出卷老师可能会参考的老版《大学英语快速阅读3》较短篇章及答案.doc

出卷老师可能会参考的老版《大学英语快速阅读3》较短篇章及答案
Unit 1
Text B-1 (Reading Time: 4 minutes)
Caution: Bumpy Road Ahead
Students graduating from colleges today are not fully prepared to deal with the “real world”. It is my belief that college students need to be taught more skills and information to enable them to meet the challenges that face everyone in daily life. The areas in which students need training are playing the credit game, planning their personal financial strategy, and consumer awareness.
Learning how to obtain and use credit is probably the most valuable knowledge a young person can have. Credit is a dangerous tool that can be of tremendous help if it is handled with caution. Having credit can enable people to obtain material necessities before they have the money to purchase them outright. But unfortunately, many, many young people get carried away with their handy plastic cards and awake one day to find they are in serious financial debt. Learning how to use credit properly can be a very difficult and painful lesson indeed.
Of equal importance is learning how to plan a personal budget. People have to know how to allocate their money for living expenses, insurance, savings, and so forth in order to avoid the “Oh, no! I’m flat broke and I don’t get paid again for two weeks!” anxiety syndrome.
Along with learning about credit and personal financial planning, graduating college students should be trained as consumers. The consumers market today is flooded with a variety of products and services of varying quality and prices. A young person entering the “real world” is suddenly faced with difficult decisions about which product to buy or whose services to engage. He is usually unaware of such things as return policies, guarantees, or repair procedures. Information of this sort is vital knowledge to everyday living.
For a newly graduated college student, the “real world” can be a scary place to be when he or she is faced such issues as handling credit, planning a budget, or knowing what to look for when making a purchase and whom to purchase it from. Entering this “real world” could be made less painful if people were educated in dealing with these areas of daily life. What better place to accomplish this than in college? (380 words; P9-P12)
NB: bumpy 崎岖不平的，坑坑洼洼的

1) According to the writer, graduating students __________. A. will find it hard to get a job with only knowledge gained from college B. have insufficient skills and knowledge and do not deserve a college diploma C. will not be able to earn enough money to support themselves D. do not have the necessary knowledge and skills to deal with the realities of life
2) The writer points out that many young people __________. A. fall into debt due to ill-advised use of credit cards B. have to depend on credit to purchase some material necessities C. do not know the power of credit any easily run into serious financial debt D. start buying too much on credit before they get a paid job
3) Students suffer from an anxiety syndrome because __________. A. they do not have their parents’ financial support B. they are worried that they don’t get paid on time C. they run out of money and can’t cover their living expenses D. they can’t afford to buy insurance for themselves
4) To “train students as consumers” means to enable them to __________. A. handle their credit with caution B. plan their spending carefully so that they don’t go broke C. make wise purchasing decisions and be informed about consumer services D. cope with serious financial problems
5) By asking “What better place to accomplish this than in college?” the writer means that __________. A. the best place to train students to deal with personal financial issues is in college B. students should be trained to enter the real world after they graduate from college C. students can best be trained in business and economics in college D. students should be taught to cope with the difficult problems they will be facing after graduation
Key: 1—5: D A C C A

Unit 3
Text B-1 (Reading Time: 3.5 minutes)
Brave New World of Biometrics
There are always people who can find a reason to criticize strongly any new technology as too personally invasive, but I’m all for biometrics. Among the amazing things biometrics enables us to do is to scan a person’s iris—the colored part of the eye—which displays a natural pattern that is even more distinct than the fingerprint.
Imagine what that will do to cut down on credit card fraud if the pattern of a person’s iris must be scanned before the credit card can be used. Imagine how foolproof it will make Internet purchases, which are now extremely vulnerable to fraudulent abuse.
Biometrics’ ability to prevent theft against the government also is endless. When the state of Connecticut required people to be fingerprinted in order to receive welfare benefits, 25 percent of the recipients dropped off the rolls (many of whom, we have to assume, were receiving benefits improperly).
Biometrics also give law-enforcement officers terrific new powers to track and capture international terrorists. Imagine what miniature face scans embedded secretly in passports will do to passport fraud, and the ability of terrorists to flee from one country to the next.
Does this mean the government and corporations will have more “personal information” about you on file? Sure, to the extent that you consider your face or your iris to be personal “information”. But all the hubbub about “invasion of privacy” is vastly overblown.
Ever since the invention of telemarketing and the ceaseless parade of phone calls bombarding my home day and night began, I’ve considered my privacy to be a thing of the past. But in the scheme of things, it is a minor inconvenience, not a major assault.
Of course, if biometrics is too much for some people, they always can cut up their credit cards, disconnect their phones and computers and move to the Rockies and live alone away from people and society. Meanwhile, I’ll continue to enjoy all the benefits modern technology offers. (P41-P44; 328 words)
NB: biometrics生物统计学 iris虹膜；虹彩 fraudulent欺骗性的，骗人的 recipient接受者 law-enforcement执法 miniature缩影 hubbub喧嚣，喧嚷 overblown华而不实的 assault侵犯人身

1) The author believes that the use of biometrics ________. A. will cause a lot of people to move to the Rockies B. is not welcomed by most people C. will lead to a violation of personal privacy D. offers a lot of benefits to people
2) According to the passage, biometrics ________. A. can make a recording of a person’s eye pattern by scanning his eyes B. can provide a more accurate identification of a person by scanning his iris than the fingerprint recognition system C. is a newly developed technology that can help analyze personal information D. involves recognition techniques that are extremely sophisticated but very expensive
3) One important advantage of using biometrics is that ________. A. it could be used to eliminate credit card fraud entirely B. it would make it much easier for law-enforcement officers to prevent acts of terrorism C. it could easily trace the whereabouts of lost identification cards and passports D. it would make fraudulent abuse of Internet purchase a thing of the past
4) The example that people applying for welfare benefits in Connecticut have to be fingerprinted is used by the author to show that ________. A. biometrics can be efficiently used to prevent theft against the government B. fingerprinting can be used to combat improper distribution of welfare benefits C. biometrics can be used to further reduce the number of welfare applicants D. fingerprint recognition systems are as efficient as biometrics in the prevention of crime
5) It can be inferred from the passage that the author believes ________. A. new technologies tend to be personally invasive B. the government has too much personal information about people on files C. one’s face or iris is not really personal information D. all talk about the invasion of privacy is groundless
Key: 1—5: D B D A C

Unit 6
Text B-1 (Reading Time: 4.5 minutes)
Peanuts Creator Schulz Dies on Eve of Last Strip
Just hours before Sunday papers with the last drawings of the Peanuts characters began hitting newsstands, the man who created the world’s most popular comic strip died in his sleep at his Santa Rosa, California home.
Charles Schulz, “Sparky” to those who knew him, was diagnosed with colon cancer in November. And ever since, get-well wishes and tributes have been pouring in. Mail reached 500 pieces a day at his Santa Rosa studio. And other cartoonists expressed their feelings through their own comic characters.
Mike Luckovich is an editorial cartoonist for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “He’s a fan of editorial cartooning, although one time he asked me, “Mike, why do you do those mean cartoons?’ because his strip was always so gentle and so sweet.”
The mini-plots of the Peanuts gang were as profound as they were funny.
Paige Braddock works for Schulz Creative Associates. “He’s an observer of how people interact and what people’s insecurities are and somehow he manages to capture that, in this simple, elegantly-designed art form. You know, in 20 words, or less.”
The insecure and anxious Charlie Brown may well have been a reflection of the other side of Schulz’s own personality.
Gaye Lebaron is a columnist for the Santa Rosa Press Democrat. “…and in a way, he’s Everyman. And I think that’s what the appeal has been. He has characteristics shared by everybody.”
The Peanuts kids had a universal appeal. The strip appeared in 2,500 papers in 76 countries.
Daryl King read the last strip early Sunday in a Washington, D.C. coffee shop. “It’s like the end of an era. You grow up with Peanuts, you expect it’s always going to be there.”
For San Francisco school psychologist Wes Cedros, the Peanuts kids became more interesting with time. “As I grew older, I could identify with all the themes that were running through.”
It was the animated characters of the Peanuts television specials that Los Angeles e-commerce fashion worker Pat remembers. “There was this sort of sad undertone to it, that just really hit; it hit that soft spot.”
Schulz was the 1978 International Cartoonist of the Year and twice won cartooning’s highest honor, the Reuben Award. Last week he spoke about the art of cartoon with Santa Rosa radio station, KSRO. “I’m just pleased that somehow I’ve been able to kind of point out to some people that comic strip art is an art.”
There will be returns. But Schulz and his family decided long ago that after he stopped, no one else would ever draw the strip he drew for nearly 50 years. (P91-P94; 431 words)

1) Who is now writing the Peanuts comic strip? A. Mike Luckovich of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. B. No one; it is appearing only as returns. C. Paige Braddock of Schulz Creative Associates. D. Gaye Lebaron of the Santa Rosa Press Democrat.
2) How did editorial cartoonist Mike Luckovich describe Charles Schulz’s comic strip? A. It was sad and anxious. B. It was always mean. C. It was unpopular. D. It was gentle and sweet.
3) Why was Schulz’s comic strip so popular? A. Because people grew up reading Charlie Brown and the Peanuts gang. B. Because people liked the animated characters of the Peanuts television specials. C. Because people had the same ideas, experiences and attitudes towards the world at large as Charlie Brown. D. Because he turned his form of cartoon drawing into an elegant art that people enjoy.
4) The reason why the e-commerce fashion worker, Pat, liked the Peanuts television program was that __________. A. she felt sorry for the characters in it B. she could identify with the characters in it C. she enjoyed watching the adventures of the characters in it D. she shared in the experience of the characters in it
5) According to the article, what is cartooning’s highest award? A. The Academy Award. B. The Reuben Award. C. The Grammy Award. D. The Santa Rosa Award.
Key: 1—5: B D C A B

备注：个别篇章在期中考试试卷纸中出现过，但愿也会在期末考试试卷中出现。不管出不出现，多读几篇文章总没有坏处。
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