Part III Listening Comprehension
Section A
11. B 12. B 13. B 14. B 15. D 16. A 17. C 18. D 19. C 20. B 21. A 22. D 23. C 24. B 25. A
11. W: If I am not mistaken, your birthday is coming up. Has your brother sent you something?
M: Not yet. He never forgets it though.
Q: What does the man imply?
12. W: Im not swimming in the lake unless it warms up outside today.
M: Me neither. Unfortunately I think its supposed to stay as cold as this all day.
Q: What can be inferred about the speakers?
13.M: That sweater is so unusual, and yet it looks familiar. Did I just see you wearing it yesterday?
W: Well, not me, but...see, it belongs to my roommate Jill, and she is in your chemistry class.
Q: What does the woman imply?
14. M: Do you want to go to a lecture tonight over in the science auditorium? Its some guy who spent a year living in Antarctica.
W: No kidding! Im doing a report on Antarctica for my geography class. Maybe I can get some good information to add to it.
QWhat does the woman mean?
15. W: Id really like to learn how to play chess, but it looks so complicated. It seems like it will take a really long time to learn.
M: Well, it takes a long time to get good at it. But we can go over the basics this afternoon if you want.
Q: What does the man imply?
16. M: Do you think you can lend me that novel when you are finished with it? Ive been looking all over for a copy, but apparently it was sold out at all the bookstores.
W: Oh, its not mine. It belongs to Alice. But Ill see what she says.
Q: What will the woman probably do?
17. W:Umm...are you going to try some of this chocolate pudding? Its incredible.
M: Well, to be honest with you, Ive never been a big fan of chocolate.
Q: What does the man imply?
18. W: So, how was the drama clubs new production last night? Did I miss out on anything good?
M: Hardly, I kept looking at my watch the whole time.
QWhat does the man mean?
Now youll hear two long conversations.
Conversation One
M: What are you doing?
W: Im ordering some filing cabinets out of a catalog.
M: What do you need them for?
W: Theres so much stuff piling up in my dormitory room. If I dont do something soon, I wont be able to move in there.
M: Do you usually order from a catalog?
W: Sometimes. Why?
M: Oh, its just in the history class today we were talking about how the catalog sales business first got started in the USA Chicago retailer, Montgomery Ward started it in the late 1800s. It was really popular among farmers. It was difficult for them to make it to the big city stores so they ordered from catalogs.
W: Was Ward the only one in the business?
M: At first, but another person named Richard Sears started his own catalog after he heard how much money Ward was making.
W: What made them so popular?
M: Farmers trusted Ward and Sears for one thing. They delivered the products the farmers paid for and even refunded the price of things the farmers werent satisfied with. The catalog became so popular, some counties school teachers even used them as textbooks.
W: Textbooks?
M: Yeah. Students practice spelling the names and adding up the prices of things in the catalogs.
W: Was everybody that excited about it?
M: Thats doubtful. It is said they drove some small store owners out of business. Sears and Ward sold stuff in such large quantities. They were able to undercut the prices at some small family owned stores.
Questions 19 to 22 are based on the conversation you have just heard.
19. Why was the woman reading a catalog?
20. Who were the main customers of Sears and Wards business?
21. In what unusual ways were the catalogs used?
22. What was one of the negative effects of the catalog business?
Conversation Two
W: Im not optimistic about finding a job after I finish college.
M: Oh? Why not?
W: The economy is going down-hill fast.
M: I know. What is this would coming to? Its getting to the point where even a degree wont help you anymore.
W: Thats right. And the way things are going, Ill be lucky to even move out of my parents house.
M: I know what you mean. First they raised taxes, then they cut education, and the salaries havent gone up in years-its just one thing after another.
W: By the way, hows your business coming along?
M: Oh, its getting there. Our sales are up only 2 percent, but its a step in the right direction.
W: I remember when you opened 10 years ago you almost went bankrupt. The company certainly has come a long way.
M: Yeah, but its got a long way to go. Say, maybe youd like to come work for me!
W: Well, Im not sure I want to work as a clothes-hanger inspector.
M: No, I mean as a manager.
W: Thats more like it.
Questions 23 to 25 are based on the conversation you have just heard.
23. What is the woman worrying about?
24. What do we know about the mans business from the conversation?
25. What will the woman most probably do after she graduates from college?
Section B
26. A 27. A 28. D 29. D 30. A 31. B 32. A 33. A 34. C 35. B
Passage One
Ok, so in our last class we were discussing big band swing music. You remember this was a kind of dance music with a steady rhythm. But today we deal with music played by smaller jazz bands. Its called bebop which may use all sorts of new types of rhythms; some of them are very irregular. Well talk more about that later. But first I want to talk about some of the social elements that I believe contributed to the development of bebop music. To do this, we have to look at when bebop arose and started becoming so popular. It was from the late 1930s to the 1940s. The environment for bebop music was the decline of the US economy. During the great depression the economy suffered tremendously. And fewer people had money to spend on entertainment. Then during the 2nd World War the government imposed a new tax on public entertainment, what you might call performance tax. The government collected money on performances that included any types of acting, dancing or singing, but not instrumental music. So to avoid this new tax, some jazz bands stopped using singers altogether. They started relying on the creativity of the instrumentalist to attract audiences. This was what bebop bands did. Now remember a lot of bands have singers. So the instrumentalists simply played in the background and had occasional solos while the singer sang the melody to the songs, but not with bebop bands. So the instrumentalists had much more freedom to be creative. They experimented, playing the music faster and using new irregular sorts of rhythms.
Questions 26 to 28 are based on the passage you have just heard.
26. How did the bebop bands avoid the performance tax?
27. Why does the speaker mention the decline of the US economy during the great depression?
28. What does the speaker describe as a significant characteristic of bebop music?
Passage Two
Recently some researchers conducted an interesting case study in one ethic culture. The study was about the development of basket weaving by African-American women who lived in the town of Mount Pleasant, South Carolina. The town is known for its high quality sweet grass baskets which are woven by these women. Theyve been weaving the baskets for generations, handing down the skill from mother to daughter. Some of the baskets have been placed on permanent display at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
The origin of their basket weaving dates back to the 17th centuries and even earlier when these womens ancestors came to the United States from the west coast of Africa. Now, its mainly a hobby. But back in the 17th and 18th centuries African and American women wove the baskets for use on the rice plantations. There were two types of baskets then: workbaskets and baskets for use in the home. The workbaskets were made out of the more delicate sweet grass. They were used for everything from fruit baskets to baby cradles.
Questions 29 to 31 are based on the passage you have just heard.
29. What is the talk mainly about?
30. According to the passage, how did the women learn to weave baskets?
31. What is the main reason that the women in South Carolina now weave baskets?
Passage Three
Some of the most practical lessons coming out of research in psychology are in the area of memory. People ask, why cant I remember that term from the text book or when the library books are due? With a lot of people, memory may be weak, because they dont use it enough. Its like muscle.If you dont exercise it, it wont get strong. Thats why its important to keep our minds active, to keep on learning through our life. We can do this by reading, playing memory games and seeking things out. Its my guess though that the lack of stimulation isnt a problem for students like you. More likely, the life you are now leading is so busy and stimulating that it may sometime interfere with learning. Information needs to be recorded from memory, in other words, learned. And for busy people like you and me, that will be a real problem. If we are distracted, or we are trying to think what we are going to do next, the incoming message just might not get recorded effectively. And that leads to the first tip for students who want to improve their memories. Give your full attention to the information you hope to retain. Research clearly shows the advantages of this, and also of active learning, of consciously trying to visualize a new fact, perhaps to make a mental picture, even a wild ridiculous one, so the new fact will stick in the memory. Let me illustrate that for you here a little more this evening.
Questions 32 to 35 are based on the passage you have just heard.
32. What is the talk mainly about?
33. What does the speaker illustrate with the example of a muscle?
34. What does the speaker suggest students do to learn new information more effectively?
35. What will the speaker probably do next?
Section C
Graduate students often work as teaching assistants while they study in the United States. Teaching assistants (T.A.) may get money or get to take classes for (36) free, or both. A T.A. usually works about twenty hours each week. In some cases, the professors they assist have big (37) undergraduate classes with hundreds of students. The professor gives one or two (38) lectures a week, and teaching assistants (39) lead smaller discussions at other times. They also give tests, (40) grade work, provide laboratory assistance and meet with students who need help. And they have their own educations to think about.
Many states have (41) proposed to require that teaching assistants be able to speak English well enough for students to understand them. Universities have increased their (42) efforts to deal with this problem. Our example school this week is the University of Southern California (USC), in Los Angeles.The American Language Institute at USC provides (43) training to help international teaching assistants improve their English. (44) The university requires most non-native English speakers to pass a test before they can become a T.A.
The exam at USC is a fifteen-minute spoken test that involves two examiners. Students talk about their education and interest in the school. (45)Then they present some issue or idea from their area of study, and answer questions about it from the examiners. Those who do not score high enough on the test have to take classes to improve their English.(46) Until their English is better, some departments give them jobs that do not require them to communicate with students.