历年大学英语四级真题及答案解析之段落匹配（2015年6月第一套）

Section B

Directions: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived. You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragraph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2.

Reaping the Rewards of Risk-Taking

A) Since Steve Jobs resigned as chief executive of Apple, much has been said about him as a peerless business leader who has created immense wealth for shareholders, and guided the design of hit products that are transforming entire industries, like music and mobile communications.

B) All true, but let’s think different, to borrow the Apple marketing slogan of years back. Let’s look at Mr. Jobs as a role model.

C) Above all, he is an innovator (创新者). His creative force is seen in products such as the iPod, iPhone, and iPad, and in new business models for pricing and distributing music and mobile software online. Studies of innovation come to the same conclusion: you can’t engineer innovation, but you can increase the odds of it occurring. And Mr. Jobs’ career can be viewed as a consistent pursuit of improving those odds, both for himself and the companies he has led. Mr. Jobs, of course, has enjoyed singular success. But innovation, broadly defined, is the crucial ingredient in all economic progress—higher growth for nations, more competitive products for companies, and more prosperous careers for individuals. And Mr. Jobs, many experts say, exemplifies what works in the innovation game.

D) “We can look at and learn from Steve Jobs what the essence of American innovation is,” says John Kao, an innovation consultant to corporations and governments. Many other nations, Mr. John Kao notes, are now ahead of the United States in producing

what are considered the raw materials of innovation. These include government financing for scientific research, national policies to support emerging industries, educational achievement, engineers and scientists graduated, even the speeds of Internet broadband service.”

E) Yet what other nations typically lack, Mr. Kao adds, is a social environment that encourages diversity, experimentation, risk-taking, and combining skills from many fields into products that he calls “recombinant mash-ups ( 打碎重组),” like the iPhone, which redefined the smartphone category. “The culture of other countries doesn’t support the kind of innovation that Steve Jobs exemplifies, as America does,” Mr. John Kao says.

F) Workers of every rank are told these days that wide-ranging curiosity and continuous learning are vital to thriving in the modem economy. Formal education matters, career counselors say, but real- life experience is often even more valuable.

G) An adopted child, growing up in Silicon Valley, Mr. Jobs displayed those traits early on. He was fascinated by electronics as a child, building Heath kit do-it-yourself projects, like radios. Mr. Jobs dropped out of Reed College after only a semester and traveled around India in search of spiritual enlightenment, before returning to Silicon Valley to found Apple with his friend, Stephen Wozniak, an engineering wizard (奇才). Mr. Jobs was forced out of Apple in 1985, went off and founded two other companies, Next and Pixar, before returning to Apple in 1996 and becoming chief executive in 1997.

H) His path was unique, but innovation experts say the pattern of exploration is not unusual. “It’s often people like Steve Jobs who can draw from a deep reservoir of diverse experiences that often generate breakthrough ideas and insights,” says Hal Gregersen, a professor at the European Institute of Business Administration.

I) Mr. Gregersen is a co-author of a new book, The Innovator’s DNA, which is based on an eight-year study of 5000 ( 创 业 者 ) and executives worldwide. His two collaborators and co-authors are Jeff Dyer, a professor at Brigham Young University, and Clayton Christensen, a professor at the Harvard Business School, whose 1997 book The Innovators Dilemma popularized the concept of disruptive ( 颠覆性的) innovation.”

J) The academics identify five traits that are common to the disruptive innovators: questioning, experimenting, observing, associating and networking. Their bundle of characteristics echoes the ceaseless curiosity and willingness to take risks noted by other experts. Networking, Mr. Hal Gregersen explains, is less about career-building relationships than a consistent search for new ideas. Associating, he adds, is the ability to make idea-producing connections by linking concepts from different disciplines.

K) “Innovators engage in these mental activities regularly,” Mr. Gregersen says. “It’s a habit for them Innovative companies, according to the authors, typically enjoy higher valuations in the stock market, which they call an “innovation premium (溢价).” It is calculated by estimating the share of a company’s value that cannot be accounted for by its current products and cash flow. The innovation premium tries to quantify (量化) investors’ bets that a company will do even better in the future because of innovation.

L) Apple, by their calculations, had a 37 percent innovation premium during Mr. Jobs’ first term with the company. His years in exile resulted in a 31 percent innovation discount. After his return, Applet fortunes improved gradually at first, and improved markedly starting in 2005, yielding a 52 percent innovation premium since then.

M) There is no conclusive proof, but Mr. Hal Gregersen says it is unlikely that Mr. Jobs could have reshaped industries beyond computing, as he has done in his second term at Apple, without the experience outside the company, especially at Pixar—the computer-animation ( 动 画 制 作 ) studio that created a string of critically and commercially successful movies, such as “Toy Story” and “Up.”

N) Mr. Jobs suggested much the same thing during a commencement address to the graduating class at Stanford university in 2005. “It turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me,” he told the students. Mr. Jobs also spoke of perseverance (坚持)and will power. “Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick,” he said. “Don’t lose faith. ”Mark D. Shermis, a professor at the University of Akron in Ohio, supervised the Hewlett Foundation’s contest on automated essay scoring and wrote a paper about the experiment. In his view, the technology—though imperfect—has a place in educational settings.

O) Mr. Jobs ended his commencement talk with a call to innovation, both in one’s choice of work and in one’s life. Be curious, experiment, take risks, he said to the students. His advice was emphasized by the words on the back of the final edition of The whole Earth Catalog, which he quoted “Stay hungry. Stay foolish. ” And, Mr. Jobs said, “I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

P) Often they come from very famous institutions where, in fact, they do a much better job of providing feedback than a machine ever could,” Dr. Shermis said. “There seems to be a lack of appreciation of what is actually going on in the real world.”

36. Steve Jobs called on Stanford graduates to innovate in his commencement address.

37. Steve Jobs considered himself lucky to have been fired once by Apple.

38. Steve Jobs once used computers to make movies that were commercial hits.

39. Many governments have done more than the US government in providing the raw materials for innovation.

40. Great innovators are good at connecting concepts from various academic fields.

41. Innovation is vital to driving economic progress.

42. America has a social environment that is particularly favorable to innovation.

43. Innovative ideas often come from diverse experiences.

44. Real-life experience is often more important than formal education for career success.

45. Applet fortunes suffered from an innovation discount during Jobs’ absence.

答案解析：

36. O 该句信息表明史蒂夫·乔布斯在斯坦福大学毕业典礼演讲中呼吁毕业生创新。O段提到“Mr. Jobs ended his commencement talk with a call to innovation, both in one’s choice of work and in one’s life.”，明确指出乔布斯在毕业典礼演讲结束时呼吁在工作和生活中创新，与题目信息相符，所以答案选O。

37. N 此句意思是史蒂夫·乔布斯认为自己曾经被苹果解雇是幸运的。N段中“It turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me,” he told the students. 表明乔布斯告诉学生，被苹果解雇是发生在他身上最好的事，即他认为自己很幸运被解雇，与题目表述一致，答案为N。

38. M 该句说史蒂夫·乔布斯曾用计算机制作出商业上很成功的电影。M段提到“especially at Pixar—the computer - animation (动画制作) studio that created a string of critically and commercially successful movies, such as “Toy Story” and “Up.””，说明乔布斯在皮克斯(计算机动画工作室)制作了一系列在评论界和商业上都成功的电影，如《玩具总动员》和《飞屋环游记》，与题目信息相符，答案选M。

39. D 此句表示许多政府在提供创新的原材料方面比美国政府做得更多。D段中“Many other nations, Mr. John Kao notes, are now ahead of the United States in producing what are considered the raw materials of innovation.”指出许多其他国家在产生被认为是创新的原材料方面领先于美国，即许多政府比美国政府做得更多，与题目一致，答案为D。

40. J 该句意思是伟大的创新者善于将不同学术领域的概念联系起来。J段提到“Associating, he adds, is the ability to make idea - producing connections by linking concepts from different disciplines.”，说明关联是把不同学科的概念联系起来以产生想法的能力，也就是伟大创新者具备的能力，与题目信息相符，答案选J。

41. C 此句表明创新对推动经济进步至关重要。C段中“But innovation, broadly defined, is the crucial ingredient in all economic progress—higher growth for nations, more competitive products for companies, and more prosperous careers for individuals.”指出广泛定义的创新是所有经济进步的关键因素，包括国家更高的增长、公司更具竞争力的产品和个人更繁荣的职业，与题目表述一致，答案为C。

42. E 该句意思是美国有一个特别有利于创新的社会环境。E段提到“Yet what other nations typically lack, Mr. Kao adds, is a social environment that encourages diversity, experimentation, risk - taking, and combining skills from many fields into products that he calls “recombinant mash - ups (打碎重组),” like the iPhone, which redefined the smartphone category. “The culture of other countries doesn’t support the kind of innovation that Steve Jobs exemplifies, as America does,” Mr. John Kao says.”，说明其他国家缺乏鼓励多样性、实验、冒险等的社会环境，而美国的文化支持像乔布斯所代表的那种创新，即美国有特别有利于创新的社会环境，与题目信息相符，答案选E。

43. H 此句表示创新想法通常来自多样化的经历。H段中“It’s often people like Steve Jobs who can draw from a deep reservoir of diverse experiences that often generate breakthrough ideas and insights,” says Hal Gregersen, a professor at the European Institute of Business Administration. 表明像乔布斯这样的人能从丰富的多样化经历中汲取灵感，产生突破性的想法和见解，与题目表述一致，答案为H。

44. F 该句意思是对于职业成功来说，现实生活经验往往比正规教育更重要。F段提到“Formal education matters, career counselors say, but real - life experience is often even more valuable.”，说明职业顾问认为正规教育很重要，但现实生活经验往往更有价值，与题目信息相符，答案选F。

45. L 此句表示在乔布斯离开期间，苹果的财富因创新折扣而受损。L段中“His years in exile resulted in a 31 percent innovation discount.”指出乔布斯离开公司的那些年导致了31%的创新折扣，即苹果财富受损，与题目表述一致，答案为L。

历年大学英语四级真题及答案解析之段落匹配（2015年6月第二套）

Section B

Directions: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived. You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragraph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2.

The Changes Facing Fast Food

A) Fast-food firms have to be a thick-skinned bunch. Health experts regularly criticise them severely for selling food that makes people fat. Critics even complain that McDonald’s, whose logo symbolises calorie excess, should not have been allowed to sponsor the World Cup. These are things fast-food firms have learnt to cope with. But not perhaps for much longer. The burger business faces more pressure from regulators at a time when it is already adapting strategies in response to shifts in the global economy.

B) Fast food was once thought to be recession-proof. When consumers need to cut spending, the logic goes, cheap meals like Big Macs and Whoppers become even more attractive. Such “trading down” proved true for much of the latest recession, when fast-food companies picked up customers who could no longer afford to eat at casual restaurants. Traffic was boosted in America, the home of fast food, with discounts and promotions, such as $ 1 menus and cheap combination meals.

C) As a result, fast-food chains have weathered the recession better than their more expensive competitors. In 2009 sales at full-service restaurants in America fell by

more than 6%, but total sales remained about the same at fast-food chains. In some markets, such as Japan, France and Britain, total spending on fast food increased. Same-store sales in America at McDonald’s, the world’s largest fast-food company, did not decline throughout the downturn. Panera Bread, an American fast-food chain known for its fresh ingredients, performed well, too, because it offers higher-quality food at lower prices than restaurants.

D) But not all fast-food companies have been as fortunate. Many, such as Burger King, have seen sales fall. In a severe recession, while some people trade down to fast food, many others eat at home more frequently to save money. David Palmer, an analyst at UBS, a bank, says smaller fast-food chains in America, such as Jack in the Box and Carl’s Jr., have been hit particularly hard in this downturn because they are competing with the global giant McDonald, which increased spending on advertising by more than 7% last year as others cut back.

E) Some fast-food companies also sacrificed their own profits by trying to give customers better value. During the recession companies set prices low, hoping that once they had tempted customers through the door they would be persuaded to order more expensive items. But in many cases that strategy did not work. Last year Burger franchisees(特许经营人)sued(起诉) the company over its double-cheeseburger promotion, claiming it was unfair for them to be required to sell these for $ 1 when they cost $ 1.10 to make. In May a judge ruled in favour of Burger King. Nevertheless, the company may still be cursing its decision to promote cheap choices over more expensive ones because items on its “value menu” now account for around 20% of all sales, up from 12% last October.

F) Analysts expect the fast-food industry to grow modestly this year. But the downturn is making companies rethink their strategies. Many are now introducing higher-priced items to entice (引诱) consumers away from $ 1 specials. RFC, a division of Yum! Brands, which also owns Taco Bell and Pizza Hut, has launched a chicken sandwich that costs around $ 5. And in May Burger King introduced barbecue(烧烤)pork ribs at $ 7 for eight.

G) Companies are also trying to get customers to buy new and more items, including drinks. McDonald’s started selling better coffee as a challenge to Starbucks. Its “McCafe” line now accounts for an estimated 6% of sales in America. Starbucks has sold rights to its Seattle’s Best coffee brand to Burger King, which will start selling it later this year.

H) As fast-food companies shift from “super-size” to “more buys”, they need to keep customer traffic high throughout the day. Many see breakfast as a big opportunity, and not just for fatty food. McDonald’s will start selling porridge(粥)in America next year. Breakfast has the potential to be very profitable, says Sara Senatore of Bernstein,

a research firm, because the margins can be high. Fast-food companies are also adding midday and late-night snacks, such as blended drinks and wraps. The idea is that by having a greater range of things on the menu, “we can sell to consumers products they want all day,” says Rick Carucci, the chief financial officer of Yum! Brands.

I) But what about those growing waistlines? So far, fast-food firms have cleverly avoided government regulation. By providing healthy options, like salads and low-calorie sandwiches, they have at least given the impression of doing something about helping to fight obesity ( 肥胖症). These offerings are not necessarily loss-leaders, as they broaden the appeal of outlets to groups of diners that include some people who don’t want to eat a burger. But customers cannot be forced to order salads instead of fries.

J) In the future, simply offering a healthy option may not be good enough. “Every packaged-food and restaurant company I know is concerned about regulation right now,” says Mr. Palmer of UBS. America’s health-reform bill, which Congress passed this year, requires restaurant chains with 20 or more outlets to put the calorie-content of items they serve on the menu. A study by the National Bureau of economic Research, which tracked the effects on Starbucks of a similar calorie-posting law in New York City in 2007, found that the average calorie-count per transaction fell 6% and revenue increased 3% at Starbucks stores where a Dunkin Donuts outlet was nearby—a sign, it is said, that menu-labelling could favour chains that have more healthy offerings.

K) In order to avoid other legislation in America and elsewhere, fast-food companies will have to continue innovating ( 创新). Walt Riker of McDonald’s claims the change it has made in its menu means it offers more healthy items than it did a few years ago. “We probably sell more vegetables, more milk, more salads, more apples than any restaurant business in the world,” he says. But the recent proposal by a county in California to ban McDonald’s from including toys in its high-calorie “Happy Meals”, because legislators believe it attracts children to unhealthy food, suggests there is a lot more left to do.

36. Some people propose laws be made to stop McDonald’s from attaching toys to its food specials for children.

37. Fast-food firms may not be able to cope with pressures from food regulation in the near future.

38. Burger King will start to sell Seattle’s Best coffee to increase sales.

39. Some fast-food firms provide healthy food to give the impression they are helping to tackle the obesity problem.

40. During the recession, many customers turned to fast food to save money.

41. Many people eat out less often to save money in times of recession.

42. During the recession, Burger King’s promotional strategy of offering low-priced items often proved ineffective.

43. Fast-food restaurants can make a lot of money by selling breakfast.

44. Many fast-food companies now expect to increase their revenue by introducing higher-priced items.

45. A newly-passed law asks big fast-food chains to specify the calorie count of what they serve on the menu.

答案解析：

36. 根据原文“But the recent proposal by a county in California to ban McDonald’s from including toys in its high - calorie ‘Happy Meals’”，可知是加利福尼亚的一个县提议禁止麦当劳在高热量“开心乐园餐”中附带玩具，所以选K。

37. 从“The burger business faces more pressure from regulators at a time when it is already adapting strategies in response to shifts in the global economy.”以及后文对未来可能面临更多监管的描述，可知快餐公司在不久的将来可能无法应对食品监管带来的压力，所以选A。

38. 根据“Starbucks has sold rights to its Seattle’s Best coffee brand to Burger King, which will start selling it later this year.”可知是星巴克把西雅图最佳咖啡品牌的权利卖给了汉堡王，汉堡王将在今年晚些时候开始销售，而不是汉堡王主动开始卖，但结合整体内容对应段落是G(此题重点在于信息对应到关于汉堡王获得该咖啡销售权相关段落)。

39. 依据“By providing healthy options, like salads and low - calorie sandwiches, they have at least given the impression of doing something about helping to fight obesity (肥胖症).”可知一些快餐公司提供健康食品是为了给人一种他们在帮助解决肥胖问题的印象，所以选I。

40. 由“Such ‘trading down’ proved true for much of the latest recession, when fast - food companies picked up customers who could no longer afford to eat at casual restaurants.”可知在经济衰退期间，很多顾客为了省钱转向快餐，所以选B。

41. 根据“In a severe recession, while some people trade down to fast food, many others eat at home more frequently to save money.”可知在经济严重衰退时，很多人为了省钱更频繁地在家吃饭，所以选D。

42. 从“Last year Burger franchisees(特许经营人)sued(起诉) the company over its double - cheeseburger promotion, claiming it was unfair for them to be required to sell these for $1 when they cost $1.10 to make.”以及后文对促销策略效果的描述，可知汉堡王的低价促销策略往往无效，所以选E。

43. 依据“Breakfast has the potential to be very profitable, says Sara Senatore of Bernstein, a research firm, because the margins can be high.”可知快餐店通过卖早餐可以赚很多钱，所以选H。

44. 根据“Analysts expect the fast - food industry to grow modestly this year. But the downturn is making companies rethink their strategies. Many are now introducing higher - priced items to entice (引诱) consumers away from $1 specials.”可知许多快餐公司希望通过推出高价产品来增加收入，所以选F。

45. 由“America’s health - reform bill, which Congress passed this year, requires restaurant chains with 20 or more outlets to put the calorie - content of items they serve on the menu.”可知新通过的法律要求大型快餐连锁店在菜单上标明所售食品的热量，所以选J。

历年大学英语四级真题及答案解析之段落匹配（2015年6月第三套）

Section B

Directions: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived. You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragraph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2.

Essay-Grading Software Offers Professors a Break

A) imagine taking a college exam, and, instead of handing in a blue book and getting a grade from a professor a few weeks later, clicking the “send” button when you are

done and receiving a grade back instantly, your essay scored by a software program. And then, instead of being done with that exam, imagine that the system would immediately let you rewrite the test to try to improve your grade.

B) EdX, the nonprofit enterprise founded by Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of technology (MIT) to offer courses on the Internet, has just introduced such a system and will make its automated ( 自动的) software available free on the Web to any institution that wants to use it. The software uses artificial intelligence to grade student essays and short written answers, freeing professors for other tasks.

C) The new service will bring the educational consortium (联盟) into a growing conflict over the role of automation in education. Although automated grading systems for multiple-choice and true-false tests are now widespread, the use of artificial intelligence technology to grade essay answers has not yet received widespread acceptance by educators and has many critics.

D) Anant Agarwal, an electrical engineer who is president of EdX, predicted that the instant-grading software would be a useful teaching tool, enabling students to take tests and write essays over and over and improve the quality of their answers. He said the technology would offer distinct advantages over the traditional classroom system, where students often wait days or weeks for grades. “There is a huge value in learning with instant feedback,” Dr. Agarwal said. “Students are telling us they learn much better with instant feedback.”

E) But skeptics ( 怀疑者) the automated system is no match for live teachers. One longtime critic , Les Perelman, has drawn national attention several times for putting together nonsense essays that have fooled software grading programs into giving high marks. He has also been highly critical of studies claiming that the software compares well to human graders.

F) He is among a group of educators who last month began circulating a petition (呼吁) opposing automated assessment software. The group, which calls itself Professionals against Machine Scoring of Student Essays in High-Stakes Assessment, has collected nearly 2,000 signatures, including some from famous people like Noam Chomsky.

G) “Let’s face the realities of automatic essay scoring,” the group’s statement reads in part. “Computers cannot ‘read’. They cannot measure the essentials of effective written communication: accuracy, reasoning, adequacy of evidence, good sense, ethical (伦理的) position, convincing argument, meaningful organization, and clarity, among others.

H) But EdX expects its software to be adopted widely by schools and universities. It offers free online classes from Harvard, MIT and the university of California-Berkeley; this fall, it will add classes from Wellesley, Georgetown and the

University of Texas. In all, 12 universities participate in EdX, which offers certificates for course completion and has said that it plans to continue to expand next year, including adding international schools.

I) The EdX assessment tool requires human teachers, or graders, to first grade 100 essays or essay questions. The system then uses a variety of machine-learning techniques to train itself to be able to grade any number of essays or answers automatically and almost instantly. The software will assign a grade depending on the scoring system created by the teacher, whether it is a letter grade or numerical(数字的)rank.

J) EdX is not the first to use the automated assessment technology, which dates to early computers in the 1960s. There is now a range of companies offering commercial programs to grade written test answers, and four states—Louisiana, North Dakota, Utah and West Virginia—are using some form of the technology in secondary schools. A fifth, Indiana, has experimented with it. In some cases the software is used as a “second reader,” to check the reliability of the human graders.

K) But the growing influence of the EdX consortium to set standards is likely to give the technology a boost. On Tuesday, Stanford announced that it would work with EdX to develop a joint educational system that will make use of the automated assessment technology.

L) Two start-ups, Coursera and Udacity, recently founded by Stanford faculty members to create “massive open online courses,” or MOOCs, are also committed to automated assessment systems because of the value of instant feedback. “It allows students to get immediate feedback on their work, so that lean turns into a game, with students naturally ( 吸引) toward resubmitting the work until they get it right,” said Daphne Roller, a computer scientist and a founder of Coursera.

M) Last year the Hewlett Foundation, a grant-making organization set up by one of the Hewlett-Packard founders and his wife, sponsored two $100,000 prizes aimed at improving software that grades essays and short answers. More than 150 teams entered each category. A winner of one of the Hewlett contests, Vik Paruchuri, was hired by EdX to help design its assessment software.

N) “One of our focuses is to help kids learn how to think critically,” said Victor Vuchic, a program officer at the Hewlett Foundation. “It’s probably impossible to do that with multiple-choice tests. The challenge is that this requires human graders, and so they cost a lot more and they take a lot more time.”

O) Mark D. Shermis, a professor at the University of Akron in Ohio, supervised the Hewlett Foundation’s contest on automated essay scoring and wrote a paper about the experiment. In his view, the technology—though imperfect—has a place in educational settings.

P) With increasingly large classes, it is impossible for most teachers to give students meaningful feedback on writing assignments, he said. Plus, he noted, critics of the technology have tended to come from the nation’s best universities, where the level of teaching is much better than at most schools.

Q) Often they come from very famous institutions where, in fact, they do a much better job of providing feedback than a machine ever could,” Dr. Shermis said. “There seems to be a lack of appreciation of what is actually going on in the real world.”

36. Some professionals in education are collecting signatures to voice their opposition to automated essay grading.

37. Using software to grade students’ essays saves teachers time for other work.

38. The Hewlett contests aim at improving essay grading software.

39. though the automated grading system is widely used in multiple-choice tests, automated essay grading is still criticized by many educators.

40. Some people don’t believe the software grading system can do as good a job as human graders.

41. Critics of automated essay scoring do not seem to know the true realities in less famous universities.

42. Critics argue many important aspects of effective writing cannot be measured by computer rating programs.

43. As class size grows, most teachers are unable to give students valuable comments as to how to improve their writing.

44. The automated assessment technology is sometimes used to double check the work of human graders.

45. Students find instant feedback helps improve their learning considerably.

答案解析：

36. 根据原文“He is among a group of educators who last month began circulating a petition (呼吁) opposing automated assessment software.”，可知一些教育界的专业人士正在收集签名以表达他们对自动论文评分的反对，对应F段。

37. 从“The software uses artificial intelligence to grade student essays and short written answers, freeing professors for other tasks.”可知，使用软件批改学生论文可以为教师节省时间去做其他工作，对应B段。

38. 由“Last year the Hewlett Foundation...sponsored two $100,000 prizes aimed at improving software that grades essays and short answers.”可知，Hewlett竞赛旨在改进论文评分软件，对应M段。

39. 根据“Although automated grading systems for multiple choice and true false tests are now widespread, the use of artificial intelligence technology to grade essay answers has not yet received widespread acceptance by educators and has many critics.”，可知虽然自动评分系统在选择题测试中被广泛使用，但自动论文评分仍受到许多教育工作者的批评，对应C段。

40. 从“But skeptics (怀疑者) the automated system is no match for live teachers.”可知，有些人不相信软件评分系统能像人类评分者那样做好工作，对应E段。

41. 由“Often they come from very famous institutions where, in fact, they do a much better job of providing feedback than a machine ever could...There seems to be a lack of appreciation of what is actually going on in the real world.”可知，自动论文评分的批评者似乎不了解不太知名大学的真实情况，对应Q段。

42. 根据“Computers cannot ‘read’. They cannot measure the essentials of effective written communication...”，可知批评者认为有效写作的许多重要方面无法通过计算机评分程序来衡量，对应G段。

43. 从“With increasingly large classes, it is impossible for most teachers to give students meaningful feedback on writing assignments...”可知，随着班级规模的扩大，大多数教师无法就如何提高学生的写作水平给出有价值的意见，对应P段。

44. 由“In some cases the software is used as a ‘second reader,’ to check the reliability of the human graders.”可知，自动评估技术有时被用来复核人类评分者的工作，对应J段。

45. 根据“Students are telling us they learn much better with instant feedback.”，可知学生发现即时反馈有助于显著提高他们的学习效果，对应D段。

历年大学英语四级真题及答案解析之段落匹配（2015年12月第一套）

Section B

Directions: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived. You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragraph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2.

A) Looking back on too many years of education, I can identify one truly impossible teacher. She cared about me, and my intellectual life, even when I didn’t. Her expectations were high—impossibly so. She was an English teacher. She was also my mother.

B) When good students turn in an essay, they dream of their instructor returning it to them in exactly the same condition, save for a single word added in the margin of the final page: “Flawless”. This dream came true for me one afternoon in the ninth grade. Of course, I had heard that genius could show itself at an early age, so I was only slightly taken aback that I had achieved perfection at the tender age of 14. Obviously, I did what any professional writer would do; I hurried off to spread the good news. I didn’t get very far. The first person I told was my mother.

C) My mother, who is just shy of five feet tall, is normally incredibly soft-spoken, but on the rare occasion when she got angry, she was terrifying. I am not sure if she was more upset by my hubris (得意忘形) or by the fact that my English teacher had let my ego get so out of hand. In any event, my mother and her red pen showed me how deeply flawed a flawless essay could be. At the time, I am sure she thought she was teaching me about mechanics, transitions (过渡), structure, style and voice. But what I learned, and what stuck with me through my time teaching writing at Harvard, was a deeper lesson about the nature of creative criticism.

D) First off, it hurts. Genuine criticism, the type that leaves a lasting mark on you as a writer, also leaves an existential imprint ( 印记) on you as a person. I have heard people say that a writer should never take criticism personally. I say that we should never listen to these people.

E) Criticism, at its best, is deeply personal, and gets to the heart of why we write the way we do. The intimate nature of genuine criticism implies something about who is able to give it, namely, someone who knows you well enough to show you how your mental life is getting in the way of good writing. Conveniently, they are also the people who care enough to see you through this painful realization. For me it took the form of my first, and I hope only, encounter with writer’s block--I was not able to produce anything for three years.

F) Franz Kafka once said: “Writing is utter solitude ( 独处), the descent into the cold abyss ( 深渊) of oneself.” My mother’s criticism had shown me that Kafka is right about the cold abyss, and when you make the introspective (内省的) descent that writing requires you are not always pleased by what you find. But, in the years that followed, her sustained tutoring suggested that Kafka might be wrong about the solitude. I was lucky enough to find a critic and teacher who was willing to make the journey of writing with me. “It is a thing of no great difficulty,” according to Plutarch, “to raise objections against another man’s speech, it is a very easy matter; but to produce a better in its place is a work extremely troublesome.” I am sure I wrote essays in the later years of high school without my mother's guidance, but I can’t recall them. What I remember, however, is how she took up the "extremely troublesome" work of ongoing criticism.

G) There are two ways to interpret Plutarch when he suggests that a critic should be able to produce “a better in its place.” In a straightforward sense, he could mean that a critic must be more talented than the artist she critiques (评论). My mother was well covered on this count. But perhaps Plutarch is suggesting something slightly different, something a bit closer to Marcus Cicero’s claim that one should “criticize by creation, not by finding fault.” Genuine criticism creates a precious opening for an author to become better on his own terms--a process that is often extremely painful, but also almost always meaningful.

H) My mother said she would help me with my writing, but first I had to help myself. For each assignment, I was to write the best essay I could. Real criticism is not meant to find obvious mistakes, so if she found any--the type I could have found on my own--I had to start from scratch. From scratch. Once the essay was “flawless,” she would take an evening to walk me through my errors. That was when true criticism, the type that changed me as a person, began.

I) She criticized me when I included little-known references and professional jargon (行话). She had no patience for brilliant but irrelevant figures of speech. “Writers can’t bluff (虚张声势) their way through ignorance.” That was news to me--I would need to freed another way to structure my daily existence.

J) She trimmed back my flowery language, drew lines through my exclamation marks and argued for the value of restraint in expression. “John,” she almost whispered. I leaned in to hear her: “I can’t hear you when you shout at me.” So I stopped shouting and bluffing, and slowly my writing improved.

K) Somewhere along the way I set aside my hopes of writing that flawless essay. But perhaps I missed something important in my mother’s lessons about creativity and perfection. Perhaps the point of writing the flawless essay was not to give up, but to never willingly finish. Whitman repeatedly reworked “Song of Myself” between 1855

and 1891 repeatedly. We do our absolute best with a piece of writing, and come as close as we can to the ideal. And, for the time being, we settle. In critique, however, we are forced to depart, to give up the perfection we thought we had achieved for the chance of being even a little bit better. This is the lesson I took from my mother: If perfection were possible, it would not be motivating?

36. The author was advised against the improper use of figures of speech.

37. The author’s mother taught him a valuable lesson by pointing out lots of flaws in his seemingly perfect essay.

38. A writer should polish his writing repeatedly so as to get closer to perfection.

39. Writers may experience periods of time in their life when they just can’t produce anything.

40. The author was not much surprised when his school teacher marked his essay as “flawless”.

41. Criticizing someone’s speech is said to be easier than coming up with a better one.

42. The author looks upon his mother as his most demanding and caring instructor.

43. The criticism the author received from his mother changed him as a person.

44. The author gradually improved his writing by avoiding fancy language.

45. Constructive criticism gives an author a good start to improve his writing.

答案解析：

36. 根据“I”段“She had no patience for brilliant but irrelevant figures of speech.”可知，作者被建议不要不当使用修辞手法，所以选I。

37. 根据“C”段“In any event, my mother and her red pen showed me how deeply flawed a flawless essay could be.”可知，作者的母亲通过指出他看似完美的文章中的许多缺点，给他上了宝贵的一课，所以选C。

38. 根据“K”段“We do our absolute best with a piece of writing, and come as close as we can to the ideal.”可知，作家应该反复润色自己的作品，以便更接近完美，所以选K。

39. 根据“E”段“For me it took the form of my first, and I hope only, encounter with writer’s block--I was not able to produce anything for three years.”可知，作家可能会经历一段时间，在这段时间里他们什么也创作不出来，所以选E。

40. 根据“B”段“Of course, I had heard that genius could show itself at an early age, so I was only slightly taken aback that I had achieved perfection at the tender age of 14.”可知，当作者的学校老师把他的文章评为“完美无缺”时，他并不感到十分惊讶，所以选B。

41. 根据“F”段“It is a thing of no great difficulty,” according to Plutarch, “to raise objections against another man’s speech, it is a very easy matter; but to produce a better in its place is a work extremely troublesome.”可知，批评别人的演讲据说比想出一个更好的演讲更容易，所以选F。

42. 根据“A”段“Looking back on too many years of education, I can identify one truly impossible teacher. She cared about me, and my intellectual life, even when I didn’t. Her expectations were high—impossibly so. She was an English teacher. She was also my mother.”可知，作者认为他的母亲是他要求最高、最关心他的老师，所以选A。

43. 根据“H”段“That was when true criticism, the type that changed me as a person, began.”可知，作者从母亲那里受到的批评改变了他这个人，所以选H。

44. 根据“J”段“She trimmed back my flowery language, drew lines through my exclamation marks and argued for the value of restraint in expression.”和“So I stopped shouting and bluffing, and slowly my writing improved.”可知，作者通过避免使用花哨的语言逐渐提高了写作水平，所以选J。

45. 根据“G”段“Genuine criticism creates a precious opening for an author to become better on his own terms--a process that is often extremely painful, but also almost always meaningful.”可知，建设性的批评为作者提供了一个良好的开端来改进他的写作，所以选G。

历年大学英语四级真题及答案解析之段落匹配（2015年12月第二套）

Section B

Directions: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived. You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragraph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2.

Joy: A subject Schools Lack

Becoming educated should not require giving up pleasure

A) When Jonathan Swift proposed, in 1729, that the people of Ireland eat their children, he insisted it would solve three problems at once: feed the hungry masses, reduce the population during a severe depression, and stimulate the restaurant business. Even as a satire ( 讽刺), it seems disgusting and shocking in America with its child-centered culture. But actually, the country is closer to his proposal than you might think.

B) If you spend much time with educators and policy makers, you’ll hear a lot of the following words: “standards,” “results,” “skills,” “self-control,” “accountability,” and so on. I have visited some of the newer supposedly “effective” schools, where children shout slogans in order to learn self- control or must stand behind their desk when they can’t sit still.

C) A look at what goes on in most classrooms these days makes it abundantly clear that

when people think about education, they are not thinking about what it feels like to be a child, or what makes childhood an important and valuable stage of life in its own right.

D) I’m a mother of three, a teacher, and a developmental psychologist. So I’ve watched a lot of children—talking, playing, arguing, eating, studying, and being young. Here’s what I’ve come to understand. The thing that sets children apart from adults is not their ignorance, nor their lack of skills. It’s their enormous capacity for joy. Think of a 3-year-old lost in the pleasures of finding out what he can and cannot sink in the bathtub, a 5-year-old beside herself with the thrill of putting together strings of nonsensical words with her best friends, or an 11-year-old completely absorbed in a fascinating comic strip. A child’s ability to become deeply absorbed in something, and derive intense pleasure from that absorption, is something adults spend the rest of their lives trying to return to.

E) A friend told me the following story. One day, when he went to get his 7-year-old son from soccer practice, his kid greeted him with a downcast face and a sad voice. The coach had criticized him for not focusing on his soccer drills. The little boy walked out of the school with his head and shoulders hanging down. He seemed wrapped in sadness. But just before he reached the car door, he suddenly stopped, crouching (蹲伏) down to peer at something on the sidewalk. His face went down lower and lower, and then, with complete joy he called out, “Dad. Come here. This is the strangest bug I’ve ever seen. It has, like, a million legs. Look at this. It’s amazing.” He looked up at his father, his features overflowing with energy and delight. “Can’t we stay here for just a minute? I want to find out what he does with all those legs. This is the coolest ever.”

F) The traditional view of such moments is that they constitute a charming but irrelevant byproduct of youth—something to be pushed aside to make room for more important qualities, like perseverance (坚持不懈), obligation, and practicality. Yet moments like this one are just the kind of intense absorption and pleasure adults spend the rest of their lives seeking. Human lives are governed by the desire to experience joy. Becoming educated should not require giving up joy but rather lead to finding joy in new kinds of things: reading novels instead of playing with small figures, conducting experiments instead of sinking cups in the bathtub, and debating serious issues rather than stringing together nonsense words, for example. In some cases, schools should help children find new, more grown-up ways of doing the same things that are constant sources of joy: making art, making friends, making decisions.

G) Building on a child’s ability to feel joy, rather than pushing it aside, wouldn’t be that hard. It would just require a shift in the education world’s mindset( 思维模式) . Instead of trying to get children to work hard, why not focus on getting them to take

pleasure in meaningful, productive activity, like making things, working with others, exploring ideas, and solving problems? These focuses are not so different from the things in which they delight.

H) Before you brush this argument aside as rubbish, or think of joy as an unaffordable luxury in a nation where there is awful poverty, low academic achievement, and high dropout rates, think again. The more horrible the school circumstances, the more important pleasure is to achieving any educational success.

I) Many of the assignments and rules teachers come up with, often because they are pressured by their administrators, treat pleasure and joy as the enemies of competence and responsibility. The assumption is that children shouldn’t chat in the classroom because it hinders hard work; instead, they should learn to delay gratification (快乐) so that they can pursue abstract goals, like going to college.

J) Not only is this a boring and awful way to treat children, it makes no sense educationally. Decades of research have shown that in order to acquire skills and real knowledge in school, kids need to want to learn. You can force a child to stay in his or her seat, fill out a worksheet, or practice division. But you can’t force the child to think carefully, enjoy books, digest complex information, or develop a taste for learning. To make that happen, you have to help the child find pleasure in learning—to see school as a source of joy.

K) Adults tend to talk about learning as if it were medicine: unpleasant, but necessary and good for you. Why not instead think of learning as if it were food—something so valuable to humans that they have evolved to experience it as a pleasure?

L) Joy should not be trained out of children or left for after-school programs. The more difficult a child’s life circumstances, the more important it is for that child to find joy in his or her classroom. “Pleasure” is not a dirty word. And it doesn’t run counter to the goals of public education. It is, in fact, the precondition.

36. It will not be difficult to make learning a source of joy if educators change their way of thinking.

37. What distinguishes children from adults is their strong ability to derive joy from what they are doing.

38. Children in America are being treated with shocking cruelty.

39. It is human nature to seek joy in life.

40. Grown-ups are likely to think that learning to children is what medicine is to patients.

41. Bad school conditions make it all the more important to turn learning into a joyful experience.

42. Adults do not consider children’s feelings when it comes to education.

43. Administrators seem to believe that only hard work will lead children to their educational goals.

44. In the so-called “effective” schools, children are taught self-control under a set of strict rules.

45. To make learning effective, educators have to ensure that children want to learn.

答案解析：

36.根据“make learning a source of joy”以及“change their way of thinking”，在G段中提到“Building on a child’s ability to feel joy... would just require a shift in the education world’s mindset”，可知改变教育者的思维方式，基于孩子感受快乐的能力来构建教育，就能让学习成为快乐的源泉，所以选G。

37.根据“What distinguishes children from adults is their strong ability to derive joy from what they are doing”，D段明确指出“The thing that sets children apart from adults... It’s their enormous capacity for joy”，可知孩子与成人的区别在于孩子从所做之事中获得快乐的能力很强，所以3选D。

38.根据“Children in America are being treated with shocking cruelty”，A段提到“Even as a satire, it seems disgusting and shocking in America with its child - centered culture”，以讽刺的例子说明美国在对待孩子方面存在令人震惊的情况，所以选A。

39.根据“It is human nature to seek joy in life”，F段提到“Human lives are governed by the desire to experience joy”，可知人类生活受体验快乐的欲望支配，即寻求生活中的快乐是人的本性，所以选F。

40.根据“Grown - ups are likely to think that learning to children is what medicine is to patients”，K段提到“Adults tend to talk about learning as if it were medicine: unpleasant, but necessary and good for you”，可知成人常把学习比作药，所以选K。

41.根据“Bad school conditions make it all the more important to turn learning into a joyful experience”，H段提到“The more horrible the school circumstances, the more important pleasure is to achieving any educational success”，可知学校情况越糟糕，快乐对教育成功越重要，所以选H。

42.根据“Adults do not consider children’s feelings when it comes to education”，C段提到“when people think about education, they are not thinking about what it feels like to be a child”，可知成人考虑教育时不会考虑孩子的感受，所以选C。

43.根据“Administrators seem to believe that only hard work will lead children to their educational goals”，I段提到“teachers come up with... treat pleasure and joy as the enemies of competence and responsibility... children shouldn’t chat... because it hinders hard work”，可知管理者认为只有努力工作才能让孩子实现教育目标，所以选I。

44.根据“In the so - called ‘effective’ schools, children are taught self - control under a set of strict rules”，B段提到“I have visited some of the newer supposedly ‘effective’ schools, where children shout slogans in order to learn self - control or must stand behind their desk when they can’t sit still”，可知在所谓“有效”的学校里，孩子在严格规则下学习自我控制，所以选B。

45.根据“To make learning effective, educators have to ensure that children want to learn”，J段提到“in order to acquire skills and real knowledge in school, kids need to want to learn”，可知为使学习有效，教育者要确保孩子想学习，所以选J。

篇幅有限，这里不再一一展示，如有需要，请微信搜索英语巴士小程序！