Question

【題目】 Asking for help is a sign of strength rather than weakness. In American culture, the independent individual is seen as their ideal. As the University of Missouri at St. Louis states on its website under the heading Key American Values, “Americans have been trained since very early in their lives to consider themselves as separate individuals who are responsible for their own situations in life and their own destinies.” The value also makes them think they can do everything themselves, and makes them feel bad about asking for help when they need it.

And when it comes to work situations, when they think about asking for help there, sometimes they fear that a request for help would make them look inept. While this has always been true for men, many women in the workplace have felt the need to try twice as hard as their male colleagues and do twice as much to get just as far and to prove their worth. Sometimes when we think about asking for help, our inner voices tell us, “See, if you admit you can’t do this on your own, they’ll see you for the imposter (騙子) you really are.”

But the fact is, even though individualism is on the rise, we can’t do everything by ourselves and we shouldn’t try.

Apple founder Steve Jobs once told the Santa Clara Valley Historical Association about the power of asking for help, and how he “never found anybody who didn’t want to help me when I asked them for help”. He said, at the age of 12, he called Bill Hewlett, co-founder of Hewlett-Packard, on the phone after getting his number from the phone book and asking him for spare parts so he could build a frequency counter(計頻器). And Hewlett agreed and offered young Jobs a summer job assembling frequency counters.

“If you’re afraid of failing, you won’t get very far,” Jobs said.

【1】What is the first paragraph mainly about?

A.What key American values are.B.Why Americans refuse to ask for help.

C.Asking for help is a sign of strength.D.Americans are responsible for their life.

【2】Which of the following can replace the underlined word “inept” in Paragraph 2?

A.impoliteB.depressedC.incompetentD.sensitive

【3】What can be learned from this US cultural phenomenon?

A.Americans suffer a lot from mutual distrust.

B.Americans see weakness as a sign of strength.

C.Americans should learn to build up confidence.

D.Americans think highly of individual values.

【4】What can we learn from Jobs’ words in the last paragraph?

A.Don’t hesitate to ask for help.B.Be brave to try whatever you want.

C.Never ask for help.D.Learn to cooperate with others.

Answer 1

【答案】

【1】B

【2】C

【3】D

【4】A

【解析】

本文是議論文。在美國，每個人都認為自己是獨立的個體，認為可以自己做每件事，

很多人不愿意向別人求助，覺得向別人求助會被認為是沒有能力。作者認為尋求幫助是力量而不是軟弱的表現(xiàn)，應(yīng)該敢于向他人求助。

【1】主旨大意題。本段講到美國人“… to consider themselves as separate individuals” 和“The value also makes them think they can do everything themselves, and makes them feel bad about asking for help when they need it”可知，美國人認為自己是獨立的個體。由于這個價值觀的影響，美國人認為自己可以自己做每件事，一般不愿求助于人。本段主要解釋美國人一般不愿求助于人的原因。故選B項。

【2】詞句猜測題。根據(jù)第二段“if you admit you can’t do this”可知，如果你請求幫助，就意味著承認自己沒有能力勝任某項工作。incompetent意為“沒能力的”。故選C項。

【3】推理判斷題。根據(jù)第一段“Americans have been trained… to consider themselves as separate individuals …The value also makes them think they can do everything themselves” 和第三段“even though individualism is on the rise”可知美國人認為自己是獨立的個體，遇事不求人。這反映了美國人崇尚個人價值，個人主義感比較強。故選D項。

【4】推理判斷題。根據(jù)第4段喬布斯告訴他人“the power of asking for help”和“If you’re afraid of failing, you won’t get very far”可知，喬布斯利舉出自己的例子，說明向他人尋求幫助的好處。他告訴我們不要害怕失敗，要敢于求助。故選A項。

閱讀理解中詞義猜測技巧

1.根據(jù)下定義、定語從句、同位語或破折號對所修飾的詞的解釋說明猜測生詞的詞義

如：（1）Here is The Pines ,whose cook has developed a special way of mixing foreign food such as caribou ,wild boar ,and reindeer with surprising sauces .

通過whose引導(dǎo)的定語從句，可以推測The Pines 是一家餐館的名字。

（2）This terrible tornado—a wind which went round and round as fast as 500 miles an hour and picked up everything in its path, such as large trees, cars and even houses.

根據(jù)破折號后面的句意，可以猜測出tornado意思是“龍卷風(fēng)”。

2. 根據(jù)舉例猜測詞義 表示舉例的詞匯和短語主要有：for example , such as , take…for example, for instance 等

如：The course will provide more space to study particular issues such as relationship among countries in the European Union, third world debt, international disagreement.

根據(jù)such as 后面列舉的例子，可以推斷issue 是指“議題”。

3.根據(jù)邏輯關(guān)系猜測詞義

對比關(guān)系 表示對比關(guān)系的詞匯和短語有：unlike, not, but, however, despite, in spite of, in contrast等

并列關(guān)系 表示并列關(guān)系的詞和短語有：and, or , either… or, neither … nor, not only… but also , not.. but, as well as 等

因果關(guān)系 表示因果關(guān)系的詞和短語有：because, since, as, so,so … that與such … that等

表示同義詞語境的有or, like , similarly, either, just as , the same… as

表示反義詞語境的詞有：yet, but, unlike, however, although, while, instead of, rather than ,on the other hand, on the contrary 等。

如:（1）Pruning is important because it encourages the growth of tender shoots, or young leaves.

根據(jù)because原因狀語從句的內(nèi)容可以判斷Pruning的意思是：“修剪（樹枝等）”。

如本題第2小題，第二段中“if you admit you can’t do this”與選項incompetent同義，從而確定選項。

4.通過構(gòu)詞法 根據(jù)前綴、后綴、復(fù)合詞、詞義轉(zhuǎn)化等構(gòu)詞法猜測詞義

如：（1）It's a quiet, comfortable hotel overlooking (俯瞰) the bay in an uncommercialized Cornish fishing village on England's most southerly point．

后綴 -ise/ize意思是“使成為…；使…化”，結(jié)合詞根commercial（商業(yè)的），可以推測 uncommercialized 的意思是“未被商業(yè)化的”。

（2）We live in a technological society where most goods are mass-produced by unskilled labor. Because of this, most people that craft (手藝) no longer exists.

根據(jù)合成詞中的mass （大量的）和produce （生產(chǎn)），可以推測 mass-produce的意思是“大批量生產(chǎn)；規(guī)模生產(chǎn)” 。

5.據(jù)上下文的指代關(guān)系推測詞義

如：Despite the celebrations, though, in the U.S. the jazz audience continues to shrink and grow older, and the music has failed to connect with younger generations. It's Jason Moran's job to help change that.

根據(jù)語境可知，畫線詞that指代上一句的內(nèi)容，即爵士樂聽眾的數(shù)量減少并且趨于老齡化，不受年輕人喜歡的現(xiàn)狀。