Prinston综合写作练习8篇.docVIP

Prinston Integrated Writing PracticeReading 1Soon there will be something new for the tourist who has been everywhere and seen everything on Earth. Spacecraft being developed by private commercial companies will soon enable private citizens to buy their own tickets to travel into space, thereby creating a space tourism industry. So far, space travel has been undertaken only by governments, but the new, privatized spaceflight industry will bring great benefits to both science and the public.First, private space travel will benefit serious exploration by making spaceflight cheaper. Privatization of space technology will bring technological costs down very fast because it will allow competitionand competition is one of the strongest motivators to cut costs. Thus, lowering the cost of space travel will benefit not only space tourists but also scientists, who will be able to use private space flights for research purposes.Furthermore, privatization of space travel will accelerate the rate at which important scientific discoveries occur. The aerospace industry already sponsors a lot of groundbreaking scientific research, and adding private spaceflight companies to it will make the industry as a whole grow in size, thereby employing more scientists than it does now. That increased number of working scientists means not only that more discoveries are likely to be made but also that those discoveries are likely to be made more quickly than in the past.Finally, when governments are the sole providers of space travel, the costs are paid for by the whole taxpaying public, but with privatization, the expenses of space travel will be borne by the customers of the industry. The fact that private spaceflight operators will be able to raise funds through ticket sales means that the financial burden on taxpayers will be eased significantly.阅读部分要点记录Listening 1Professor: Well, it looks as though well soon see private spaceships carrying tourists into space. But will it really provide great benefits for serious science and for the public? I dont think so.First, privatized space travel, which is extraordinarily expensive, is likely to stay that way. For one thing, commercial space travel will require an elaborate space traffic-control system to prevent collisionand the development and operation of such a system wont come cheap either. Another thing thatll keep costs high is tested and retestedand that also tends to be a very expensive process. Both of those costs will be reflected in the prices of the spaceflight tickets, so no one should expect the cost of space flights to go down fast.Second, if commercial spaceflight has any effect at all on the rate of scientific discovery and innovation, it will be to delay or even prevent such discovery and innovation. If the best and the brightest engineers get lured away from government space programs by the high salaries offered by private, for-profit companies, they might end up working on commercial stuff that doesnt have much scientific value. And as a result, serious space research might actually suffer.And finally, will the taxpaying public get off the hook financially? No chance! The fact is that so-called private space tourism isnt possible without huge public tax subsidies. It will take billions and billions of dollars to build space stations, space airports, and so on, and private investors simply cannot raise such huge amounts. So the burden on taxpayers wont be significantly eased with the development of the private spaceflight industry. In fact, all taxpayers will be paying more to subsidize the vacations of the space tourists.听力部分要点记录Reading 2Educators have long recognized that high school can be a difficult experience for many students. Along with the stress of challenging academic work, high school can also be a source of social, emotional, and even financial stress. One effective way of decreasing these nonacademic kinds of stress is to require students to wear a school uniform so that all students wear basically the same clothing.One of the most obvious benefits of such a policy is that it makes high school more affordable for both students and their parents. Clothing, especially trendy, fashionable clothing, is very expensive, and teenagers usually want to have several different outfits in their wardrobesfor some, the more the better. When there is no possibility of dressing fashionably at school, a students clothing bill will go down drastically.Furthermore, wearing the same school uniform as everyone else eliminates a significant source of discomfort and self-consciousness for many teenagers: the uncertainty that what they are wearing is “right”. Such anxiety interferes with a students ability to act in ways that show his or her personality to advantage.Finally, a mandatory school-uniform policy will reduce the amount of teasing and bullying among students. Currently, many students are teased or pout down simply because they dress differently from everyone else or because they cant afford to dress like the majority. Once all students wear the same uniform, there will be such less opportunity for these kinds of intimidating behaviors.阅读部分要点记录Listening 2Professor: What youve just read really is way too optimistic. Its rather easy to poke holes in the reasoning. First off, school uniforms are themselves often quite costlyusually they are only available from certain select stores. Plus, what kind of clothes will students put on after school when they go meet their friends? Well, if you cant dress trendy at school, its even likely youll want to do that after school. So kids will still demand a full wardrobe of fashionable after-school clothes in addition to their uniforms.To take up another point, doing away with differences in dress can affect some students quite negatively. Many students may feel very uncomfortablemight even feel self-consciousabout how they look when they are not allowed to select the clothes that they wear. For many, choosing clothing is not a matter of making a fashion statement; it is simply a way of presenting themselves in ways they feel will call attention to what they consider their attractive featuresplus they feel they can also select clothing to de-emphasize other features they perhaps like less about themselves. So school uniforms can actually end up increasing self-consciousness and discomfort among students.Finally, students will always pick on other students. Dividing into groups, teasing and bullying other for being differentthese are things teenagers everywhere do because they are at that particular stage of life. If students cannot pick on differences in dress, they will surely find other things to pick onthings like choice in music or the kind of backpack brought to schoolany of these can easily take on as much importance as clothing.听力部分要点记录Reading 3Donating part of ones income to public causes, known as charitable giving, used to be a common practice. But, in the United States charitable giving has declined substantially in recent years, and, for several reasons, it is unlikely to increase in the future.One reason that charitable giving has fallen is simply that there is less need for charitable giving, because the United States government now provides most of the important public services. The government assumes much of the responsibility for feeding the poor, providing health care, and taking care of the victims of natural disastersfunctions that charities used to perform. These government institutions of social welfare are permanent, and so the diminished need for private charitable giving will also be permanent.Another reason people are, and will be, giving less to charities is that in the past few years there have been highly publicized disclosures that the managers of some prominent national charities were receiving huge salaries and other benefits as large or larger than salaries of heads of major for-profit corporations. These salaries and expenses for travel, fancy offices, and advertising significantly reduce the percentage of donated money that went to charitable purposes. Naturally people have been turned off by these excesses and inefficiencies.Finally, beyond the shortcomings of legitimate charities, there has been an increasing number of fraudulent solicitations by organizations or individuals who merely pose as charities. As a result, people are now becoming skeptical even about what are in fact legitimate appeals for support. So potential donors are starting to give less and give less frequently. And since the incidence of charity fraud seems to be increasing, we can expect further declines in charitable giving as people become more concerned that they are being taken advantage of.阅读部分要点记录Listening 3Professor: Theres no doubt that giving to charities has declined in recent years, but there are good reasons to think itll soon begin to go up.Consider, for example, the fact that the number of elderly and retired people in our society keeps growing. Right now, elderly citizens who cant afford health care often rely on government programs to pay for it. But as the elderly population grows, government programs probably wont be able to cover the health assistance, Americans respond to that need. And since the need will be increasing, we should expect to see charitable giving rise accordingly.Theres another reason to be optimistic about the future of charitable giving. The disclosures of waste and bad management at major charities, and peoples anger at this waste, are producing significant reforms. Overpaid managers have been forced to resign by the bad publicity. Charities are reducing their expenses and are now subject to closer public scrutiny. As a result, people are regaining confidence that the money they donate will support the causes they care about.Peoples reaction to charity fraud is also evolving. In the short run, people dont want to donate because theyre concerned with whether charities are honest. But in the long run, such skepticism makes people careful, not stingy. For example, many people now refuse to give money when theyre asked to do so over the telephone. They insist on receiving proof and documentation before they donate. Just as people learn how to be careful consumers, most people are acquiring the skills needed to guard against charity fraud without stopping their support for worthwhile causes.听力部分要点记录Reading 4It used to be that parents took their children on vacation during the summer, when school was out of session. But today, much more often than in the past, many parents take their children on vacation during the school year. Although these children are away from school, sometimes for several weeks, traveling itself serves a valuable educational function.The most important educational benefit of taking children on vacation is that traveling exposes children to new places and cultures. It is good for children to read about distant countries, but it is even better to take them there. What students learn by meeting the people and absorbing the culture of these places is something they could not learn in their classrooms.Moreover, the benefits to the children who have been away from the classroom for several weeks traveling continue after they have returned to their classes. Students who are in school every day of the school year can easily lose enthusiasm for their studies. But students invigorated by time away return with heightened excitement.The trend of students taking vacations during the school year also has benefits for teachers. When these students return to school, their knowledge and enthusiasm contribute positively to the entire class. Teachers can ask the children to share stories of their travels with their peers and can incorporate what they have learned from traveling into writing and reading projects. This makes lesson development easier for teachers because the returning students experiences provide a ready basis for classroom discussions and projects.阅读部分要点记录Listening 4Professor: Now, lets consider how taking children on vacation when school is in session impacts their education. I believe the impact on children and their teachers can be quite negative.While students have been traveling, their fellow students have been working. What do you think happens when they return to school? Well, they have to spend a lot of time “playing catch-up”, you know, doing work that fellow students have already done. Its one thing to miss a day or two of school, but many parents take their children on vacation for weeks on end, and its very difficult for any child to make up that much missed time. So, the missed learning has to be weighed against the benefits of traveling and learning about other cultures. On balance, what is lost is greater than what is gained.When children come back to class after a long trip, theyre excited about their recent adventures. Sounds good, but this enthusiasm can have a downside. Their excitement can make it difficult for them to fit back into the routine of the school day. School seems a little boring to them, so theyre not attentive to their studies, and their restlessness can distract other students.When a student is distracted or has to catch up on missed work, theres a negative effect on the teacher too. Teachers have lessons plans that detail, day by day, what they are going to teach. When a student is absent from the classroom, this interferes with a teachers plan for that student. And if teachers spend time helping a few students catch up, they have less time for other studentsso they suffer too.听力部分要点记录Reading 5Easter Island, a small, remote island in the Pacific Ocean, was once home to a flourishing culture. But about 500 years ago (A.D.1500), its society went into a steep decline. History teaches us that events like this are often caused by outside influences. So it is not unreasonable to consider whether there are facts about the decline of Easter Islands society that would be explained by a hypothesis of an invasion.One such fact has to do with trees. Most Pacific island societies have managed to find an ecologically balanced way of living by usingbut not overexploitingnatural resources such as trees. Most Pacific islands, therefore, remain lushbut not Easter Island. Although it was once densely forested, most of its trees had disappeared by about 500 years ago. Environmental destruction of this sort has often been caused by invaders who deplete an areas natural resources without any concern for the future.Facts about the large stone statues on Easter Island could also support the idea of an invasion. There are about 900 of these statues on the island; the largest is over 20 meters tall. The native society clearly placed a great deal of importance on their production. Yet about the same time that the island became deforested, islanders stopped making these huge statues. An invasion would help explain why this traditional practice came to a sudden end.Furthermore, we know that around the time these other changes were taking place, a new religion developed on Easter Island: the “Birdman” worship. There is no convincing evidence that the Birdman religion existed before 1500, which suggests that this new religious practice may have been introduced by outsiders.阅读部分要点记录Listening 5Professor: The idea considered in the reading is not unreasonable in the abstract, but all the concrete evidence points to internal causes for the decline of Easter Islands culture 500 years ago. Its a sad story of a native culture that did not have the foresight to sustain itself.In the centuries before 1500, the inhabitants of Easter Island were prosperousso prosperous that they were able to invest extra time and energy in building giant statues, which became important signs of status. Different island communities began competing as to who could erect the most statues. Now heres where the problem for trees come in: archaeological evidence shows that the islanders used tree logs to move the statues into position. So, as the number of statues increased, more and more trees had to be cut, until finally, 500 years ago, there were no more left.Of course, once the trees were gone, the islander could no longer build rafts to fish at sea, and so they could no longer catch big fish. As the necessities of life became harder and harder to get, the islanders no longer had the time and energy to create big statues. Without logs, of course, they couldnt move the statures anyway, so naturally the interest in making the statues declined.Finally, it would not be surprising if the islanders lost confidence in their old gods when life on the island became a struggle for survival. I mean, the old gods wouldnt seem to be protecting them anymore. So it would be natural for the islanders to have developed a different religious idea, hoping that the new god would ensure them a better life.听力部分要点记录Reading 6When a company needs to hire someone for a managerial position, there is often a choice between promoting an employee who is already working inside the company or bringing in a person from outside. Hiring a qualified outsider is often to a companys advantage for several reasons.An important reason for hiring outsiders as managers is that they bring a new perspective. This contributes to the diversity of ideas and allows company practices to be seen in a new light. Often, an outside hire will ask, “Whats the reason for doing things this way?” This question may lead to a reevaluation of practices that are actually i