-
2013
年
12
月大学英语六级考试真题（第
1
套）
Part I
Writing
(30 minutes)
（请于正式开考后半小时内完成该部分，之后将进行听力考试）
Directions:
For this part,
you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay
on happiness by referring
to
the saying
“Happiness is not the absence
of problems, but the ability to deal with
them.”
You
can cite examples
to illustrate your point and then
explain how you can develop your
ability to
deal
with
problems
and
be
happy
.
You
should
write
at
least
150
words
but
no
more
than
200
words.
Part II
Listening Comprehension
(30
minutes)
Section A
Directions:
In this section,
you will hear 8 short conversations and 2 long
conversations. At theend
of
each
conversation,
one
or
more
questions
will
be
asked
about
what
was
said.
Both
the
conversation and the
questions will be spoken only once. After each
question there will be a pause.
During
the pause, you must read the four choices marked
A), B), C) and D), and decide which is
the best answer. Then mark the
corresponding letter on
Answer Sheet
1
with a single line through
the centre.
注意：此部分试题请在
答题卡
1
上作答。
1
.
A) The rock
band needs more hours of practice.
B)
The rock band is going to play here for a month.
C) Their hard work has resulted in a
big success.
D) He appreciates the
woman’s help with the band.
2. A) Go on a diving tour in Europe.
C)
Travel overseas on his own.
B) Add 300
dollars to his budget.
D) Join a package tour to
Mexico.
3. A) In case some
problem should occur.
C) To avoid more work later on.
B) Something unexpected has
happened.
D) To
make better preparations.
4. A) The
woman asked for a free pass to try out the
facilities.
B) The man is going to
renew his membership in a fitness center.
C) The woman can give the man a
discount if he joins the club now.
D)
The man can try out the facilities before he
becomes a member.
5. A) He is not
afraid of challenge.
B) He
is not fit to study science.
C) He is
worried about the test.
D)
He is going to drop the physics course
6. A) Pay for part of the picnic food.
C)
Buy something special for Gary.
B)
Invite Gary’s
family to dinner.
D)
Take some food to the picnic.
7. A) Bus
drivers’ working conditions.
C)Public transportation.
B)
A labor dispute at a bus company.
D) A corporate
takeover.
8. A) The bank statement.
C) The payment for an
order.
B) Their sales overseas.
D) The check just
deposited.
Questions 9 to 11 are based on the
conversation you have just heard.
9. A)
A hotel receptionist.
C)
A shop assistant.
B) A private
secretary.
D) A sales
manager.
10. A) Voice.
C)
Appearance.
B) Intelligence.
D) Manners.
11. A) Arrange one more interview.
C)
Report the matter to their boss.
B)
Offer the job to David Wallace.
D) Hire Barbara
Jones on a trial basis.
Questions 12 to 15 are based on the
conversation you have just heard.
12.
A) He invented the refrigerator.
C) He got a
degree in Mathematics.
B) He patented
his first invention.
D) He was admitted to
university.
13. A) He distinguished
himself in low temperature physics.
B)
He fell in love with Natasha Willoughby.
C) He became a professor of
Mathematics.
D) He started to work on
refrigeration.
14. A) Finding the true
nature of subatomic particles.
B) Their
work on very high frequency radio waves.
C) Laying the foundations of modem
mathematics.
D) Their discovery of the
laws of cause and effect.
15. A) To
teach at a university.
C) To spend his
remaining years.
B) To patent his
inventions.
D) To have a three-week
holiday.
Section B
Directions:
In this section,
you will hear 3 short passages. At the end of each
passage, you will hear
some questions.
Both the passage and the questions will he spoken
only once. After you hear a
question,
you must choose the best answer from the four
choices marked A), B), C) and D). Then
mark the corresponding letter on
Answer Sheet 1
with a single
line through the centre.
注
意<
/p>
：此部分试题请在
答题卡
1
上作答
。
Passage One
Questions 16 to
18 are based on the passage you have just heard.
16. A) They have fallen prey to wolves.
B) They have become a tourist
attraction.
C) They have caused lots of
damage to crops.
D) They have become a
headache to the community.
17. A) To
celebrate their victory.
C) To scare the
wolves.
B) To cheer up the hunters.
D) To alert the deer.
18. A)
They would help to spread a fatal disease.
B) They would pose a threat to the
children.
C) They would endanger
domestic animals.
D) They would
eventually kill off the deer.
Passage Two
Questions 19 to 22 are based on the
passage you have just heard.
19. A) She
is an interpreter.
C)
She is a domestic servant.
B) She is a
tourist guide.
D) She is from
the royal family.
20. A) It was used by
the family to hold dinner parties.
B)
It is situated at the foot of a beautiful
mountain.
C) It was frequently visited
by heads of state.
D) It is furnished
like one in a royal palace.
21. A) It
is elaborately decorated.
B) It has
survived some 2,000 years.
C) It is
very big, with only six slim legs.
D)
It is shaped like an ancient Spanish boat.
22. A) They are uncomfortable to sit in
for long.
B) They do not match the oval
table at all.
C) They have lost some of
their legs.
D) They are interesting to
look at.
Passage Three
Questions 23 to 25 are based on the
passage you have just heard.
23. A) It
in an uncommon infectious disease.
B)
It destroys t
he patient’s ability to
think.
C) It is a disease
very difficult to diagnose.
D) It is
the biggest crippler of young adults.
24. A) Search for the best cure.
C) Write a book about her life.
B) Hurry up and live life.
D)
Exercise more and work harder.
25. A)
Aggressive.
C) Sophisticated.
B)
Adventurous.
D)
Self-centered.
Section C
Directions:
In this section,
you will hear a passage three times. When the
passage is read fort the
first time,
you should listen carefully for its general idea.
When the passage is read for the second
time, you are required to fill in the
blanks with the exact words youhave just heard.
Finally, when
the passage is read for
the third time, you shouldcheck what you have
written.
注意：此部分试题请在
答题卡
1
上作答。
It’s
difficult
to
estimate
the
number
of
youngsters
involved
in
home
schooling,
where
childrenare
not
sent
to
school
and
receive
their
formal
education
from
one
or
both
parents.
(26)_______
and
court
decisions
have
made
it
legally
possible
in
most
states
for
parents
to
educate
their
children
at
home,
and
each
year
more
people
take
advantage
of
that
opportunity.
Some
states
require
parents
or
a
home
tutor
to
meet
teacher
certification
standards,
and
many
require
parents to completelegal forms to verify that
their children are receiving (27) _______ in
state-approved curricula.
Supports
of
home
education
claim
that
it
’
s
less
expensive
and
far
more
(28)_______
thanmass
public
education.
Moreover,
they
cite
several
advantages:
alleviation
of
school
overcrowding, strengthened family
relationships, lower (29) _______ rates, the fact
that students
are allowed
to learn at their own rate, increased (30)
_______, higher standardized test scores, and
reduced (31) _______ problems.
Critics of the home schooling movement
(32) _______ that it creates as many problems as
it
solves. They acknowledge that, in a
few cases, home schooling offers educational
opportunities
superior
to
those
found
in
most
public
schools,
but
few
parents
can
provide
such
educational
advantages.
Some
parents
who
withdraw
their
children
from
the
schools
(33)
_______
homeschooling
have
an
inadequate
educational
background
and
insufficient
formal
training
to
provide
a
satisfactory
education
for
their
children.
Typically,
parents
have
fewertechnological
resources
(34) _______ than do schools. However, the
relatively inexpensivecomputer technology
that is readily available today is
causing some to challenge the notion that home
schooling is in
any way (35) _______
more highly structured classroom education.
Part III
Reading
Comprehension (40 minutes)
Section A
Directions:
In this section,
there is a passage with ten blanks. You are
required to select one word
for
each
blank
from
a
list
of
choices
given
in
a
word
bank
following
the
passage.
Read
the
passage through carefully before making
your choices. Each choice in the bank is
identified by a
letter. Please mark the
corresponding letter for each item on
Answer Sheet 2
with a single
line
through the centre. You may not
use any of the words in the bank more than once.
Questions 36 to 45 are based on the
following passage.
Some performance
evaluations require supervisors to take action.
Employees who receive a
very
favorable
evaluation
may
deserve
some
type
of
recognition
or
even
a
promotion.
If
supervisors do not
acknowledge such outstanding performance,
employees may either lose their36
and
reduce their effort or search for a new job at a
firm that will37 them for high performance.
Supervisors should acknowledge high
performance so that the employee will continue to
perform
well in the future.
Employees
who
receive
unfavorable
evaluations
must
also
be
given
attention.
Supervisors
must
38
the
reasons
for poor
performance.
Some
reasons,
such
as
a
family
illness,
may
have
a
temporary adverse 39 on performance and
can be corrected. Other reasons, such as a bad
attitude,
may
not
be
temporary.
When
supervisors
give
employees
an
unfavorable
evaluation,
they
must
decide
whether to take any 40 actions. If the employees
were unaware of their own deficiencies,
the
unfavorable
evaluation
can
pi
npoint
(
指出
)
the
deficiencies
that
employees
must
correct.
In
this
case,
the
supervisor
may
simply
need
to
monitor
the
employees
41
and
ensure
that
the
deficiencies are corrected.
If
the
employees
were
already
aware
of
their
deficiencies
before
the
evaluation
period,
however, they may be
unable or unwilling to correct them. This
situation is more serious, and the
supervisor may need to take action. The
action should be 42
with the firm’s
guidelines and may
include
reassigning
the
employees
to
new
jobs,
43
them
temporarily,
or
firing
them.
A
supervisor’s action toward a poorly
performing worker can
44 the attitudes
of other employees. If
no 45 isimposed
on an employee for poor performance, other
employees may react by reducing
their
productivity as well.
注意：此部分题请在
< br>答题卡
2
上作答。
A) additional
I) identify
B) affect
C)
aptly
D) assimilate
H)
circulation
F) closely
G)
consistent
H) enthusiasm
J)
impact
K) penalty
L) reward
M) simplifying
N) suspending
O) vulnerable
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 College Essay: Why
Those 500 Words Drive Us Crazy
A)
Meg
is
a
lawyer-mom
in
suburban
Washington,
D.C.,
where
lawyer-moms
are
thick
on
the
ground.
Her
son
Doug
is
one
of
several
hundred
thousand
high-school
seniors
who
had
a
painful fall. The deadline for applying
to his favorite college was Nov. 1,and by early
October
he had yet to fill out the
application. More to the point, he had yet to
settle on a subject for the
personal
essay
accompanying
the
application.
According
to
college
folklore,
a
well-turned
essay has the power to
seduce
(
诱惑
) an
admiss
ions committee. “He wanted to do
one thing at
a
time,
”
Meg says,
explaining her son’s delay. “But really, my son is
a huge
procrastinator
(
拖
延者
)
. The
essay is the hardest thing to do, so he’s put it
off the longest.”
Friends and other
veterans of the process have warned Meg
that the back and forth between editing parent and
writing student can be
traumatic
(
痛苦的
).
B)
Back
in
the
good
old
days
—
say,
two
years
ago,
when
the
last
of
my
children
suffered
the
ordeal
(
折磨
)
—
a
high-
school
student
applying
to
college
could
procrastinate
all
the
way
to
New Year’s
Day of their senior year, assuming they could
withstand the parental
pestering
(
烦
扰
).But
things
change
fast
in
the
nail-biting
world
of
college
recent
trend
toward early decision and early action
among selective
colleges and
universities has pushed
the traditional
deadline of January up to Nov. 1 or early December
for many students.
C)
If
the
time
for
heel-dragging
has
been
shortened,
the
true
source
of
the
anxiety
and
panic
remains
what it has alway
s been. And it’s not
the application itself. A college application is a
relatively
straightforward
questionnaire
asking
for
the
basics:
name,
address,
family
history
employment
history.
It
would
all
be
innocent
enough
—
20
minutes
of
busy
work
—
except
it
comes attached to a
personal essay.
D)
“There
are
good
reasons
it
causes
such
anxiety,”
says
Lisa
Sohmer,
director
of
college
counseling at the
Garden School in Jackson Heights, N.Y.
“It’
s not just the actual writing. By
noweverything else is already set. Your
course load is set, your grades are set, your test
scores
are set. But the essay is
something you can still control, and it’s
open
-ended. So the temptation
is to write and rewrite and rewrite.”
Or stall and stall
and stall.
E)
The
application
essay,
along
with
its
mythical
importance,
is
a
recent
invention.
In
the
1930s,when
only
one
in
10
Americans
had
a
degree
from
a
four-year
college,
an
admissionscommit
tee was
content to ask for a sample of applicants’ school
papers to assess
their writing ability. By the 1950s,
most schools required a brief personal statement
of why the
student had chosen to apply
to one school over another.
F)
Today
nearly
70
percent
of
graduating
seniors
go
off
to
college,
including
two-year
and
four-year institutions. Even apart from
the increased competition, the kids enter a
process that
has
been
utterly
transformed
from
the
one
baby
boomers
knew.
Nearly
all
application
materials
are
submitted
online,
and
the
Common
Application
provides
a
one-
size-fits
form
accepted by
more than 400 schools, including the nation’s most
selective.
G) Those schools
usually require essays of their own, but the
longest essay, 500 words maximum,
is
generally
attached
to
the
Common
Application.
Students
choose
one
of
six
questions.
Applicants are
asked to
describe an ethical dilemma they’ve faced and its
impact on them, or
discuss
a
public
issue
of
special
concern
to
them,
or
tell
of
a
fictional
character
or
creative
work
that has profoundly influenced them. Another
question invites them to write about the
importance (to them, again) of
diversity―a word that has assumed magic power in
American
higher education. The most
popular option: write on a topic of your choice.
H) “Boys in particular look at the
other questi
ons and say,
‘Oh, that’s too much work,’” says John
Boshoven, a counselor in the Ann Arbor,
Mich., public schools. “They think if they do a
topic
of their choice,
“I’ll
just go get that history paper I did last year on
the Roman Empire and turn
it
into
a
first-
person
application
essay!
’
And
they
end
up
producing
something
utterly
ridiculous.”
I)
Talking to admissions professionals like Boshoven,
you realize that the list of “don’ts” in essay
writing
is
much
longer
than
the
“dos.”“No
book
reports,
no
history
papers,
no
character
studies,”
says Sohmer.
J) “It drives you cra
zy, how
easily kids slip into
cliché
s
(
老生常谈
)
,”says Boshoven. “They don’t
realize
how
typical
their
experiences
arc.
‘
I
scored
the
winning
goal
in
soccer
against
our
arch-
rival.
’‘
My grandfather
served in World War II, and I hope to be just like
him someday.
’
That
may
mean
a
lot
to
that
particular
kid.
But
in
the
world
of
the
application
essay,
it’s
nothing. You’ll lose the reader in the
first paragraph.”
K) “The
greatest strength you bring to this essay,” says
the College Board’s how
-
to
book, “is 17
years or so of familiarity
with the topic: YOU. The form and style are very
familiar, and best
of all, you are the
world-class expert on the subject of YOU ... It
has been the subject of your
close
sc
rutiny
every
morning
since
you
were
tall
enough
to
see
into
the
bathroom
mirror.”
Thekey word in the
Common Application prompts is “you.”
L) The college admission essay
contains the grandest American
themes―status anxiety, parental
piety
(
孝顺
),
intellectual
standards
—
and
so
it
is
only
a
matter
of
time
before
it
becomes
infected by the country’s culture of
excessive concern with self
-esteem.
Even if the question
is
ostensibly
(
表面上
) about
something outside the self (describe a fictional
character or solve a
problem of
geopolitics), the essay invariably returns to the
favorite topic: what is its impact on
YOU?
M)
“For
all
the
anxiety
the
essay
causes,”
says
Bill
McClintick
of
Mercersburg
Academy
in
Pennsylvania, “it’s a very small piece
of the puzzle.
I was in college
admissions for 10 years. I
saw
kids
and
parents
beat
themselves
up
over
this.
And
at
the
vast
majority
of
places,
it
is
simply not a big variable in the
college’s decision
-
making
process.”
N) Many admissions
officers say they spend less than a couple of
minutes on each application,
including
the
essay.
According
to
a
recent
survey
of
admissions
officers,
only
one
in
four
private
colleges
say
the
essay
is
of
“considerable
importance”
in
judging
an
application.
Among public
colleges and universities, the number drops to
roughly one in 10. By contrast,
86
percent place “considerable importance” on an
applicant’s grades, 70 percent on “strength
of curriculum.”
O) Still, at the most selective
schools, where thousands of candidates may submit
identically high
grades and test
scores, a marginal item like the essay may serve
as a tie-breaker between two
equally
qualified
candidates.
The
thought
is
certainly
enough
to
keep
the
pot
boiling
under
parents like Meg, the lawyer-mom, as
she tries to help her son choose an essay topic.
For a
moment
the
other
day,
she
thought
she
might
have
hit
on
a
good
one.
“His
father’s
from
France,”
she
says.
“I
said
maybe
you
could
write
about
that,
as
something
that
makes
you
different. You know: half French, half
American. I said,
‘
You could
write about your identity
issues
.’
He
said,
‘I
don’t
have
any
identity
issues!’
And
he’s
right.
He’s
a
well
-adjusted,
normal kid.
But that doesn’t
make for a good essay, does it?”
注意：此部分试题请在
答题卡
2
上作答。
46. Today
many universities require their applicants to
write an essay of up to five hundred words.
47.
One
recent
change
in
college
admissions
is
that
selective
colleges
and
universities
have
movedthe traditional deadline to
earlier dates.
48.
Applicants
and
their
parents
are
said
to
believe
that
the
personal
essay
can
sway
the
admissions committee.
49. Applicants are usually better off
if they can write an essay that distinguishes them
from the
rest.
50. Not only
is the competition getting more intense, the
application process today is also totally
different from what baby boomers knew.
51. In writing about their own
experiences many applicants slip into
cliché
s, thus failing to engage
the reader.
52.
According
to
a
recent
survey,
most
public
colleges
and
universities
consider
an
app
licant’s
grades highly important.
53.
Although the application essay causes lots of
anxiety, it does not play so important a role in
the college’sdecision
-making
process.
54. The question you
aresupposed to write about may seem outside the
self, but the theme of the
essay should
center around its impact on you.
55. In
the old days, applicants only had to submit a
sample of their school papers to show their
writing ability.
Section C
Directions:
There are 2
passages in this section. Each passage is followed
by some questions or
unfinished
statements.
For each
of
them
there
are
four
choices
marked
A), B), C) and D). You
should
decide
on
the
best
choice
and
mark
the
corresponding
letter
on
Answer
Sheet
2
with
a
single line through the
centre.
Passage One
Questions 56 to 60 are based on the
following passage.
Among the
government’s most interesting reports is one that
estimates what parents spend on
their
children. Not surprisingly, the costs are steep.
For a middle-class, husband-and-wife family
(average
pretax
income
in
2009:
$$76,250),
spending
per
child
is
about
$$12,000
a
year.
With
inflation the family’s spending on a
child will total $$286,050 by age 17.
The dry statistics ought to inform the
ongoing deficit debate, because a budget is not
just a
catalog of programs and taxes.
It reflects a society’s priorities and values. Our
society does not—
despite
rhetoric
(
说辞
< br>)
to
the
contrary
—
put
much
value
on
raising
children.
Present
budget
policies tax parents heavily to support
the elderly. Meanwhile, tax breaks for children
are modest.
If deficit reduction
aggravates these biases, more Americans may choose
not to have children or to
have fewer
children. Down that path lies economic decline.
Societies that cannot replace their
populations discourage investment and innovation.
They
have
stagnant
(
萧条的
)
or
shrinking
markets
for
goods
and
services.
With
older
populations,
theyresist
change.
To
stabilize
its
pop
ulation
—
discounting
immigration
—
women
must
have
an
average of two children. That’s a
fertility rate of
countries with
struggling economies
are well below
that.
Though
having
a
child
is
a
deeply
personal
decision,
it’s
shaped
by
culture,
religion,
economics, and government policy. “No
one has
a
good
answer” asto why fertility varies among
countries,
says
sociologist
Andrew
Cherlin
of
The
Johns
Hopkins
University.
Eroding
religious
belief in Europe
may partly explain lowered birthrates. In Japan
young women may be rebelling
against
their
mothers’
isolated
lives
of
child
rearing.
General
optimism
and
pessimism
count.
Hopefulness
fueled
America’s
baby
boom.
After
the
Soviet
Union’s
collapse,
says
Cherlin,
“anxiety for the future” depressed
birthrates in
Russiaand Eastern Europe.
In poor societies, people have children
to improve their economic well-being by increasing
the
number
of
family
workers
and
providing
supports
for
parents
in
their
old
age.
In
wealthy
societies, the logic
often reverses. Government now supports the
elderly, diminishing the need for
children. By some studies, the safety
nets for retirees have reduced fertility rates by
0.5 children in
the United States and
almost 1.0 in Western Europe, reports economist
Robert Stein in the journal
National
Affairs.
Similarly, some couples
don’t have children because they don’t
want to sacrifice
their own lifestyles
to the lime and expense of a family.
Young
Americans
already
face
a
bleak
labor
market
that
cannot
instill
(
注入
)
confidence
about having
children. Piling on higher taxes
won’t
help, “If higher taxes make it more expensive
to raise children,” says Nicholas
Eberstadt of the American Enterprise Institute,
“people will think
twice about having
another child.” Tha
t seems like common
sense, despite the multiple influences
on becoming parents.
注意：此部分试
题请在
答题卡
2
上作答。
56. What do we learn from the
government report?
A) Inflation
increases families’ expenses.
B) Raising children is getting
expensive.
C) Budget reduction in
around the corner.
D) Average family
expenditure is increasing.
57. What is
said to be the consequence of a shrinking
population?
A) Weakened national
strength.
C)
Economic downturn.
B) Increased
immigration.
D) Social instability.
58.
What accounted f
or America’s baby
boom?
A) Optimism for the
future.
C) Religious beliefs.
B)
Improved living conditions.
D) Economic
prosperity.
59.
Why do people in wealthy countries prefer to have
fewer children?
A) They want to further
improve their economic well-being.
B)
They cannot afford the time and expenses of
rearing children.
C) They are concerned
about the future of the coming generation.
D) They don’t rely on their children to
support them in old age.
60.
What is the author’s purpose in writing the
p
assage?
A) To instill
confidence in the young about raising children.
B) To advise couples to think twice
before having children.
C) To encourage
the young to take care of the elderly.
D) To appeal for tax reduction for
raising children.
Passage
Two
Questions 61 to 65 are based on the
following passage.
Space exploration
has always been the province of dreamers: The
human imagination readily
soars where
human
ingenuity
(
创造力
)struggles to
follow.
A Voyage to the
Moon
,often cited as
the
first science fiction story, was written by Cyrano
de Bergerac in 1649. Cyrano was dead and
buried for a good three centuries
before the first manned rockets started to fly.
In 1961, when President Kennedy
declared that America would send a man to the moon
by
the decade’s end,
those
words, too, had a dreamlike quality. They
< br>resonated
(
共鸣
)
with optimism
and ambition in much the
same way as the most famous dream speech of all,
delivered by Martin
Luther King Jr. two
years later. By the end of the decade, both
visions had yielded concrete results
and transformed American society. And
yet in many ways the two dreams ended up at odds
with
each other. The fight for racial
and economic equality is intensely
pragmatic
(
讲求实用的
) and
immediate
in
its
impact.
The
urge
to
explore
space
is
just
the
opposite.
It
is
figuratively
and
literally otherworldly in its aims.
When
the
dust
settled,
the
space
dreamers
lost
out.
There
was
no
grand
follow-up
to
the
Apollo missions. The technologically
compromised space shuttle program has just come to
an end,
with
no
successor.
The
perpetual
argument
is
that
funds
are
tight,
that
we
have
more
pressing
problems here on
Earth. Amid the current concerns about the federal
deficit, reaching toward the
stars
seems
a
dispensable
luxury
—
as
if
saving
one-
thousandth
of
a
single
year’s
budget
would
solve our problems.
But
human ingenuity struggles on. NASA is developing a
series of robotic probes that will
get
the
most
bang
from
a
buck.
They
will
serve
as
modem
Magellans,
mapping
out
the
solar
system for whatever explorers follow,
whether man or machine. On the flip side,
companies like
Virgin Galactic are
plotting a bottom-up assault on the space dream by
making it a reality to the
public.
Private spaceflight could lie within reach of rich
civilians in a few years. Another decade
or two and it could go mainstream.
The
space
dreamers
end
up
benefiting
all
of
us
—
not
just
because
of
the
way
they
expand
human
knowledge,
or
because
of
the
spin-off
technologies
they
produce,
but
because
the
two
types of dreams feed off each other.
Both Martin Luther King and John Kennedy appealed
to the
idea that humans can transcend
what were once considered inherent limitations.
Today we face
seeming challenges in
energy, the environment, health care. Tomorrow we
will transcend these as
well,
and
the
dreamers
will
deserve
a
lot
of
the
credit.
The
more
evidence
we
collect
that
our
species is capable of greatness, the
more we will actually achieve it.
注意：此部分试题请在
答题卡
2
上作答。
61. The author
mentions Cyrano de Bergerac in order to show
that_________.
A) imagination is the
mother of invention
B) ingenuity is
essential for science fiction writers
C) it takes patience for humans to
realize their dreams
D) dreamers have
always been interested in science fiction
62. How did the general public view
Kennedy’s
space exploration plan?
A) It symbolized the American spirit.
B) It was as urgent as racial equality.
C) It sounded very much like a dream.
D) It made an ancient dream come true.
63. What does the author say about
America’s aim to explore space?
A) It may not bring about immediate
economic gains.
B) It cannot be
realized without technological innovation.
C) It will not help the realization of
racial and economic equality.
D) It
cannot be achieved without a good knowledge of the
other worlds.
64. What is the
author’s attitude toward space
programs?
A) Critical.
C) Unbiased.
B)
Reserved.
D) Supportive.
65. What does the author think of the
problems facing human beings?
A) They
pose a serious challenge to future human
existence.
B) They can be solved sooner
or later with human ingenuity.
C) Their
solutions need joint efforts of the public and
privatesectors.
D) They can only be
solved by people with optimism andambition.
Part IV
Translation(30
minutes)
Directions:
For
this
part,
you
are
allowed
30
minutes
to
translate
a
passage
from
Chinese
intoEnglish. You
should write your answer on Answer Sheet 2.
中国园林（
the
Chinese
garden
）是经过三千多年演变而成的独具一格的园林景观
（
landscape
）。它既包括为
皇室成员享乐而建造的大型花园，也包括学者、商人和卸任的政
府官员为摆脱嘈杂的外部
世界而建造的私家花园。
这些花园构成了一种意在表达人与自然之
间应有的和稭关系的微缩景观。
典型的中国园林四周有围墙，
园内有池塘、
假山
（
rockwork
）
、
树木、
花
草以及各种各样由蜿蜒的小路和走廊连接的建筑。
漫步在花园中，
人们可以看到一
系列精心设计的景观犹如山水画卷（
scro
ll
）一般展现在面前。
注意：此部
分试题请在
答题卡
2
上作答。
答案
1~5 CDADB
6~10
ABCAC
11~15 BDCBA
16~20
DDCBA
21~25 CADBB
26.
Legislation
27. instruction
28. efficient
29. dropout
30. motivation
31.
discipline
32. contend
33.
in favor of 34. at their disposal
35.
inferior to
36~40 HLIJA
41~45 FGNBK
46~50 GBAOF
51~55 JNMLE
56~60 BCADD
61~65 ACADB
2013
年
12
月大学英语六级考试真题（第
2<
/p>
套）
Part I Writing
(30 minutes)
（请于正式开考后半小时内完成该部分，之后将进行听力考试）
Directions: For this part, you are
allowed 30 minutes to write an essay about the
impact of the
information explosion by
referring to the saying “A wealth of information
creates a poverty of
atten
tion.” You can give
examples to illustrate your point and then explain
what you can do to
avoid being
distracted by irrelevant information. You should
write at least 150 words but no more
than 200 words.
Part II Listening Comprehension
(30 minutes)
Section A
Directions: In
this section, you will hear 8 short conversations
and 2 long conversations. At the
end of
each conversation, one or more questions will be
asked about what was said. Both the
conversation and the questions will be
spoken only once. After each question there will
be a pause.
During the pause, you must
read the four choices marked A), B), C) and D),
and decide which is
the best answer.
Then mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet
1 with a single line through
the
centre.
1. A) Labor problems.
B) Weather conditions.
C) An error in the order.
D)
Misplacing of goods.
2. A) What the
woman says makes a lot of sense.
B) The rich are
opposed to social welfare.
C) He is
sympathetic with poor people.
D) He
agrees
with Mr. Johnson’s
views.
3. A) He will be
practicing soccer.
B) He
has work to finish in time.
C)
He will be attending a meeting.
D) He
has a tough problem to solve.
4. A)
Mary should get rid of her pet as soon as
possible.
B) Mary will not be able to
keep a dog in the building.
C)Mary is
not happy with the ban on pet animals.
D)Mary might as well send her dog to
her relative.
5.A) The twins’ voices
are quite different.
B) Lisa
and Gale are not very much alike.
C) He
does not believe they are twin sisters.
D) The woman seems a bit
hard of hearing.
6.A) The serious
economic crisis in Britain.
B) A
package deal to be signed in November.
C) A message from their business
associates.
D) Their ability to deal
with financial problems.
7.A) It is
impossible to remove the stain completely.
B) The man will be charged extra for
the service.
C) The man has to go to
the main cleaning facility.
D) Cleaning
the pants will take longer than usual.
8.A) European markets.
B) A
protest rally.
C) Luxury goods.
D) Imported products.
Questions 9 to 12 are based on the
conversation you have just heard.
9.A) He made a business trip.
B) He had a quarrel with Marsha.
C) He talked to her on the phone.
D) He resolved a budget problem.
10.A) She may have to be fired for poor
performance.
B) She has developed some
serious mental problem.
C) She is in
charge of the firm’s budget planning.
D) She supervises a number of important
projects.
11.A) She failed to arrive at
the airport on time.
B) David promised
to go on the trip in her place.
C)
Something unexpected happened at her home.
D) She was not feeling herself on that
day.
12.A) He frequently gets things
mixed up.
B) He is always finding fault
with Marsha.
C) He has been trying hard
to cover for Marsha.
D) He often fails
to follow through on his projects.
Questions 13 to 15 are based on the
conversation you have just heard.
13.A) They are better sheltered from
all the outside temptations.
B) They
are usually more motivated to compete with their
peers.
C) They have more opportunities
to develop their leadership skills.
D)
They make an active part in more extracurricular
activities.
14.A) Its chief positions
are held by women.
B) Its teaching
staff consists of women only.
C) Its
students aim at managerial posts.
D)
Its students are role models of women.
15.A) It is under adequate control.
B) It is traditional but colourful.
C) They are more or less isolated from
the outside world.
D) They
have ample opportunities to meet the opposite sex.
Section B
Directions: In this section, you will
hear 3 short passages. At the end of each passage,
you will
hear some questions. Both the
passage and the questions will be spoken only
once. After you hear
a question, you
must choose the best answer from the four choices
marked A), B), C) and D).
Then mark the
corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 1with a
single line through the centre.
Passage
One
Questions 16 to 19 are based on the
passage you have just heard.
16.A) By
invading the personal space of listeners.
B) By making gestures at strategic
points.
C) By speaking in a deep, loud
voice.
D) By speaking with the local
accent.
17.A) To promote sportsmanship
among business owners.
B) To encourage
people to support local sports groups.
C) To raise money for a forthcoming
local sports event.
D) To
show his family’s contribution to the
community.
18.A) They are
known to be the style of the sports world.
B) They would certainly appeal to his
audience.
C) They represent the latest
fashion in the business circles.
D)
They are believed to communicate power and
influence.
19.A) To cover up his own
nervousness.
B) To create a warm
personal atmosphere.
C) To enhance the
effect of background music.
D) To allow
the audience to better enjoy his slides.
Passage Two
Questions 20 to 22 are based on the
passage you have just heard.
20.A) She
was the first educated slave of John
Whitley’s.
B) She was the
greatest female poet in Colonial America.
C) She was born about the time of the
War of Independence.
D) She was the
first African-American slave to publish a book.
21.A) Revise in a number of times.
B) Obtain consent from her owner.
C) Go through a scholarly examination.
D) Turn to the colonial governor for
help.
22.A) Literary works calling for
the abolition of slavery.
B) Religious
scripts popular among slaves in America.
C) A rich stock of manuscripts left by
historical figures.
D) Lots of lost
works written by African-American women.
Passage Three
Questions 23 to 25 are based on the
passage you have just heard.
23.A) It
is a trait of generouscharacter.
B) It is a reflection of self-esteem.
C) It is an indicator of high
intelligence.
D) It is a sign of
happiness and confidence.
24.A) It was
self-defeating.
B) It was aggressive.
C) It was the essence of comedy.
D) It was something admirable.
25.A) It is a double-edged sword.
B) It is a feature of a given culture.
C) It is a unique gift of human beings.
D) It is a result of both nature and
nurture.
Section C
Directions: In this section, you will
hear a passage three times. When the passage is
read for the
first time, you should
listen carefully for its general idea. When the
passage is read for the second
time,
you are required to fill in the blanks with the
exact words you have just heard. Finally, when
the passage is read for the third time,
you should check what you have written.
It is important that we be mindful of
the earth, the planet out of which we are born and
by which
we are nourished, guided,
healed
—
the planet, however,
which we have (26)_______to a
considerable degree in these past two
centuries of (27)_______ exploitation. This
exploitation has
reached such
(28)_______ that presently it appears that some
hundreds of thousands of species
will
be (29)_______ before the end of the century.
In our times, human shrewdness has
mastered the deep (30)_______ of the earth at a
level far
beyond the capacities of
earlier peoples. We can break the mountains apart;
we can drain the
rivers and flood the
valleys. We can turn the most luxuriant forests
into throwaway paper products.
We can
(31)_______ the great grass cover of the western
plains and pour (32)_______ chemicals
into the soil until the soil is dead
and blows away in the wind. We can pollute the air
with acids,
the rivers with
sewage(
污水
), the seas with
oil. We can invent computers (33)_______
processing
ten million calculations per
second. And why?To increase the volume and the
speed with which
we move natural
resources through the consumer economy to the junk
pile or the waste heap. Our
managerial
skills are measured by the competence (34)_______
in accelerating this process. If in
these activities the physical features
of the planet are damaged, if the environment is
made
inhospitable for (35)_______
living species, then so be it. We are, supposedly,
creating a
technological wonderworld.
Part III
Reading Comprehension (40 minutes)
Section A
Directions: Inthis
section, there is a passage with ten blanks. You
are required to select one word
for
each blank from a list of choices given in a word
bank following the passage. Read the passage
through carefully before making your
choices. Each choice in the bank is identified by
a letter.
Please mark the corresponding
letter for each item on Answer Sheet 2with a
single line through
the centre. You may
not use any of the words in the bank more than
once.
Questions 36 to 45 are based on
the following passage.
Quite often, educators tell families of
children who are learning English as a second
language to
speak only English, and not
their native language, at home. Although these
educators may have
good36
,their advice to families is misguided,
and it
37
from
misunderstandings about the
process of
language acquisition. Educators may fear that
children hearing two languages will
become 38
confused and thus their language
development will be 39
;this concern is not
documented in the literature. Children
are capable of learning more than one language,
whether
40
or
sequentially(
依次地
). In fact,
most children outside of the United States are
expected to
become bilingual or even,
in many cases, multilingual. Globally, knowing
more than one language
is viewed as an
41
and even a necessity in
many areas.
It is also of concern that
the misguided advice that students should speak
only English is given
primarily to poor
families with limited educational opportunities,
not to wealthier families who
have many
educational advantages. Since children from poor
families often are
42
as at-risk
for academic
failure, teachers believe that advising families
to speak English only is appropriate.
Teachers consider learning two
languages to be too
43
for children from poor families,
believing that the children are already
burdened by their home situations.
If
families do not know English or have limited
English skills themselves, how can they
communicate in English? Advising non-
English-speaking families to speak only English is
44
to telling them not to
communicate with or interact with their children.
Moreover, the
45message is
that the family's native language is not important
or valued.
注意：此部分试题请在答题卡
2
上作答。
A) asset
B) delayed
C) deviates
D) equivalent
E) identified
F) intentions
G) object
H) overwhelming
I)
permanently
J) prevalent
K)
simultaneously
L) stems
M)
successively
N) underlying
O) visualizing
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 Uses of
Difficulty
The brain likes a
challenge
—
and putting a few
obstacles in its way may well boost its
creativity.
A)
Jack White, the former
frontman of the White Stripes and an influential
figure among fellow
musicians, likes to
make things difficult for himself. He uses cheap
guitars that won’t stay in
shape or in
tune. When performing, he positions his
instruments in a way that is deliberately
inconvenient, so that switching from
guitar to organ mid-song involves a mad dash
across the
stage. Why? Because he’s on
the run from what he describes as a disease that
preys on every artist:
“ease of use”.
When making music gets too easy, says White, it
becomes harder to make it sing.
B)
I
t’s an odd
thought. Why would anyone make their work more
difficult than it already is? Yet
we
know that difficulty can pay unexpected dividends.
In 1966, soon after the Beatles had finished
work on “Rubber Soul”, Paul McCartney
looked into the possibility
of going to
America to record
their next album. The
equipment in American studios was more advanced
than anything in Britain,
which had led
the Beatles’ great rivals, the Rolling Stones, to
make their latest album,
“Aftermath”,
in Los Angeles. McCartney f
ound that
EMI
’
s
(
百代唱片
) contractual clauses
made
it prohibitively expensive to
follow suit, and the Beatles had to make do with
the primitive
technology of Abbey Road.
C)
Lucky for us. Over the
next two years they made their most groundbreaking
work, turning
the recording studio into
a magical instrument of its own. Precisely because
they were working
with old-fashioned
machines, George Martin and his team of engineers
were forced to apply every
ounce of
their creativity to solve the problems posed to
them by Lennon and McCartney. Songs
like “Tomorrow Never Knows”,
“Strawberry Fields Forever”, and “A Day in the
Life” featured
revolutionary sound
effects that dazzled and mystified Martin’s
American counterparts.
D)
Sometimes it’s only when a difficulty
is remo
ved that we realise what it was
doing for us. For
more than two
decades, starting in the 1960s, the poet Ted
Hughes sat on the judging panel of an
annual poetry competition for British
schoolchildren. During the 1980s he noticed an
increasing
number of long poems among
the submissions, with some running to 70 or 80
pages. These poems
were verbally
inventive and fluent, but also “strangely boring”.
After making inquiries Hughes
discovered that they were being
composed on computers, then just finding their way
into British
homes.
E)
You might have thought any tool which
enables a writer to get words on to the page would
be
an advantage. But there may be a
cost to such facility. In an interview with the
Paris Review
Hughes speculated that
when a person puts pen
to paper, “you
meet the terrible resistance of what
happened your first year at it, when
you couldn’t write at all”. As the brain attempts
to force the
unsteady hand to do its
bidding, the tension between the two results in a
more compressed,
psychologically denser
expression. Remove that resistance and you are
more likely to produce a
70-page ramble
(
不着边际的长篇大论
).
F)
Our brains respond better
to difficulty than we imagine. In schools,
teachers and pupils alike
often assume
that if a concept has been easy to learn, then the
lesson has been successful. But
numerous studies have now found that
when classroom material is made harder to absorb,
pupils
retain more of it over the long
term, and understand it on a deeper level.
G)
As a poet, Ted Hughes had
an acute sensitivity to the way in which
constraints on
self-expression, like
the disciplines of metre and rhyme
(
韵律
), spur creative thought.
What
applies to poets and musicians
also applies to our daily lives. We tend to
equate
（等同于）
happiness with
freedom, but, as the psychotherapist and writer
Adam Phillips has observed,
without
obstacles to our desires
it
’
s harder to know what we
want, or where we
’
re
heading. He
tells the story of a
patient, a first-time mother who complained that
her young son was always
clinging to her, wrapping himself
around her legs wherever she went. She never had a
moment to
herself, she said, because
her son was “always in the way”. When Phillips
asked her where she
would go if he
wasn’t in the way, she replied cheerfully, “Oh, I
wouldn’t know where I was!”
H)
Take another common
obstacle: lack of money. People often assume that
more money will
make them happier. But
economists who study the relationship between
money and happiness
have consistently
found that, above a certain income, the two do not
reliably correlate. Despite the
ease
with which the rich can acquire almost anything
they desire, they are just as likely to be
unhappy as the middle classes. In this
regard at least, F. Scott Fitzgerald was wrong.
I)
Indeed, ease of
acquisition is the problem. The novelist Edward St
Aubyn has a narrator
remark of the very
rich that,
“
not having to
consider affordability, their desires rambled on
like
unstoppable bores, relentless
(
持续不断的
) and
whimsical
（反复无常的）
at the same
time.” When
Boston College, a private
research university, wanted a better feel for its
potential donors, it asked
the
psychologist Robert Kenny to investigate the
mindset of the super-rich. He surveyed 165
households, most of which had a net
worth of $$25m or more. He found that many of his
subjects
were confused by the infinite
options their money presented them with. They
found it hard to
know what to want,
creating a kind of existential bafflement. One of
them put it like this: “You
know, Bob,
you can just buy so much stuff, and when you get
to the point where you can just buy
so
much stuff, now what are you going to
do?”
J)
The
internet makes information billionaires out of all
of us, and the architects of our online
experiences are catching on to the need
to make things creativel
y difficult.
Twitter’s huge success
is rooted in the
simple but profound insight that in a medium with
infinite space for
self-expression, the
most interesting thing we can do is restrict
ourselves to 140 characters. The
music
service This Is My Jam helps people navigate the
tens of millions of tracks now available
instantly via Spotify and iTunes. Users
pick their favourite song of the week to share
with others.
They only get to choose
one. The service was only launched this year, but
by the end of
September 650,000 jams
had been chosen. Its co-founder Matt Ogle explains
its raison d
’ê
tre
(
存
在的理由
) like
this: “In an age of endless choice, we were
missing a way to say: ‘This. This is the
one you should listen to’.”
K)
Today’s world offers more
opportunity than
ever to follow the
advice of the Walker Brothers
and make
it easy on ourselves. Compared with a hundred
years ago, our lives are less tightly
bound by social norms and physical
constraints. Technology has cut out much of life’s
donkeywork, and we have more freedoms
than ever: we can wear what we like and
communicate
with hundreds of friends at
once at the click of a mouse. Obstacles are
everywhere disappearing.
Few of us wish
to turn the clock back, but perhaps we need to
remind ourselves how useful the
right
obstacles can be. Sometimes, the best route to
fulfilment is the path of more resistance.
注意：此部分试题请在答题卡
2
上作答。
46. The rigorous requirements
placed on the writing of poetry stimulate the
poet’s creativity.
47. With
creativity, even old-fashioned instruments may
produce spectacular sound effects.
48.
More money does not necessarily bring greater
happiness.
49. It IS a false assumption
that lessons should be made easier to learn.
50. Obstacles deliberately placed in
the creation of music contribute to its success.
51. Those who enjoy total freedom may
not find themselves happy.
52. Ted
Hughes discovered many long poems submitted for
poetry competition were composed
oncomputers.
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