其实表达方式对英语的提升帮助很大,如果大家能在平时学习中多学习一些英文特殊的表达方式,那么对于托福听力的理解力也会提升不少。下面小编就和大家分享托福听力备考攻略,来欣赏一下吧。
托福听力备考攻略
一.学习时态表达方式
汉语中用副词表达时态,而英语中是用动词的变形来表达时态的。中国考生一般都对时态缺乏敏感度,这是很正常的,这就像外国人很难掌握我们汉语中的声调一样。
在托福听力中,尤其是在lecture(讲座)中,我们要特别注意时态的变化。因为在托福的lecture文段开头部分,教授常常会通过讨论过去讲的内容来引出本次讲座的内容,或者讨论过去的理论和观点与当前的新理论和新观点进行对比。如果不注意时态,一股脑地听下来,很容易会混淆lecture的主题,影响答题。
例如,官方真题Official16中第二篇lecture的开头如下
Up until now in our discussions and readings about the broken early classical periods, we've been talking about the development of musical styles and genres within the relatively narrow social context of its patronage by the upper classes…
But I think if I were asked to identify a single crucial development in European music of this time, it would be the invention of the piano…
这篇lecture主要讲的是钢琴的发明对西方音乐史的影响,教授在讲座开头回忆了上几节课谈到的出资人如何影响音乐家的创作风格。句中"we've been talking about…"这样的现在完成进行时,表明了教授在讨论过去讲过的内容。后面由表达转折的"But"引导的用一般现在时讲述的内容才是lecture的真正重心。
所以,如果在听力中能够抓住时态的变化,我们就能更好地把握文段的结构和层次,将文章听得更有调理。
二.学习否定表达方式
在否定意义的表达上,汉语和英语的表述方式有比较大的差别。
我们来假设一个场景:妈妈让小明吃菠菜补充营养,可是小明非常不喜欢菠菜的味道,于是小明对妈妈说:“妈妈,你别让我吃了,我_____菠菜了。”
如果根据场景,帮小明把话补全来表达对菠菜的厌恶和否定,那么汉语表达大概会是:“妈妈,你别让我吃了,我最不喜欢菠菜来了。”否定的语气会很直接的表达出来。
那么,美语的表达会是怎么样的呢,大概会是:"Mommy, please, the last thing I would like to eat is spinach. "是的,美国人会说他想吃的东西中的一个是菠菜。这个逻辑对中国人来说是比较“曲折”的,但是我们必须适应,否则听力中的某些关键句就会反应不出来到底是什么含义。(可参考:新航道基础阶段《教程》中82页关于实习的对话练习,其中出现过类似表达。)
另外,双重否定的形式在汉语的固定词组中比较常用,如“不得不”、“无不”等等。但是双重否定在英语中用得更为灵活,不单单以固定词组的形式出现。
举个例子来说,如官方真题Official24中的篇lecture,讲鳄鱼的发声。其中有一句话是同学们特别容易迷惑:"No discussion of reptiles would be complete without some mention of crocodiles."按句序翻译过来就是:“关于爬行动物的讨论不会完整,如果不提到鳄鱼。”用比较通顺的中文表达出来就是“如果讨论爬行动物,那么我们就不得不谈到鳄鱼。”从中不难看出,中文的双重否定结构紧凑固定,而英文就比较松散灵活。同学们只有适应这样的表达方式才能较快地反应出句子的含义。
三.学习约定俗成表达方式
在英语中有很多约定俗成的表达方式,而且这些方式往往都是由简单的单词组成,非常容易望文生义。如果不知道这些表达方式的正确含义,以美式思维方式理解和记忆,就不能很好的理解听力文段。下面简单地举两个例子:
1. rule of thumb:
在OG听力部分的Practice Set1中,教授说了这样的话:
So, think about what you'd need to include if you were going to explain your research project to someone with general or casual knowledge about the subject, like . . . like your parents. That's usually my rule of thumb: would my parents understand this?
这里的"rule of thumb"不是“大拇指原则”,它的意思是“经验之谈;通常的行事原则”。这个短语的起源说法不一,有一种说法是:旧时英国人普遍遵循一个原则,就是丈夫不能用比拇指粗的东西鞭打妻子。所以,了解了短语背后的故事,我们就能明白为什么拿这个短语代表“经验之谈”的意思了。
2.put two and two together:
在官方真题Official3的一个lecture中,有这样的表述:
So he put two and two together, and decided there was an element in the sun that hadn't been discovered here on the earth yet.
这里的"put two and two together"并不是“2+2=4”,而是“根据已有的资料推论”的意思。想象一下,把手头的资料和线索七拼八凑起来,然后得出结论。只不过,汉语中我们用的“七”和“八”来代表凌乱无序,这里用"two"和"two"来表达罢了。
托福听力备考中,很多同学没有注意到学习表达方式对听力提升的重要性,上文中为大家总结了积累英文表达方式,建议大家在平时多注意学习。如果精通了英文表达方式,托福听力自然也会有明显提升。
2020托福听力练习:运输货物的丝绸之路传播疾病
For thousands of years, what's called the Silk Road was a group of land and sea trade routes that connected the Far East with South Asia, Africa, the Middle East and southern Europe. Of course, when humans travel they carry their pathogens with them. So scientists and historians have wondered if the Silk Road was a transmission route not just for goods, but for infectious disease.
Now we have the first hard evidence of ancient Silk Road travelers spreading their infections. The find comes from a 2,000-year-old latrine that had first been excavated in 1992. The report is in the Journal of Archaeological Science.
"So the site is a relay station on the Silk Road in northwest China. It's just to the eastern end of the Tarim Basin, which is a large arid area just to the east of the Taklamakan desert, and not far from the Gobi Desert. So this is a dry part of China."
Piers Mitchell, paleopathologist at the University of Cambridge, and one of the study's authors, along with his student Ivy Yeh and colleagues in China.
In the latrine, archaeologists found used hygiene sticks wrapped with cloth. These were used for what you think they were used for.
"This excavation was great because the cloth was still preserved and the feces was still adherent to the cloth on some of the sticks. So the archaeologist kept these sticks in the museum. And so my Ph.D. student, Ivy Yeh, who's first author on the paper, she went out to China took some scrapings from the feces adherent to the cloth. So we were then able to analyze that down the microscope when she brought it back to Cambridge."
Where they found eggs from parasites—including one from a liver fluke.
"And that's the exciting one because that's only found in eastern and southern China and in Korea, where they have marshy areas that have the right snails and the right fish."
The fluke needs snails and fish for its lifecycle, but there were no such snails or fish in this dry region of China. So the unlucky traveler who harbored the parasite had to have transported the disease to that spot.
"Well firstly it tells us that people were doing very long journeys along the Silk Road and you might think that's obvious. But no one really knew how long people were traveling. Some people may have been trading, only going short distances selling their goods on to the next person. And so the goods might have gone all the way along the Silk Road, but people might not. But we know that some people were doing huge distances..."
"Secondly it shows that this was, would be a viable route for the spread of those other infectious diseases like Bubonic plague and leprosy and anthrax that people had previously suggested might have been spread between East Asia and Europe along the Silk Road. Because modern genetic analyses have shown similarities between the strains of one end and the other."
Mitchell says there's much more work to be done to better understand the spread of diseases around the world. Perhaps from analyzing skeletons—or various other kinds of remains—to be found along the Silk Road.
Thanks for the minute for Scientific American — 60-Second Science Science. I'm Cynthia Graber.
数千年来,海洋与陆地之间的贸易路线丝绸之路将远东、南亚、非洲、中东和南欧连接起来。当然,人类在旅行时也携带着病原体。科学家和历史学家怀疑,丝绸之路运输的不仅仅是货物,还有传染性疾病。
现在,我们掌握了第一个有力的证据,证明古代丝绸之路的游客传播了自身的疾病。这项结果源自1992年发掘的一个有2000年历史的茅厕。该项研究结果发表在《考古科学:报告》杂志上。
“这里是中国西北部丝绸之路上的一个中转站。位于塔里木盆地的东端,塔里木盆地这块广阔干旱的地区位于塔克拉玛干沙漠的东部,距离戈壁沙漠不远。这里是中国的一个干旱地带。”
皮尔斯·米切尔是剑桥大学的古生物病理学家,同时也是该报告的作者之一,他和他的学生艾薇·叶以及来自中国的同事们一同进行了该项研究。
考古学家在发掘的茅厕里发现了用过的卫生棍,这些卫生棍用布裹着。这些东西的用途和你认为的一样。
“这次发掘意义很大,因为这些布仍然保存完整,而且排泄物还附着在一些棍子裹着的布上。考古学家把这些卫生棍保存在博物馆。我的博士学生艾薇·叶,同时也是该论文的第一作者,去中国刮取了布上的一些排泄物。这样,我们就能够在显微镜下分析她带回剑桥的样本。”
他们发现了寄生虫的卵,还有肝吸虫的卵。
“这项发现让我们兴奋不已,因为这些只存在于中国东部和南部以及韩国,那里的沼泽地有含有这些病原体的蜗牛和鱼类。”
肝吸虫需要依靠蜗牛和鱼类进行生命循环,但是中国干旱地区没有这些病原体所需要的蜗牛和鱼类。所以,携带着寄生虫的倒霉游客将疾病带到了该地区。
“首先,这告诉我们,人们沿着丝绸之路长途跋涉,你可能认为这是显而易见的。但是没有人确切知道人们到底走了多远。有些人可能一直在进行贸易活动,他们只走了很短的距离,将自己的货物转卖给他人。所以,货物可能要一直沿着丝绸之路运输,但是人就不一定了。不过我们知道有些人的确走了很远的距离。”
“其次,这项发现表明,这可能也是黑死病、麻风病和炭疽等传染疾病的传播路线,此前人们认为这些疾病沿着丝绸之路在东亚和欧洲之间传播。因为,现代基因分析表明,菌株一端和另一端存在相似性。”
米切尔表示,为了更好的了解疾病在世界范围内的传播,还有更多的工作要做。也许可以分析在丝绸之路上发现的骨骼或是其他类型的遗留物。
重点讲解:
1. come from 来自;始于;
例句:The news comes from a reliable source.
这消息来自可靠的来源。
2. along with 与…一起;
例句:She came to dinner along with her boyfriend.
她和她的男朋友一道来用餐。
3. be adherent to 黏附;附着;
例句:The brass plate must be adherent to the steel.
黄铜片必须和钢粘结。
sell on 转卖;倒卖;
例句:Mr Farrier bought cars at auctions and sold them on.
法里尔先生拍得汽车后再将其转手。
2020托福听力练习:鹳靠捡垃圾生活
Humans aren't the only creatures who love junk food—many animals are known to enjoy sifting through our garbage to find edible treats.
And now we learn that some storks have stopped migrating from Europe to sub-Saharan Africa in the winter—they'd rather feed at landfills.
“They use landfill sites heavily during the winter and they travel very long distance to get to the sites.”
Aldina Franco of the University of East Anglia, one of the scientists who studied the storks' use of landfills in Portugal.
GPS tracking devices on 17 birds showed that the landfill life might mean up to 100-kilometer round-trips to feed—healthy distances, but far shorter than their historic migration routes.
“And also they use the nests throughout the year and look after the nests.
So these resident birds are in perfect condition, they are always ready to start breeding.
So as soon as spring arrives they're ready to go, the nest is in good condition, and they start breeding earlier.”
The number of storks overwintering in Portugal has shot up from fewer than 2,000 in 1995 to 14,000 in 2014.
The increase appears to reflect both changes in behavior and a booming stork population in general.
The study is in the journal Movement Ecology.
The Portuguese landfills are slated to close in 2018, with the trash diverted to covered recycling and composting facilities.
How will the storks respond?
Franco thinks they'll get back to basics.
“So the storks are social animals.
They live in colonies.
They migrate in groups.
So potentially as long as there are a few birds that still know the route, they can teach the ones that are currently residents how to migrate.”
不仅人类喜欢垃圾食品—许多动物也喜欢翻垃圾箱找寻食物。
而现在我们了解到一些鹳已经不再于冬天从欧洲向撒哈拉以南的非洲迁徙—因为它们宁愿在垃圾堆里寻找食物。
冬季它们严重依赖垃圾填埋场,而且要飞很远的距离才能到达。
东安格利亚大学的一位科学家,爱尔迪娜·弗朗科研究了葡萄牙鹳是如何利用垃圾填埋场的。
对17只鹳的GPS追踪定位装置显示垃圾填埋场的生活意味着觅食要来回飞行100千米,这可是段漫长旅途,但同它们过往的迁徙路线相比就变得微不足道了。
同时,鹳全年都需要栖居并照顾自己的巢穴。
因此这些没有迁徙的鹳现在过着很好的生活,它们总是随时准备进行繁殖。
因此春天一到,它们就做好准备,自己的爱巢处于绝佳状态而它们则提早繁殖。
在葡萄牙过冬的鹳数量骤增,从1995年的不到2000只,蹿升至2014年的1.4万只。
数量上的增长总体上反应了鹳行为上的变化以及数量的增加。
这项研究已在《运动生态学》杂志上发表。
而随着垃圾进行回收及堆肥处理,葡萄牙的垃圾填埋场将于2018年关闭。
届时这些鹳该如何应对呢?
弗朗科认为它们会回归以前的生活。
鹳是群居动物。
它们依靠群体而活。
同时也成群迁徙。
因此只要少数鹳仍然知道迁徙路线,就可以教会现在的居民们如何迁徙。
1.junk food 垃圾食品
例句:That's all candy and junk food.
那都是糖果和垃圾食品。
2.as soon as 只要
例句:As soon as we found this out, we closed the ward.
我们一发现此事就关闭了病房。
3.look after 照顾
例句:I love looking after the children.
我喜欢照顾小孩。
4.ready to 准备
例句:Are you ready to board, Mr. Daly?
你准备好登机了吗,戴利先生?
2020托福听力备考攻略
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