阅读理解Researchers have established that when people are mentally engaged, biochemical changes occur in the brain that allow it to act more effectively in cognitive areas such as attention and memory. This is true regardless of age. People will be alert and receptive if they are faced with information that gets them to think about things they are interested in. And someone with a history of doing more rather than less will go into old age more cognitively sound than someone who has not had an active mind. Many expert are so convinced of the benefits of challenging the brain that they are putting the theory to work in their own lives." The idea is no necessarily to learn to memorize enormous amounts of information, "says James Fozard, associate director of the National Institute on Aging." Most of us don''t need that kind of skill. Such specific training is of less interest than being able to maintain mental alertness." Fozard and others say they challenge their brains with different mental skills, both because they enjoy them and because they are sure that their range of activities will help the way their brains work. Gene Cohen, acting director of the same institute, suggests that people in their old age should engage in mental and physical activities individually as well as in groups. Cohen says that we are frequently advised to keep physically active as we age, but older people need to keep mentally active as well. Those who do are more likely to maintain their intellectual abilities and to be generally happier and better adjusted." The point is, you need to do both," Cohen says," Intellectual activity actually influences brain-cell health and size."

阅读理解In many cultures people make a distinction between fine art and folk art. Although telling the difference between these two types of art is not always easy, each has certain general characteristics that help to identify it. One characteristic of folk art, for example, is that it is the product of ordinary people, the folk. Further more, folk art is often traditional in composition and subject matter. Fine art, in contrast, is usually the product of professionals who have studied art. These professional artists are usually more strongly influenced by the contemporary world and modern composition than by tradition. Another difference between folk and fine art is that folk art is often created to decorate a functional object. For example, a person who decorates his or her home by sculpting the wooden beam that holds up the roof is creating folk art. Fine art, on the other hand, is usually purely decorative Its only function is to its environment. A third distinguishing characteristic of folk art is that it is "participatory". This means that the art is created through the active involvement of the participants in the artistic project. For instance, a work song is created when a group of workers with one job to do sing together. By singing together, they make their work easier and also create a song that is considered to be folk art. In addition, paintings on the walls of churches are some times considered folk art since many people are involved in the endeavor, not only painters. The participants who are not skillful at drawing or painting, mix colors or clean up spilled paint. Fine art, such as music, how ever, seldom involves participation of any one besides the artist. Other people are usually not involved in the production. People at a music concert are only listeners, not participants. In the same way, a fine-art painting is primarily the work of one known artist, not a group. Folk art is characterized by anonymity; the folk artist is rarely, if ever, known. A final distinctive characteristic of folk art is that it tends to become rarer as a society becomes more industrialized. When machines produce all of the objects that people are likely to need in their everyday lives, people are likely to stop producing and decorating household objects at home. Likewise, when most people have radios, they tend to listen to the songs on the radio while they work rather than to sing traditional work songs. However, the quality and quantity of fine art do not decrease with industrialization. In fact, the amount may in crease if industrialization raises the standard of living, thus creating a larger number of people who can afford to buy fine art.

阅读理解In the game Philip lost his ground because ________.

阅读理解In the 1920s demand for American farm products fell, as European countries began to recover from World War I and instituted austerity (紧缩) programs to reduce their imports. The result was a sharp drop in farm prices. This period was more disastrous for farmers than earlier times had been, because farmers were no longer self-sufficient. They were paying for machinery, seed, and fertilizer, and they were also buying consumer goods. The prices of the items farmers bought remained constant, while prices they received for their products fell. These developments were made worse by the Great Depression, which began in 1929 and extended throughout the 1939s. In 1929, under President Herbert Hoover, the Federal Farm Board was organized. It established the principle of direct interference with supply and demand, and it represented the first national commitment to provide greater economic stability for farmers. President Hoover''s successor attached even more importance to this problem. One of the first measures proposed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt when he took office in 1933 was the Agricultural Adjustment Act, which was subsequently passed by Congress. This law gave the-Secretary Of Agriculture the power to reduce production through voluntary agreements with farmers who were paid to take their :land out of use. A deliberate scarcity of farm products was planned in an effort to raise prices.. This law was declared :.unconstitutional by the Supreme Court on the grounds that general taxes were being collected to pay one special group of people. How ever, new laws were passed immediately that achieved the same result of resting soil and providing flood-control measures, but which were based on the principle of soil conservation. The Roosevelt Administration believed that rebuilding the nation''s soil was in the national interest and was not simply a plan to help farmers at the expense of other citizens. Later the government guaranteed loans to farmers so that they could buy farm machinery, hybrid (杂交) grain, and fertilizers.

阅读理解Some of today''s most cutting-edge technology is now being used to help students with special needs. No longer just the province of games for "video needs", virtual reality has come into its own as a tool for special education teachers and therapists. As such, it is used for assessment, teaching, and practice, according to Skip Rizzo, research assistant professor at the University of Southern California. For example, virtual reality has been used effectively to assess students'' depth perception, with the results being quite different from those obtained from traditional paper and pencil tests. It is also used to help students gain transition skills. Students with autism or developmental delay can visit a virtual supermarket, take public transportation, cross the street, or organize his or her day. Students in wheelchairs can learn how to navigate buildings And the beauty is, these students can make any number of mistakes without endangering themselves. In fact, one of the biggest virtues of virtual reality is that it allows students to learn in a safe environment, and this holds true for students with behavior disorders. After a student has learned an appropriate behavior or way of controlling his or her anger, the student is put in progressively more difficult virtual social situations where he or she can practice the new technique. And it is expected that future teachers will be exposed to virtual classes, complete with "difficult students" to help them master behavior management techniques. Virtual reality even allows us to tailor the world to meet a child''s needs. Let''s say we''re teaching a child to cross the street by paying attention to traffic signs. Educators have found that it is often difficult for the child to locate the traffic sign in a busy environment. With virtual reality, we can blow up the "walk sign" so the student knows what it looks like. Then we gradually begin shrinking the sign and adding other environmental elements. Once the student has mastered this virtually, he or she transfers the knowledge to the real world. In the end, this is the most important function of virtual reality programs for special students.

阅读理解Women''s minds work differently from men''s. At least, that is what most men are convinced of. Psychologists view the subject either as a matter of frustration or a joke. Now the biologists have moved into this minefield, and some of them have found that there are real differences between the brains of men and women. But being different, they point out hurriedly, is not the same as being better or worse. There is, however, a definite structural variation between the male and female brain. The difference is in a part of the brain that is used in the most complex intellectual processes—the link between the two halves of the brain. The two halves are linked by a trunk line of between 200 and 300 million nerves, the corpus callosum. Scientists have found quite recently that the corpus callosum in women is always larger and probably richer in nerve fibres than it is in men. This is the first time that a structural difference has been found between the brains of women and men and it must have some significance. The question is "What?", and, if this difference exists, are there others? Research shows that present-day women think differently and behave differently from men. Are some of these differences biological and inborn, a result of evolution? We tend to think that is the influence of society that produces these differences. But could we be wrong? Research showed that these two halves of the brain had different functions, and that the corpus callosum, enabled them to work together. For most people, the left half is used for word-handling, analytical and logical activities; the right half works on pictures, patterns and forms. We need both halves working together. And the better the connections, the more harmoniously the two halves work. And, according to research findings, women have the better connections. But it isn''t all that easy to explain the actual differences between skills of men and women on this basis. In schools throughout the world girls tend to be better than boys at "language subjects" and boys better at maths and physics. If these differences correspond with the differences in the hemispheric trunk line, there is an unalterable distinction between the sexes. We shan''t know for a while, partly because we don''t know of any precise relationship between abilities in school subjects and the functioning of the two halves of the brain, and we cannot understand how the two halves interact via the corpus callosum. But this striking difference must have some effect and, because the difference is in the parts of the brain involved in intellect, we should be looking for differences in intellectual processing.

阅读理解There is a popular belief among parents that schools are no longer interested in spelling. No school I have taught in has ever ignored spelling or considered it unimportant as a basic skill. There are, however, vastly different ideas about how to teach it, or how much priority it must be given over general language development and writing ability. The problem is, how to encourage a child to express himself freely and confidently in writing without holding him back with the complexities of spelling. If spelling becomes the only focal point of his teacher’s interest, clearly a bright child will be likely to" play safe". He will tend to write only words within his spelling range, choosing to avoid adventurous language. That’s why teachers often encourage the early use of dictionaries and pay attention to content rather than technical ability. I was once shocked to read on the bottom of a sensitive piece of writing about a personal experience:" This work is terrible! There are far too many spelling errors and your writing is illegible." It may have been a sharp criticism of the pupil’s technical abilities in writing, but it was also a sad reflection on the teacher who had omitted to read the essay, which contained some beautiful expressions of the child’s deep feelings. The teacher was not wrong to draw attention to the errors, but if his priorities had centered on the child’s ideas, an expression of his disappointment with the presentation would have given the pupil more motivation to seek improvement.

阅读理解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 tree of children who suffer for years in foster homes because of parents who can'' t or won'' t care for them but refuse to give up custody 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 custody battle 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 c/aim" 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 wash'' t the Twiggs'' own daughter, but Kimberly 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 rights. Those rights were ended when Mr. Mays decided that Kimberly was being harmed. The decision to leave Kimberly with Mr. Mays rendered her suit debated. But the judge made clear that Kimberly did have standing to sue on her own behalf. Thus he made clear that she was more than just property to be handled as adults saw fit. Certainly, the biological link between parent and child is fundamental. But biological parents aren''t always preferable to adoptive ones, and biological parentage does not convey an absolute ownership that cancels all the rights of children.

阅读理解A new era is upon us. Call it what you will: the service economy, the information age, the knowledge society. It all translates to a fundamental change in the way we work. Already we''re 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 and Japan (two thirds or more in many of these 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 also is giving rise to a radical new way of thinking about the nature of work itself. Long-held notions about jobs and careers, the skill needed to succeed, even the relation between individuals and employers--all these are being challenged. We have only to look behind us to get some sense of what may lie ahead. No one looking ahead 20 years possibly could have foreseen the ways in which a single invention, the chip, would transform our world thanks to its applications in personal computers, digital communications and factory robots. Tomorrow''s achievements in biotechnology, artificial intelligence or even some still unimagined technology could produce a similar wave of dramatic changes. But one thing is certain: information and knowledge will become even more vital, and the people who possess it, whether they work in manufacturing or services, will have the advantage and produce the wealth. Computer knowledge will become as basic a requirement as the ability to read and write. The ability to solve problems by applying information instead of performing routine tasks will be valued above all else. If you cast your mind ahead 10 years, information services will be predominant. It will be the way you do your job.

阅读理解The phrase the linguistically oppressed refers to those who were _______.

阅读理解Attention to details is something everyone can and should do -- especially in a fight job market. Bob Crossley, a human resources expert notices this in the job applications that come across his desk every day." It'' s amazing how many candidates eliminate themselves," he says. "Resumes arrive with stains. Some candidates don''t bother to spell the company'' s name correctly. Once I see a mistake, I eliminate the candidate," Crossley concludes." If they canto;, take care of these details, why should we trust them with a job?" Can we pay too much attention to details? Absolutely. Perfectionists struggle over little things at the cost of something larger they work toward." To keep from losing the forest for the tree," says Charles Garfield, an associate professor at the University of California, San Francisco," we must constantly ask ourselves how the details we'' re working on fit into the larger picture. If they don''t, we should drop them and move to something else." Garfield compares this process to his work as a computer scientist at NASA." The Apollo II moon launch was lightly off course 90 percent of the time," says Garfield." But a successful landing was still likely because we knew the exact coordinates of our goal. This allowed us to make adjustments as necessary." Knowing where we want to go helps us judge the importance of every task we undertake. Too often we believe what accounts for others'' success is some special secret or a lucky break. But rarely is success so mysterious. Again and again, we see that by doing little things within our grasp well, large rewards follow.

阅读理解According to the author, ___.

阅读理解Which of the following can best serve as the topic of the passage?

阅读理解According to the passage, which of the following is fundamental to Harrington's success?

阅读理解A breakthrough in the provision of energy from the sun for the European Economic Community could be brought forward by up to two decades, if a modest increase could be provided in the EEC'' s research effort in this field, according to the senior EEC scientists engaged in experiments in solar energy at EEC'' s scientific laboratories at Ispra, near Milan. The senior West German scientist in charge of the community'' s solar energy program, Mr. Joachim Gretz, told journalists that at present levels of research spending it was most unlikely that solar energy would provide as much as three percent of the Community'' s energy requirements even after the year 2000. But he said that with a modest increase in the present sums, devoted by the EEC to this work it was possible that the breakthrough could be achieved by the end of the next decade. Mr. Gretz calculates that if solar energy only provided three percent of the EEC'' s needs, this could still produce a saving of about a billion bounds in the present bill for imported energy each year. And he believes that with the possibility -of utilizing more advanced technology in this field it might be possible to satisfy a much bigger share of the Community'' s future energy needs. At present the EEC spends about $ 2.6 millions a year on solar research at Ispra, one of the EEC'' s official joint research centers, and another $ 3 millions a year in indirect research with universities and other independent bodies.

阅读理解The symptoms of Alzheimer''s disease were long dismissed as normal consequences of human aging, but in the 1980''s the disease came to be recognized as the most common cause of intellectual deterioration in the elderly and middle-aged. It is characterized by the death of nerve cells in the cerebral cortex -- the part of the brain involved in complex function. The major debilitating symptoms of Alzheimer''s disease include serous forgetfulness -- particularly about recent events--and confusion. At first, the individual experiences only minor and almost imperceptible symptoms that are often attributed to emotional upsets or other physical illnesses. Gradually, however, the person becomes more forgetful, and this may be reported by anxious relatives. The person may neglect to turn off the oven, may misplace things, any recheck to see if a task was done, may take longer to complete a chore that was previously routine, or may repeat already-answered questions. As the disease progresses, memory loss and such changes in personality, mood, and behavior, such as confusion, irritability, restlessness and agitation, are likely to appear. Judgment, concentration, orientation, writing, reading, speech, motor behavior and naming of objects may also be affected. Even when a loving and caring family is available to give support, the victim of Alzheimer''s disease is more likely to spend his or her last days in a nursing home or long-term care institution. At this time, there is no cure.

阅读理解I first became aware of the unemployment problem in 1928. At that time I had just come back from Burma, where unemployment was only a word, and I had gone to Burma when I was still a boy and the post-war boom was not quite over. When I first saw unemployed men at close quarters, the thing that horrified and amazed me was to find that many of them were ashamed of being unemployed. I was very ignorant, but not so ignorant as to imagine that when the loss of foreign markets pushes two million men out of work, those two million are any more to blame than the people who draw blanks in the Calcutta Sweep. But at that time nobody cared to admit that unemployment was inevitable, because this meant admitting that it would probably continue. The middle classes were still talking about" lazy idle loafers on the dole" and saying that" these men could all find work if they wanted to", and naturally these opinions spread among the working class themselves. I remember the shock of astonishment it gave me, when I first mingled with tramps and beggars, to find that a fair proportion, perhaps a quarter, of these beings whom I had been taught to regard as cynical parasites, were decent young miners and cotton workers gazing at their destiny with the same sort of dumb amazement as an animal in a trap. They simply could not understand what was happening to them. They had been brought up to work, and behold! It seemed as if they were never going to have the chance of working again. In their circumstances it was inevitable, at first, that they should be haunted by a feeling of personal degradation. That was the attitude towards unemployment in those days: it was a disaster that happened to you as an individual and for which you were to blame.

阅读理解Run, Rabbits, Run From Greenwich to the Mall is good sport for all In its 13 years, the London Marathon has acquired a pedigree of excellence. That excellence is not just the awesome energy of the best runners and the smoothness of the organization, but also the quality of determination shown by all the competitors, male and female, able-bodied and disabled. When more than 26,000 gather at Greenwich tomorrow morning, only a few will be in the running to win the big prize money. The success of this event is that most of the athletes would be prepared to pay serious money just for the privilege of running the 26 miles 385 yards to The Mall past the most famous urban scenery in the world. The London Marathon has become one of Britain'' s leading sports events. Since 1981, something like 45 million has been raised in individual sponsorship for charities. Tomorrow hundreds of thousands of people will line the route to cheer and to gasp in sympathetic participation. Millions will watch on television. Although they will be excited by the struggle for first place, they will also identify with the ordinary person trying to fulfill his or her physical potential. Many spectators will wonder whether next year they could complete the historic distance. That is how athletic dreams are born. If the London Marathon and the growth in interest in physical fitness have transformed the lives of many adults, it is also important that children should have the opportunity to fulfill their ability in individual competitive sports. Team games should be an essential ingredient of physical education in the national curriculum. However, coexisting with the playing of team games there should be an equal emphasis on the importance of individual competitive sports at all levels in schools. The Government must be careful that in insisting on the value of team games in schools, it does not ignore the value of individual activities, which are practiced throughout the world and form the basis of the Olympic Games. Many of the runners in the London Marathon tomorrow have found courage, fulfillment and fitness through training for the event. These are qualities that schoolchildren can, and should, acquire through a variety of demanding individual activities in physical education.

阅读理解Researchers have established that when people are mentally engaged, biochemical changes occur in the brain that allow it to act more effectively areas such as attention and memory. This is true regardless of age. People will be alert and receptive if they are faced with information that gets them to think about things they are interested in. And someone with a history of doing more rather than less will go into old age more cognitively sound than someone who has not had an active mind. Many experts are so convinced of the benefits of challenging the brain that they are putting the theory to work in their own lives." The idea is not necessarily to learn to memorize enormous amounts of information," says James Fazard, associate director of the National Institute on Aging." Most of us don'' t need that kind of skill. Such specific training is of less interest than being able to maintain mental alertness." Fozard and others say they challenge their brains with different mental skills, both because they enjoy them and because they are sure that their range of activities will help the way their brains work. Gene Cohen, acting director of the same institute, suggests that people in their old age should engage in mental and physical activities individually as well as in groups. Cohen says that we are frequently advised to keep physically active as we age, but older people need to keep mentally active as well. Those who do are more likely to maintain their intellectual abilities and to be generally happier and better adjusted." The point is, you need to do both," Cohen says." Intellectual activity actually influences brain-cell health and size."

阅读理解What reason do Americans give for the reduction in traffic accidents?