-
unit 1
unit 1
An IMPRESSIVE English lesson
一堂难忘的英语课
1. If I am the only
parent who still corrects his
child’s
English, then
perhaps my son is
right. To
him, I am a tedious oddity: a father he is obliged
to listen to and a man
absorbed in the
rules of grammar, which my son seems allergic to.
如果我是唯一一个还在纠正小孩英语的家长，那么我儿子也许是对的。
< br>
对他而
言，我是一个乏味的怪物：一个他不得不听其教
诲的父亲，一个还沉湎于语法规
则的人，对此我儿子似乎颇为反感。
2. I think I got serious about this
only recently when I ran into one of my former
stud
ents, fresh from an excursion to
Europe
.“How
was
it”
I asked, full of earnest
anticipation.
我觉得我是在最近偶遇我以前
的一位学生时，才开始对这个问题认真起来的。这
个学生刚从欧洲旅游回来。
我满怀着诚挚期待问她：
“
欧洲之行如何？
”
3. She nodded three or four times
searched the heavens for the right words, and
then exclaimed,
it was like, whoa!
她点了三四下头，绞尽脑汁，苦苦寻找恰当的词
语，然后惊呼：
“
真是，哇！
”
4. And that was
it. The civilization of Greece and the glory of
Roman architecture we
re captured in
condensed non-statement. My student
“whoa”
was exceeded only by
my head-shaking distress.
没了。
所有希腊文明和罗马建筑的辉
煌居然囊括于一个浓缩的、不完整的语句
之中！
我的学生以
“
哇！
”
来表示她的惊叹，我只能以摇头表达比之更强烈的忧
虑。
5. There are many
different stories about the downturn in the proper
use of English.
Surely students should
be able to distinguish between their/there/they're
on the disti
nctive difference between
complimentary and complementary. They unfairly
bear the
bulk of the criticism for
these knowledge deficits because there is a sense
that they sho
uld know better.
关于正确使用英语能力下降的问题，有许多不同的故事。
学生的确本应该能够
区分诸如
their/
there/they're
之间的不同，或区别
compli
mentary
跟
complementary
之间显而易见的差异。
由于这些知识缺陷，他们承
受着大部分不该承受的批评
和指责，因为舆论认为他们应该学得更好。
< br>
6. Students are not
dump, but they are being misled everywhere they
look and listen.
For example, signs in
grocery stores point them to the stationary, even
though the actu
al stationery items-
pads, albums and notebooks-are not nailed down.
Friends and love
d ones often proclaim
they've just ate when, in fact, they've just
eaten. Therefore, it do
esn't make any
sense to criticize our students
学生并不笨，他们只是被周围所看到和听到的语言误导了。
<
/p>
举例来说，杂货店
的指示牌会把他们引向
stationary
（静止处），虽然便笺本、相册、和笔记本等真
< br>正的
stationery
（文具用品）并没有被钉在那
儿。
朋友和亲人常宣称
They've just
ate
。实际上，他们应该说
They've just
eaten
。
因此，批评学生不合乎情理。
7. Blame for the scandal of this
language deficit should be thrust upon our
schools, whi
ch should be setting high
standards of English language proficiency.
Instead they only t
each a little
grammar and even less advanced vocabulary.
Moreover, the younger teac
hers
themselves evidently have little knowledge of
these vital structures of language
because they also went without exposure
to them. Schools fail to adequately teach
the
essential framework of language,
accurate grammar and proper vocabulary, while
the
y should take the responsibility of
pushing the young onto the path of competent
com
munication.
对这种缺乏语言功底而引
起的负面指责应归咎于我们的学校。学校应对英语熟练
程度制定出更高的标准。
可相反，学校只教零星的语法，高级词汇更是少之又
< br>少。
还有就是，学校的年轻教师显然缺乏这些重要的语
言结构方面的知识，因
为他们过去也没接触过。
学校有责任教会年轻人进行有效的语言沟通，可他们
并没把语言的基本框架<
/p>
——
准确的语法和恰当的词汇
——
充分地传授给学生。
8. Since grammar is boring to most of
the young students I think that it must be
handl
ed delicately, step by step. The
chance came when one day I was driving with my
son.
As we set out on our trip, he
noticed a bird in jerky flight and said,
“It's
flying so
unstea
dy. I carefully asked, my son,
how is the bird flying?
“What’s
wrong? Did I say
anything
incorrectly?”
He
got lost.
“Great!
You said
incorrectly instead of incorrect. We use
adve
rbs to describe verbs. Therefore,
it's flying so unsteadily but not so
unsteady.”
因为语法对
大多数年轻学生而言枯燥且乏味，所以我觉得讲授语法得一步一步、
注重技巧地进行。<
/p>
有一天机会来了。我跟儿子开车外出。
我们出发时，他看到
一只小鸟飞得很不稳，就说：
“
它飞的不稳。
”
（
It's flying so
unsteady.
）
我小心翼
翼地问：
“
儿子，鸟怎么飞
?” “
有问题吗？我说得不对吗？（
Did I
say anything
incorrectly?
）
”
他一头雾水。
“
太好了，
你说的是
incorrectly
而不是
incorrect
。我
们用副词来描述动词。所以，要用<
/p>
unsteadily
来描述鸟飞
，而不是
unsteady
。
”
9. Curious about my
correction, he asked me what an adverb was.
Slowly, I said,
“it's
a
word that tells you something about a
verb.”
It led to his asking
me what a verb was. I
explained,
“Verbs
are action words; for
example, Dad drives the truck. Drive is the
verb
because it's the thing Dad is
doing.”
他对我的纠正很好奇，就问我什么是副词。
< br>我慢慢解释道：
“
副词是用来修饰动
词的词。
”
这又导致了他询问我什么是动词。
我
解释说：
“
动词是表示行为的
词，例如
：爸爸开卡车。
‘
开
’
是动词，因为它是爸爸在做的事。
”
10. He became attracted to
the idea of action words, so we listed a few more:
fly, swim
, dive, run. Then, out of his
own curiosity, he asked me if other words had
names for th
eir use and functions. This
led it a discussion of nouns, adjectives, and
article. Within th
e span of a 10 -
minute drive, he had learned from scratch to the
major parts of speech
in a sentence. It
was painless learning and great fun!
他开始对表示行为的词产生兴趣，所以我们又罗列了几个动词：
“
飞行
”
、
“
游
泳
”
、
“
跳水
”
、
“
跑步
”
。
然后，他又好奇地问我，其他的词有没有说明它们的用
法和功能的名称。
这就引发了我们对名词、形容词和冠词的讨论。
在短短十分
钟的驾驶时间内，他从对语法一无所知到学会了句子中主要词语的
词性。
这是
一次毫无痛苦而又非常有
趣的学习经历。
11.
Perhaps, language should be looked upon as a road
map and a valuable possessio
n: often
study the road map (check grammar) and tune up the
car engine (adjust vocab
ulary).Learning
grammar and a good vocabulary is just like driving
with a road map in a
well-conditioned
car.
也许，语言应该被看成是一张路线图和一件珍品：
我们要常常查看路线图（核对
语法）和调整汽车的引擎（调节词汇）。
< br>
学好语法和掌握大量的词汇就好比拿着
路线图在车况良
好的车里驾驶。
12. The
road map provides the framework and guidance you
need for your trip, but it
won’t
tell you exactly what
trees or flowers you will see, what kind of people
you will e
ncounter, or what types of
feelings you will be experiencing on your journey.
Here, the
vocabulary makes the journey
true colors come alive!A good vocabulary enable
you to
enjoy whatever you see as you
drive along. Equipped with grammar and a good
vocab
ulary, you have flexibility and
excellent control. While the road map guides your
journe
y to your destination, an
excellent vehicle helps you to fully enjoy all of
the sights, soun
ds and experiences
along the way.
路线图为你的旅行提供所需的基本路线和路途指南
，可是它不会告诉你一路上你
究竟会看见什么树或什么花，你会遇见什么样的人，或会有
什么样的感受。
这
里，词汇会使你的
旅途变得五彩缤纷、栩栩如生。
大量的词汇让你享受到开车<
/p>
途中所见的点点滴滴。
借助语法和丰富的词汇，你就有了灵活性，掌控自如。
路线图会把你带到目的地，而一台好车却能让你完全陶醉于旅途的所有景色、声
音及经历之中。
对学生来说，有效、准确且富有成效
的沟通技能取决于语法和词汇这两大有利条
件，可是学校并没有教他们这些。
13. Effective, precise and
beneficial communication depends upon grammar and
a good
vocabulary the two essential
assets for students, but they are not being taught
in schools.
对学生来说，有效、准确且富有成效
的沟通技能取决于语法和词汇这两大有利条
件，可是学校并没有教他们这些。
14. Just this
morning, my son and I were eating breakfast when I
attempted to add milk
to my
tea.
“Dad,”
he said,
“If
I were you, I
wouldn’t
do that.
It’s
sour.”
就在今天早
上，我跟儿子吃早饭时，我想把牛奶加入我的茶里。
“
爸爸，
”
他说，
“
如果我是
你的话，我不会这样
做。牛奶会变酸。
（
If I were you, I
wouldn't do that. It's
sour.
）
”
15.
“Oh
my!”
I said, swelling with
pride toward my son,
“that’s
a grammatically perfect
sentence. You
used were instead of
was.”
“
哦，上帝！
”
我满怀着无比的骄傲说
道，
“
这是
一句语法完全正确的句子。你用了
were
而不是
was
。
”
16.
“I
know, I know,
“he
said with a long
agreeable sigh.
“It's
the
subjunctive
mood.”
< br>“
我知道，我知道，
”
他愉悦地
舒了口气，
“
这是虚拟语气！
”
17. I was like, whoa!
< br>这下轮到我
“
哇！
”
了。
unit
2Text A
课文
A
The humanities: Out of
date?
人文学科：过时了吗？
1
When the going gets tough,
the tough takeaccounting. When the job market
worsens,
manystudents
calculate
they can't major
in English orhistory. They have to study
somet
hing that boosts their
prospects
of landing a
job.
当形势变得困难时，强者会去选学会计。当就业市场
恶化时，许多学生估算着他
们不能再主修英语或历史。他们得学一些能改善他们就业前景
的东西。
2
The data
show that as students have increasingly shouldered
the ever-rising cost of tuiti
on,they
have defected from the study of the humanities and
toward applied science and
more andmore seen as a means for economic
betterment rather than a means for human
is a
trend
that
is likely to persist and even
accelerate
.
数据显示，随着学生肩负的学费不断增加，他们已从学习人文学科转向他们相信
有益于将来就业的应用科学和
“
硬
”
技能。换言之，大学教育越来越被看成是改善
经济而不是提升
人类自身的手段。这种趋势可能会持续，甚至有加快之势。
3
Over the next few years, as labor
markets struggle, the humanities will probably
continu
e theirlong
slide
in succession. There
already has been a nearly 50 percent
decline
in the
portion
of
liberal
arts majors over
the past generation, and it is
logical
to think that the
trend
is boundto continue or
even
accelerate
. Once the
dominant
pillars of
university l
ife, the humanities nowplay
little roles when students take their college
tours. These day
s, labs are more
vivid
and
compelling
than
libraries.
在未来几年内，由于劳动力市场的不景
气，人文学科可能会继续其长期低迷的态
势。在上一代大学生中，主修文科的学生数跌幅
已近
50%
。这种趋势会持续、甚<
/p>
至加速的想法是合情合理的。人文学科曾是大学生活的重要支柱，而今在学生们
参观校园的时候，却只是一个小点缀。现在，实验室要比图书馆更栩栩如生、受
人青睐。
4
Here,
please allow me to stand up for and
promote
the true value that
the humanities ad
d topeople's
lives.
在这儿，请允许我为人文学科给人们的生活所增
添的真实价值进行支持和宣传。
5
Since ancient times, people have
speculated aboutthe
mystery
of those inner forces that
drive
somepeople to greatness and others to
self-
destruction
.This inner
drive has been c
alled many things
over thecenturies. The famous
psychologist
, SigmundFreud,
called i
t the
unconscious
mind
instinct
自古以来，人们一直在思索人类自身具有什么神奇的内力使一些人变得崇高伟
大，而使另一些人走向自我毁灭。几个世纪以来，这股内力被称作很多东西。著
名的
心理学家西格蒙德
·
弗洛伊德称之为
“
潜意识
”
，或更为人熟知的
“
本能
”
。
6
From the beginning
of time, this inner aspect of our being, this
drive that can be
constru
ctive
or
destructive
, has captured
our imagination. The stories of this amazing
struggle
have formedthe basis of
cultures the world over. Historians, architects,
authors, philoso
phers and artistshave
captured the words, images and meanings of this
inner struggle in
the form of
story,music,
myth
, painting,
architecture,
sculpture
,
landscape
and
traditio
ns. These men andwomen
developed
artistic
understand
these
aspirations and alsoeducate generations. This
fertile
body of work from
ancient times, t
he very
foundation
ofcivilization,
forms the basis of study of the
humanities.
从一开始，
人类这股可以是建设性也可以是毁灭性的内在驱动力，就令我们心驰
神往。这些惊人的、
充满内心挣扎的故事形成了世界文化的基础。历史学家、建
筑师、作家、哲学家和艺术家
们以故事、音乐、神话、绘画、建筑、雕刻、风景
画和传统的形式，捕捉到了这些撞击心
灵的文字、形象及内涵。这些男男女女创
造出了具有艺术性的
“
语言
”
，帮助我们了解人类的这些强烈
愿望，并用以教育一
代又一代人。从古时起开始的这些充满想象的大量作品，正是文明的
底蕴，它奠
定了人文研究的基础。
7
Studying the humanities improves our
ability to read and write. No matter what we do
i
n life, we
will have a huge
advantage
if we can read
complex
ideas and
understand
their
meanin
g. Wewill have a bright career if
we are the person in the office who can write a
clear an
d
elegantanalysis
of those
ideas!
学习人文学科会提高我们的阅读和写作能力。无
论我们这一生中从事什么职业，
如果我们能读懂复杂的思想并理解它们的内涵，我们都会
受益匪浅。如果我们是
在办公室里能对这些思想写出既明确又简洁的分析的人，我们会有
光明的职业前
景。
8
Studying the humanities makes us
familiar with thelanguage of emotion and the
creativ
e
process.
In aninformation economy, many people have the
ability to
produce
a useful
product such as a
new MP3 , very few people
have the ability to create
a
s
pectacular
brand
: the iPod.
Most importantly,studying
the humanities invests us wit
h
great
insight
and
self-
awareness
,
thereby
releasing
our
creative
energy and
talent in a
positive
and
constructive
manner.
学习人文学科会让我们熟悉表达情感的语言及
进行创造的过程。在信息经济中，
很多人都有能力创造出一个如新的
MP3
播放器那样的有用产品。然而，仅有很
少的人具
有能力创造出一个如
iPod
那样的精彩品牌。最重要的是
，学习人文学科
使我们具有伟大的洞察力和自我意识，从而以积极和建设性的方式来发挥
我们的
创造力和才艺。
9
Perhaps the best argument in favor of
the humanities is the
scope
of possibilities that are
widely
open to us. Did you know
that James Cameron, world-famous
director
of the
movie,
Titanic, graduated
with a degree in the humanities? So did Sally
Ride, the first woman i
n did actors
Bruce Lee, Gwyneth Paltrow, Renee Zellweger and
Matt Damon.
Dr. HaroldVarmus, who won a
Nobel Prize for Medicine, studied the humanities.
Even
Michael Eisner,
Chairman of
the Disney
Company, majored in the humanities. Famous people
who stu
died the
humanities
make a long list indeed. It's easy to see that the
humanities can prepare us fo
r
many different careers and jobs we can
undertake, whether medicine, business, science
or
entertainment
.
也许，支持人文学科的最好论点是，人文学科为我们提供了广阔的机会
。你知道
世界闻名的电影《泰坦尼克号》的导演詹姆斯
·
卡梅隆拿的是人文学科的学位吗？
第一个登上太空的女宇航员萨利
·
赖德拿的也是人文学科的学位。还有电影演员李
< br>小龙、格温妮丝
·
帕特洛
·
蕾妮
·
齐薇格及马特
·
达蒙，也都如此。获诺贝尔医学奖的
哈罗德
·
瓦慕斯博士也学过人文学科。甚至迪士尼公司的总裁迈克尔
< br>·
艾斯纳也主
修人文学科。学习人文学科的有名人士确实
可以列出一长串。显而易见，人文学
能为我们从事许多不同的职业做准备，不管是医学、
商务、科学或娱乐。
10
If
we study only mathematics, it's likely we will be
a
candidate
only for jobs as
a mathe
matician. If weinclude studying
the humanities, we can makebreakthroughs on many
ba
rriers and are
limited
onlyby our effort
and imagination.
如果我们仅学习数学，我
们很可能只能申请数学家之类的工作。如果我们还学了
人文学科，那我们就能突破许多障
碍，只要我们愿意付出努力，敢于想象。
11
Of course, nowadays, if we study the
humanitiesalone, we are
liable
to miss many
oppo
rtunities.
Each one of
us needs to become as technically and
professionally skilled as possible to
help meet
the needs of
modern life. In fact, increasingly a pairing of
technical
knowledge and
inne
r
insight
is seen as the ideal in the
establishment
of a career.
If I were the Dean of Ad
missionsat a
medical school and two people applied to our
school, both having the requi
red
basicscientific courses, one a philosophy major
and the other solely a pre-med stude
nt,
the philosophy
applicant
would be chosen.
当然，在当下，如果我们
单学人文学科，可能会失去很多机会。我们每个人都需
要尽可能变得技能化、职业化，以
满足现代生活的需要。事实上，技术知识和内
在洞察力的结合越来越被看成是建立职业生
涯的理想搭配。如果我是某个医学院
的招生部主任，有两个人同时申请我们学校，这两个
人都学过基础的科学课程，
一个主修哲学，另一个仅是医学院的预科生，我会选择那位哲
学专业的申请者。
12
In
summary
, the humanities help
to create well-rounded human beings with
insight
and
understanding of the passions, hopes
and dreams common to all
humanity
. The
humani
ties,the ancient timeless
reservoir
of knowledge,
teach us to see things differently and
b
roaden
our
horizons. They are as useful and
relevant
in our modern age
as
they have
al
ways 't it make sense to spend some
time in the company of the humanities,
our
outstanding
and
remarkable
treasure of
knowledge? Who knows how famous YO
U
might become!
总之，人文学科帮助造就全面发
展的人，这些人具有洞察力，并理解全人类共有
的激情、希望和理想。人文学科，这个古
老、永恒的知识储蓄库，教我们如何以
不同的方式看待事物，同时也拓宽我们的视野。在
现代社会中，人文学科一如既
往地同生活息息相关，也发挥着重要作用。我们在学习中花
一些时间与人文学科
——
我们杰出、非凡的知识宝藏
——
相伴，这难道不是明智的吗？谁知道你将来
会
变得多有名气呢！
Book 2 Unit 3 Journey through the
odyssey years
奥德赛岁月之旅
1
Most of us know about the
phases of life which we label to parallel
different age grou
ps and life stages:
childhood, adolescence, adulthood, and old age. We
think of infanc
y before childhood and
middle age before old age, with each unique phase
bringing it
s own peculiar set of
challenges. These challenges can be overcome by
acquainting o
urselves with them, such
as the child's need to learn, the adult's need to
find the right
career and build a
family, and the senior's need for support and good
health care.
我们大多数人都知道，根据不同的年龄和生活阶段，人
生可与此平行划分为童
年、青春期、成年和老年这四个阶段。我们把这些阶段想象为婴儿
期在童年之
前，中年在老年之前，每个阶段都会面临一系列特有的挑战，如孩子对学习的
需
要，成人对找到合适的职业生涯和建立一个家庭的需要，以及年长者对得到帮助
和良好医疗保健的需要。通过对它们的充分了解，我们就可以战胜这些挑战。
< br>
2
Interestingly, ideas about the stages
of life are changing.
有趣的是，关于人生阶段的观念正在发生变化。
3
In previous
times, people didn't have a solid idea of
childhood as being separate from
ad
ulthood. A hundred years ago, no one
thought of adolescence. Until recently it was
unde
rstood as a norm that their
induction to adulthood was completed as soon as
they gradua
ted from college. They would
now find a sensible job which would lead to a
career. The
n during this career they
would start a family, ideally before they turned
30.
在先前的年代，人们并没有一种固有的把童年和成年分开的想法。一百年前
，谁
也没有想到过青春期。直到最近，人们还很自然地认为：只要他们一从大学毕
业，他们的成人入门阶段就结束了。他们就会找到一份把他们引入职业生涯的合
适的工作。然后在此职业生涯期间，他们会成家，三十岁之前成家更为理想。
4
Today we have
an equivalent need to recognize a new phase of
life that comes after hig
h school
graduation, continues through college, and then
leads to starting a family and h
aving a
career, the so-called odyssey years. Recent trends
show radical changes as youn
g people
are following a different agenda. They take breaks
from school, live with frien
ds and
often return to living with their parents.
Similarly, they fall in and out of love,
qu
it one job and try another or even
shift to a new career. So, we need to recognize
this ne
w stage, the odyssey years,
which many now consider to be an unavoidable stage
in reac
hing adulthood.
今天，
我们同样需要认识一个新的人生阶段：从高中毕业到上大学，然后到成家
立业，即所谓的
奥德赛岁月。由于年轻人正按照一种不同的模式生活，最近的趋
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