myself for a good price, / experience will make a difference. / While working, I get to know people / employers as well as workers. / I learn how to deal with the bosses / and how to get along with my fellow workers. / All this experience gained from my part-time job / will be valuable to my future. / (169 words) 13. Badminton Badminton is a fast game played by two or four persons. / It can be played both indoors and outdoors. / The outdoor game is more suitable for family enjoyment at home. / Badminton is an ancient game, which took its name from the place where the game was played indoors for the first time. / There are several explanations of how the modern game began. / One is that English army officers brought the game home from India in the 1870s and it soon became popular in England. / Badminton trains the player's ability to react quickly with his eyes, his mind, his feet and his hand. / Becoming a good player requires physical fitness and mental effort. / Constant practice and habits of concentration and confidence are necessary. / The great players of the game have often been great sportsmen. / This is apparent in their conduct both on and off the court. / (146 words) 14. Animated Cartoons When we see Mickey Mouse on the screen, / we all know that he is not a real mouse at all. / Yet like a living creature, he moves and talks. / How can Mickey Mouse move around, / tell jokes and do tricks in an animated cartoon? / The first thing that needs to be done / is to divide the script or the movie story into sections / and illustrate each section separately. / A full-length cartoon feature needs hundreds of thousands of drawings. / When all the drawings are completed, they are photographed by a motion picture camera. / There is much more to a cartoon film than drawings. / It sometimes takes hundreds of artists to work for years to produce one. / Actors and singers are selected to give voices to the drawn pictures. / Music is specially composed and fitted into the movie. / No wonder cartoon characters are fun to watch, / whether seen at home on television or in a movie theater. / (158 words) 15. The Nursing Staff The physicians in a hospital form the core of the medical staff. / But they could not provide effective medical care to their patients without the help of numerous nurses. / For the patients, the nursing staff is particularly important. / Nurses are usually in close contact with patients / as long as they are in the hospital. / The nursing staff is usually quite large and diverse. / The general term “nurse” refers to a person / trained to offer bedside care to sick persons. / A nurse does not study for as many years as a doctor. / However, she must be very dedicated. / Caring for the sick requires a great deal of patience and concern. / Most nurses work long days, / and they often must work at odd hours or during the night. / Serving as a nurse in a hospital can be a very rewarding job. / But not every person is suited to become one. / (151 words) 16. The Supermarket In almost all supermarkets there are shopping carts with a special space to put the baby. In the early days, before there were carts, it was noticed that as soon as a woman shopper had her arms full of goods, she stopped buying. Thus carts were introduced. Later a space for the baby was provided in the cart because it was observed that with the baby sitting comfortably in the cart the mother felt less need to hurry through the store and consequently bought more. The average American housewife goes to the supermarket twice a week. On the average she spends one or two hours there each week. Women don’t go to the supermarket just to buy food. Visiting the supermarket is the housewife's chance to get away from home for a while. In the supermarket she feels that she is part of the outside world. She gets to know all the new products. Frequently she meets a number of her friends in the supermarket. (167 words) 17. Changes in Fashions Women's fashions tend to change more rapidly and radically than men’s. In the early 1900s, all women wore their skirts down to the ankle. Today, skirt length varies from floor-length to ten inches above the knee. Women’s shoes have also gone through all sorts of changes in the last seventy years. For example, boots for women were very common around the turn of the century. Then, for years, they were not considered fashionable. Today they are back in style again in all colors, lengths, and materials. In fact, today's women can wear all sorts of clothes, even slacks and shorts, on almost any occasion. While all of these changes were taking place in women's fashions, men's clothing remained pretty much the same until a couple of years ago. In fact, most men still wear the traditional suit though bright colors and varieties in cut are now more common. (153 words) 18. The Future of the Cinema The cinema became the greatest entertainment industry in the world because millions of people paid to see films. But today, in many countries, more and more people prefer to watch television. In countries where a lot of people watch television, fewer and fewer films are made, and there are fewer and fewer cinemas to show them. But this does not mean that there will come a time when no films are made and there are no cinemas left. The cinema did not really become a form of art for many years. Most films were made for entertainment only. But a number of film directors have always tried to do more than entertain. And their films have been works of art. In the future this kind of film will become more and more important. The cinema, which began as entertainment, may perhaps live on as art. (151 words) 19. Football in England What is surprising about football in England is the great knowledge of the game which even the smallest boys seem to have. They can tell you the names of the players on most of the important teams. They know the results of large numbers of matches. They will tell you, with an air of authority, who will win such and such a match, and their opinion is usually as valuable as that of men three or four times their age. Most schools in England take football seriously. They believe that education is not merely a matter of filling a boy's mind with facts in the classroom. It also means character training. And one of the best ways of training character is by means of games, especially such team games as football. The schools, therefore, regularly arrange games and matches for their pupils. (145 words) 20. Life Life is difficult. Life is a series of problems. What makes life difficult is that the process of facing and solving problems is a painful one. Problems, depending on their nature, cause in us sadness or loneliness or regret or anger or fear. And since life poses an endless series of problems, life is always difficult and full of pain as well as joy. Yet, it is in this process of solving problems that life has its meaning. It is only because of problems that we grow mentally. When we desire to encourage the growth of the human spirit, we challenge and encourage the human capacity to solve problems, just as in school we set problems for our children to solve. It is through the pain of meeting and working out problems that we learn. It is for this reason that wise people learn not to dread but actually to welcome the pain of problems. (157 words) 21. Going on a Tour Have you ever been a tourist? If so, did you enjoy every part of your tour? Your tour was almost certainly easier and more comfortable than the journeys of a hundred years ago. Today you can fly in comfortable planes and stay in good hotels. The countries that you visit all try to make your tour as enjoyable as possible. Not very long ago, a tourist had to be either rich or ready to bear very rough conditions. Today it is not necessary to be rich in order to be a tourist. More and more people leave their own countries for holidays in foreign lands. The tourist industry has become very important. At present most of these tourists go to countries in Europe. Italy usually attracts most tourists. Mountain lovers go to Switzerland in winter and sun-lovers from northern lands crowd the shores of the Mediterranean Sea in summer. (153 words) 22. My First Day Abroad When the plane finally touched down on the runway, I was terribly scared. I didn't know how they were going to receive me. At the airport I passed through immigration and customs, and entered a big hall. Sitting next to me were a young man and a woman and three children running about. A singing group sang a welcome song for a group of students from America. I was green with jealousy and was very disappointed since nobody was there waiting for me! I found a telephone, called Friendship Ambassadors, and told them I had arrived. Later that night the founder of the organization told me that they hadn't received my telegram, so they couldn't meet me on my arrival. I felt better when some warm-hearted people treated me very kindly that night. I will never forget my first experience going abroad. (147 words) 23. Senior Citizens People over the age of sixty-five in the United States are called senior citizens. The number of these people is increasing rapidly because people are living longer than before. Their life is different from that of younger Americans. Most of them are retired or no longer work full time. For many senior citizens, the years after sixty-five are not enjoyable. They feel that their lives lose meaning after retirement. In addition, they may feel lonely being away from their families and the contacts they had in their work. Moreover, they become more worried about their health as they grow older, and about their safety if they live in big cities. Other senior citizens enjoy their lives. They feel free to do what they were not able to when they were working and raising families. They now have time to enjoy hobbies and sports and travel. (148 words) 24. Thanksgiving Day The American Thanksgiving Day goes back to 1621. In that year a special feast was prepared in Plymouth, Massachusetts. The colonists who had settled there had left England to find religious freedom. They experienced many difficulties in coming across the Atlantic. After arriving in the new land, they were assisted by the Indians. They had much to be thankful for. Their religious practices were no longer forbidden. They learned to adjust their farming habits to the climate and soil. When they selected the fourth Thursday of November for their Thanksgiving celebration, they invited the Indians to join them in dinner and a prayer of gratitude for the new life. They recalled the group of 102 men, women and children who left England. They remembered their dead who did not live to see the shores of Massachusetts. They reflected on the 35-day journey which tested their strength. (146 words) 25. Chinese Food The first time I ever ate Chinese food I loved it. From then on, it tasted better and better. The first thing I noticed was the fresh taste of the meat and vegetables. When I learned more about the food, I began to understand why it is so. In ancient times, China lost much of its wood due to overpopulation and poor management of its forests. Wood became very expensive and hard to get, so the Chinese had to either find something else to use, or learn how to use wood better. In order to use as little wood as they could, they started cutting their meat and vegetables into small pieces before they put them into the hot oil. In that way the food cooked faster and they saved wood. The food kept its fresh flavor, and it’s this flavor that attracts people to the art of Chinese cooking. (152 words) 26. Sugar Sugar has been known to man for at least 3,000 years, but has come into common use only in modern times. Until quite recently, it was considered a medicine and a luxury for the very rich. But what exactly is sugar? Of course, most of us recognize it immediately as the sweet material we put in coffee or cakes. This common form of sugar is derived from such plants as the sugar cane. But in fact there are many kinds of sugar, and the chemist recognizes hundreds of different varieties. About 90% of the sugar produced is used as food. Only 10% is used in industry for purposes other than food production. Yet sugar has great possibilities for use as the basis of chemicals. It can even be used for making plastics. In the future, these potential uses of sugar will certainly be developed more fully than in the past. (149 words) 27. Working Wives Should married women work outside the home? The question seems almost odd today although it was a serious one in the past. More and more married women are working and for most of them the reason is obvious. They must work if their families are to survive in an age of soaring inflation and unemployment. But what about those who don't really have to work? Do the rewards justify their efforts? The answer is pretty clearly yes. In families in which the wife has a choice, the extra paycheck may ease the financial burden on her husband. For young couples, it may mean the possibility of buying a house of their own. Unless the wife works, buying a house is simply out of the question. Another important reason is that a job provides a wife with additional security, psychological as well as financial, in the event of the illness or death of her husband. (157 words) 28. Benefits of Urban Life In spite of the city's image as an unhealthy place, city living often provides benefits that country living lacks. That's why people living in urban areas often live longer than those in the country. One factor which seems to contribute to their long life is exercise. In the cities it is often faster and less frustrating to walk short distances than to wait for a bus. Even taking public transportation often requires some walking. Smaller apartment houses have no elevators and so tenants must climb stairs. City dwellers usually have to walk to local supermarkets. Since parking space is hard to find, there is often no alternative to walking. On the other hand, those who live in the country do not have to walk every day. In fact, the opposite is often true. To go to work, school or almost anywhere else, they must ride in cars. (152 words) 29. Disadvantages of Living in Big Cities Although big modern cities provide people with many facilities, they certainly have their disadvantages. The first serious problem is the traffic. During the rush hours, wherever you look it’s people, people, people. All the streets are jammed with packed buses and endless lines of cars. As a result, traffic accidents often occur. Next comes the problem of pollution. Factories and vehicles are constantly giving off harmful smoke, so that urban people seem to have forgotten what fresh air is like. Every year, millions of people die of cancer or other diseases caused by air-pollution. Apart from these, there are many more. For example, there is the housing problem. And another is the high crime rate. Finally, urban dwellers are so far away from nature that most of them just lose track of seasons !(140 words) 30. The Great American Game Baseball is called the great American game. Hardly a boy in the U. S. has grown up without playing it. The game is so much a part of American life that its terms have become the common everyday speech of the people. Scores of baseball terms are used by people who may never have seen a game in their life. During World War II, Germans dressed in American uniforms turned up behind the American lines. Many of them spoke English so well that they passed themselves off as American soldiers. However, the U. S. Army found a way to tell which were false and which were real. They halted strange soldiers at check-points and asked them questions about baseball and some of the star players. Genuine Americans could answer the questions easily. But the Germans, who couldn't, were promptly made prisoners of war. (146 words) 31. The U.S. Coast Guard The U. S. Coast Guard does what its name says. It has responsibility for many different duties. The Coast Guard can be found at many large lakes in America and in coastal waters. It enforces laws controlling navigation, immigration, and fishing. It enforces other laws that affect the thousands of privately-owned boats in the United States. Coast Guard planes, boats, and helicopters search for missing boats and rescue people in dangerous situations. It also does scientific research on the ocean and clears ice from rivers or lakes, so boats can travel safely. One of the Coast Guard's most important duties now is to stop drug trafficking into the United States. Armed Coast Guard boats use radio and radar to find boats that may carry drugs. They stop the boats suspected of carrying drugs and search them. They seize the drugs and arrest the people if they find any illegal drugs aboard. (158 words) 32. Encounter with Strangers Talking with a stranger will often enrich our knowledge. For instance, a gardener I met in a park told me more about how plants grow than I had ever learned before. Once a taxi driver invited me to tea at his home and helped me learn about a way of life different from my own. Through talking with strangers, we can learn something about ourselves, for an encounter with a stranger, at its best, is a meeting of hearts and minds. To a stranger, we may say things that we have always wanted to say, but never dared mention to our family members or friends, and thus see ourselves through new eyes. Meeting a stranger by chance can result in a life-long friendship. Thirty years ago I met a stranger at a station while waiting for a train, and we’ve been friends ever since. Come to think of it, weren't nearly all our friends once strangers? (160 words) 33. Laws Before laws were written, there was no sure way of knowing what was permitted and what was forbidden. One judge might apply one set of rules to a case while another judge might apply completely different rules to a similar case. It all depended on the personal judgment of one person. Today we follow the custom of recording our laws. Rules passed by our lawmakers are printed and available for everyone to see. Unless laws are publicly available, we do not regard them as binding. Each of us is subject to many different sets of laws. Some laws say what is permitted, such as how fast you may drive. Other laws say what is required, such as paying a federal income tax. Still other laws say what is prohibited, such as smoking in elevators. In the United States, federal laws apply to everyone and state laws apply to activities within each state. (154 words) 34. What Can We Do about the Water Pollution Problem? Water pollution has become a serious problem. Industrial wastes have already made many rivers lifeless. Oil spills in the seas are killing enormous numbers of fish and birds. What is more, polluted water is an increasing danger to public health. It causes people to become ill with all kinds of diseases. What can we do about it in order to survive on earth? First, we can make great efforts to clean up polluted water and limit further pollution. Second, we can insist that water pollution control laws be passed and strictly enforced. Third, we can personally help to prevent water pollution by not throwing anything into streams or lakes. Finally, we can also protect ourselves against polluted water. If we go on a camping trip, for instance, we can avoid drinking water that is unsafe and avoid swimming in water that is polluted. By doing so, we may be able to live a healthier life. (164 words) 35. A New Way to Clean Waste Water American researchers have successfully tested a new way to clean waste water without chemicals. It is based on the fact that waste water is an excellent food for green plants. The United States Environmental Protection Agency is supporting the test which was carried out at an existing waste water treatment center. The scientists put plants in narrow containers inside a glass building. One end of each container was a little higher than the other and waste water was directed down the containers through the plants’ thick roots. As expected, the roots trapped the wastes in the water and used them for food. At the same time, the plants produced natural gas. The gas could be collected and sold as fuel. This technique of cleaning waste water is more effective than most chemical systems. Many places in the United States have now begun to use green plants to clean their waste water. (157 words) 36. Heat If you are asked to name the one factor that has contributed most to modern civilization, you will probably answer “heat”. Modern civilization really began when man learned how to make heat engines. Heat is needed for various purposes in every industry. It is a form of energy. Therefore, studying heat mainly consists in studying changes in the forms of energy. For example, one of the most important uses of electricity is the production of heat. Electricity is used as a source of heat where extremely high temperatures are needed. Let us take another example. When you go into the broad sunshine, you at once become aware that the sun is one of the important sources of heat. If there were no sunlight, life on this earth would be impossible. Indeed, we would all be frozen to death if the sun were cold. (144 words) 37. Eating Habits City people in my country eat three times a day as the Americans do: breakfast, lunch, and supper or dinner. Meals are served at the following times: morning, noon, and evening. Ordinary families most commonly eat meals of meat, fish, rice, flour, vegetables and fruits. Our eating habits are not very different from those of the Americans. Americans have their Thanksgiving dinner in late November, in order to celebrate the gratitude of the Pilgrims after their first harvest in the New World. In my country we have a special family dinner on New Year’s Eve in order to celebrate Spring Festival. Also, like many Americans, when I am in a hurry, I just have a snack for lunch. Therefore, it seems that human beings are just the same everywhere; they become hungry about every four to five hours, regardless of nationality. (143 words) 38. Population Growth A UN report shows that if the present growth rate continues, world population will hit 6. 4 billion by the year 2000. What’s more, the greatest part of the growth will be in the poor developing countries. These are the nations where providing enough food for millions of people proves to be a difficult problem to solve. Food isn’t the only problem that such a population explosion presents. The more people there are and the worse their living conditions, the greater the possibility for all kinds of social problems. Actually, the world’s birth rates are falling. But so are death rates, as medical advances have made it possible for man to live longer than before. Such advances have also reduced infant death rates. Unless population growth is reduced, the world population may reach 12 billion in a century. Is the earth capable of providing a decent life for so large a population?(151 words) 39. A World without TV Television hasn't been with us very long, but we are already beginning to forget what the world was like without it. Before we admitted the one-eyed monster into our homes, we never found it difficult to occupy our spare time. We used to enjoy civilized pleasures. For instance, we used to have hobbies, we used to entertain our friends and be entertained by them, we used to go outside for our amusement, to theaters, cinemas, restaurants and sporting events. All that belongs to the past. Now all our free time is regulated by that monster. We have even given up sitting at table and having a leisurely meal, exchanging the news of the day. A sandwich and a glass of beer will do—anything, provided it doesn’t interfere with the program. The monster demands absolute silence and attention. If anyone dares to open his mouth during a program, he is quickly silenced.(157 words) 40. Exploring Explorers have gone all over the world, and most parts of it are well known today, though there are still some forests and mountains about which one would like to know more. But it is not necessary to go abroad in order to learn something new about the world. In our own city or town, even in our own village, there is probably a great deal to be learnt, and certainly no one has seen all that is beautiful or interesting in his own country. We can usually see mountains that we have not climbed, and if we reach the top of one we can see others in the distance. If we walk along a river we shall find other streams running into it, and wonder where they come from. Every valley gives us a new view. Even on a short walk we may see birds and trees and flowers of which we do not know the names. (159 words) 41. Human Language Human language is a system of symbols, primarily spoken. It is composed of sounds that describe things, ideas, actions, and the like. Written language uses letters and other signs to represent the sounds of speech. We learn to read by noticing or being taught groups of letters that stand for the sounds that we already know how to speak. We learn to write by learning to form the letters and to put them together s o that others can read what we “say”. Since human language is a form of human behavior, there is nothing absolute about it. It has developed slowly throughout human history and will continue to develop. In the English language there are perhaps 600,000 words, but most of them are known only to specialists and are rarely used. The average mature person has a working vocabulary of about 10,000 words and a recognition vocabulary of 30,000 to 40, 000 words. (150 words) 42. Why I Attend college? Why did I choose to attend college? Is the four-year academic life worthwhile? I have put these questions to myself many times in the past two years, and now I have reached the conclusion that a college education is something that I truly want and it is worthwhile. I chose to attend college because I enjoy learning. I felt that I wanted to continue to study. I simply couldn’t end my education upon graduation from the high school and enter the working world so soon. I chose to attend college also because I feel college is more than a place which offers knowledge. It can expose one to a rich variety of ideas. Finally, I feel that in today’s world, a college education has become almost essential if one wishes to compete in the job market. Attending college is a practical and necessary step to a secure future. (153 words) 43. Dried Food Centuries ago, man discovered that removing water from food helps to preserve it, and that the easiest way to do this is to expose the food to the sun and wind. All foods contain water. Cabbage and other leaf vegetables contain as much as 93% water, potatoes and other root vegetables 80%, and fish from 80% to 60 %, depending on how fatty they are. If this water is removed, food wo n’t go bad easily. Dried foods take up less room and weigh less than the same food packed in cans or frozen, and they do not need to be stored in special conditions. For these reasons they are invaluable to climbers, explorers and soldiers in battle, who have little storage space. They are also popular with housewives because it takes so little time to cook them. Usually it is just a case of replacing the water removed with boiling water. (150 words) 44 Teaching Teaching is supposed to be a professional activity requiring long and complicated training. The act of teaching is looked upon as a flow of knowledge from a higher source in to an empty container. The student’s role is one of receiving information; the teacher’s role is one of supplying it. However, teaching need not be the province of a special group, nor need it be looked upon as a technical skill. Teaching is not forcing information into a supposedly empty head but guiding and assisting. If you have a certain skill you should be able to share it with someone. All of us, from the youngest child to the oldest member of our society, should come to realize our own potential as teachers. We can share what we know, however little it might be, with someone who has need of that knowledge or skill. (145 words) 45. Energy from the Sun The energy from the sun goes in every direction. However, only a minute part of it falls on the earth. Even so, it represents the power of about five million horsepower per square mile per day. The sun gives us as much energy every minute as mankind uses in a year. At present, we use this energy indirectly, and it is our only final source of power. Coal represents the chemical action of the sun on green plants thousands of years ago. Water power results from the sun’s creating vapor and the resulting rain. Even windmills operate because of air currents set in motion by the sun. Some day, through some type of solar motor, we shall use this source of energy more directly. Already, a scientist has worked out a surprisingly efficient engine, which uses a series of mirrors to concentrate the sun’s energy to create steam. (152 words) 46. Women’s College in the United States In the United States 84 colleges now accept just women. Most of them were established in the 19th century. They were designed to offer women the education they could not receive anywhere else. At that time major universities and colleges accepted only men. In the past 20 years many young women have chosen to study at colleges that accept both men and women. As a result some women’s colleges decided to accept men students too. Others, however, refused to change. Educational experts say that men students usually speak more in class than women students do. In a women’s college, women feel free to say what they think. Women's colleges also bring out leadership capability in many women. Recent studies show that this leadership continues after college. The studies also show that American women who went to women’s colleges are more likely to hold successful jobs later in life.(153 words) 47. The Value of a Name Names can affect the way people see themselves. If a person likes his name, he is likely to have high self-esteem. However, the value of a person’s name to his or her self-esteem is mostly influenced by other people's opinion of that name. For example, some teachers like students because of their names. A tea cher’s tone of voice, smile, and warm treatment of certain students show his or her preference. This does not happen only in the classroom. Studies show that youngsters with aggressive names actually commit more crimes than teenagers who have quiet, peaceful-sounding names. The studies described above emphasize the disadvantages of uncommon names. However, uncommon names may also have advantages in certain occupations. So if your name is unusual, you may one day become a well-known scientist or the president of your own business! (147 words) 48. The horse The horse preceded man on earth. The earliest remains of primitive horses have been found on the North American continent. Many scientists believe this small species travelled over a land mass to Asia to found the beginning of the modern Asian horse. Yet it became extinct in America. Other scientists believe that the horse may have originated in Asia. In any event the animal soon spread to China, Europe, and the Middle East. The first modern horses to be introduced into the American continent came with the early Spanish explorers. Horses are said to rate in intelligence after the ape, the elephant and the dog. They have excellent memories and can sometimes find their way home when lost, and sense danger better than their masters. The early civilizations of man that made use of the horse developed more rapidly than those which did not. (147 words) 49. Space and Distance The study of space and distance concerns the way we use the space around us. The minute you enter a classroom, for example, you will have to decide where to sit. You may choose to sit in the back because you do not want to be noticed, or because you do not want people behind you to look at you. On the other hand, you might select a front-row seat because you have a lot of confidence or because you want to be noticed. What is interesting about your choice of seating is that you might be sending your instructor a message. When he sees you sitting in the back or in the far corner, he might decide that you are not very interested in the subject. If you are in the front row, he might conclude that you are an unusually attentive student and he should give you special attention. (155 words) 50. Travel and the Hotel Business A hotel is a temporary home for travelers. In a hotel the traveler can rest and have food and drink. The hotel may also offer facilities for recreation, such as a swimming pool, or a golf course. In many cases, the hotel also provides free parking space for the traveler’s means of transportation. Travel and hotels have always been closely related. In Europe and America, for example, inns were built along the roads. The inns were primitive by modern standards. The traveler usually had to share his bed with other people. The old fashioned inns, however, did provide food and shelter for both men and horses and therefore became a symbol of hospitality. Indeed, the word "inn" has been used by many modern hotels to suggest the image of people warming themselves in front of a cheerful fire while waiting to be called to a rich dinner. (153 words) 51. A new Era A new era is upon us. We can call it the service economy, the information age, or the knowledge society. It all translates to a fundamental change in the way we work. Already we are partly there. The percentage of people who earn their living by making things has fallen dramatically in the Western World. Today the majority of jobs in America, Europe, Japan, and many other countries are in the service industry, and the number is on the rise. More women are in the work force than ever before. There are more part-time jobs. More people are self-employed. But the breadth of the economic transformation can't be measured by numbers alone, because it is also giving rise to a radical new way of thinking about the nature of work itself. Long-held notions about jobs and careers, the skills needed to succeed, even the relation between individuals and employers---all these are being challenged. (160 words) 52. Nuclear Power The big advantage of nuclear power is the large amount of energy released from a relatively small amount of material. Nuclear power has become an important source of energy in some countries, especially in Germany and Japan. The United States and Canada are less dependent than Europeans on nuclear energy, in part because of their more abundant coal reserves. Five problems severely restrict the use of nuclear power instead of coal to generate electricity. The first problem is the danger of an accident. The second is the need to store waste products following the reaction. No country has devised an effective storage system for waste products. The third problem is that a bomb can be made from the material. Nuclear power has been used in warfare twice. The final problem is its high cost. The future of nuclear power has been seriously affected by its high risks and costs. (151 words) 53. Diet and Health Even though we have more choice of what to eat than forty years ago, the diet of the average American is less healthy. In fact, according to a recent study, American pets, eating specially prepared tinned food, have a healthier diet than most of their owners. The Health Department was alarmed at recent figures which show that America has the third highest record in the world for heart disease. Cancer is also a growing cause of death. This has led to governments to try to launch a campaign to encourage healthier eating habits. The campaign will urge people to eat less salt, sugar, animal fat than they do today. It will show the advantages of eating more fresh fruits and vegetables. The Health Department is going to issue a booklet that will give guidance on which foods to eat and which to avoid. (148 words) 54. New Y ear’s Celebration New Year's Day is the world’s oldest celebration. In fact, ancient people celebrated the new year even before they had exact ways of measuring time. New Year's Day is also the one holiday that is observed by people of all national and religious groups. Not everyone celebrates the new year at the same time. The Chinese celebrate at different times each year, sometime between January twenty-first and February nineteenth. But the majority of people today celebrate it on January first. In some countries, the New Year's holiday is the most important celebration of the year. But this is not true in the United States, even though it is a celebration that many people enjoy. One reason may be that Christmas comes just one week before the new year. Christmas is America’s biggest holiday. And the American people give it the importance that people in other countries give the start of a new year. (158 words) 55. Seasons and Human Intelligence If you are like most people, your intelligence varies from season to season. You are probably a lot sharper in the spring than you are at any other time of the year. A noted scientist concluded from other men's work and his own that climate and temperature have a definite effect on our mental abilities. He found that cool weather is much more favorable for creative thinking than is summer heat. This does not mean that all people are less intelligent in the summer than they are during the rest of the year. It does mean, however, that the mental abilities of large numbers of people tend to be lowest in the summer. Spring appears to be the best period of the year for thinking. One reason may be that in the spring man's mental abilities are affected by the same factors that bring about great changes in all nature. (150 words) 56. A False Alarm Last night I had a frightening experience. While I was eating at a fast-food restaurant, the manager came to announce that everybody would have to leave the building because a bomb was reported to be hidden somewhere in the restaurant. When the announcement was made, the place was immediately thrown into confusion as everyone was determined to get out first. To make matters worse, an elderly woman, who must have weighed 300 pounds, had just come up to the entrance, which was also the only exit. In the meantime, I suddenly remembered that I had left my purse in the chair in which I had been sitting. It was certainly not convenient now to return to get it. When I finally managed to get my purse and go outside, I saw the police had arrived and were searching the area. Eventually they determined that it had been all a false alarm. (154 words) 57. Air-conditioning With air-conditioning, you can be comfortable anywhere indoors even on the hottest summer day. Inventors had been trying to come up with methods of keeping the air cool. There were hundreds of ideas, but none of them really worked. The first machine was developed by Willis H. Carrier, who is often called “the father of air-conditioning”. He built the machine for a printing plant in New York. Soon air-conditioning was being used in many factories. But the public did not really know about this invention until the 1920s when movie theaters, department stores and restaurants had air conditioners installed. As air conditioners became popular during the 1930s, central air-conditioning systems were developed. A whole office or apartment building could he cooled from one unit. After World War II, large numbers of air conditioners began to be used in both public buildings and private homes. (150 words) 58. Helen Keller. Helen Keller was born in 1880 into a middle-class family. Her father was a newspaper editor. They lived in a comfortable house on a farm. From the time she lost her eyesight and hearing until she was nearly seven, she was cared for by her loving family, who allowed her uncontrolled freedom around the home. She had the servants’children as playmates, and she ruled them like a little queen. She did not sit at the table at dinner, but wandered around helping herself to food from other people's plates. Without any discipline, she grew up to be a little wild animal. She behaved very badly if anyone prevented her from doing or having what she wanted. But later, with the help of her teacher, Helen Keller managed to overcome the double disabilities of blindness and deafness and became one of the most remarkable persons in the nineteenth century. (151 words) 59. The Submarine Trying to describe a submarine is like trying to describe an automobile. There are dozens of different kinds of automobiles and each is different from any other. So a description of any one automobile would fail to describe the rest. And yet all automobiles are alike in the most important things: all have engines, wheels, steering devices, and certain other vital parts. And a description of a sort of "average" automobile would in some way describe all others. The same is true of submarines. There are many kinds and sizes, but all work basically the same way and all must have the equipment necessary for sailing, for diving beneath the sea, for communicating with their home bases, for housing and feeding a crew and so on. So it is possible to describe a sort of "average" submarine in a way that will tell something about all submarines and how they all operate. (154 words) 60. Motel The word "motel” m eans motorist hotel and it is used chiefly by people traveling by car. Parking space is always available. Motels are usually outside the center of town near major roads and are less expensive than hotels. Rates in motels are about $10 to $15 per person a day for a room and bath. Motels in and near large cities tend to be more expensive. In smaller towns the prices may be lower. Because motels are often located outside the center of town, it will probably be inconvenient to stay in a motel unless you have a car or unless the motel is located near public bus or train lines. Although reservations in advance are usually required in motels in busy areas, this is not always the case in less crowded parts of the country. Because of their convenience and economical prices, it is easy to understand why they are so popular with Americans. (155 words) 61. Shrinking Families Challenge Traditions It has been a Chinese tradition for several generations to live under the same roof. However, this tradition is being challenged by new ideas brought about by economic development in the last decade. The concept of an extended family is disappearing in China. Experts point out that the traditionally large families are splitting into smaller nuclear families. Along with one-child families, there are single-parent families and "dink" families. "Dink" stands for "double-income-no-kid". Single parent families are the result of the increasing divorce rate, which has caused problems in child care and education. As more and more women are working outside the home, they choose either not to have children or leave their children in the care of grandparents. Thus, the number of "dink" families and families in which grandparents live with their grandchildren is on the rise. (147 words) 62. How Your Memory Works In all human communication, information is transferred from one person's memory to another's. No matter how the message is sent, it must arrive in a form that can be understood, held and recalled later by the brain. How do these three memory processes function? Before answering this question, we need to consider the fact that there are two kinds of memory: short-term and long-term memory. Your short-term memory can hold only five to seven items of information such as five numbers, six words, or seven syllables. However, unless you repeat that information to yourself over and over again, you will forget it in less than a minute. This temporary memory is used when you try to remember a name or telephone number that someone told you a moment ago. Short-term memory plays an important part in thinking and understanding.(148 words) 63. The United Nations The most important international organization is the United Nations, created at the end of World War II by the victorious allies. When it was established in 1945, the United Nations comprised 49 states. But by the early 1990s it had grown to 159 members. However, the United Nations is now frequently criticized for various reasons. It is criticized, for example, for failing to keep world peace. Members can vote to establish a peace-keeping force and request states to contribute soldiers. However, any one of the five permanent members of the Security Council may veto the operation. It is also attacked for being one-sided on a number of world issues. Yet, with all its weaknesses, the United Nations still represents a place where for the first time in human history nearly all states of the world can meet and vote on important issues. (144 words) 64. A Change of Interests on Campus in China There has been a change of interests on campus in recent years. Many excellent students used to show a great interest in liberal arts. To become a writer was their life-long dream. Now, top students go in for computer science, business studies and other subjects concerning finance. Obviously, they believe if they master such subjects they are more likely to get well-paid jobs in the future. Moreover, students display greater enthusiasm than ever for learning English. A good command of the language will open up new windows for them and help widen their scope of knowledge. Besides, with the carrying out of the open-door policy and the rapid development of our economy, more and more companies have business ties with foreign firms. So university graduates with a good knowledge of English will find it easier to win good positions. (150 words) 65. Education in America Life in the twentieth century demands preparation. Today, all individuals must have adequate schooling to prepare them for their work and for their responsibilities as citizens. In America, government officials, parents, and teachers are working hard to give the children the best preparation available. There is no national school policy in the US. Each state makes its own education rules and regulations, but there are many similarities among the school systems. Public schools in all states are supported by taxes paid by the citizens of the individual state. In most states, the children are required to attend school until they reach sixteen. When they become six years old, children begin elementary school. After six years in elementary school, they go into junior high school and remain there for three years. The last three years of their public school education are spent in senior high school, from which they graduate at the age of eighteen. (157 words) 66. Work and Careers Sometimes we say that someone we know is “a square peg in a round hole.”This simply means that the person is not suited for his job. He may be a bookkeeper who really wants to be an actor or a mechanic who likes cooking. Unfortunately, many people in the world are "square pegs" who are not doing the kind of work they should be doing. Most of us spend a great part of our lives at our jobs. For that reason we should try to find out what our talents are and how we can use them. There are many careers open to each of us. Perhaps we like science. Then we might prepare ourselves to be chemists, physicists, or biologists. Maybe our interests take us into the business world or the medical profession. Teaching, newspaper work, and engineering—these and many other fields all offer satisfying careers to persons with talent and training. (158 words) 67. Automobiles It is impossible to say that any one man invented the automobile. Many individuals living and working in different countries and at different times contributed to its development. Many of the discoveries that went into the creation of the automobile were small in themselves. But together they were important. Here are two examples. On Christmas Eve 1801, the silence of the English countryside was shattered by a steam-powered carriage running at a speed of 8 to 9 miles an hour—almost unheard of in those days. According to automobile historians, this was the first practical use of mechanical power to move a vehicle. After its first run, the machine reportedly burned up while the inventor and his friends were celebrating its success at a pub. Henry Ford is considered the father of modern automobile mass production. His famous Model T car, because of its low price, made it possible to produce cars on a large scale.(155 words) 68. Automation For thousands of years man has been busy making tools and machines to make his work easier. Automation is the latest stage in this process of replacing manpower with machines. Automation is as up-to-date as space flight, yet some of the ideas behind it are nearly 200 years old. The steam engine invented in 1784 is one of the first examples of the automatic control of machinery. A big step toward automation was taken when the first electronic computer was devised by American scientists during World War II. Automation is not the same as mechanization. With mechanization, workers are still needed to operate the machines. With automation, the machines are controlled by other machines, without a human worker. Not all things can be done by automation. The machine will not replace man in tasks that involve the use of judgement, imagination, artistic creation and personal care or service. (150 words) 69. Newspapers Almost every family buys at least one copy of a newspaper every day. Why do people read newspapers? Five hundred years ago, news of important happenings took months and even years to travel from one country to another. Today we can read in our newspapers of important events that occur in faraway countries on the same day they happen. Apart from supplying news from all over the world, newspapers give us a lot of other useful information. There are weather reports, TV and film guides, book reviews, and, of course, advertisements. Companies pay newspapers thousands of dollars for the advertising space, but it is worth the money, for news of their products goes into almost every home in the country. For those who publish newspapers, advertisements are also very important. Money earned from advertisements makes it possible for them to sell their newspapers at a low price and still make a profit.(153 words) 70. The Source of Energy All the useful energy at the surface of the earth comes from the activity of the sun. The sun heats and feeds mankind. Each year it provides men with two hundred million tons of grain and nearly ten million tons of wood. Coal, oil, natural gas, and all other fuels are stored-up energy from the sun. Some was collected by this season's plants as carbon compounds. Some was stored by plants and trees ages ago. Even waterpower derives from the sun. Water turned into vapor by the sun falls as rain. It courses down the mountains and is converted to electric power. Light transmits only the energy that comes from the sun’s ou ter layers, and much of this energy that is directed toward the earth never arrives. About nine-tenth of it is absorbed by the atmosphere of the earth. In fact, the earth itself gets only half-billionth of the sun’s entire output of radiant energy.(159 words) 71. The Influence of Fire In the early times when human beings hunted and gathered food, they were not in control of their environment. They could only interact with their surroundings as the other lower animals did. When they learned to make fire, however, they became capable of altering their environment. To provide themselves with fuel, they cut down trees. They also burned clearings in forests to increase the growth of grass and to provide a greater grazing area for the wild animals that human beings fed upon. This development led to farming and the domestication of animals. Fire also provided the means for cooking plants which had previously been inedible. Only when the process of meeting the basic need for food reached a certain level was it possible for humans to follow other pursuits such as setting up families, forming societies and founding cities.(144 words) 72. A Dream Laboratory There is a dream laboratory at the University of Chicago where researchers are studying dreamers. Their findings have revealed that everyone dreams from three to seven times a night, although in ordinary life a person may remember none or only one of his dreams. While the subjects are asleep, special machines record their brain waves and eye movements as well as body movements that signal the end of a dream. Observers report that a person usually appears restless before a dream. Once the dream has started, his body relaxes and his eyes become more active. As soon as the machines indicate that the dream is over, the sleeper is awakened. Researchers have found that if the dreamer is awakened immediately after his dream, he can usually recall the entire dream. If he is allowed to sleep even five more minutes his memory of the dream will have faded.(151 words) 73. Qualifications for a Flight Attendant One of the most important qualifications for flight attendants is education. Applicants must have at least a high school education to be accepted by any airline. And while this is a minimum requirement, most airlines prefer either some college education or a year or two of business experience. Most international airlines consider fluency in a language an important factor, and a few have special language requirements. A flight attendant must, of course, speak the language of the country in which the airline is based. The large international airlines require fluency in English. Most of them have some additional requirements as well, depending on where they fly. In some cases, the language requirement can be met at some time during service, and the airline helps the attendant to learn a second or third language by providing special classes. Language classes are sometimes part of the training program. (151 words) 74. Another Route to Take The United States is well-known for its network of major highways designed to help a driver get from one place to another in the shortest possible time. Although these wide modern roads are generally smooth, straight and well-maintained, a direct route is not always the most enjoyable one. These highways generally connect large urban centers, which means that they often become crowded with heavy traffic during rush hours, when the "fast, direct way" becomes a very slow route. However, there is almost always another route to take if you are not in a hurry. Not far from the new "superhighways", there are often older, less heavily travelled roads which go through the countryside. These secondary routes may go up steep slopes, along high cliffs, or down frightening hillsides to towns lying in deep valleys. Through these indirect, longer routes, the drivers may have a chance to get a fresh, clean view of the world.(160 words) 75. Living in an Apartment Living in an apartment while attending college is advantageous for many students because it helps them to develop maturity. For one thing, it promotes self-confidence and self-reliance. To manage apartment living successfully, students have to do their own washing and cleaning, and buy and cook their own food. Since they are faced with expenditures they didn’t have at home, such as rent, utility bills, food and furniture, they must also learn to budget their money and spend it wisely. If they do, they will take an important step along the road to maturity. Finally, living in an apartment stimulates pride of ownership. Decorating and furnishing an apartment, however simply, requires thought and taste in the purchase and arrangement of furniture and other things. Those who have invested their time and energy in acquiring such possessions are apt to take care of them. (148 words) 76. Newspapers and Magazines Most British people begin their day by reading newspapers. In this way they learn what is going on in the world. Sometimes, however, they don't have time to read the news carefully and must be satisfied with a quick look at the front page. There are newspapers to satisfy every reader. In big cities, there are many types of papers, with several different editions every day. In small towns there are fewer newspapers and perhaps only one edition each day. Most newspapers have several sections, especially on Sundays, when the edition is larger than usual. There are, in addition to the front page, the sports section, the amusement section, and so on. Another type of publication which helps keep the population informed is the magazine. There are news magazines, literary magazines and magazines for a wide range of other interests. In Britain, there are publications for every taste and interest.(153 words) 77. Media for Advertising The Western world is filled with advertisements, for advertising is a good way to persuade people to buy goods or services. Different media are used to reach the public. The most important one is television. Because it combines sight, sound, movement and color, television gives advertisers many ways of catching customers’ attention.TV programs are interrupted every five minutes with commercials telling people to buy a certain make of car, or to drink a different kind of beer. Advertisers also use different magazines to advertise products for different readers. Women’s magazines, for example, are full of ads showing models dressed in the latest style. Newspapers have their own advantages. They are the most flexible of the media and are very general in their advertising. People can also find advertisements in the form of posters almost everywhere, on walls, by both sides of the street, on buildings and even on buses. (153 words) 78. Different Dictionaries There are different kinds of dictionaries. You need to know what kind you are using and what help you can get from it. Desk dictionaries are one-volume, general purpose dictionaries. They vary in size and, therefore, in scope, but they are the most useful tools for the user. From your desk dictionary you can get information about meaning, spelling, pronunciation and grammar. Library dictionaries are also general purpose dictionaries, yet they supply the information that is lacking in the smaller desk dictionaries. It should be available in your public library and can be found in some college libraries. Specialist dictionaries provide the information that neither desk dictionaries nor even library dictionaries attempt to give. Every trade, profession, and business now has an extensive vocabulary of its own. The specialist dictionaries supply most of our needs in the specialized areas.(142 words) 79. The Heart of Drama Hollywood produces many kinds of films, including mysteries, musicals, love stories and horror films. Different these films may be, they have one thing in common—conflict. The main character wants something badly and will do anything to get it. The opponent tries to stop him from achieving his goal. This opposition creates conflict, which is the heart of drama. For example, the main character is a young man of humble origin who wants to marry the daughter of a rich banker. The father thinks the young man unworthy of his daughter and doesn't allow her to see him. The young man, deeply in love, nevertheless refuses to give up without a fight. The conflict between the young man and the banker makes the story interesting. In a good story, the main character changes. He learns something from his experiences and becomes a different, perhaps a better person. (150 words) 80. The Difference between Radio and TV Commentators When television first began to expand, very few famous radio commentators were able to be effective on television. When working on radio, they had become accustomed to seeing on behalf of the listener. This art of seeing for others means that the commentator has to be very good at talking. Above all, he has to be able to create a continuous sequence of visual images which add meaning to the sounds which the listener hears. In the case of television, however, the commentator sees everything with the viewer. His role, therefore, is completely different. He is there to make sure that the viewer does not miss some point of interest, to help him focus on particular things, and to interpret 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. (158 words) 81. The Influence of Science on People's Life If you compare the life of people today with that before the industrial revolution, you will see that science has done a great deal to improve the quality of life. People now travel in cars, buses, trains and airplanes, which bring distant places within reach in a matter of hours. With the invention of radio and TV, people can now stay at home and still keep themselves well informed. One doesn't need to go to a theater to see a play or go to the remote parts of the world to see the strange customs of some primitive tribes. A variety of programs bring them right into your living-room. Refrigerators, washing machines and microwave ovens have made housekeeping so much easier that women can pursue their own careers without neglecting the duties of a good wife and mother. Indeed, with the advance of science, we can look forward to greater conveniences and comforts which, even today, seem quite unimaginable. (167 words) 82. The Efficient Use of Resources Human actions may result in more efficient use of some resources, rather than their destruction. One dramatic example of human efforts to make more efficient use of available resources is the increasing capacity of the earth’s surface to provide food. The ratio of population to food supply has become more favorable in many regions. This is especially so in Asia, where population growth has slowed, while food supply has grown. The challenge in these regions is to continue recent progress by further expanding food resources. In other regions, especially Africa, the problem is getting worse. Food supply must be quickly expanded to meet the needs of the rapidly expanding population. In order to increase the food supply, we can either expand the land area used for agriculture, or increase the productivity of land now used for agriculture. In some cases, people can find new food sources or increase exports from other countries.(157 words) 83. Human Action and Pollution Human actions can destroy resources. When we produce goods and services that are supposed to improve our health, we may destroy resources. We misuse resources such as air and water by regarding them as unlimited, unchanging, and freely available for use in the production of goods and services. Not all human actions harm the physical environment. Every resource has the capacity to accept some human abuse. Harmful effects result when human actions generate more waste than the resource is capable of accommodating. Human action that negatively affects a resource is known as pollution. Pollution varies from region to region according to the types of human actions. In general, we find high levels of pollution in regions of population concentration. Pollution also varies according to levels of economic development. Most pollution is a by-product of production in relatively developed economies. (144 words) 84. The Reform in Britain's Secondary Education The changes in British education have been tremendous, though this has not been true of elementary education, where the problems were largely those of coping with a growing number of children. Issues in secondary education have been more controversial. The system in operation before the war sorted out the children at the age of eleven and placed them in grammar schools according to their abilities and interests. This system was criticized on the ground that a child's capabilities could not be judged accurately when the child was only eleven years of age. An answer has been found in the establishment of comprehensive schools which offer all types of education and permit children to pass from one type to another according to their abilities. The school-leaving age has been raised to fifteen by an act of 1944; a further rise to sixteen, recommended in 1959, is now in effect. (153 words) 85. Climate Climate is the long-term average weather condition at a particular location. Geographers frequently divide the world into five main climate regions, namely, tropical climates, dry climates, warm climates, snow climates and ice climates. Traditionally, humans find it difficult to tolerate extreme temperatures or rainfall and thus avoid living in places that are too hot, too cold, too wet, or too dry. Relatively large numbers of people live in the warm climate region. The dry climate region is less intensively settled. The climate of a particular location influences human activities, especially production of the food needed to survive. From one generation to the next, people learn that different crops grow in different climates. Rice, for example, requires a good deal of water, whereas wheat survives on a limited amount. And rice grows better in warm climates, while wheat is more likely to be grown successfully in colder climates. (149 words) 86. Smoking In America, "No Smoking" signs are going up in public places such as theaters and cinemas, schools and libraries, airplanes and buses. The right of the non-smoking majority to smoke-free air is increasingly being protected by law. In the past two years, many states and cities have limited smoking in public places. An increasing number of restaurants and other private enterprises have voluntarily introduced smoking regulations for health reasons. A dozen ice cream shops in New Y ork have set up non-smoking sections and there seems to be more demand for seats there than in smoking sections. The new smoking restrictions started to appear in 1972 after a medical report warned the public of the dangers of passive smoking. The report said non-smokers, particularly people with heart or lung problems, might be exposed to harmful concentrations of smoke. (141 words) 87. Our Demanding Dog Friends Most people have had a dog or wanted one as their companion at some time in their lives. If you are thinking of buying a dog, however, you should first decide what sort of companion you need. Most breeds were originally developed to perform specific tasks. So, if you want a dog to protect you or your house, for example, you should choose a breed that has the right size and characteristics. You must also be ready to devote a good deal of time to train the dog when it is young and give it the exercise it needs throughout its life. Dogs are demanding pets. If baby dogs have not established a relationship with the human beings until they are over three months old, their strong relationship will always be with dogs. They are likely to be too shy when they are brought out into the world to become good pets. (156 words) 88. American “Invasion” of Europe Travelling and living in Europe has become increasingly popular with Americans since the end of World War II. Some seek escape from the hurry and worry of contemporary American life. They seek the more leisurely, culturally richer life, which they hope to find in such cities as Paris, London and Rome. The increase in the number of American businesses and factories in Europe has dramatically increased the size of American "colonies" in foreign countries. In fact, American businessmen comprise the largest group of Americans living in Europe. A third group consists of U. S. government, employees, technical experts, and those sent to administer trade and aid programs. And, finally, college-age youths travel to Europe for study, fun or adventure. This flow of Americans, however, has not been universally welcomed by the people of the host countries. In fact, some European critics complain that this new American “invasio n”is corrupting European life. (156 words) 89. Noise and Sea-animals A team of scientists recently began a project to measure the effects of noises on sea-animals. If noises prove harmless to the animals, then the researchers can proceed with a plan to transmit sound waves through the Pacific to take the eart h’s temperature. Sound travels faster through warm water than cold water. By analyzing the speed of sound through the ocean, scientists can determine if our planet is warming up. The experiment was nearly cancelled for the fear that the sound will harm the sea-animals. So scientists are conducting tests on the animals first. Scientists lowered a loud speaker that transmitted sound waves into the ocean and kept track of the animals' movements. If sea-animals are distressed by the sounds, they would swim away from the speaker. So far, however, there aren't any signs that the animals are being harmed. Researchers noticed that a large number of sea-animals swim near the speaker whether it was turned on or off. 90. After-School Activities In addition to their academic work, children in the United States are offered a wide range of activities in after-class hours. These are designed to help broaden their skills, abilities and appreciation of life, and to give them a chance to practice leadership and assume responsibilities. There is often a wide range of activities from which to choose, such as nature clubs, science clubs, or art and drama groups. A wide selection of sport activities is always available. Some of these activities take place during the school day, but many are held after classes are over. Even though they are optional, they are considered a part of the American educational experience and parents encourage their children to participate. Both employers and college admission officers in the United States carefully consider the after-class activities in which students have participated. These indicate their leadership potential, enthusiasm, creativity, and breadth of interest. (154 words) 91. American English and British English Why is the English language used in the United States so different from that used in England? The answer is that the United States grew in isolation from England. Separated by the Atlantic, the United States and England developed their languages with little influence from each other. The English of the United States differs from that of England in vocabulary, spelling and pronunciation. The vocabulary is different largely because U. S. settlers encountered many unfamiliar objects and experiences. Spelling differs from the British standard because of a strong national feeling in the United States for an independent identity. Differences in pronunciation between British and U. S. speakers are striking. From the time of their arrival in North America, colonists began to pronounce words differently from the British. Such a difference is normal, since communication between the two groups was largely confined to exchange of letters and other printed matter rather than by direct speech.(159 words) 92. American Restaurants Because there are so many different nationalities in America, visitors can find almost any kind of restaurant in most of the large cities. Restaurants in large cities vary greatly in price. Many restaurants post their menus in the window so that you can have some idea of the price of food before you enter. If the menu is not posted, and you are uncertain about how expensive the place is, ask to see the menu before you are seated at a table, or just ask about the price range. Appearances from the outside can be misleading----what looks like a small, informal restaurant may really be very expensive and what looks like a large, expensive restaurant may be very reasonable. You can get a meal for about $2 or slightly more if you eat in snack bars, or coffee shops, but in most city restaurants you should expect to pay $6 to $8 a person for dinner, with alcoholic drinks and wine extra. (162 words) 93. The Functions of the Family The family fulfills a number of roles, such as providing education and recreational activities. Yet there are several major functions performed by the family. First, unlike the young of animals, human infants need constant care and economic security. In all cultures, the family assumes ultimate responsibility for the protection of children. Second, parents monitor a child's behavior and transmit the values and language of a culture to the child. Third, ideally, the family provides members with warm and intimate relationships and helps them to feel satisfied and secure. Unlike other institutions, the family is obliged to serve the emotional needs of its members. Finally, family resources affect children’s ability to pursue certain opportunities such as higher education and specialized study. It is apparent, then, that the family has been assigned at least four vital functions within human societies. (142 words) 高校英语专业英语听力听写技巧与训练.doc英语听力听写技巧与训练 Passage 1 Social psychologists have observed that there is more eye contact / between people who like each other than those who are indifferent or hostile towards each other. / And the longer the length of the gaze, / the more likely it is that the listener is more interested in the person / who is speaking, than the actual topic of conversation. / Frequently looking down can indicate submissiveness, humility, or embarrassment. / Looking away repeatedly may express boredom or dislike. / Women tend to engage in more eye contact than men, / especially when talking to other women. / (90 words) Passage 2 There are about two thousand and eight hundred different languages in the world. / According to the investigation of linguists, / the fastest speaking nation is France. / A Frenchman speaks an average of three hundred and fifty syllables per minute. / The Japanese comes second, / speaking three hundred and eleven syllables per minute. / The slowest speaking nation is the people of the Polynesia Islands in the Pacific. / Both Americans and the British speak English; / but it is very interesting that the British speak faster than Americans. / An Englishman speaks an average of two hundred and twenty syllables per minute / while an American only speaks one hundred and fifty to one hundred and seventy-five syllables per minute. / (112 words) Passage 3 My most embarrassing experience happened /when I had just left university. / I had just started teaching in a London secondary school then. / One morning my alarm clock didn't ring. / I had forgotten to wind it up. / I woke up at half past eight and school began at nine. / I quickly washed, shaved, dressed, jumped into my car / and drove to school. / When I arrived the students had already gone into classes. / I didn't go to the staff room, / but went straight into class. / After two or three minutes the students began laughing, / and I couldn't understand why! / Suddenly I looked down and understood. / I had put on one black shoe and one brown shoe! / (114 words) Passage 4 When photographing a wedding, / it is worth planning a shooting schedule in advance. / List the aspects of the events to cover and try to shoot them all. / Some of the obvious shots are: / scenes of the bride dressing, arrival at the church, the ceremony, signing the register, / family groups, cutting the cake, and leaving on the honeymoon. / Other shots could include the father pinning on his button hole flower, / the presents, a posed portrait of the bride, guests arriving, close-up details in the church / and reception, the priest, bridesmaids, the cake, the ring and so on. / At the reception a range of unlikely subjects present themselves. / Photograph the funniest telegram, the oldest relative or father dancing. / (115 words) Passage 5 Listening is important to us for many reasons. / First, listening is one of the primary means of obtaining information. / Second, listening is an important way to conduct business. / Third, listening carefully helps us interpret people's responses more accurately. /Besides, we also depend on listening for entertainment. / Statistics show that about forty-five percent of our waking time is spent listening. / In our life, when you take time to listen to people, / you let them know that you think they are important. / Your listening habits also tell people that you think / what they have to say is important, too. / The chance to give a speaker this sense of self worth / is one of the most important reasons for learning to listen effectively. / (120 words) Passage 6 How much living space does a person need? / What happens when his space requirements are not adequately met? / Researchers are conducting experiments on rats / to try to determine the effects of overcrowded conditions on man. / Recent studies have shown that the behavior of rats is greatly affected by space. / If rats have adequate living space, / they eat well, sleep well, and reproduce well. / But, if their living conditions become too crowded, / their behavior patterns and even their health change noticeably. / They cannot sleep and eat well, / and signs of fear and tension become obvious. / The more crowded they are, / the more they tend to bite each other and even kill each other. / Thus, for rats, population and violence are directly related. / (121 words) Passage 7 Children spend the first years of life solving problems all the time. / Probably more learning takes place in the first two years than at any similar period thereafter. / Children are born learning: / if there is nothing to learn they are bored, / and their attention is distracted. / We do not have to train children to learn, or even account for their learning: / we have to avoid interfering with it. / Children who have learned to comprehend spoken language / and who can see sufficiently well to distinguish a pin from a paper clip on the table in front of them / have already demonstrated sufficient language and learning ability to learn how to read. / Learning to read is and should be easy for a child. / (121 words) Passage 8 Every day all over the world there are meetings. / People meet in companies, schools, and government offices. / Why are there meetings? / What is the real purpose of the meeting? / Here are some of the answers to these questions. / One, a meeting defines the group. / Each person at the meeting forms a part of the group. / Each person realizes his or her place in the group. / Two, at meetings the members of the group share their experiences and news. / They begin to have one mind. / This one mind can often find the best answers to problems. / Three, the members of the group have to follow the decisions of the group. / Group decisions have more force. / Good or bad, long or short, meetings always have a purpose. / (124 words) Passage 9 It requires capital to start a new business. / Capital is money that can be used for purpose of investment. / Let's take an example. / John and Joan Smith have saved a few thousand dollars / after working in restaurants for several years. / They have always wanted to have a restaurant of their own. / Now they've taken their money and used it to rent a suitable location / and to buy tables, chairs and all the other equipment / that is necessary for a restaurant. / They've hired kitchen and dining room staff and opened their doors to the public. / John is in charge of the kitchen and Jane takes care of the dining room. / By investing their money, / they have become the owners and managers of their own business. / (124 words) Passage 10 We cannot feel speed, but our senses let us know that we are moving. / We see things moving past us and feel that we are being shaken. / We can feel acceleration, an increase in speed, / but we notice it for only a short time. / For instance, we feel it during the take-off run of an airplane. / We feel the plane's acceleration / because our bodies do not gain speed as fast as the plane does. / It seems that something is pushing us back against the seat. / Actually, our bodies are trying to stay in the same place / while the plane is carrying us forward. / Soon the plane reaches a steady speed. / Then because there is no longer any change in speed, / the feeling of forward motion stops. / ( 126 words ) Passage 11 The bicycle is the most popular means of transportation in China. / It plays an active part in Chinese people's daily life. / Most Chinese go to work or school by bicycle. / On the country roads it is not rare to find bicycles with heavy loads. / Compared with the car, the bicycle has several advantages. / First, it doesn't need any fuel, / thus it would neither pollute the air nor cost much to maintain. / Second, its price is what the Chinese can afford, / for it is much cheaper than a car. / It can also be beneficial to our health. / However, too many bicycles may also cause some problems. / In China most traffic accidents are related to bicycles. / In rush hours, people often disobey the rules and cause traffic jams. / (126 words) Passage 12 Education is one of the biggest and most important jobs of government in the United States. / However, it is a task that is carried out by local governments rather than the federal government. / Help from Washington usually comes in the form of money and research. / There are no national educational standards or regulations, / as there are in many other countries. / Local areas —states or cities or counties—have kept control over their own school systems. / In spite of local control, school systems throughout the country are very similar. / A child can transfer from a school in one state to a school in another / without encountering any serious difficulty. / Different books may be required or different courses may be offered, / but the same basic subjects are taught throughout the country. / (129 words) Passage 13 Writing is much more demanding than reading, even in a narrow physical sense. / Readers can flick their eyes over pages of type for hours on end without bodily fatigue, / but writers must plod their way through every word, / pushing their pencil or pen forward at barely a tenth of the speed that readers achieve. / Even writers who employ electric typewriters and word processors / are constrained to putting their thoughts on paper at a much slower rate / than the brain can comfortably produce them. / Writers who use Dictaphones lose the main advantage that writers have over speakers, / immediate and easy access to what they have already said. / Besides the alphabet was invented before the tape recorder / and it serves to assist the secretary ad printer as well as the creative writer. / (130 words) Passage 14 The Olympic Games started about 2,700 years ago in Greece. / There were Games once every four years, / and they were important events. / The Olympics lasted for hundreds of years. / Then they stopped because athletes wanted to play for money. / There were no Olympic games for about 1,500 years. / In the 1800s, some Germans found the ruins of the old stadium of Olympic in Greece. / This gave a Frenchman named Pierre an idea. / He decided to start the Olympic Games again. / He talked to an international sports group, / and in 1896 athletes from thirteen countries came to Athens, Greece for the first modem Olympics. / In the modern Olympics, athletes don't receive any money for playing sports. / At First these amateur athletes were only men, / but now women compete in many Olympic Games. / (132 words) Passage 15 Finding enough meat was a problem for primitive man. ) Keeping it for times when it was scarce was just as hard. / Three ways were found to keep meat from spoiling: / salting, drying and freezing. / People near salty waters salted their meat. / At first they probably rubbed dry salt on it, / but this preserved only the outside. / Later they may have salted their meat by soaking it in salt water. / In hot dry lands, men found that they could eat meat / that had dried while it was still on the bones. / They later learned to cut meat into thin strips and hang it up to dry in the hot air. / Men in cold climates found that frozen meat did not spoil. / They could leave their meat outside and eat it when they pleased. / (132 words) Passage 16 Left-handed children are more likely to suffer accidental injury than right-handed ones. / One in ten people are left-handed /—they choose to write and perform tasks with their left hand rather than their right. / But in some cultures it is incorrect to perform certain tasks, such as eating, with the left-hand. / So left-handers have to adapt and use their right hands. / Doctors at a hospital in the US found that left-handed children were twice as likely to have an accident, / such as a fall, sports injury or cut by a sharp object. / Researchers found the main cause of the injuries to be environmental. / A lot of things are designed for right-handed use, / like scissors and tin openers, which expose left-handers to injury. / The advice for parents with left-handed children is to be even more aware of childhood safety. / (136 words) Passage 17 Much publicity and discussion have in recent years surrounded various ways / and special courses designed to help people increase their reading speed. / So much depends on definition. / Even among experts there is not complete agreement as to exactly what we mean / when we speak of "reading" a page of print. / For some, it is attention to, and interpretation of most of the words on the page. / Others seem to mean simply "dealing with large groups of words by speeding through them and picking out highlights". / Most reading experts stress the importance of increasing the level of comprehension---/ the rate at which words and the ideas they stand for can be truly understood. / They believe that there has been overemphasis on the "numbers game" of increasing the number of words / a person can "run through" per minute. / (136 words) Passage 18 How many words are there in the English dictionary? / If you had asked that question in 1806, / the answer would have been 28,000. / In 1822, the answer would have been 70,000. / Today the question is difficult to answer / because there are many kinds of dictionaries! / The number of words depends on how complete the dictionary is. / A complete and exhaustive English dictionary today / would probably contain around 650,000 words. / Don't worry, though. / Few people use more than 60,000 words. / A recent college edition of Webster's New World Dictionary / contains more than 142,000 entries. / In this dictionary the letter S has more entries than any other letter. / Over 200 pages contain S entries. / The second highest letter is C with over 167 pages. / The lowest is X with only one and a half pages containing exactly 81 entries. / (137 words) Passage 19 All mammals, except man and the monkey, swim naturally from birth. / For man, like the monkey, it is not instinctive to float. / Deaths by drowning are common everywhere. / In the United States alone, about 7,000 children under four drown each year. / Everything possible has been done to prevent such tragedies. / One solution is particularly effective---/ teaching children to swim while they are still babies. / Most large towns in Florida and California already run lessons for babies and infants. / The idea has spread to Europe where, in several countries, special courses / are now arranged for children from seven to twenty-four months. / The first step is to eradicate the child's fear of the water. / Next, he is taught to float. / Once he can do this naturally and without fear, / the child grasps the technique and can propel himself through the water. / (138 words) Passage 20 The concept of sleep research is a fairly new development. / A lot of experimental work is being done to increase our knowledge about insomnia and other sleep-related problems / in order to help people who are deprived of sleep. / Some of these studies have shown that, / although some people have trouble falling asleep, others have an equally difficult time waking up. / It is believed that there is a natural cycle which regulates man's body temperature. / During the night a person's temperature may drop one or two degrees, / and it can be difficult to arouse him in the morning / if his body hasn't become hot enough yet. / In addition, a person awakened during a period of heavy sleep is irritable and cannot think clearly. / Finally, some people don't want to get up simply / because they don't like the activity that awaits them. / (140 words) Passage 21 There are few homes in the world today that do not have either a radio or television set. / Both of them have become an essential part of our daily life, / keeping us informed of the news of the day, instructing us in many fields of interest, / and entertaining us with singing, dancing, and acting. / Radio has had as much influence on the world as any other communications device. / Events of universal interest can be reported to the entire globe a few seconds after they happen. / Explorers in remote areas, ships at sea, even astronauts circling the earth / are able to keep in touch with civilization by means of radio. / Television is another major instrument of communication, / permitting us to see as well as to hear the performer. / Since its appearance, TV has had a tremendous effect on the daily life of people everywhere. / (143 words) Passage 22 Cheese is one of those foods that we tend to take for granted as always having been with us, / and it's odd to think that someone must have discovered the process that takes place / when micro-organisms get into milk and bring about changes in its physical and biochemical structure. / Obviously, we don't know who discovered the process, / but it's thought that it came from South-west Asia about 8,000 years ago. / Also the ancient Romans were great pioneers in the art of cheese-making. / In the nineteenth century, with increasing knowledge about micro-organisms, / there was a great advance in cheese-making. / Once it was known exactly which micro-organisms were involved in the different stages of producing a cheese, / and how the presence of different micro-organisms affected the taste, / it was possible to industrialize the process. / From then on, cheese-making moved very much into the world of technology and industrial processes. / (147 words) Passage 23 There was once a very famous American general, / who was an important figure in the army. / Everybody in the United States knew him, / and many people wished to have something of his in their homes. / Soon after World War II, the general returned to Washington. / One day, he went to a dentist and had 6 teeth pulled out. / A week later the general heard that his teeth were being sold in curiosity shops at $ 5 each, / and on each of the teeth there was a label with his name. / The general got very angry. / He rushed to his office and ordered 6 officers to go around the city and buy all the teeth. / The officers were away from the office all day. / In the evening they returned / and put on the table in front of the general / the teeth they had bought. / They had collected nearly 200 of them! / (149 words) Passage 24 In industrialized countries, the home is rapidly becoming a complicated workshop filled with technically advanced machinery. / Some of this machinery is already so complex as to be well beyond the understanding of the persons who have to use it. / The resulting accident risks, therefore, are high. / The extent of these risks may be judged from the fact / that some new domestic machinery requires the use of very high voltages indeed. / In addition, the rotary cutter, common in the kitchen, is capable of / a speed well in excess of that of ordinary industrial lathes and drills. / It can inflict injuries at least as serious as those produced by an industrial wood-planning machine. / Considerations of necessity and usefulness in design often give way to / the less utilitarian arguments of appearance, novelty and even social status. / Home mechanization reaches new heights of absurdity / with electric toothbrushes and, in the USA, electric erasers. / (149 words) Passage 25 It is easier to go downhill than to climb uphill, / so it is easier to fall into bad habits than into good ones. / Bad habits do not come suddenly. / They come little by little without one being aware of their danger. / Schoolboys first pick up little bad habits in school and on the streets. / When they cannot write their lessons, / they copy from their schoolmates. / If they see bigger boys smoking, / they also want to learn to smoke. / If they see their friends gambling, / they want to gamble. / When they get older the habits become stronger and stronger, / so that they can no longer get rid of them. / From copying, they learn to steal; / from gambling, they learn to cheat. / In the end, nobody trusts them. / How necessary it is then that we get rid of these habits in the beginning, / so that they will not bring about our downfall! / (150 words) Passage 26 A visitor who arrives in the United States from another country may want to try American food. / But when he asks about the best restaurants, he is surprised. / He is told about a fine French restaurant, / or a good Chinese restaurant, or an interesting Mexican one. / He is given the name of the place with good German or Italian food. / In many cities, if he asks about a restaurant where American food is served, / he may he told that those are not the best restaurants. / Americans enjoy American-food eaten in their own homes. / The American food served in many restaurants is good. / There are excellent restaurants on the east coast and the west coast / for those who like fish and other kinds of seafood. / But for especially good dinner in most cities, / Americans go where there is food from another country. / The best American restaurants serve foreign food. / (150 words) Passage 27 In recent years, advances in medical technology have made it possible for people to live longer than in the past. / New medicines and machines are being developed every day to extend life. / However, some people, including some doctors, are not in favor of these life-extending measures, / and they argue that people should have the right to die when they want to. / They say that the quality of life is as important as life itself, / and that people should not be forced to go on living / when the conditions of life have become unbearable. / They say that people should be allowed to die with dignity and to decide when they want to die. / Others argue that life under any circumstances is better than death / and that the duty of doctors is always to extend life as long as possible. / And so the battle goes on and on without a definite answer. / (150 words) Passage 28 The most important thing about first aid is not only to do what is necessary, / but also to do that as carefully and quickly as you can. / When an accident happens, don't rush or get excited. / Stop and think first. / If the injured person is in no immediate danger from fire, water or traffic, / leave him lying where he is. / A rolled-up coat or pullover placed under his head, and a coat or blanket over him, / is the best treatment you can give while waiting for help. / If the person is unconscious, loosen his clothing, especially round the neck. / Remember that you can do a lot of harm by trying to do too much. / Of course, there are times when you can't do the best you can / until a doctor or an ambulance arrives. / If the injured person has stopped breathing, / you must start artificial respiration as soon as possible. / (150 words) Passage 29 When a person draws an analogy, / he or she observes similarities between two things, / and usually goes on to suggest that / the thing which is familiar can help explain the one / which is not or is only partly understood. / As in forms of logic, there is often also the inference / that the similarities noted imply other probable similarities. / Scientists have often described organic processes by analogy. / Some analogies are useful and accurate as far as they go. / For example, the comparison of the heart with a pump or of the kidney with a filter / has helped illustrate the nature and function of these organs. / However, analogies that have been proposed to explain the nervous system have been less successful. / One aspect of analogies is that they are limited by the scientific understanding of the time. / The mind cannot be compared to a computer, for instance, until there is a computer. / (150 words) Passage 30 Water is one of the elements most necessary for survival. / A person can go without food for almost two months, / but without water he can go for only a few days. / Yet most people have no idea how much water they should drink. / In fact, many people live in a state of lacking water. / Without water, we'd be poisoned to death by our own waste products. / When our bodies remove wastes, they need water. / If there isn't enough water, / wastes are not removed effectively / and may build up in our bodies. / Water is also important for chemical reasons in digestion. / It also carries oxygen to the cells through blood / and helps to cool our bodies through sweat. / Daily water intake for a healthy person is eight to ten eight-ounce glasses. / For an overweight person or a person who exercises a lot or lives in a hot climate, / he may need more. / (151 words) Passage 31 A number of values and beliefs in traditional societies tend to decrease the amount of money / people are willing and able to take from their income / and make available for productive investment. / In many of these societies, gold and silver, house and land have been some of the ways / in which wealth has been stored. / Attempts to encourage people to keep their savings in monetary form often meet strong resistance, / which is simply increased in times like these of rapid inflation. / Perhaps the greatest obstacle to increasing savings and investments in the traditional society / is the pressure of increasing population. / In such countries, there is still a direct relationship between the amount of food available / and the number of children who survive. / A large food supply often leads to an immediate increase in the number of people / who must be fed and thus cannot be used to increase the standard of living. / (152 words) Passage 32 As children, many of us got a great deal of criticism and, / as a result, learned a variety of patterns for coping with it. / Mary had apparently received little criticism, / but knowing that she was not perfect and deserved what other children got, / developed her own patterns of self-judgment and centure. / Being judged, whether we are underestimated or overestimated, / usually implies a demand, subtle or direct, that we change. / If others do not demand change, we may feel the need to demand it of ourselves. / Reactions that are relatively free from attempts to change or discredit us, / given by someone who cares for us, / and with the intention of letting us know what impressions we are making, may be easier to take. / If, however, our usual reaction is to defend ourselves, / even mild criticism or impressions given gently without demands that we change / may affect our defensive structure and become difficult to handle. / (153 words) Passage 33 Smoking, which may be a pleasure for some people, / is a serious source of discomfort for their fellows. / Further, medical authorities express their concern about the effect of smoking on the health / not only of those who smoke but also of those who don't. / In fact, nonsmokers who must involuntarily breathe the air polluted by tobacco smoke / may suffer more than the smokers themselves. / As you are doubtless aware, / a considerable number of our students have joined in an effort to / persuade the university to ban smoking in the classrooms. / I believe they are entirely right in their aim. / However, I would hope that it is possible to achieve this by calling on the smokers / to use good judgment and show concern for others rather than by regulations. / Smoking is prohibited by laws in theaters, cinemas and in laboratories / where there may be a fire hazard. / Elsewhere, it is up to your good sense. / (154 words) Passage 34 Most words have more than one meaning. / Dictionaries try to separate the different senses of the word and to list them all. / Usually the different meanings will be numbered,/ as many as thirty or forty meanings being listed for some words. / Dictionaries differ on the order in which the meanings are listed. / Some try to arrange the meanings in the order of frequency of occurrence, /—the most common meanings first and the rarest last. / Others use a historical order---the earliest meaning first and the most recent last. / Whatever the order used by your dictionaries, / you usually have to hunt around to get the meaning you want. / If you are looking up a word encountered in your reading, / you have to check the different meanings against the passage / in which you found the word, selecting the meaning that fits, or most nearly fits the context. / Ultimately it is always the context that indicates what the word means. / (157 words) Passage 35 In certain countries the conflict between young people and the educational system has become very serious indeed. / In addition to causing trouble within the educational system itself, / the young are also in conflict with the adult society outside it. / In considering how to deal with such issues, / many people look to education and educational institutions for help. / This is a natural and understandable response from an older generation / that has failed to understand the significance of the revolt of youth / and to create a world in which such revolt would be unnecessary. / When we are asked to help, in the adjustment of youth, we must ask: / Adjustment to what? / Should we adjust them, for example, / to the miseries and injustices in the world, the hunger and poverty in the midst of plenty? / Or do we want them to conform to the comforts of a secure, routine job / and a narrow routine existence in a small, closed community? / (157 words) Passage 36 There is increasing scientific evidence that large cars cause more highway accidents than small cars. / In the news recently was the story of a woman who died of a heart attack while driving her car. / The car was moving so fast that it went through the highway- dividing fence, / causing a collision in which five people died. / Those unnecessary deaths are due in part to the woman's choice of a large automobile. / A lighter and smaller car probably wouldn't have gone through the fence, / because the heavier the car, / the greater the force it will have in a collision. / Furthermore, even if the lighter car had broken through the fence, / its remaining energy would have been much less, / and this would have reduced the chances of serious injury or death. / Because of its small size, it might have missed the other car completely. / The present design of the big automobile is largely responsible / for the increasing deaths on the highways. / (159 words) Passage 37 The sea is the largest unknown part of our world. / It covers seventy-one per cent of the earth. / There is still much to be discovered about this vast blanket of water. / Luckily, no single nation has the task of learning all we need to know about the ocean. / The world sea is owned by no one; / it surrounds the earth and belongs to us all. / Scientists in many different countries are working to explain its mysteries. / Some are studying ways of bringing the ocean's huge supply of water to the deserts of the world. / Others hope to control the weather by learning more about the exchange of heat and moisture between the ocean and the air. / Others are studying the ways in which sound travels and is affected by water and heat. / What happens when seawater touches different elements is another subject of study. / These are just a few of the questions to which oceanographers are devoting their energies. / (159 words) Passage 38 Some people have the idea that at some time in the future everybody will speak the same language. / Meanwhile, there are so many international meetings involving people / who speak different languages that a new profession has grown up: / the profession of the simultaneous translator. / A simultaneous translator must listen to what the speaker is saying / and at the same time say it in another language. / The usual arrangement is that the translator wears earphones and sits in a glass booth / in order to listen to and translate the speeches. / Members of the audience who don't understand the language of the speaker / can listen through earphones to whichever language they want. / Usually there is a choice of two or three; / sometimes there are as many as five, as in the United Nations, for example. / What the translators have to do means almost superhuman ability. / That they are able to do it so easily and so well is really amazing. / (160 words) Passage 39 In ancient times, the farmers that surrounded a settlement supplied all its food. / The same was true for other products; / they were made and consumed only within a small area. / There was no system to distribute and transport goods for more than a few miles. / As civilization developed, however, some areas had a surplus / while others began to specialize in a particular foodstuff or handicraft. / Merchants bought these goods and then sold them in more distant communities. / In time a number of trade routes were established both on land and sea. / Goods moved slowly hut steadily from one part of the world to another. / The most important trade was in grain—wheat, rice, and similar foodstuffs. / Areas which grew a surplus were able to supply those which did not have enough. / Ancient Rome, for example, depended on North Africa to feed its population of a million or more. / Much of the trade, however, was in luxury goods such as silks and spices. / (161 words) Passage 40 It may be possible to increase life span by altering diet in various ways. / In experiments on rats and other animals, / scientists have found that reducing the number of calories / taken in by the animals actually increases their life span. / Although this may seem strange, it is supported by the evidence of a small group of people / who lived in a specially-constructed environment in order to see / how people can adapt to living on another planet such as Mars. / These people grew their food inside the place where they lived, / but because of problems with food production their diet was very restricted for several months. / Surprisingly, their blood pressure fell / and the immune systems of their bodies functioned more efficiently than before. / There is obviously a limit to the reduction of calorie intake / and most people would probably not be very happy restricting their diet in this way, / hut scientists may discover a way of producing the effects of calorie restriction / without causing feelings of hunger! / (166 words) Passage 41 Millions of words have been written about young people in the United States. / There are reasons for this great interest in the ideas, feelings, and actions of youth. / Today there are about seven million Americans in colleges and universities. / Young persons under twenty-five make up nearly half of the American population. / Many of these will soon be in charge of the nation. / Naturally their ideas are important to everyone in the country, / and it is necessary for older people to understand what they think and feel. / College students today have strong opinions about right and wrong. / They are deeply interested in making a better life for all people, / especially for those who have not been given a fair chance before now. / They see much that is wrong in the lives of their parents. / It is hard for them to see what is right and good in the older ways. / As a result, there is often trouble in American families. / Your country may be meeting such problems, too. / (167 words) Passage 42 When I was young, I was sent home from school / because I asked the teacher so many questions that she thought I was stupid. / At home my mother taught me and encouraged me to study. / I became a newsboy and I also got a job selling magazines and fruit on a train. / I even set up a printing press in the luggage van of a train on which I worked. / I loved chemistry and experimenting with chemicals, / but unfortunately one day I spilled some chemicals / and accidentally set fire to the luggage van. / Next I went to New York and was lucky enough to walk into a large telegraph office / when the telegraph stopped working. / As I was the only person who could repair it immediately, / I was offered my first real job with the company. / I invented many things, / including the phonograph, the mouthpiece part of the telephone, and the electric light bulb. / My success was simply the result of hard work rather than any special ability. / (168 words) Passage 43 An old man whose eyesight was not very good / came to stay in a hotel room with a bottle of wine in each hand. / On the wall there was a fly which he took for a nail. / So the moment he hung the bottles on the wall, they fell broken on the floor. / When the landlady discovered what had happened, she decided to do him a favor. / She told a hotel worker to hammer a nail on the wall, / and the worker happened to hammer the nail exactly where the fly had stayed. / A few hours later the old man returned. / The smell of the wine reminded him of the accident. / He glanced at the wall and found the fly was still there. / He decided to have his revenge. / So he quietly walked towards the wall and slapped the nail with all his might. / On hearing a loud cry, the kind-hearted landlady rushed in. / To her surprise, the old man was lying on the ground and his right hand was bleeding. / (169 words) Passage 44 Coffee is one of the most popular beverages throughout the world today. / In fact, according to some estimates, over 30% of all adults in the world / drink coffee at least once a day on the average. / Coffee contains a kind of drug called caffeine. / Caffeine is a chemical or chemical substance that stimulates the nerves of the body. / Drinking coffee tends to make people a little bit more awake or alert—at least for a short time---/ because of this stimulating effect on the nervous system. / A cup of coffee has, on the average, about 3% caffeine in it. / It is said that coffee was first found in East Africa in about the year 850. / Later, the hot coffee drink became popular among Arab travelers who visited East Africa. / After coffee drinking became common in the Arab countries, / its popularity spread to Europe. / Gradually, the European traders and explorers introduced coffee drinking to the people in North America and Asia. / Today, it remains a popular hot drink in many places. / (170 words) Passage 45 Almost everybody understands the meanings of Mr. , Mrs. , and Miss. / Mr. is used before the names of men. / Mrs. is for married woman and Miss is for an unmarried woman or a girl. / For some time, businessmen in the United States used Ms. before a woman's name / when they were not sure whether the woman was married or not. / Today, however, many women prefer to use Ms. rather than Mrs. or Miss. / The word Mr. does not tell us whether or not a man is married. / Many women think this is an advantage for men. / They want to be equal to men in this way. / These women feel that it is not important for people to know whether they are married or not. / There are some problems with Ms. , however, not all women like it. / Some like the old ways of doing things. / Some find it difficult to pronounce. / Generally, young women like it better than older women. / It is hard to tell whether or not Ms. will be used by more American women in the future. / (177 words) Passage 46 I lose so many things that I could swear that they just get up and walk away by themselves. / Pencils are never anywhere near the telephone. / Screwdrivers and can-openers always manage to wander into the yard. / The situation was getting so out of control that I decided I'd better get organized. / I built a large cabinet in the kitchen. / On the shelves I neatly arranged a number of boxes and tin cans, / the contents of which I clearly marked on the outside. / There was a new address book in one corner of the cabinet / so that I could conveniently jot down telephone numbers and addresses. / Having made such a serious attempt to prevent things from running away, / I felt very proud of myself. / But it was not long before matches disappeared and the hammer decided to hide itself in the wastepaper basket. / I soon got my revenge, however. / I had a lock installed on the cabinet door and thus made sure that nothing could escape. / This was a perfect solution, / until one day I lost the key to the lock. / (180 words) Passage 47 Surfing is not a new sport. / It originated hundreds of years ago in Hawaii. / Men swam out to sea to catch fish / and found they could come back to land very quickly by riding the waves. / These first surfers did not use a hoard. / Many people still do this type of surfing today. / After a while people started to use boards and rode the waves / by lying, kneeling or standing on them. / These first surfboards were made of wood and the water made them rot after a while. / Today surfboards are made of plastic instead. / Be careful when you pick the spot where you are going to surf. / If there are rocks about, you might hurt yourself, / so you should find a spot where the bottom of the sea is sand. / Another good piece of advice is not to surf on your own. / A friend surfing with you can save your life if you get into difficulties. / Some surfers have a rope tied around their ankles and attached to the hoard, / so that they won't lose it if they fall off. / (181 words ) Passage 48 Go is another game played by two players. / Like chess, it is a game of skill and strategy. / One player uses black stones and the other uses white stones. / There are 181 black stones and 180 white stones. / In chess, the pieces are placed on the squares of the board. / In Go, the stones are placed on the intersections of the lines on the board. / On a Go board, there are nineteen vertical lines and nineteen horizontal lines. / Thus, there are a total of 361 places, or points, where stones can be played. / The players try to gain territory by surrounding unoccupied pointed. / They play one stone at a time. / The player with the most territory at the end of the game is the winner. / Stones can be captured, but that isn't the main object of the game. / There are very few actual rules. / So, to the beginner it often seems rather easy. / But it is a game which requires great concentration and skill. / Traditionally, Go was played mostly in China and Japan, / but nowadays it's gaining popularity in other countries as well. / (183 words) Passage 49 Most of us are inclined to feel that it is difficult to spend our leisure properly. / When we have holidays, we usually feel bored and do not know what to do. / Some just sit on a sofa looking at the ceiling all day long, / while others stay in bed to venture in their dreamland. / Actually, having this feeling is quite natural since, in our daily life, / we do things more or less in agreement with an unwritten daily routine in our mind. / Gradually and accordingly we get used to it. / However, during holidays we need not carry out this routine. / Then we are at a complete loss. / Here are some helpful suggestions for you to spend your leisure. / If you are extroverted, / you can go out for a picnic, or play some sports games. / The fresh air and the fascinating scenery in the countryside may refresh you / and the amusing games may make you happier. / If you like to stay at home, you may enjoy light music or read a few novels instead. / Hobbies such as gardening, philately and keeping pets are also enjoyable. / (185 words) Passage 50 A schoolboy's life is in preparation for the real battle of life. / One of the most important parts of a schoolboy's life is / to get as much knowledge and sound mind-training as he can. / His main business in school is to learn. / Another part that forms a schoolboy's life is school discipline. / He has to learn to obey the strict rules of school or he should get punished. / This strict discipline can teach him some very necessary virtues for the road to a successful life. / Obedience, diligence, regularity, punctuality and forbearance are / all the essential virtues of school discipline and of a man of success. / School is a place for a schoolboy to learn what social life is like. / In the classroom and on the playground, / he has to mix with his fellows and not members of his family. / He is no longer a spoilt child. / He will soon get his corners rubbed off / and learn the lessons of good manners and thought for others. / When he grows up into an adult, / he should also carry himself in this way in society. / (185 words) Passage 51 If you want to buy a coat, / you can look around and try on as many different types as possible. / You will get to know as much about it as possible before you decide to buy. / Compared with buying a coat, the decision about your job is much more difficult to make in your life. / Between now and when you die you will spend more hours at work / than you will on any other single activity. / So it is smart to choose carefully. / The trouble with choosing a job is that / it is difficult to know what it is really like before you actually start work. / You can know a lot about the job, / but sometimes that doesn't help a lot. / You can look at a coat for a long time, / find out about the color, design, material etc., / but it is only after you have tried it on that / you can feel convinced it is the right coat for you. / How can you "try a job on" for a while before deciding it is the right one for you? / One possibility is through work experience. / (186 words ) Passage 52 Many businesses, such as department stores, restaurants, hotels and airline companies, / use a credit system for selling their products and services. / In a credit system, the seller agrees to sell something to the buyer without immediately receiving cash. / The buyer receives the goods or services immediately and promises to pay for them later. / There are two types of credit cards. / One type is issued directly by a store to a customer. / Many large department stores issue credit cards to their customers. / The store credit card can be used to make purchases only at a particular store. / The other kind of credit card is issued by a credit company. / Credit cards from credit companies can be used to buy things almost anywhere. / If you have a major credit card, / you can buy airplane tickets, stay at hotels, and eat at restaurants with it. / Most large credit companies are connected to large banks. / So if you want a credit card from a credit company, / you generally have to make an applicant at a bank. / After an applicant receives a credit card, / he or she can make purchases, using the card. / (188 words) Passage 53 The price of a house depends on its size and location. / Big houses are more expensive than smaller ones, / and houses closer to the center of big cities are more expensive / than ones in the suburbs or in small towns. / Regardless of the cost, it is usual for people to buy their houses over a period of time. / When a family buys a house, / it is necessary to borrow money from a bank to pay for it. / Then they repay the bank in regular payments. / Families can take 30 years to pay off the loan. / Without a loan it would be impossible for most people to own their houses. / Many Americans do not own their own homes; / they pay landlords to live in their homes. / The money they pay for this is called a rent. / Usually, it is cheaper to rent than it is to buy. / Also when something needs to be repaired, / it is easy for the renter to ask the landlord to fix it. / Some people rent houses, but most renters live in apartments. / Apartment buildings are located in cities where it is too costly to build houses. / (189 words) Passage 54 All big cities are quite similar. / Living in a modem Asian city is not very different from living in an American city. / The same cannot be said about living on farms, however. / In many parts of the world, farmers and their families live in villages or towns. / In the United States, however, each farm family lives on its own fields, / often beyond the sight of any neighbors. / Instead of traveling from a village to the fields every morning, / American farmers stay on their land throughout the week. / They travel to the nearest town on Saturdays for shopping and on Sundays for church. / The children ride on buses to large schools which serve all of the farm families living in the area. / In some areas, there are small schools serving a few farm families, and the children walk to school. / Of course life keeps changing for everyone, including farmers. / Today there are cars, good roads, radios, and TV sets. / And, of course, there are modern machines for farming. / All of these have changed farm life. / The farmers have learned to try new methods and to trust science instead of following older ways. / (191 words) Passage 55 Japan is a small country with few natural resources. / Despite this, Japanese productivity, the rate at which goods are produced, / has increased more than eleven-fold in the past thirty years. / Many people in the West wonder how the Japanese do it. / The key to Japan's success can be discovered by looking at some basic differences / between Japanese and Western attitudes towards work. / People in the West generally view work as a necessary evil, / one must give up part of one's freedom to earn the money needed to live. / To the Japanese, work is the central interest of one's life ; / it is here that the Japanese establishes his identity. / A Japanese business firm is like a family. / When an employee joins a company, / he expects to work for that company for the rest of his working life; / rarely is anyone dismissed. / Promotion is based on the seniority system, / the length of employment determining one's rank in the company. / Those at the bottom do not worry about chances for promotion / because those at the top retire at a certain age so that others may have their turn. / In addition, the difference between the lowest and the highest salaries is much less than that in the West. / (203 words) Passage 56 What can your handwriting reveal about you? / According to graphologists, just about everything. / Specific parts of a person's handwriting can be particularly revealing. / One example is the signature. / An extremely large signature, much larger than the rest of the writing, / can indicate an inferiority complex---/ the largeness of the signature compensating for the person' s feeling of being of less value than others. / Illegible signatures are sometimes a sign that the writer wishes to hide and remain anonymous. / Spiky signatures imply aggression, / while ornate, loopy ones indicate a vain, egotistical person who likes admiration and attention. / Graphologists say there is no point in trying to disguise your handwriting / to make it reveal the personality you would like to have. / The give-aways are always there. / Although graphologists complain that their science is not taken seriously enough, / the study of handwriting as an indication of character is gaining recognition as a reliab1e tool in many areas. / It is used by law-enforcing institutions to identify the author. / It is admissible evidence in court of a person's state of mind at the time of writing. / It is increasingly used by large firms in executive staff selection. / In addition, all psychology courses in Europe include graphology as a diagnostic tool. / (204 words) Passage 57 English has been spoken in England for 1,500 years but in Australia for only 200. / This fact explains why we have a great wealth of regional dialects in England / that is more or less totally lacking in Australia. / It is often possible to tell where an English person comes from to within about 15 miles or less. / In Australia, there has not been enough time for changes to bring about strong regional variation. / As a result, it is almost impossible to tell where someone comes from at all, / although very small differences are now beginning to appear. / It is unlikely, however, that there will ever be as much dialectal variation in Australia as there is in England. / This is because modern transport and communication conditions / are very different from what they were 1,500 years ago. / Even though English is now spoken in many different parts of the world many thousands of miles apart, / it is very unlikely that English will ever break up into a number of different languages. German and Norwegian became different languages / because the ancestors of the speakers of these two languages moved apart / and were no longer in touch and communicating with one another. / In the modern world, this will not happen, at least in the near future. / (212 words) Passage 58 Animals perform many useful and entertaining jobs. / Dogs are particularly valuable in guiding the blind, / protecting property, finding lost people, and hunting criminals. / Horses are used in guarding herds, carrying men in lands where there are no roads, / and helping farmers work their land. / Pigeons have long been used to carry messages. / Wild animals from the jungles, forests and seas / are very popular performers in circuses and moving pictures. / People realize that, although animals may not have the same intelligence as human beings, / they are smart enough to learn certain things. / Animals can learn to do many things that, while not necessarily useful, are very amusing to watch. / In circuses, animals are taught to do the tricks / that are most compatible with their physical and temperamental make-up. / Lions and tigers can be taught to leap and spring gracefully when told to do so, / or to stay in place on command. / Elephants learn to walk in line, to stand on their hind legs, / to lie on their sides, and to stand on their heads. / They can also learn to dance. / The moving pictures and television can use trained animals too. / Some animals, such as skunks and foxes, are easy to film. / All you have to do is make a trail in front of the camera by dragging something / that smells good to the animals over the ground. / (226 words ) Passage 59 Long before recorded history, our ancestors were bathing for pleasure and health. / Man has found many interesting ways to take his bath. / The earliest records often mention the use of rivers for bathing. / In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, many people considered bathing unhealthy. / Instead of taking baths, men and women used powder, paint and perfume / to hide the uncleanliness of their bodies. / It was not until about a hundred years ago / that people began to realize the 'importance of bathing. / All baths do not use a tub or shower. / Hot air baths, for example, are taken in a room heated by a furnace. / The hot, dry air makes the bather perspire. / After he is perspiring freely, he is given a shower and rubbed hard with a towel. / In a Turkish bath, one goes through a series of rooms of different degrees of heat. / It is a long process and is often combined with massages and periods of rest and sleep. / Turkish baths are often taken to reduce weight. / Many people take baths as a medical treatment. / In northern Europe, bathers first go into a room filled with hot steam. / When they are quite hot, they plunge into a pool of cold water or roll in the snow outside. / The American Indians used a similar bath as a treatment for pneumonia. Mud baths are also popular. / (226 words) Passage 60 The holiday season is a time when you must be especially on guard against pickpockets. / Here are some precautions you should take to safeguard your possessions. / If you are a man who uses a wallet, / put your wallet in a side trouser pocket with a zipper or your inside jacket pocket. / Never put your wallet in your rear trouser pocket / because that is the most vulnerable spot. / If you are a woman who carries a handbag, / make sure it has a strong clasp and a zip pocket inside. / Never leave your handbag unattended while shopping. / Hang it in front of you so that you can cross your arms over it when in a crowded place. / Another thing to remember is to avoid tempting thieves. / Do not carry large amounts of cash on you. / Never leave your belongings inside the car in full view of everyone; / always lock them in the hoot. / In crowded places, watch out for a person carrying a jacket on his arm or a newspaper in his hand. / Today's pickpockets often use these things to hide the sharp blade they are carrying / to slash the pocket, shopping bag or handbag of the victim. Also, watch out for a person who always rushes at an approaching bus / But never seems to be able to get on board. / Be alert at all times and report any suspicious person to the police immediately. / (233 words)