2021年12月英语四级真题
Part I Writing (30 minutes)
Directions: Suppose your university student union is planning to hold a speech contest. You are now to write a proposal for organizing the contest. The proposal may include the topic, aim, procedure and selection of contestants. You will h*e 30 minutes to write the proposal. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words.
Part Ⅱ Listening Comprehension (25 minutes)
Section A
Directions: In this section, you will hear three news reports. At the end of each news report, you will hear two or three questions. Both the news report and the questions will be spoken only once. After you hear a question, you must choose the best answer from the four choices marked A), B), C) and D). Then mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 1 with a single line through the centre.
Questions 1 and 2 are based on the news report you h*e just heard.
1. A) She was pierced by a chicken bone.
B) She was coughing all the time.
C) She suffered from lung cancer.
D) She suffered from shock.
2.A) By eating chicken soup daily.
B) Through regular exercising.
C) Through a surgical operation.
D) By using traditional Chinese medicine.
Questions 3 and 4 are based on the news report you h*e just heard.
3. A) It was born 13 years ago.
B) It was Alice Gray’s lovely pet.
C) It got injured in a big bushfire.
D) It ran away into a nearby forest.
4. A) They rebuilt the fencing around their farm.
B) They spent seven years replanting their farm.
C) They claimed damages for their he*y losses.
D) They installed a camera to monitor sheep activity.
Questions 5 to 7 are based on the news report you h*e just heard.
5. A) The disappearance of some gold and diamonds.
B) The tran*er of tons of precious metal by air.
C) The crash of a Russian cargo airplane.
D) The loss of gold from an airplane.
6. A) It made an emergency landing.
B) It informed the local police at once.
C) It contacted the goldmine company.
D) It had a crew member fix the problem.
7.A) They will cooperate with the police.
B) They had checked the plane carefully.
C) They will be questioned by the police.
D) They took some gold bars and diamonds.
Section B
Directions: In this section, you will hear two long conversations. At the end of each conversation, you will hear four questions. Both the conversation and the questions will be spoken only once. After you hear c question, you must choose the best answer from the four choices marked A), B), C) and D). Then mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 1 with a single line through the centre.
Questions 8 to 11 are based on the conversation you h*e just heard.
8. A) For the company’s records.
B) For future training purposes.
C) To follow the company’s rule.
D) To ensure information security.
9. A) To check her customer reference number.
B) To inquire about the price of office chairs.
C) To get her money back for the returned chair.
D) To make complaints about its customer service.
10.A) She had to update its information.
B) She forgot where she had left it.
C) She lost it about three days ago.
D) She was issued a new card.
11.A) Reconsider her options for payment methods.
B) Make a specific note on the company’s system.
C) Update her bank card details on the company’s website.
D) Upload her personal information to the company’s website.
Questions 12 to 15 are based on the conversation you h*e just heard.
12.A) He is feeling exhausted.
B) He is tired of cooking.
C) He has to work late.
D) He wants to try Asian foods.
13.A) Book a table.
B) Order a delivery.
C) Download a menu.
D) Locate a restaurant.
14.A) It is not tasty.
B) It is not healthy.
C) It is too oily.
D) It is too spicy.
15.A) She is too concerned about money.
B) She is too weight-conscious.
C) She is too picky about food.
D) She is too eager to please.
Section C
Directions: In this section, you will hear three passages. At the end of each passage, you will hear three or four questions. Both the passage and the questions will be spoken only once. After you hear a question, you must choose the best answer from the four choices marked A), B), C) and D). Then mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 1 with a single line through the centre.
Questions 16 to 18 are based on the passage you h*e just heard.
16.A) Owners’ personalities affect their cats’ beh*iour and wellbeing.
B) Parents’ personalities can affect the personalities of their children.
C) Parents and cat owners alike experience high levels of anxiety.
D) More and more people are treating pet cats like their children.
17.A) Give their pets beh*ioural training.
B) Provide their pets with the best care.
C) Know their pets’ feelings and desires.
D) Interact with their pets in novel ways.
18.A) More convincing explanation.
B) More extensive sampling.
C) Collection of more data.
D) Further investigation.
Questions 19 to 21 are based on the passage you h*e just heard.
19.A) People should do more running than mere walking.
B) Running is the best exercise for extending one’s life.
C) People should exercise at least 60 minutes every day.
D) Running is the easiest form of exercise for most people.
20.A) Improving their brain function.
B) Regulating their breathing rate.
C) Slowing down their ageing process.
D) Accelerating their blood circulation.
21.A) They found it easy to control their emotions.
B) They struggled to handle negative emotions.
C) They were more eager to enjoy a movie.
D) They were less affected by sad movies.
Questions 22 to 25 are based on the passage you h*e just heard.
22.A) He is a tour guide.
B) He is a famous architect.
C) He is local entrepreneur.
D) He is the owner of the Hil1 House.
23.A) He studied the blueprints of other famous buildings.
B) He inquired about his client’s family background.
C) He observed his client’s life and habits.
D) He took a tour of his client’s old home.
24.A) A house made of timber and brick.
B) A house with a lot of free space.
C) A house of the current fashion.
D) A house of a unique design.
25.A) They are well preserved and in pretty good shape.
B) They are copies built to the architect’s designs.
C) They were designed by another architect.
D) They were badly damaged but restored.
Part Ⅲ Reading Comprehension (40 minutes)
Section A
Directions: In this section, there is a passage with ten blanks. You are required to select one word for each blank from a list of choices given in a word bank following the passage. Read the passage through carefully before making your choices. Each choice in the bank is identified by a letter. Please mark the corresponding letter for each item on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre. You may not use any of the words in the bank more than once.
The sheets are damp with sweat. You’re cold, but your heart is racing as if a killer just chased you down a dark street. It was just a nightmare, you tell yourself; there’s nothing to be afraid of. But you’re still filled with 26 .
Given how unsettling and haunting nightmares can be, is there a way for dreamers to 27 , or even turn off, these bad dreams as they happen?
Research is 28 , but some studies suggest that people who can master lucid dreaming—that is, the ability to be 29 that a nightmare is happening and possibly even control it without waking up—may hold the 30 .
Nightmares are part of the human experience, especially for kids. Doctors 31 don’t consider occasional nightmares a problem. They can just be symptoms of a sleep disorder that can 32 from an unpleasant experience, stress, or certain drugs.
To treat the disorder,there are a number of medicines and therapies that are backed by 33
research, according to the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, which *yzed the *ailable research on the treatment of nightmare disorder in a recent 34 published in the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine.
However, nightmares are complicated, and researchers are still struggling to understand them,Said Dr. Rachel Salas, an expert on sleep disorders and an associate professor at Johns Ho*ins Medicine in Baltimore. What we do know is that people 35 to h*e different kinds of nightmares at different points during the sleep cycle.
A) amount
B) answer
C) *oid
D) aware
E) depart
F) drastically
G) fear
H) limited
l) mechanical
J ) result
K) review
L) rigorous
M) tend
N) timidity
O) typically
Section B
Directions: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived. You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragraph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2 .
Why it matters that teens are reading less
[A] Most of us spend much more with digital media than we did a decade ago. But today’s teens h*e grown up with *artphones. Compared with teens a couple of decades ago, the way they interact with traditional media like books and movies is fundamentally different.
[B] *ysis of surveys of over one million teens in the United States collected since 1976 reveals a major shift in how teens are spending their leisure time. Paper books are being ignored, in f*or of screens. Digital devices are changing other beh*iors, too. More and more, young people choose spending time on their electronic devices over engaging in other activities, regardless of the type. Indeed, by 2016, the *erage American high school senior said they spent six hours a day writing text messages, on social media, and online during their free time. And that covers just three activities, and if other digital media activities were included, that estimate would no dou* rise.
[C] Teens did not always spend that much time with digital media. Online time has doubled since 2006, and social media use has moved from a periodic activity to a daily one in the same period. By 2016,nearly nine out of ten young women in the 12th grade said they visited social media sites every day. Meanwhile, time spent playing video games rose from under an hour a day to an hour and a half on *erage, One out of ten American 8th grace students in 2016 spent 40 hours a week or more playing video games. Let me emphasize that this is equal to the time most *s spend per week at work.
[D] If teens are spending so much time using electronic devices, does that mean they h*e to give up some other activities? Maybe not.Over the years，many scholars h*e insisted that time online does not necessarily take away time spent engaging with traditional media or on other activities. Some people,they argue, are just more interested in certain kinds of media and entertainment. Thus,using more of one type of media does not necessarily mean less of the other.
[E] That may be true, but that still does not tell us much about what happens across a whole generation of people when time spent on digital media grows. Large surveys conducted over the course of many years tell us that American youth are not going to the cinema nearly as often as they did in the past. While 70 percent of 8th and 10th grade students used to go to the movies once a month or more, now only about half do this, More and more, watching a movie is something teens choose to do on their electronic devices. Why is this a problem? One reason is that going to the cinema is generally a social activity. Now, watching movies is something that most teens do alone. This fits a larger pattern. In another *ysis, researchers found that today’s teens go out with their friends much less often than previous generations did.
[F] But the trends related to movies are less disturbing compared with the change in how teens spend their time. Research has revealed an enormous decline in reading. In 1980, about 60 percent of senior high school students said they read a book, newspaper or magazine every day that was not assigned for school. By 2016, only 16 percent did. This is a huge drop and it is important to note that this was not merely a decline in reading paper books, newspapers or magazines. The survey allowed for reading materials on a digital device.
[G] Indeed, the number of senior high school students who said they had not read any books for pleasure in the last year was one out of three by 2016.That is triple the number from two decades ago. For today's youth, books,newspapers and magazines h*e less and less of a presence in their daily lives. Of course, teens are still reading. But they are generally reading short texts. Most of them are not reading long articles or books that explore deep themes and require critical thinking and reflection. Perhaps not accidentally, in 2016 reading scores were the lowest they h*e ever been since 1972.
[H] This might present problems for young people later on. When high school students go on to college, their past and current reading habits will influence their academic performance. Imagine going from reading texts as short as one or two sentences to trying to read entire books written in complex language and containing sophisticated ideas. Reading and comprehending longer books and chapters takes practice, and American teens are no longer getting that practice.
[I] So how can this problem be solved? Should parents and teachers take away teens’ *artphones and replace them with paper books? Probably not. Research has shown that *artphones are currently American teens’ main form of social communication. This means that, without a *artphone, teens are likely to feel isolated from their peers. However,that does not mean teens need to use electronic devices as often as they do now. Data connecting excessive digital media time to mental health issues suggests a limit of two hours a day of free time spent with screens, a restriction that will also allow time for other activities—like going to the movies with friends or reading longer, more complicated texts.
[J] The latter is especially important. I would argue that of all the changes brought about by the widespread use of digital devices, the huge decline in reading is likely to h*e the biggest negative impact on today’s teens because reading books and longer articles is one of the best says to learn critical thinking. It helps people to understand complex issues and to separate fact from fiction. Thus, deep reading is crucial for being a good citizen, a succes*ul college student and a productive employee. If serious reading dies, a lot will go with it.
36.Many years’ surveys reveal that young people in America are going to the cinema much less often than they used to.
37. Survey *ysis shows American teens now spend their leisure time on digital devices rather than reading printed books.
38.The number of senior high schoolers not reading books for pleasure in a year increased three times over 20 years.
39. Many scholars claim that spending time on electronic devices doesn’t necessarily mean a decrease of time for other activities.
40. Most people spend much more time interacting with digital media than they did ten years ago.
41. The author claims that it will be a great loss if we no longer read books and longer articles.
42. Over a decade or so, American teens’ social media use shifted from an occasional activity to a routine one.
43. A more disturbing trend in America today is that teens are spending far less time reading than around four decades ago.
44. Some five years ago, high school seniors in America generally spent more than six hours a day on electronic devices.
45. It was found that American youngsters today don’t socialize nearly as much as the earlier generations.
Section C
Directions: There are 2 passages in this section. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A), B), C) and D). You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on