Section II Reading Comprehension
Part A
Directions:
Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D. Mark your answers on the ANSWER SHEET. (40 points)
Text 1
It is curious that Stephen Koziatek feels almost as though he has to justify his efforts to give his students a better future.
Mr. Koziatek is part of something pioneering. He is a teacher at a New Hampshire high school where learning is not something of books and tests and mechanical memorization, but practical. When did it become accepted wisdom that students should be able to name the 13th president of the United States but be utterly overwhelmed by a broken bike chain?
As Koziatek knows, there is learning in just about everything. Nothing is necessarily gained by forcing students to learn geometry at a graffitied desk stuck with generations of discarded chewing gum. They can also learn geometry by assembling a bicycle.
But he’s also found a kind of insidious prejudice. Working with your hands is seen as almost a mark of inferiority. Schools in the family of vocational education “have that stereotype...that it’s for kids who can’t make it academically,”he says.
On one hand, that viewpoint is a logical product of America’s evolution. Manufacturing is not the economic engine that it once was. The job security that the US economy once offered to high school graduates has largely evaporated. More education is the new principle. We want more for our kids, and rightfully so.
But the headlong push into bachelor’s degrees for all – and the subtle devaluing of anything less – misses an important point: That’s not the only thing the American economy need. Yes, a bachelor’s degree opens more doors. But even now, 54 percent of the jobs in the country are middle-skill jobs, such as construction and high-skill manufacturing. But only 44 percent of workers are adequately trained.
In other words, at a time when the working class has turned the country on its political head, frustrated that the opportunity that once defined America is vanishing, one obvious solution is staring us in the face. There is a gap in working-class jobs, but the workers who need those jobs most aren’t equipped to do them. Koziatek’s Manchester school of Technology High School is trying to fill that gap.
Koziatek’s school is a wake-up call. When education becomes one-size-fits-all, it risks overlooking a nation’s diversity of gifts.
(1).A broken bike chain is mentioned to show students’ lack of .
A. practical ability
B. academic training
C. pioneering spirit
D. mechanical memorization
参考答案：A
(2).There exists the prejudice that vocational education is for kids who .
A. have a stereotyped mind
B. have no career motivation
C. are not academically successful
D. are financially disadvantaged
参考答案：C
(3).We can infer from Paragraph 5 that high school graduates .
A. used to have big financial concerns
B. used to have more job opportunities
C. are reluctant to work in manufacturing
D. are entitled to more educational privileges
参考答案：B
(4).The headlong push into bachelor's degrees for all .
A. helps create a lot of middle-skill jobs
B. may narrow the gap in working-class jobs
C. is expected to yield a better-trained workforce
D. indicates the overvaluing of higher education
参考答案：D
(5).The author's attitude toward Koziatek’s school can be described as .
A. supportive
B. tolerant
C. disappointed
D. cautious
参考答案：A
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