2016届广东省天河区高考英语二轮语法复习精讲精练：阅读理解04

　　阅读理解精讲精炼04

　　15.

　　Bonus(奖金) culture has become the subject of many studies nowadays. Many people have been angered by the way some bankers and high officials seem to have been rewarded for failure. Others find the idea of offering many-million-dollar bonuses morally disgusting.

　　But few have asked whether performance-related bonuses really do improve performance. The answer seems so obvious that even to ask the question can appear ridiculous. Indeed, in spite of all the complaints about them, financial encouragements continue to be introduced in more and more areas, from healthcare and public services to teaching and universities.

　　So it may come as a shock to many to learn that paying for results can actually make people perform badly in many circumstances, and that the more you pay, the worse they perform.

　　No one is arguing that bonuses can help companies and institutions attract and keep the best staff. Nor does anyone argue against the idea that you can encourage people to do specific tasks by linking payments to those tasks. Rather, the point is about how to get the best out of people. Do employees really perform better if you promise to pay them more for getting results?

　　There are some obvious reasons why such payments can fail. It has been argued, for instance, that cash bonuses contributed to the financial crash, because traders had little enthusiasm to make sure that their companies enjoyed long-term survival.

　　Most bonus projects are poorly designed, says Professor Malcolm Higgs. He thinks the reason is that organisations try to keep bonus arrangements simple. Nevertheless, he thinks bonus projects can work as long as they link the interests of individual employees with the long-term goals of a business.

　　Bonuses can also encourage cheating. “Once you start making people’s rewards dependent on outcomes rather than behaviours, the evidence is people will do whatever they can to get those outcomes,” says Professor Edward Deci. “In many cases the high officials simply lied and cheated to make the stock (股票) price go up so they got huge bonuses.”

　　But the work of Deci and others suggests the problem with bonuses runs far deeper than poor design or cheating. In 1971, he asked students to solve puzzles, with some receiving cash prizes for doing well and others getting nothing. Deci found those offered cash were less likely to keep working on puzzles after they had done enough to get paid.

　　These studies suggest that offering rewards can stop people doing things for the pure joy of it. This was the basis for a series of books by Kohn in which he argues that rewarding children, students and workers with grades, scholarships and other “bribes” (贿赂) leads to low-quality work in the long run.

　　Those who believe in the power of bonuses fail to distinguish between inner drive and outside pressure — wanting to do something because you like it for itself in contrast to doing something because you want the reward, Kohn says. “It’s not just that these two are different, it’s often that the more you reward people for doing something, the more their inner drive tends to decline.”

　　A “do this and get that” approach might improve performance in the short term, but over longer periods it will always fail, Kohn says. People who receive bonus will naturally play safe, become less creative, cooperate less and feel less valued, he adds. What’s more, the studies also suggest that offering rewards can also stop people taking responsibility.

　　1. The effect of performance-related bonuses has not been well studied because people _______.

　　A. take the function of bonuses for granted

　　B. see that bonus offering is done everywhere

　　C. think financial encouragement is disgusting

　　D. are shocked by the practice of rewarding for failures

　　2. According to Malcolm Higgs, designs that _________ are the good ones.

　　A. drive people to finish short-term tasks

　　B. help to attract and keep good employees

　　C. link financial rewards with the quality of the outcomes

　　D. connect individual interests with long-term business goals

　　3. If a person plays safe to get a bonus, he is probably being ________.

　　A. more enthusiastic

　　B. more risk-taking

　　C. less daring

　　D. less responsible

　　4. Which of the following do you think the author would most probably agree with?

　　A. Companies should make their bonus projects simple.

　　B. The benefit of bonus helps to get the best out of people.

　　C. The biggest problem with bonus is it creates cheating.

　　D. Bonus offering can stop people doing things for pure joy.

　　5. Which do you think is the best title of the passage?

　　A. What Is Bonus?

　　B. Does Bonus Work?

　　C. Why Bonus Offered?

　　D. How Bonus Works?

　　【答案与解析】依据表现发奖金己为世人接受，似乎无可厚非。作者却反弹琵琶，条分缕析，阐述了奖金的弊端。

　　1.A推理判断题。第二段的前半部分提到几乎没有人质疑过根据表现发奖金是否真的可以提升表现，答案看起来如此明显以至于询问这样问题似乎很荒谬，由此可推断人们想当然地肯定了奖金的功能。

　　2.D细节理解题。，根据第六段后半部分的内容可知这位教授认为良好的奖金设汁是把员工的个人兴趣和公司的长期目标结合在一起。

　　3．D细节理解题。根据最后一段最后一句话可知，奖金会使人们不愿承担责任，故选D项。

　　4．D作者态度题。作者在第二段中提出了自己的观点，指出了奖金的弊端，下文则进行详细的剖析。根据倒数第三段第一句中的内容可知作者认为发奖金会阻止人们在做事过程中享受纯粹的快乐。

　　5 B主旨人意题。前两段是引题，概述的是人们对奖金的世俗看法，第二段则提出了相反的观点，下文则进行了深入的阐述，所以B项最能概括文章大意。

　　1.

　　A cancer-stricken British teenage said Thursday she had been moved by messages of support from around the world after writing an online“Bucket List” of things she wanted to do before dying.

　　Alice

　　Pyne，l5，created an internet blog in which she described her fight against a cancer of the white blood cells. “I’ve been fighting cancer for almost four years and now I know that the cancer is gaining on me and it doesn’t look like I’m going to win this one,” she wrote .

　　For her list，at the site www.alicepyne.blogspot.com, she has included making everyone sign up to be a bone marrow donor(骨髓捐赠者)，swimming with sharks , meeting boy band Take That and getting a purple iPad computer.

　　Messages of support and offers of help quickly flooded her webpage and it became one of the most talked about subjects on Twitter．

　　“Oh, dear and I thought that I was just doing a little blog for a few friends!” she wrote after her site attracted huge attention．“Thank you so much for all your lovely messages to me。”

　　Pyne，who lives with her family in the northwest English town of Ulverston, revealed(透露)the management of Take That had arranged for her to see the band after reading her blog.

　　A group of local lawmakers have also joined forces with the Anthony blood cancer charity to encourage people to join its stem cell register.

　　1．What happened after Alice Pyne wrote her “Bucket List”?

　　A．People around the world sent messages to support her.

　　B. People sent gifts to her from all over the world.

　　C. A lot of people offered to donate bone marrow to her.

　　D. The media called on people to help her．

　　3．Alice Pyne wrote her “Bucket List” to

　　.

　　A. catch people’s

　　attention

　　B. say goodbye to a few friends

　　C. give comfort to two terminally ill men

　　D. express her last few wishes

　　4．It can be inferred from the second paragraph that Alice Pyne

　　.

　　A. is unaware of her own conditions

　　B. is very sad to know that she will die

　　C. is calm to know that death is approaching

　　D. is still quite confident in fighting against cancer

　　4．Which of the following is NOT on Alice Pyne’s “Bucket List”?

　　A．To ask people to donate bone marrow.

　　B. To get a cool computer．

　　C. To swim with shark.

　　D．To meet a boy。

　　’

　　5. Take That will arrange to

　　.

　　A．meet Pyne in person

　　B. help Pyne in any possible way

　　C. donate money to Pyne

　　D. invite Pyne to join the band

　　【答案与解析】身患癌症的英国少女Alice Pyne 把自己的临终遗愿张贴在网上以后，引起了社会各界的普遍关注，再次阐述了“只要人人都献出一点爱，世界将变成美好的人间”的真谛。

　　1.A 细节理解题。由倒数第三段的“Messages of support and offers of help quickly flooded her webpage and it became one of the most talked about subjects on Twitter．”可以看出帖子发布后，收到了世界各地的支持他的信息。

　　2. D 细节理解题。由第一段的“after writing an online“Bucket List” of things she wanted to do before dying.”可以看出，“Bucket List”表达的就是他最后的愿望。3. C

　　推理判断题。由该段的“I know that the cancer is gaining on me and it doesn’t look like I’m going to win this one”对自己的病情和结果进行了平静的叙述，由此可知，C项符合语境。

　　4. D 细节判断题。第四段介绍了“Bucket List”所有的内容，前三项都在里面，但是里面的“boy band Take That”是一个乐队，而不是想见某一个男孩，所以应该排除D。

　　5. A 细节理解题。由倒数第二段的“… revealed(透露)the management of Take That had arranged for her”可以看出，她想见的那家乐队已经安排亲自见她了。故选A。

　　17.

　　I am a strong believer that if a child is raised with approval, he learns to love himself and will be successful in his own way.

　　Several weeks ago，I was doing homework with my son in the third grade and he kept standing up from his chair to go over the math lines．I kept asking him to sit down, telling him that he would concentrate better. He sat but seconds later, as if he didn’t even notice he was doing it, he got up again．I was getting frustrated, but then it hit me．I started noticing his answers were much quicker and accurate when he stood up．Could he be more intent while standing up？

　　This made me start questioning myself and what I had been raised to believe. I was raised to believe that a quiet, calm child was a sure way to success．This child would have the discipline to study hard, get good grades and become someone important in life．

　　Now those same people perhaps come to realize that their kids are born with their own sets of DNA and personality traits，and all you can do is loving and accepting them．As parents，throughout their growing years and beyond that, we need to be our kids' best cheerleaders，guiding them and helping them find their way.

　　I have stopped asking my son to sit down and concentrate．Obviously, he is concentrating just in his own way and not mine．We need to learn to accept our kids' ways of doing things．Some way may have worked for me but doesn't mean we need to carry it through generations．There is nothing sweeter than being individual and unique．It makes us free and happy and that's just the way I want my kids to live their own life．1. At the beginning, the author tried to keep his son seated in order to make him________.

　　A. pay more attention to his study

　　B. keep silent in the room

　　C. finish his homework on time

　　D. get right answers

　　2. Inspired by the case of his son，the author began to doubt________.

　　A．the importance of parents

　　B．the old form of education

　　C．the relationship between kids and their parents

　　D．the good grades of some kids

　　3. According to the passage, which of the following statements is right?

　　A. We should help kids correct their wrong ways.

　　B. Parents should study their kids’ DNA.

　　C. Kids should be taught to behave themselves.

　　D. Parents should love and accept their kids.

　　4. The author has stopped asking his son to sit down because __________.

　　A. he has changed his traditional ideas

　　B. his son wants to be unique

　　C. his son doesn’t follow his advice

　　D. his son’s DNAis different

　　5. Which of the following would be the best title of the passage?

　　A. Study hard and you'll be successful

　　B. Be friendly to your children

　　C. Children's success in their own style

　　D. Parents' help with their children's study

　　【答案与解析】作者通过辅导孩子写作业的经历意识到用传统的教育方式约束孩子已不再适用，父母应该引导和帮助孩子找到适合他们自身的学习方法，培养独特的个性，进而获得成功。

　　1.·A细节理解题。根据第一段的“I kept asking him to sit down，telling him that he would concentrate better．”可知作者让他儿子坐下来是想让他更专心地学习。

　　2.·B推理判断题。结合第三段前两句中的内容可推断作者开始怀疑传统教育。

　　3.·D正误判断题。根据第四段的“…and all you can do is loving and accepting them．”可知父母应该关爱并接受他们的孩子。

　　4.·A推理判断题。第三段是对传统教育的质疑，第四段指出父母应该引导并帮助孩子发现适合他们自己的学习方式，最后一段提到作者不再要求孩子坐下专心学习，由此可推断作者改变了他的传统教育观念。5.·C主旨大意题。文章第一段开门见山地提出了本文的主题，如果孩子得到了认同，就能学会自爱并用自己的方式取得成功，所以C项最能概括文章大意。

　　The brown widow spider became established in Southern California in early 2000 and has become part of the local spider family in urban Los Angeles and San Diego. The brown widow spider is continuing its expansion in Southern California and could possibly move northward into Central California.

　　The brown widow is suspected to have evolved in Africa although it was first described from South America, which adds confusion as to where it might have originated.  It is a tropical and subtropical spider having established populations in Hawaii, Florida, parts of Australia, South Africa and Japan.  In North America, the brown widow was restricted for many decades to the Florida peninsula.  However, around the year 2000, it started showing up in other Gulf Coast states.  Brown widows are now known from Texas to Georgia and South Carolina. 

　　The brown widow builds its web in protected sites around homes and in woody vegetation with branches.  Some typical sites selected by brown widows for web building are empty containers such as buckets and nursery pots, mail boxes, entry way corners, under eaves, storage closets and garages, undercarriages of motor vehicles that are stationary for long periods, and the undersides of outdoor furniture. They choose places that are more exposed than sites chosen by black widows and therefore, appear to be at higher risk for interactions with humans as far as bites are concerned.

　　One recent study demonstrates that the brown widow spider is less poisonous than other widow species. The reason for the weaker effect of brown widow bites on humans is possibly because the brown widow does not have much poison as its larger relatives, but it is really a threat to humans as to its poison. The two major symptoms of a brown widow bite were that the bite hurt when it was given and it left a red mark. These two symptoms are not much different from the bite of normal household spiders. 

　　There is no specific information regarding the control of brown widows by farm chemicals. Most current advice is what is used for controlling spiders in general. Therefore, most commercially available farm chemicals should work on brown widows. Avoiding a mess of the house and the garage should reduce nest sites for them. Also, one should store garage items in plastic bags where there might be interactions with spiders. These items include rarely worn garments such as gardening clothes and gloves, recreational items like sports equipment (i.e., baseball gloves) and other items where spiders can crawl up into holes where fingers can be inserted.

　　1. The author wrote this article to _______.

　　A. announce the result of a research on spiders

　　B. introduce the ways to get rid of the spiders

　　C. report a new finding of the widow species

　　D. warn readers against the brown widow

　　2. From the passage we can conclude that _______.

　　A. brown widows are spreading northward

　　B. the brown widow originated from Africa

　　C. brown widows now can be found in all countries

　　D. there used to be no brown widows in North America

　　3. The third paragraph is mainly about _______.

　　A. the brown widow’s web building

　　B. the characteristics of the brown widow

　　C. the habitat preferences of the brown widow

　　D. the brown widow’s threaten to human beings

　　4. It can be inferred that _______.

　　A. brown widows can be killed with any farm chemicals

　　B. at present people can only control brown widow spiders

　　C. the brown widow has more poison than the black widow

　　D. victims bitten by the brown widow needn’t see the doctor

　　【答案与解析】

　　一种褐色的毒蜘蛛正在美国蔓延，其危害不容忽视。更糟糕的是，目前还没有消灭它的方法，只能尽力进行控制和预防。

　　1．D作者意图题。文章从这种蜘蛛的渊源谈起，预测了它的蔓延范围，进而介绍了它的生活习性、危害以及控制方法，所以作者意在警告读者当心这种蜘蛛。

　　2．A细节理解题。根据第一段最后一句话可知它们可能会朝北方蔓延。

　　3．C段落大意题。本段指出了这种蜘蛛经常选择的织网的地方，即主要介绍这种蜘蛛的栖息偏好。

　　4．B推理判断题。最后一段提到还没有掌握控制这种蜘蛛应当使用的化学药品的具体信息，目前的建议是采用控制蜘蛛的一般方法，并提供了一些预防措施，由此可推断目前人们只能控制它们。