According to US research, it can take up to ten years to become a near-native English speaker. Asian and Spanish students took between five and ten years to reach native speaker performance in English-only schools. Fluency obviously doesn’t happen overnight. But time can definitely make you a better speaker.
After testing his own memory, German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus discovered that humans forget most of what they learn in the first 20 minutes.
So cramming right before a speaking exam is not likely to be as effective as practicing regularly over time. The more you practice, the more familiar new words will become. In the classroom, studies have also shown that repeating oral tasks improves a speaker’s performance.
One of the best repetition exercises is the 4/3/2 technique. Speakers give the same talk to three different listeners with a progressive decrease in delivery time, starting at four minutes, then three, and finally two minutes. This exercise has been proven to help learners speak faster. It can also result in less hesitation and more grammatical accuracy. While time dose make a difference when it comes to speaking perfect English, it would not hurt to brush up on your other language skills.
Studies have also shown that reading can increase your speaking vocabulary. After one month of an extensive reading program, a 27-year-old student of French became more familiar with 65 percent of the new words.
Aside from choosing the right learning methods, having certain personality traits may also help. US linguistics expert Stephen Krashen believes those with high motivation, self-confidence and a low level of anxiety are better equipped for speaking success.
Krashen says students who don’t have these qualities are more likely to have a “mental block”. “Even if they understand the message, the input will not reach the part of the brain responsible for language acquisition,” he writes in his book Principles and Practice in second Language Acquisition.According to the passage, if you want to be a near-native speaker, you need _____.
| A．long-term speaking practice and much reading |
| B．speaking practice for ten years only |
| C．long-term speaking practice, much reading and certain qualities |
| D．cramming new words every day |
The author put forward the 4/3/2 technique just to show that _____.
| A．you should speak to 3 different people |
| B．you should speak to 3 different people at 3 different times |
| C．it can prevent you from making grammar mistakes |
| D．it is really a good way to make you a better speaker |
The example of a 27-year-old student of French in the passage mainly means that _____.
| A．reading can enlarge your vocabulary for your speaking |
| B．reading can make you memorize just 65 percent of the new words |
| C．the 27-year-old student of French is very clever |
| D．in one month, you can improve your speaking ability |
The underlined phrase “linguistics expert” means a person who is quite expert at _____.
| A．languages | B．spoken language |
| C．scientific research | D．teaching English |
The evidence for harmony may not be obvious in some families. But it seems that four out of five young people now get on well with their parents, which is the opposite of the popularly-held image of unhappy teenagers locked in their room after endless family quarrels.
An important new study into teenage attitudes surprisingly shows that their family life is more harmonious than it had ever been in the past. “We were surprised by just how positive today’s young people seem to be about their families,” said one number of the research team. “They’re expected to be rebellious and selfish but actually they have other things on their minds: they want a car and material goods, and they worry about whether school is serving them well. There’s more negotiation and discussion between parents and children, and children expect to take part in the family decision-making process. They don’t want to rock the boat.”
So it seems that this generation of parents is much more likely than parents of 30 years ago to treat their children as friends. “My parents are happy to discuss things with me and willing to listen to me,” says 17-year-old Daniel Lazall. “I always tell them when I’m going out clubbing. As long as they know what I’m doing, they’re fine with me.” Susan Crome, who is now 21, agrees. “Looking back on the last 10 years, there was a lot of what you could call negotiation. For example, as long as I’d done all my homework, I could go out on a Saturday night. But I think my grandparents were a lot stricter with my parents than that.”
Maybe this positive view of family life should not be unexpected. It is possible that the idea of teenage rebellion is not rooted in real facts. A researcher comments, “Our surprise that teenagers say they get along well with their parents comes because of a brief period in our social history when teenagers were regarded as different beings. But that idea of rebelling and breaking away from their parents really only happened during that one time in the 1960s when everyone rebelled. The normal situation throughout history has been a smooth change from helping out with the family business to taking it over. ”What is the popular image of the teenagers today？
| A．They worry about school. |
| B．They dislike living with their parents. |
| C．They have to be locked in to avoid troubles. |
| D．They quarrel a lot with other family members. |
The study shows that teenagers don’t want to __________.
| A．share family responsibility |
| B．cause trouble in their families |
| C．go boating with their family |
| D．make family decisions |
Compared with parents of 30 years ago, today’s parents ____________.
| A．go to clubs more often with their children |
| B．are much stricter with their children |
| C．care less about their children’s life |
| D．give their children more freedom |
According to the writer, teenage rebellion __________.
| A．may be a false belief |
| B．is common nowadays |
| C．existed only in the 1960s |
| D．resulted from changes in families |
What is the passage mainly about？
| A．Negotiation in family. |
| B．Education in family. |
| C．Harmony in family. |
| D．Teenage trouble in family. |
Library Special Needs Service
Shellharbour City Library provides a rang of Library Special Needs Service for people who are unable to access our library service in the usual way. As long as you live in Shellharbour City, we’ll provide a full rang of library services and resources including:
● Large printed and ordinary printed books
● Talking books on tape and CD
● DVDs and music CDs
● Magazines
● Reference and information requests
You will be asked to complete a ‘Statement of Need’ application form which must be signed by a medical professional.
Home delivery service
Let us know what you like to read and we will choose the resources for you.Our staff will deliver the resources to your home for free. We also provide a service where we can choose the resources for you or someone instead of you choose the things from the library .You can also choose the resources you need personally.
Talking books and captioned videos
The library can provide talking books for people who are unable to use printed books because of eye diseases. You don’t have to miss out on reading any more when you can borrow talking books from the library. If you have limited hearing which prevents you from enjoying movies, we can provide captioned videos for you at no charge.
Languages besides English
We can provide books in a rang of languages besides English. If possible, we will request these items from the State Library of NSW, Australia.
How to join?
Contact the Library Special Needs Coordinator to register or discuss if you are eligible for any of the services we provide ---Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday 9am ---5pm on 4297 2522 for more information.Library Special Needs Service are meant for .
| A．those who are fond of reading |
| B．only those who have walking disabilities |
| C．people living in Shellharbour City with an illness or disability |
| D．those who can’t get medical help in Shellharbour City |
If people with eye diseases want to learn about history, they can choose .
| A．captioned videos | B．talking books |
| C．magazines | D．large printed books |
What can we learn from the passage?
| A．Books with different languages are available. |
| B．Few entertaining resources are offered here. |
| C．People with limited hearing have to pay for captioned videos. |
| D．People have to choose what they need by themselves. |
To get home delivery service, you must .
| A．only choose printed books |
| B．register ahead of time |
| C．pay the library ahead of time |
| D．have others choose the resources for you |
How can you learn more about the special service information?
| A．By emailing the library. |
| B．By visiting the library personally. |
| C．By contacting the library on weekends. |
| D．By phoning the library at the required time. |
An Ofsted (英国教育标准办公室）study reports that teachers are discouraging students who want to leave school and work as apprentices (学徒）in beauty salons (美容中心）or hair dressers.
Inspectors questioned 105 young people for a report on apprenticeships published on Wednesday. They found several examples of young people who felt they had been laughed at by their teachers for wanting to progress to work-based learning, particularly in care or hairdressing, rather than stay on at school.
Right or wrong, is it any surprise that this is happening? From 2014，the government will measure schools according to the rate of their pupils who go to university. Brian Lightman , general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, says the government has already put teachers under “very great pressure to focus on academic subjects”.
On the other hand, the Education Act 2011，which came into force in November, places schools under a duty to give fair career advice to pupils. This advice must include information on all post-16 education and training choices, including apprenticeships. This doesn’t appear to be happening in several schools, according to Ofsted9S report. Many of the young people the inspectors talked to said the advice they had received on apprenticeships was “unsatisfactory”.
Schools were also blamed for lack of work experience courses, which are particularly important for teenagers considering an apprenticeship. They help students decide whether they enjoy a line of work and enable employers to see whether those on work experience have the potential to be hired as apprentices in future years.
But there is a good reason why they can’t do this: they’d be unable to adapt to GCSE (英国普通中等教育证书）exams if they did. Sometimes, it seems, schools just can’t win.Why do teachers oppose the students’ leaving school and working as apprentices?
| A．The government urges teachers to concentrate on academic subjects. |
| B．The students are only wasting time working as apprentices. |
| C．Employers are under great pressure of taking GCSE exams. |
| D．Employers don’t give students chances to work as apprentices |
Pressure for schools to provide pupils with career advice comes from ______.
| A．Association of School and College Leaders | B．Education Act 2011 |
| C．GCSE exams | D．OFSTED |
What does the author think of teachers’ discouraging students working as apprentices?
| A．Surprising | B．Understandable | C．Wrong | D．Right |
Have you ever picked a job based on the fact that you were good at it but later found it made you feel very uncomfortable over time? When you select your career, there’s a whole lot more to it than assessing your skills and matching them with a particular position. If you ignore your personality, it will get you a long-term hurt regardless of your skills or the job’s pay. There are several areas of your personality that you need to consider to help you find a good job. Here are a few of those main areas:
1) Do you prefer working alone or with other people?
There are isolating（孤立的）jobs that will drive an outgoing person crazy and also interactive jobs that will make a shy person uneasy. Most people are not extremes in either direction but do have a tendency that they prefer. There are also positions that are sometimes a combination of the two, which may be best for someone in the middle who adapts easily to either situation.
2) How do you handle change?
Most jobs these days have some elements of change to them, but some are more than others. If you need stability in your life, you may need a job where the changes don’t happen so often. Other people would be bored of the same daily routine.
3) Do you enjoy working with computers？
I do see this as a kind of personality characteristic. There are people who are happy to spend more than 40 hours a week on a computer, while there are others who need a lot of human interaction throughout the day. Again, these are extremes and you’ll likely find a lot of positions somewhere in the middle as well.
4) What type of work environment do you enjoy？
This can range from being in a large building with a lot of people you won’t know immediately to a smaller setting where you’ll get to know almost all the people there fairly quickly.
5) How do you like to get paid?
Some people are motivated by the pay they get, while others feel too stressed to be like that. The variety of payment designs in the sales industry is a typical example for this.
Anyway, these are a great starting point for you. I’ve seen it over and over again with people that they make more money over time when they do something they love. It may take you a little longer, but making a move to do what you have a passion for can change the course of your life for the better.What does the underlined sentence in Paragraph 1 mean?
| A．You may ignore your skills when you select job. |
| B．Job skills are the most important things when you select job. |
| C．There are more important things than job skills when you select job. |
| D．Selecting job, you should assess your skills and match them with the position. |
Which of the following is TRUE according to the passage?
| A．Isolating jobs usually drive people mad. |
| B．Interactive jobs make people shy easily. |
| C．Extreme people tend to work with others. |
| D．Almost everyone has a tendency in jobs. |
What is the missing word about a job search in the following chart?
| A．Design | B．Changes | C．Cooperation | D．Hobbies |
What is the best title for this passage?
| A．Lifestyles and Job Pay | B．Jobs and Environment |
| C．Job Skills and Abilities | D．Personalities and Jobs |
Silence is unnatural to man. He begins life with a cry and ends it in stillness. In between he does all he can to make a noise in the world, and he fears silence more than anything else. Even his conversation is an attempt to prevent a fearful silence. If he is introduced to another person, and a number of pauses occur in the conversation, he regards himself as a failure, a worthless person, and is full of envy of the emptiest headed chatterbox (喋喋不休的人). He knows that ninety-nine percent of human conversation means no more than the buzzing of a fly, but he is anxious to join in the buzz and to prove that he is a man and not a waxwork figure (蜡塑人像).
The aim of conversation is not, for the most part, to communicate ideas; it is to keep up the buzzing sound. There are, it must be admitted, different qualities of buzz; there is even a buzz that is as annoying as the continuous noise made by a mosquito (蚊子). But at a dinner party one would rather be a mosquito than a quiet person. Most buzzing, fortunately, is pleasant to the ear, and some of it is pleasant even to the mind. He would be a foolish man if he waited until he had a wise thought to take part in the buzzing with his neighbors.
Those who hate to pick up the weather as a conversational opening seem to me not to know the reason why human beings wish to talk. Very few human beings join in a conversation in the hope of learning anything new. Some of them are content if they are merely allowed to go on making a noise into other people’s ears, though they have nothing to tell them except that they have seen two or three new plays or that they had food in a Swiss hotel At the end of an evening during which they have said nothing meaningful for a long time, they just prove themselves to be successful conservationistsAccording to the author, people make conversation to ______
| A．exchange ideas | B．prove their value |
| C．achieve success in life | D．overcome their fear of silence |
By "the buzzing of a fly" (Para. 1), the author means"________”
| A．the noise of an insect | B．a low whispering sound |
| C．meaningless talks | D．the voice of a chatterbox |
According to the passage, people usually talk to their neighbors ______.
| A．about whatever they have prepared |
| B．about whatever they want to |
| C．in the hope of learning something new |
| D．in the hope of getting on well |
What is the author's purpose in writing the passage? ________.
| A．To discuss why people like talking about weather. |
| B．To encourage people to join in conversations. |
| C．To persuade people to stop making noises. |
| D．To explain why people keep talking. |