2003年6月21日大学英语四级考试试题



Part I Listening Comprehension (20 minutes)



Section A



Directions: In this section, you will hear 10 short conversations. At the end of each conversation, a question will be asked about what was said. Both the conversation and the question will be spoken only once. After each question there will be a pause. During the pause, you must read the four choices marked A), B), C) and D), and decide which is the best answer. Then mark the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the centre.



Example: You will hear:



You will read:



A) At the office.



B) In the waiting room.



C) At the airport.



D) In a restaurant.



From the conversation we know that the two were talking about some work they had to finish in the evening. This is most likely to have taken place at the office. Therefore, A) "At the office" is the best answer. You should choose [A] on the Answer Sheet and mark it with a single line through the centre.



Sample Answer [A] [B] [C] [D]



1. W: George, look at the long waiting line. I'm glad you've made the reservation.



M: More and more people enjoy eating out now. Besides, this place is especially popular with oversea students.



Q: Where did this conversation most probably take place?



2. M: I wonder if you can drop by tomorrow evening. The Stevensons is coming over for dinner .I'd like you to meet them.



W: Sure. I'd love to. I've heard they're interesting people.



Q: What do we learn from the conversation?



3. W: The presentation made by Professor Jackson was too complicated to understand.



M: Well, I think he didn't speak slowly enough for us to take notes.



Q: What is the man's complaint?



4. W: You've got your apartment furnished, haven't you?



M: Yes. I bought some used furniture at the Sunday Market and it was a real bargain.



Q: What does the man mean?



5. M: Mary doesn't want me to take the job. She says our child is too young and the job requires much traveling.



W: You should talk to her again and see if you can find a way out. Think about the gains and loses before you make a decision.



Q: What do we learn from the conversation?



6. M: I haven't got my scores on the GRE test yet. Do you think I should call to make inquiries?



W: There is no hurry. The test scores are released at least eight weeks after the test.



Q: What does the woman advise the man to do?



7. M: Have you finished reading the book you bought last month?



W: Oh, I didn't read it straight through the way you read a novel. I just cover the few chapters that interested me most.



Q: How did the woman read the book?



8. W: Hi, John! Haven't seen you for quite a while. Are you fine?



M: Oh, yes. But luck seemed to go against me. I had a car accident, only some minor injuries, though.



Q: What happened to John?



9. M: The taxi is waiting downstairs. Let's hurry.



W: Wait a minute. I'll take some food with us. I don't like the meal served on the train.



Q: What are the speakers going to do?



10. W: Is that optional course as hard as everybody says?



M: Exactly even worse, believe it or not.



Q: What does the man say about the course?



1. A) At a theatre. C) At a railway station.



B) At a booking office. D)At a restaurant.



2. A) The man is inviting the woman to dinner.



B) The woman is too busy to join the man for dinner.



C) The woman is a friend of the Stevensons'.



D) The man is going to visit the Stevensons.



3. A) The professor's presentation was not convincing enough.



B) The professor's lecture notes were too complicated.



C) The professor spoke with a strong accent.



D) The professor spoke too fast.



4. A) The furnished apartment was inexpensive.



B) The apartment was provided with some old furniture.



C) The furniture in the market was on sale every Sunday.



D) The furniture he bought was very cheap.



5. A) The man is thinking about taking a new job.



B) The man likes a job that enables him to travel.



C) The man is sure that he will gain more by taking the job.



D) The man doesn't want to stay home and take care of their child.



6. A) Take the GRE test again in 8 weeks. C) Be patient and wait.



B) Call to check his scores. D) Inquire when the test scores are released.



7. A) She read it selectively. C) She read it slowly.



B) She went over it chapter by chapter. D) She finished it at a stretch.



8. A) He was kept in hospital for a long time.



B) He was slightly injured in a traffic accident.



C) He was seriously wounded in a mine explosion.



D) He was fined for speeding.



9. A) Wait for a taxi. C) Go on a trip.



B) Buy some food. D) Book train tickets.



10. A) It's not as hard as expected.



B) It's too tough for some students.



C) It's much more difficult than people think.



D) It's believed to be the hardest optional course.





Section B



Directions: In this section, you will hear 3 short passages. At the end of each passage, you will hear some questions. Both the passage and the questions will be spoken only once. After you hear a question, you must choose the best answer from the four choice marked A), B), C) and D). Then mark the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the centre.



Passage One



My father woke me up early one morning when I was fourteen and announced: "Get up! You're going with me to cut grass." I felt proud and excited because my father thought I was responsible enough to help him in his business. Still that first day was really hard. From sunrise to sunset, my father, my younger brother and I cut and trimmed very large yards in a well-to-do part of the city. By the end of the day I was exhausted but I felt food. I had put in a hard day's labor and had earned six dollars. One day my father spotted some weeds I had missed cutting and pulled me aside. "Get that section again," he said firmly. "Don't let me have to tell you to do the job right the first time." In every job I have held，from cutting lawns to washing dishes to working a machine in a construction site, I have learnt something that help me in my next job. If you look hard enough, you can learn from any job you do.



11. How did the speaker feel when his father asked him to help cut grass?



12.What did his father do when the speaker missed cutting some leaves?



13.What did the speaker want to tell us in this passage?



Questions 11 to 13 are based on the passage you have just heard.



11. A) Anxious and worried. C) Nervous and confused.



B) Proud and excited. D) Inspired and confident.



12. A) His father scolded him severely. C) His father made him do the cutting again.



B) His father took back the six dollars. D) His father cut the leaves himself.



13. A) One can benefit a lot from working with his father.



B) Manual labourers shouldn't be looked down upon.



C) One should always do his job earnestly.



D) Teenagers tend to be careless.



Passage Two



I live in a small village in the country. My wife and I run the village shop. We have a very peaceful life. "Boring ", some might say. But we love it. We know all the people in the village and have plenty of time to stop and chat. I have plenty of time for my hobbies too, gardening, fishing, and walking in the countryside. I love the outdoor life. It wasn't always like this though. I used to have a really stress job, working till late in the office every evening and often bringing work home at the weekend. The advertising world is very competitive and when I look back, I can't imagine how I stayed it. I had no private life at all, no time for the really important things in life. Because of the pressure of the job I used to smoke and drink too much. The crisis came when my wife left me .She complained that she never saw me and I had no time for family life. This made me realize what was really important to me. I talked things through with her and decided to get back together again and started a new and better life together. I gave up tobacco and alcohol, and searched for new hobbies. Now I am afraid looking back since the past life seemed a horrible dream.



14. What did the speaker use to do for a living?



15. What do we know about the speaker's life in the past?



16. What made the speaker change his life style?



Questions 14 to 16 are based on the passage you have just heard.



14. A) He ran a village shop. C) He worked in an advertising agency.



B) He worked on a farm. D) He was a gardener.



15. A) It was stressful. C) It was peaceful.



B) It was colorful. D) It was boring.



16. A) His desire to start Iris own business. C) The decline in his health.



B) The crisis in his family life. D) His dream of living in the countryside.



Passage Three



"Where is the university" is the question many visitors to Cambridge asked, but no one could point them in any one direction because there is no campus. The university consists of thirty-one self-governing colleges. It has lecture halls, libraries, laboratories, museums and offices throughout the city. Individual colleges choose their own students who have to meet the minimum entrance requirements set by the university. Undergraduates usually live and study in their colleges where they are taught in very small groups. Lectures and laboratory and practical work are organized by the university and held in university buildings. There are over 10,000 undergraduates and 3,500 post-graduates, about 40% of them are women and some 8% from overseas. As well as teaching, research is of major importance. Since the beginning of the 20th century, more than 60 university members have won Nobel Prizes. University has a huge number of buildings for teaching and research. It has more than 60 specialist subject libraries as well as the university library, which, as a copyright library, is entitled to a copy of every book published in Britain. Examinations are set and degrees are awarded by the university. It allowed women to take the university exams in 1881, but it was not until 1948 that they were awarded degrees.



17.Why is it difficult for visitors to locate Cambridge University?



18. What does the passage tell us about the colleges of Cambridge University?



19. What can be learnt from the passage about the libraries in Cambridge University?



20. What does the passage tell about women students in Cambridge University?



Questions 17 to 20 are based on the passage you have just heard.



17. A) Because there are no signs to direct them.



B) Because no tour guides are available.



C) Because all the buildings in the city look alike.



D) Because the university is everywhere in the city.



18. A) They set their own exams. C) They award their own degrees.



B) They select their own students. D) They organize their own laboratory work.



19. A) Most of them have a long history.



B) Many of them are specialized libraries.



C) They house more books than any other university library.



D) They each have a copy of every book published in Britain.



20. A) Very few of them are engaged in research.



B) They were not awarded degrees until 1948.



C) They have outnumbered male students.



D) They were not treated equally until 1881.







Part II Reading Comprehension (35 minutes)



Directions: There are 4 passages in this part. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A), B), C) and D). You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the centre.



Passage One



Questions 21 to 25 are based on the following passage.



On average, American kids ages 3 to 12 spent 29 hours a week in school, eight hours more that they did in 1981. They also did more household work and participated in more of such organized activities as soccer and ballet (芭蕾舞). Involvement in sports, in particular, rose almost 50% from 1981 to 1997: boys now spend an average of four hours a week playing sports; girls log hall that time. All in all, however, children's leisure time dropped from 40% of the day in 1981 to 25%



"Children are affected by the same time crunch (危机) that affects their parents," says Sandra Hofferth, who headed the recent study of children's timetable. A chief reason, she says, is that more mothers are working outside the home. (Nevertheless, children in both double-income and "male breadwinner" households spent comparable amounts of time interacting with their parents.19 hours and 22 hours respectively. In contrast, children spent only 9 hours with their single mothers.)



All work and no play could make for some very messed-up kids. "Play is the most powerful way a child explores the world and learns about himself," says T. Berry Brazelton, professor at Harvard Medical School Unstructured play encourages independent thinking and allows the young to negotiate their relationships with their peers, but kids ages 3 to 12 spent only 12 hours a week engaged in it.



The children sampled spent a quarter of their rapidly decreasing "free time" watching television. But that, believe it or not, was one of the findings parents might regard as good news. If they're spending less time in front of the TV set, however, kids aren't replacing it with reading. Despite efforts to get kids more interested in books, the children spent just over an hour a week reading. Let's face it, who's got the time?



21. By mentioning "the same time crunch" (Line 1, Para. 2) Sandra Hofferth means



A) children have little time to play with their parents



B) children are not taken good care of by their working parents



C) both parents and children suffer from lack of leisure time



D) both parents and children have trouble managing their time



22. According to the author, the reason given by Sandra Hofferth for the time crunch is



A) quite convincing C) totally groundless



B) partially true D) rather confusing



23. According to the author a child develops better if



A) he has plenty of time reading and studying



B) he is left to play with his peers in his own way



C) he has more time participating in school activities



D) he is free to interact with his working parents



24. The author is concerned about the fact that American kids



A) are engaged in more and more structured activities



B) are increasingly neglected by their working mothers



C) are spending more and more time watching TV



D) are involved less and less in household work



25. We can infer from the passage that



A) extracurricular activities promote children's intelligence



B) most children will turn to reading with TV sets switched off



C) efforts to get kids interested in reading have been fruitful



D) most parents believe reading to be beneficial to children





Passage Two



Questions 26 to :30 are based on the following passage.



Henry Ford, the famous U.S. inventor and car manufacturer, once said, "The business of America is business." By this he meant that the U.S. way of life is based on the values of the business world.



Few would argue with Ford's statement. A brief glimpse at a daily newspaper vividly shows how much people in the United States think about business. For example, nearly every newspaper has a business section, in which the deals and projects, finances and management, stock prices and labor problems of corporations are reported daily. In addition, business news can appear in every other section. Most national news has an important financial aspect to it. Welfare, foreign aid, the federal budget, and the policies of the Federal Reserve Bank are all heavily affected by business. Moreover, business news appears in some of the unlikeliest places. The world of arts and entertainment is often referred to as "the entertainment industry" or "show business."



The positive side of Henry Ford's statement can be seen in the prosperity that business has brought to U.S. life. One of the most important reasons so many people from all over the world come to live in the United States is the dream of a better job. Jobs are produced in abundance (大量地) because the U.S. economic system is driven by competition. People believe that this system crates more wealth, more jobs, and a materially better way of life.



The negative side of Henry Ford's statement, however, can be seen when the word business is taken to mean big business. And the term big business -- referring to the biggest companies, is seen in opposition to labor. Throughout U.S. history working people have had to fight hard for higher wages, better working conditions, and the fight to form unions. Today, many of the old labor disputes are over, but there is still some employee anxiety. Downsizing ---- the laying off of thousands of workers to keep expenses low and profits high -- creates feelings of insecurity for many.



26. The United States is a typical country



A) which encourages free trade at home and abroad



B) where people's chief concern is how to make money



C) where all businesses are managed scientifically



D) which normally works according to the federal budget



27. The influence of business in the U.S. is evidenced by the fact that



A) most newspapers are run by big businesses



B) even public organizations concentrate on working for profits



C) Americans of all professions know how to do business



D) even arts and entertainment are regarded as business



28. According to the passage, immigrants choose to settle in the U.S., dreaming that



A) they can start profitable businesses there



B) they can be more competitive in business



C) they will make a fortune overnight there



D) they will find better chances of employment



29. Henry Ford's statement can be taken negatively because



A) working people are discouraged to fight for their fights



B) there are many industries controlled by a few big capitalists



C) there is a conflicting relationship between big corporations and labor



D) public services are not run by the federal government



30. A company's efforts to keep expenses low and profits high may result in



A) reduction in the number of employees



B) improvement of working conditions



C) fewer disputes between labor and management



D) a rise in workers' wages





Passage Three



Questions 31 to 35 are based on the following passage.



Professor Smith recently persuaded 35 people, 23 of them women, to keep a diary of all their absent-minded actions for a fortnight. When he came to analyse their embarrassing lapses ( 差错) in a scientific report, he was surprised to find that nearly all of them fell into a few groupings, Nor did the lapses appear to be entirely random (随机的).



One of the women, for instance, on leaving her house for work one morning threw her dog her earrings and tried to fix a dog biscuit on her ear. "the explanation for this is that the brain is like a computer," explains the professor. "People programme themselves to do certain activities regularly. It was the woman's custom every morning to throw her dog two biscuits and then put on her earrings. But somehow the action got reversed in the programme," About one in twenty of the incidents the volunteers reported were these "programme assembly failures,"



Altogether the volunteers logged 433 unintentional actions that they found themselves doing -- an average of twelve each, There appear to be peak periods in the day when we are at our zaniest (荒谬可笑的). These are two hours some time between eight a.m. and noon, between four and six p.m. with a smaller peak between eight and ten p.m. "Among men the peak seems to be when a changeover in brain 'programmes' occurs, as for instance between going to and from work." Women on average reported slightly more lapses -- 12.5 compared with 10.9 for men m probably because they were more reliable reporters.



A startlingfinding of the research is that the absent-minded activity is a hazard of doing things in which we are skilled. Normally, you would expect that skill reduces the number of errors we make. But trying to avoid silly slips by concentrating more could make things a lot worse m even dangerous.



31. In his study Professor Smith asked the subjects



A) to keep track of people who tend to forget things



B) to report their embarrassing lapses at random



C) to analyse their awkward experiences scientifically



D) to keep a record of what they did unintentionally



32. Professor Smith discovered that



A) certain patterns can be identified in the recorded incidents



B) many people were too embarrassed to admit their absent-mindedness



C) men tend to be more absent-minded than women



D) absent-mindedness is an excusable human weakness



33. "Programme assembly failures" (Line 6, Para. 2) refers to the phenomenon that people



A) often fail to programme their routines beforehand



B) tend to make mistakes when they are in a hurry



C) unconsciously change the sequence of doing things



D) are likely to mess things up if they are too tired



34. We learn from the third paragraph that



A) absent-mindedness tends to occur during certain hours of the day



B) women are very careful to perform actions during peak periods



C) women experience more peak periods of absent-mindedness



D) men's absent-mindedness often results in funny situations



35. It can be concluded from the passage that



A) people should avoid doing important things during peak periods of lapses



B) hazards can be avoided when people do things they are good at



C) people should be careful when programming their actions



D) lapses cannot always be attributed to lack of concentration





Passage Four



Questions 36 to 40 are based on the following passage.



It's no secret that many children would be healthier and happier with adoptive parents than with the parents that nature dealt them. That's especially true of children who remain in abusive homes because the law blindly favors biological parents. It's also true of children who suffer for years in foster homes (收养孩子的家庭) because of parents who can't or won't care for them but refuse to give up custody (监护) rights.



Fourteen-year-old Kimberly Mays fits neither description, but her recent court victory could eventually help children who do. Kimberly has been the object of an angry custodybaffle between the man who raised her and her biological parents, with whom she has never lived. A Florida judge ruled that the teenager can remain with the only father she's ever known and that her biological parents have "no legal claim" on her.



The ruling, though it may yet be reversed, sets aside the principle that biology is the primary determinant of parentage. That's an important development, one that's long overdue.



Shortly after birth in December 1978, Kimberly Mays and another infant were mistakenly switched and sent home with the wrong parents. Kimberly's biological parents, Ernest and Regina Twigg, received a child who died of a heart disease in 1988. Medical tests showed that the child wasn't the Twiggs' own daughter, but Kimt only was, thus sparking a custody battle with Robert Mays. In 1989, the two families agreed that Mr. Mays would maintain custody with the Twiggs getting visiting fights. Those rights were ended when Mr. Mays decided that Kimberly was being harmed.