专四听力

1Town and Country Life in England
There is a big difference between town life and country life in England. In the country, everybody knows everybody else. They know what time you get up, what time you go to bed and what you have for dinner. If you want help, you will always get it and you will be glad to help others.
In a large town like London, however, it can sometimes happen that you have never seen your next door neighbor and you do not know his name or anything about him. People in London are often very lonely. This is because people go to different places in the evenings and at weekends. If you walk through the streets in the centre of London on Sunday, it is like a town without people. One is sorry for old people living on their own. They could die in their homes and would not be discovered for weeks or even months.
2A Change in Women’s Life
The important change in women’s life-pattern has only recently begun to have its full effect on women’s economic position. Even a few years ago most girls left school at the first opportunity, and most of them took a full-time job. However, when they married, they usually left work at once and never returned to it. Today the school-leaving age is sixteen, many girls stay at school after that age, and though women tend to marry younger, more married women stay at work at least until shortly before their first child is born. Very many more afterwards return to full-time or part-time work. Such changes have led to a new relationship in marriage, with the husband accepting a greater share of the duties and satisfactions of family life and with both husband and wife sharing more equally in providing the money, and running the home, according to the abilities and interests of each of them.
Useful Words and Expressions:
1. life-pattern生活方式
2. share
3A Popular Pastime of the English People
One of the best means of understanding the people of any nation is watching what the do with their non-working time.
Most English men, women and children love growing things, especially flowers. Visitors to England in spring, summer or autumn are likely to see gardens all they way along the railway lines. There are flowers at the airports and flowers in factory grounds, as well as in gardens along the roads. Each English town has at least one park with beautifully kept flower beds. Public buildings of every kind have brilliant window boxes and sometimes baskets of flowers are hanging on them.
But what the English enjoy most is growing things themselves. If it is impossible to have a garden, then a window box or something growing in a pot will do. Looking at each other’s gardens is a popular pastime with the English.
Useful Words and Expressions:
1. window box:窗台上的花盆箱
2.pastime 消遣，娱乐
Swimming is my favorite pastime.
4British and American Police Officers
Real policemen, both in Britain and the U.S., har

dly recognize any common points between their lives and what they se on TV—if they ever get home in time.
Some things are almost the same, of course, but the policemen do not think much of them much of them.
The first difference is that a policeman’s real life deals with the law. Most of what he learns is the law. He has to know actually what actions are against the law and what facts can be used to prove them in court. He has to know nearly as much law as a lawyer, and what’s more, he has to put it into practice on his feet, in the dark and, running down a narrow street after someone he wants to talk to.
Little of his time is spent in talking with beautiful girls or in bravely facing cruel criminals. He will spend most of his working life arranging millions of words on thousands of forms about hundreds of sad, ordinary people who are guilty--- or not of stupid, unimportant crimes.
Useful Words and Expressions:
1. think much of 重视，尊重
2. in court 在法庭上
3. criminal 罪犯，犯罪者
4. guilty 犯罪的，有罪的
5Living Space
How much living space does a person need? What happens when his space needs are not met? Scientists are doing experiments on rats to try to determine the effects of overcrowded conditions on man. Recent studies have shown that the behavior of rats is greatly affected by space. If rats have enough living space, they eat well, sleep well and produce their young well. But if their living conditions become too crowded, their behavior and even their health change obviously. They can not sleep and eat well, and signs of fear and worry become clear. The more crowded they are, and more they tend to bite each other and even kill each other. Thus, for rats, populations and violence are directly related. Is this a natural law for human society as well? Is enough space not only satisfactory, but necessary for human survival? These are interesting questions.
6The United Nations
In 1945, representatives of 50 nations met to plan this organization. It was called the United Nations. After the war, many more nations joined.
There are two major parts of the United Nations. One is called the General Assembly. In the General Assembly, every member nation is represented and has an equal vote.
The second part is called the Security Council. It has representatives of just 15 nations. Five nations are permanent members: the United States, Russia, France, Britain, and China. The 10 other members are elected every two years by the General Assembly.
The major job of the Security Council is to keep peace in the world. If necessary, it can send troops from member nations to try to stop little wars before they turn into big ones.
It is hard to get the nations of the Security Council to agree on when this is necessary. But they did vote to try to stop wars.
Useful Words and Expressions:
1. representative 代表
2. General Assembly 联合国大会
3. permane

nt 永久的，持久的
4. Security Council 联合国安全理事会
7Plastic
We use plastic wrap to protect our foods. We put our garbage in plastic bags or plastic cans. We sit on plastic chairs, play with plastic toys, drink from plastic cups, and wash our hair with shampoo from plastic bottles!
Plastic does not grow in nature. It is made by mixing certain things together. We call it a produced or manufactured material. Plastic was first made in the 1860s from plants, such as wood and cotton. That plastic was soft and burned easily.
The first modern plastics were made in the 1930s. Most clear plastic starts out as thick, black oil. That plastic coating inside a pan begins as natural gas.
Over the years, hundreds of different plastics have been developed. Some are hard and strong. Some are soft and bendable. Some are clear. Some are many-colored. There is a plastic for almost every need. Scientists continue to experiment with plastics. They hope to find even ways to use them!
8.Display of Goods
Are supermarkets designed to persuade us to buy more?
Fresh fruit and vegetables are displayed near supermarket entrances. This gives the impression that only healthy food is sold in the shop. Basic foods that everyone buys, like sugar and tea, are not put near each other. They are kept in different aisles so customers are taken past other attractive foods before they find what they want. In this way, shoppers are encouraged to buy products that they do not really need.
Sweets are often placed at children’s eye level at the checkout. While parents are waiting to pay, children reach for the sweets and put them in the trolley.
More is bought from a fifteen-foot display of one type of product than from a ten-foot one. Customers also buy more when shelves are full than when they are half empty. They do not like to buy from shelves with few products on them because they feel there is something wrong with those products that are there.
Useful Words and Expressions:
1. aisle 走廊，过道
2. trolley 手推车
3. checkout 收款台
9.Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein was born in Germany in 1879, His father owned a factory that made electrical devices. His mother enjoyed music and books. His parents were Jewish but they did not observe many of the religion’s rules. Albert was a quite child who spent much of his time alone. He was slow to talk and had difficulty learning to read. When Albert was five years old, his father gave him a compass. The child was filled with wonder when he discovered that the compass needle always pointed in the same direction—to be north. He asked his father and his uncle what caused the needle to move. Their answers about magnetism and gravity were difficult for the boy to understand. Yet he spent a lot of time thinking about them. He said later that he felt something hidden had to be behind things.
Useful expressions and words:
1. device 装置，设备
leave t

o one’s own devices 听任某人自行其是，允许某人按自己的意愿做事
She left the child to her own devices for an hour in the afternoon.
她允许孩子在下午有一个小时的自由支配时间。
2. compass 指南针
beyond one’s compass某人力所不及
catch/fetch/take a compass兜圈子，绕道，拐弯抹角
keep sth within compass 把某种事物限制在适当的范围内
speak within compass 谨慎小心地说
within sb’s compass 某人力所能及的
within the compass of 在……范围内
3.magnetism 磁力
10.Private Cars
With the increase in the general standard of living, some ordinary Chinese families begin to afford a car. Yet opinions of the development of a private car vary from person to person.
It gives a much greater degree of comfort and mobility. The owner of a car is no longer forced to reply on public transport, and hence no irritation caused by waiting for buses or taxis. However, others strongly object to developing private cars. They maintain that as more and more cars are produced and run in the street, a large volume of poisonous gas will be given off, polluting the atmosphere and causing actual harm to the health of people.
Whether private cars should be developed in Chicago is a difficult question to answer, yet the desire for the comfort and independence a private car can bring will not be eliminated.
11.A Henpecked Husband and His Wife
There was once a large, fat woman who had a small, thin husband. He had a job in a big company and was given his weekly wages every Friday evening. As soon as he got home on Fridays, his wife used to make him give her all his money, and then she used to give him back only enough to buy his lunch in his company every day.
One day, the small man came home very excited. He hurried into the living-room. His wife was listening to the radio and eating chocolates there.
“You will never guess what happened to me to day, dear.” he said.
He waited for a few seconds and then added, “I won ten thousand dollars on the lottery!”
“That is wonderful! ” said his wife delightedly. But then she pulled a long face and added angrily, “But how could you afford to buy the ticket?”

Useful Words and Expressions:
1. henpecked 怕老婆的，妻管严的
2. lottery 彩票
a great lottery 虚无缥缈的事
3. pull a long face 拉下脸来
have a face to say that脸皮厚得竟能讲出这种话
12.A Young Man’s Promise
One day, a young man was writing a letter to his girlfriend who lived just a few miles away in a nearby town. He was telling her how much he loved her and how wonderful he thought she was. The more he wrote the more poetic he became. Finally he said that in order to be with her, he would suffer the greatest difficulties, he would face the greatest dangers that anyone couldn’t imagine. In fact, to spend only one minute with her, he would swim across the widest river, he would enter

the deepest forest, and he would fight against the fiercest animals with his bare hands.
He finished the letter, signed his name and then suddenly remembered that he had forgotten to mention something quite important. So, in a postscript below his name, he added:
“By the way, I’ll be over to see you on Wednesday night, if it doesn’t rain.”
13.A Kind Neighbor
Mr. and Mrs. Jones’ apartment was full of luggage, packages, furniture and boxes. Both of them were very busy when they heard the doorbell ring. Mrs. Jones went to open it and she saw a middle-aged lady outside. The lady said she lived next door. Mrs. Jones invited her to come in and apologized because there was no place for her to sit. “Oh, that’s OK.” said the lady. “I just come to welcome to your new home. As you know, in some parts of this city, neighbors are not friendly at all. They are some apartment houses where people don’t know any of their neighbors, not even the ones next door. But in this building, everyone is very friendly with everyone else. We are a big happy family. I am sure you will be very happy here.” Mr. and Mrs. Jones said, “But madam, we are not new dwellers in this apartment. We’ve lived here for two years. We are moving out tomorrow.”
14.That Isn’t Our Fault
Mr. and Mrs. Williams got married when he was twenty-three, and she was twenty. Twenty-five years later, they had a big party, and a photographer came and took some photographs of them.
Then the photographer gave Mrs. Williams a card and said, “They’ll be ready next Wednesday. You can get them from studio.”
“No,” Mrs. Williams said, “please send them to us.”
The photographs arrived a week later, but Mrs. Williams was not happy when she saw them. She got into her car and drove to the photographer’s studio. She went inside and said angrily, “You took some photographs of me and my husband last week, but I’m not going to pay for them.”
“Oh, why not?” the photographer asked.
“Because my husband looks like a monkey,” Mrs. Williams said.
“Well,” the photographer answered, “that isn’t our fault. Why didn’t you think of that before you married him?”

15.A Guide’s Answer
In 1861, the Civil War started in the United States between the Northern and the Southern states. The war continued with great bitterness until 1865, when the Northerners were victorious. However, even today, many Southerners have not forgotten their defeat, or forgiven the Northerners.
A few years ago, a party of American tourists were going round one of the battlefields of the Civil War with a guide who came from one of the Southern states. At each place, the guide told the tourists stirring stories about how a few Southern soldiers had conquered powerful forces of Northerners there.
At last, one of the tourists, a lady who came from the North, stopped the guide and said to him, “ But surely

that the Northern army must have won at least one victory in the Civil War?”
“Not as long as I’m the guide here, madam,” answered the Southern guide.
16.A Qualified Pilot
The captain of a small ship had to go along a rocky coast, but he was unfamiliar with it, so he tried to find a qualified pilot to guide him. He went ashore in one of the small ports, and a local fisherman pretended that he was a pilot because he needed some money. The captain took him on board and asked him where to steer the ship.
After half an hour, the captain began to suspect that the fisherman did not really know what he was doing and where he was going.
“Are you sure you are a qualified pilot?” he asked.
“Oh, yes,” answered the fisherman. “I know every rock on this part of the coast.”
Suddenly there was a terrible crash from under the ship. At once the fisherman added, “And that’s one of them.”

17.Living Things React
You and all organisms live an environment. An environment is made up of everything that surrounds an organism. It can include the air, the water, the soil, and even other organisms.
An organism responds to changes in its environment. When an organism responds to a change, it reacts in certain ways. All living things respond in some way.
Have you ever noticed how plants and insects respond to light? Plants bend toward light. Insects fly toward light.
Living things also respond in other ways. The leaves on some trees respond to a change in season. In autumn, they change colors and then fall off the branches Animals also respond to a change in season. Squirrels save nuts for the winter. Bears sleep through the winter in a cave.
You respond to your environment in many ways, too. You may shiver if you are cold. What other ways do you respond to changes in your environment?
18.Flowering Plants
What are the parts of a flower?
Flowers can have male parts and female parts. The female parts make eggs that become seeds. The male parts make pollen. Pollen is a powdery material that is needed by the eggs to make seeds. To make seeds, pollen and eggs must come together. The wind, insects, and birds bring pollen to eggs. Many animals love flowers’ bright colors. They also like a sugary liquid in flowers. This is called nectar. While they drink nectar, pollen rubs off on their bodies. As they move, some of this pollen gets delivered to the female flower parts.
Over time, the female parts turn into fruits that contain seeds. Animals often eat the fruits and the seeds pass through their bodies as waste. The animals do no know they are working for the plants by planting seeds as they travel to different places!
Useful words and Expressions:
1. flowering 开花的
2. pollen 花粉
3. powdery 粉状的
4. sugar 含糖的，甜的
5. nectar花蜜，甘露
6. rub 磨擦
19.Finding the Direction and Location
How can you tell which

direction? By day, look for the Sun. It is in the east in the morning and the west in the afternoon. At night, use the Big Dipper to help you find the North Star. It would be better to bring a compass because its needle always points north.
How do you know how far you have gone? You could count every step. Each step is about two feet. You’d better wear a pedometer which is a tool that counts steps. If you know where you started, which direction you are heading, and how far you have gone, you can use a good map to figure out exactly where you are.
Today there is a new way for travelers to figure out where they are. It is the GPS. It has 24 satellites that orbit the earth and constantly broadcast their positions. Someday you may carry a small receiver as you hike and use GPS to find out if you are there yet!
Useful Words and Expressions:
1. dipper北斗七星
2. compass 罗盘
3. pedometer 步数计
4. GPS= Global Position System全球定位系统
5. orbit 轨道，绕……轨道而行
6. receiver 接收器
20.Waves
How does light get from the sun to the earth? How does music get from the stage to the audience? They move the same way-----in waves!
Light and sound are forms of energy. All waves carry energy, but they may carry it differently. Light and sound travel through different kinds of matter. For example, light waves cannot move through walls, but sound waves can. That is why you can hear people talking in another room even though you cannot see them. The energy of some waves is destructive. An earthquake produces seismic waves.
Catch a wave. Ask a friend to stand a few feet away from you. Stretch a spring between you. Shake the spring to transfer energy to it. What happens? The spring bounces up and down in waves. When the waves reach your friend, they bounce back to you!
Light waves travel 300,000 kilometers (186,000 miles) per second! They can also travel through a vacuum. That is why light from the sun and distant stars can travel through space to the earth!
Useful Words and Expressions;
1. destructive 破坏的
2. seismic地震的
3. vacuum真空
21.Soils
There are many different kinds of soils. Different soils have different types of rock and minerals in them. Some soils have more water in them than others. Some soils might have more plant and animal material in them, too.
Different kinds of soils are found in different parts of the world. There are several kinds of soils found in the United States. In some areas, the soil has a lot of clay. Other soils are very sandy. Loam is a kind of soil that has a good mixture of clay and sand.
In some places, soil layers are very thick. Lots of plants grow in places with a thick soil layer. In dry and windy places soil layers are much thinner. Layers of soil on mountains are thin because gravity pulls the soil downhill.
The type of soil in a particular place affects what kinds of plants can grow there.
Use

ful Words:
1. clay 黏土，泥土
2. loam 肥土
3. layer 层
4. gravity 地心引力，重力
5. downhill 往下

22.Crisis
Life is a contest! Who will win? A bluebird and sparrow both compete for space to build their nests. A fast-growing maple tree and slower-growing dogwood compete for the sunlight they both need. Oil competes with coal and nuclear power as an energy source for electric power plants!
There is a problem. There is a limited amount of space for birds, sunlight for trees, and energy for people! If we do not cut back on our uses of some of our resources, someday they will be gone!
How can we use energy today and know we will have enough to go around in the future? We can choose alternate, or replacement, energy resources. It takes the earth millions of years to create coal, oil, and gas. They are nonrenewable resources.
Solar energy, wind energy and water energy are renewable resources. It takes the earth millions of years to create coal, oil, and gas. They are nonrenewable resources.
Solar energy, wind energy and water energy are renewable. What other ways can we conserve our sources? How can we make sure there is always enough to go around?
Useful words and expressions:
1. bluebird 蓝知更鸟
2. sparrow 麻雀
3. dogwood 山茱萸
4. power plant 发电厂，发电站
5. alternate 替换物
6. nonrenewable resources 不可再生资源
7. conserve 保存，保藏
23.America’s Worst Surprise
December 7, 1941 was one of the worst days in American history. Nearly all Americans who are old enough to remember that day can still remember what they were doing at the moment they heard “the news”. The news was that America had been attacked!
Shortly before 2:00 P.M., a radio dispatch came into Washington from Honolulu, Hawaii. “Air Raid, Pearl Harbor— This is no drill.” Japanese planes had begun an attack on the largest American military base in the Pacific. They first destroyed planes on the ground. Then they bombed the ships in the harbor.
No one had expected the attack. So no one was prepared for it. And it did not take long for Japanese to do their damage. When the smoke cleared, the Navy counted its losses. Eighteen ships had been sunk or badly damaged. Nearly 150 planes had been destroyed. More than 2,400 Americans had been killed and more than 1,200 wounded.
Useful Words and Expressions:
1. dispatch 派遣，急件
2. air raid 空袭
3. drill 军事训练，操练
4. Pearl Harbor 珍珠港

24.Great Depression in the U.S.
In 1929, the bills started to come in. American industry had produced too many goods. Americans could not afford to buy all of them. So factories had to cut down on their production. Many workers lost their jobs. Investors tried to get their money back. But businesses did not have enough money to pay them. Banks tried to get their money back from investors. But the investors could not pay, either. Too many peo

ple owed money. And few of them could pay their bills.
During the next few years, business got worse and worse. By 1932, banks all over the country were closing.
People without money could not buy goods. So more businesses closed. More and more people lost their jobs. By 1932, more than 12 million Americans were jobless. Millions more were earning barely enough to live on. The country was in a great depression they had never experienced before.
Useful Words and Expressions:
1. bill 帐单，票据
foot the bill付账，负责
2. cut down on 减少
3. depression 沮丧，萧条
Great Depression大萧条
25.A Place of Our Own
We are all usually very careful when we buy something for the house. Why? Because we have to live with it for a long time. We paint a room to make it brighter, so we choose the colors carefully.
We buy new curtains in order to match the newly decorated room, so they must be the right color. We move the furniture round so as to make more space—or we buy new furniture—and so on. It is an endless business.
Rich or poor, we take time to furnish a room. Perhaps some people buy furniture in order to impress their friends. But most of us just want to enjoy our surroundings. We want to live as comfortably as we can afford to. We spend a large part of our lives at home. We want to make a small corner in the world which we can recognize as our own.


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