新托福口语考试第三题解题思路

来源:网络发布时间:2009-06-04

  新托福口语考试第三题要求考生先阅读一段文字,然后再听一段与阅读文字在内容上相关的听力材料,最后考生按照要求口头回答相关问题。阅读材料是70~100词的自然段,共45秒钟的阅读时间。题目要求考生总结阅读材料中隐含的说话者的观点。
  此题型的内容为校园场景,形式为读-听-说。许多同学对于这一题的解答思路不是很明确,本文将对考生准备该题时必须注意的重点进行针对性的解析。
  考试内容
  此题型考查的是考生运用英语的综合能力,是对考生适应北美校园通知讨论情景的模拟考查,体现了新托福口语考试的考查目的之一,即“实现听、读、说三方面的动态有机融合”,同时也是新托福口语考试的点睛之笔。其目的在于考查考生是否真正具备了实际的校园语言综合应用能力,是否达到了较高标准和较高质量的即时输入与输出的语言运用水平。
  因此,这道题(包括第四、五、六题)既是对考生综合听说能力的考验,也是对考生概述能力的考验。
  很多人觉得它比同为校园话题的第五题难度要大些,这是很正常的,因为第五题讨论的通常都是学生个人的问题,而第三题讨论的是校园“大政方针”的问题。即使用中文来表达,大家也不一定都熟悉在这种场景中需要的词汇和句型,更别说用英文来准确地表述了。
  第三题的rating(评分标准)以“your ability to speak clearly and coherently”、“Accuracy”和“Completeness”为评判标准。
  样题分析及解题思路
  样题
  本文以Official Guide(官方指南)第214页的第三题为例(分为三个部分):
  1、阅读材料
  Announcement from the President
  The university has decided to increase the tuition and fees for all the students by approximately 8 percent next semester. For the past five years, the tuition and fees have remained the same, but it’s necessary to increase them now for several reasons. The university has many more students than we had five years ago, and we must hire additional professors to teach these students. We have also made the commitment to research and technology and will be renovating and updating our laboratory facilities to better meet our students?needs.
  2、听力材料
  You will then hear:
  Narrator: Now listen to two students as they discuss the announcement.
  The dialogue will begin:
  Man: Oh great, now we have to come up with more money for next semester.
  Woman: Yeah, I know, but I can see why. When I first started here, classes were so much smaller than they are now. With this many students, it’s hard to get the personal attention you need.
  Man: Yeah, I guess you’re right. You know, in some classes I can’t even get a seat. And I couldn’t take the math course I wanted to because it was already full when I signed up.
  Woman: And the other things, well, I am kind of worried about not being able to get a job after I graduate.
  Man: Why?I mean you’re doing really well in your classes, aren’t you?
  Woman: I’l doing ok, but the facilities here are so limited. There are some great new experiments in microbiology that we can’t even do here. There isn’t enough equipment in the laboratories, and the equipment they have is out of date. How am I going to compete for jobs with people who have practical research experience? I think the extra tuition will be a good investment.
  3、问题:
  Now answer the following question:
  The woman expresses her opinion of the announcement made by the university president. State her opinion and explain the reasons she gives for holding that opinion.
  解题思路
  下面我们来探讨一下解决这种典型校园场景读听说题的方法。
  1、阅读部分:这道题要求大家具备快速阅读的能力。
  这些阅读材料是以通知、书信等形式出现的。更重要的是,它们的内容都是校方做出decision、policy、regulation后进行的公示,或者是一名学生看到这些公示后以书信形式做出的公开评价。同时,这些阅读材料中还会出现校方做出这种决定或新规定的原因,通常都会列举两到三点理由。

  常见的速记方法有以下三种:
  ①缩略形式。
  ②符号。
  ③中文记录句子的整体意思而不是单个词。
  比如在以上的阅读通知中,出现的重要信息就蕴涵在以下几句话中:
  The university has decided to increase the tuition fees for all the students by approximately 8 percent next semester. The university has many more students than we had five years ago, and we must hire additional professors to teach these students.
  We have also made the commitment to research and technology and will be renovating and updating our laboratory facilities to better meet our students?needs.
  这三句话中加黑体部分的信息就可以采用以上三种做笔记的方法。比如将“tuition”、“facilities”记成“学费”和“设施”;学生用缩略形式Ss,教授以profs来表示,update以upd表示;而学费、学生和教授人数的增加则用上升符号“”来表示。
  2、听力部分应注意以下一些问题。
  听力通常都是conversation的形式,男女学生的对话一般以一个人的观点以及原因的表述为重心,而另一个人的任务则是配合完成这段对话。所以通常听到一个显得比较“有主见”的学生说话时,他(她)的观点就很可能是之后要被复述的内容了,考生尤其要注意这几点:
  第一,听力材料较简短,所以考生需要高度集中注意力。
  第二,做好听力笔记。练习和测试经验表明,考生应该围绕着opinions和reasons做听力笔记,而且ETS的考题设计很人性化,通常考生都有充足的时间记录下重要信息。
  现在请大家对照以上的conversation, 看看应如何运用以上三点速记方法。只要考生能够听出何处是重点信息,一般来说,其记录速度就能够跟上这类对话的速度。
  重要信息出现在这些句子中: www.toefleasy.com
  首先是观点:I think the extra tuition will be a good investment(见样题听力材料最后一句话)。
  其次记下对话中那个woman说的几点原因:
  ①With this many students, it’s hard to get the personal attention you need.
  ② I am kind of worried about not being able to get a job after I graduate.
  The facilities here are so limited. There are some great new experiments in microbiology that we can’t even do here. There isn’t enough equipment in the laboratories, and the equipment they have is out of date. How am I going to compete for jobs with people who have practical research experience?
  笔记的具体记录大家可以根据刚才的阅读材料的笔记做参考,然后做一下练习。
  3、在得到充足的笔记以后,就要解决“说”的问题了。
  这是最关键的问题,因为很多考生因为“说”方面没有找到适合ETS评分的方法而“浪费”了成功的阅读练习和听力笔记。iBT speaking的所有question都是一致的,简单地说,就是请考生回答对话中的一名学生对于以上通知的意见(反对还是支持等)以及他(她)持有该观点的原因(通常都是两点)。因此,半分钟的准备时间内,考生要注意的就是充分利用时间进行必要的层次性组织。
  ①时间控制:准备时间为30秒,除了整理笔记之外,英语表述能力较弱的同学,可以做一个这样的准备——即用中英文夹杂的方法把笔记梳理一遍,在一分钟的答题时间内考生应该先讲笔记上的哪些点,后说哪些点,都要梳理得极为清晰,因为答题过程中最好不要因为逻辑不清而分散自己的注意力,答题时的注意力是用来处理词汇、语法与句型的。
  ②简约:很多考生都反映说苦练了快速阅读和听力后,到了说的这一步特别困难,因为发现自己是“茶壶里煮饺子——有货倒不出”。其实就是因为平时在英语学习中没有进行词汇替换、口语简单句型的训练。
  ③高分词汇, 即简单替换的词汇:这一点对想拿高分的同学来说尤其重要。
  考生在力所能及的情况下,在考场上尽量不要全盘搬出笔记上的单词,注意适当的替换,哪怕只有一两个,也有利于得到高分。如“there isn’t enough equipment in the laboratories”,在考生答题时就可以说成“school labs cannot provide students with enough facilities”, 其中的provide sb. with sth.就是高分的口语词组。
  如果对以上的注意事项都有所把握,考生就能得出比较理想的speaking sample了,比如:
  The woman student thinks it’s a good idea to raise the tuition, which is mentioned in the announcement due to the increasing number of students, professors and improving the laboratory facilities.
  The first reason is that she thinks students cannot get enough personal attention in classes and some courses are even hard to sign up because of the increasing number of students.
  And the second reason is that it’s hard to get an ideal job after graduation, because the school labs cannot provide students with enough and modern facilities, so that students lack practical experiences of experiments, and she mentions thatshe wasn’t able to do a very good experiment on microbiology because of the shabby facilities.