Question

It is found that American students spend less than 15% of their time in school. While there’s no doubt that school is important, a number of recent studies reminds us that parents are even more so. A study published earlier this month by researchers at North Carolina State University, for example, finds that parental involvement — checking homework, attending school meetings and events, discussing school activities at home — has a more powerful influence on students’ academic performance than anything about the school the students attend. Another study, published in the Review of Economics and Statistics, reports that the effort put forth by parents (reading stories aloud, meeting with teachers) has a bigger impact on their children’s educational achievement than the effort devoted by either teachers or the students themselves. And a third study concludes that schools would have to increase their spending by more than $1,000 per pupil in order to achieve the same results that are gained with parental involvement.

So parents matter. But it is also revealed in researches that parents, of all backgrounds, don’t need to buy expensive educational toys or digital devices for their kids in order to give them an advantage. They don’t need to drive their offspring (子孫，后代)to enrichment classes or test-preparation courses. What they need to do with their children is much simpler: talk.

But not just any talk. Recent research has indicated exactly what kinds of talk at home encourage children’s success at school. For example, a study conducted by researchers at the UCLA School of Public Health and published in the journal Pediatrics found that two-way adult-child conversations were six times as potent in promoting language development as the ones in which the adult did all the talking. Engaging in this reciprocal（雙向的) back-and-forth gives children a chance to try out language for themselves, and also gives them the sense that their thoughts and opinions matter.

The content of parents’ conversations with kids matters, too. Children who hear talk about counting and numbers at home start school with much more extensive mathematical knowledge, report researchers from the University of Chicago. While the conversations parents have with their children change as kids grow older, the effect of these exchanges on academic achievement remains strong. Research finds that parents play an important role in what is called “academic socialization” — setting expectations and making connections between current behavior and future goals. Engaging in these sorts of conversations has a greater impact on educational accomplishment.

1.Parents are even more important than schools because ______.

A. parental involvement makes up for what schools are not able to do

B. teachers and students themselves do not put in enough effort

C. parental involvement saves money for schools and the local government

D. students may well make greater achievements with parents' attention

2.It can be inferred from the 2^nd paragraph that ______.

A. educational toys are unaffordable nowadays

B. digital devices can give children an advantage

C. some parents believe in enrichment classes

D. talking with children is a very simple task

3.The word "potent" is closest in meaning to ______.

A. powerful    B. difficult     C. necessary        D. resistant

4.Which of the following will more encourage children's success at school according to the passage?

A. Parents order their children to stop playing video games.

B. Parents discuss with their children the possible future career.

C. Parents lecture their children on getting too low marks on tests.

D. Parents introduce colleges around the US to their children.

 

Answer 1

【答案】

 

1.D

2.C

3.A

4.B

【解析】

試題分析：文章介紹了父母與孩子之間有意義的對話對孩子的教育有很大的影響。

1.推斷題：從第一段第三句中：for example, finds that parental involvement — checking homework, attending school meetings and events, discussing school activities at home — has a more powerful influence on students’ academic performance than anything about the school the students attend.例如，研究發(fā)現(xiàn)父母的參與—檢查家庭作業(yè)、參加學(xué)校會議和事件、在家討論學(xué)校活動— 在學(xué)生學(xué)習(xí)成績上比學(xué)生在學(xué)校所做的有更多的影響力。故選D。

2.推斷題：根據(jù)第二段內(nèi)容可知所有父母不需要為了給孩子提供一個優(yōu)勢而購買昂貴的教育玩具或數(shù)碼設(shè)備。他們不需要讓他們的后代上提高類或備考類課程。他們和孩子所需要做的很簡單：說話。文中沒有提到買齊買不起的問題，故A不正確；文中并沒有說數(shù)字設(shè)備可以給孩子優(yōu)勢，故B不正確；文中沒有說談話是一項簡單的任務(wù)，故D不正確；C項說有一些父母相信提高班，他們送孩子去上這類班就是因為他們相信，故選C。

3.推斷題：powerful有力的；difficult困難的；necessary 必須的；resistant抵抗的。“two-way adult-child conversations were six times as potent in promoting language development as the ones in which the adult did all the talking”成人與孩子的雙向交流在提高語言發(fā)展上比一直由成人主導(dǎo)的交流上有六倍的效力。A更貼近語境，故選A。

4.推斷題：最后一段最后兩句可知研究發(fā)現(xiàn),父母在所謂的“學(xué)術(shù)社會化”扮演著重要的角色——設(shè)置期望,使目前的行為和未來的目標(biāo)之間的連接。從事這類對話對教育成績有更大的影響。故選B。

考點：考查新聞報道類短文閱讀