2018年大学英语六级考试真题样卷

2018年大学英语六级考试真题样卷Part I Writing (30 minutes)Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay commenting on the remark “Earth provides enough to satisfy every mans need, but not every mans greed.” You can cite examples to illustrate your point. You should write at least 150 words but no more than 200 words. Write your essay on Answer Sheet 1.注意：此部分试题请在答题卡1上作答。大学英语六级考试听力样题Part II Listening Comprehension (30 minutes)Section ADirections: In this section, you will hear two long conversations. At the end of each conversation, you will hear some questions. Both the conversation 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 1with a single line through the centre.Conversation OneQuestions 1 to 4 are based on the conversation you have just heard.1. A) He invented the refrigerator.B) He patented his first invention.C) He was admitted to a university.D) He got a degree in Mathematics.2. A) He started to work on refrigeration.B) He became a professor of Mathematics.C) He fell in love with Natasha Willoughby.D) He distinguished himself in low temperature physics.3. A) Discovering the true nature of subatomic particles.B) Their explanation of the laws of cause and effect.C) Their work on very high frequency radio waves.D) Laying the foundations of modern mathematics.4. A) To have a three-week holiday.B) To spend his remaining years.C) To patent his inventions.D) To teach at a university.Conversation TwoQuestions 5 to 8 are based on the conversation you have just heard.5. A) The injury of some students.B) A school bus crash on the way.C) The collapse of a school building.D) A fire that broke out on a school campus.6. A) Teaching.B) On vacation.C) Having lunch.D) Holding a meeting.7. A) A malfunctioning stove.B) Cigarettes butts left by workers.C) Violation of traffic rules.D) Negligence in school maintenance.8. A) Sent a story to the local newspaper.B) Threw a small Thanksgiving party.C) Baked some cookies as a present.D) Wrote a personal letter of thanks.Section BDirections: In this section, you will hear two passages. At the end of each passage, you will hear some 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.Passage OneQuestions 9 to 11 are based on the passage you have just heard.9. A) It is a trait of a generous character.B) It is a reflection of self-esteem.C) It is an indicator of high intelligence.D) It is a sign of happiness and confidence.10. A) It was self-defeating.B) It was aggressive.C) It was the essence of comedy.D) It was something admirable.11. A) It is a double-edged sword.B) It is a feature of a given culture.C) It is a unique gift of human beings.D) It is a result of both nature and nurture.Passage TwoQuestions 12 to 15 are based on the passage you have just heard.12. A) She is a tourist guide.B) She is an interpreter.C) She is a domestic servant.D) She is from the royal family.13. A) It is situated at the foot of a beautiful mountain.B) It was used by the family to hold dinner parties.C) It was frequently visited by heads of state.D) It is furnished like one in a royal palace.14. A) It is elaborately decorated.B) It has survived some 2,000 years.C) It is very big, with only six slim legs.D) It is shaped like an ancient Spanish boat.15. A) They are interesting to look at.B) They have lost some of their legs.C) They do not match the oval table at all.D) They are uncomfortable to sit in for long.Section CDirections: In this section, you will hear recordings of lectures or talks followed by some questions. The recordings will be played 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.Now listen to the following recording and answer questions 16 to 19.16. A) They investigate the retirement homes in America.B) They are on issues facing senior citizens in America.C) They describe the great pleasures of the golden years.D) They are filled with fond memories of his grandparents.17. A) The loss of the ability to take care of himself.B) The feeling of not being important any more.C) Being unable to find a good retirement home.D) Leaving the home he had lived in for 60 years.18. A) The loss of identity and self-worth.B) Fear of being replaced or discarded.C) Freedom from pressure and worldly cares.D) The possession of wealth and high respect.19.A) The urgency of pension reform.B) Medical care for senior citizens.C) Finding meaningful roles for the elderly in society.D) The development of public facilities for senior citizens.Now listen to the following recording and answer questions 20 to 22.20.A) It seriously impacts their physical and mental development.B) It has become a problem affecting global economic growth.C) It is a common problem found in underdeveloped countries.D) It is an issue often overlooked by parents in many countries.21. A) They will live longer.B) They get better pay.C) They get along well with people.D) They develop much higher IQs.22. A) Appropriated funds to promote research of nutrient-rich foods.B) Encouraged breastfeeding for the first six months of a childs life.C) Recruited volunteers to teach rural people about health and nutrition.D) Targeted hunger-relief programs at pregnant women and young children.Now listen to the following recording and answer questions 23 to 25.23. A) The guaranteed quality of its goods.B) The huge volume of its annual sales.C) The service it provides to its customers.D) The high value-to-weight ratio of its goods.24. A) Those having a taste or smell component.B) Products potentially embarrassing to buy.C) Those that require very careful handling.D) Services involving a personal element.25. A) Those who live in the virtual world.B) Those who have to work long hours.C) Those who are used to online transactions.D) Those who dont mind paying a little more.Part III Reading Comprehension (40 minutes)Section ADirections: 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.Questions 36 to 45 are based on the following passage.To understand why we should be concerned about how young people read, it helps to know something about the way the ability to read evolved. Unlike the ability to understand and produce spoken language, the ability to read must be painstakingly 36_ by each individual. The “reading circuits” we construct in the brain can be 37_ or they can be robust, depending on how often and how 38_ we use them. Thers are enjoying the experience the most, the pace of their reading 39_ slows. The combination of fast, fluent decoding of words and slow, unhurried progress on the page gives deep readers time to enrich their reading with reflection and analysis. It gives them time to establish an 40_ relationship with the author, the two of them 41_ in a long and warm conversation like people falling in love.This is not reading as many young people know it. Their readingdifference between what literary critic Frank Kermode calls “carnal (肉体的) reading” and “spiritual reading.” If we allow our offspring to believe carnal reading is all there is if we dont open the door to spiritual reading, through an early 42_ on discipline and practice we will have 43_ them of an enjoyable experiencethey would not otherwise encounter. Observing young peoples 44_ to digital devices, some progressive educators talk about “meeting kids where they are,” molding instruction around their onscreen habits. This is mistaken. We need, 45 , to show them someplace theyve never been, a place only deep reading can take them.AB) actuallyC) attachmentD) cheatedE) engagedF) feebleG) illicitH) insistenceJ) notwithstanK) petitionL) ratherM) scarcelyN) swayedO) vigorouslySection BDirections: 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.A The UN had the foresight to convene a “world assembly on ageing” back in 1982, but that came and went. By 1994 the World Bank had noticed that something big was happening. In a report entitled “Averting the Old Age Crisis”, it argued that pension arrangements in most countries were unsustainable.B For the next ten years a succession of books, mainly by Ame alarm. They had titles like Young vs Old, Gray Dawn and The Coming Generational Storm, and their message was blunt: health-care systems were heading for the rocks, pensioners were taking young people to the cleaners, and soon there would be intergenerational warfare.C Since then the debate has become less emotiona known about the subject. Books, conferences and research papers have multiplied. International organisations such as the OECD and the EU issue regular reports. Population ageing is on every agenda, from G8 economic conferences to NATO summits. The World Economic Forum plans to consider the future of pensions and health care at its prestigious Davos conference early next year. The media,D Whether all that attention has translated into sufficient action is another question. Governments in rich countries now accept that their pension and promises will soon become unaffordable, and many of them have embarked on reforms, but so far only timidly. That is not surprising: politicians with an eye on the next election will hardly rush to introduce unpopular measures that may not bear fruit for years, perhaps decades.E The outline of the changes needed is clear. To avoid fiscal (财政的) meltdown, public pensions and health-care provisi taxes may have to go up. By far the most effective method to restrain pension spending is to give people the opportunity to work longer, because it increases tax revenues and reduces spending on pensions at the same time. It may even keep them alive longer. John Rother, the AARPs head of policy and strategy, points to studies showing that other things being equal, people who remain at work have lower death rates than their retired peers.F Younger people today mostly accept that they will have to work for longer and that their pensions will be less generous.Employers older workers are worth holding on to. That may be because they have had plenty of younger ones to choose from, partly thanks to the post-war baby-boom and partly because over the past few decades many more women have entered the labour force, increasing employers choice. But the reservoir of women able and willing to take up paid work is running low, and the baby-boomers are going grey.G In many countries immigrants have been filling such gaps in the labour force as have already emerged (and remember that the real shortage is still around tenyears off). Immigration in the developed world is the highest it has ever been, and it is making a useful difference. In still-fertile America it currently accounts for about 40% of total population growth, and in fast-ageing western Europe for about 90%.H On the face of it, it seems the perfect solution. Many developing countries have lots of young will boost tax revenues and keep up economic growth. But over the next few decades labour forces in rich countries are set to shrink so much that inflows of immigrants would have to increase enormously to compensate: to at least twice their current size in western Europes most youthful countries, and three times in the older ones. Japan would need a large multiple of the few immigrants it has at present. Public opinion polls show that people in most rich countries already think that immigration is too high. Further big increases would be politically unfeasible.I To tackle the problem of ageing populations at its root, “old” countries would have to rejuvenate (使年轻) themselves by having more of their own children. A number of them have tried, some more successfully than others. But it is not a simple matter of offering financial incentives or providing more child care. Modern urban life in rich countries is not well adapted to large families. Women find it hard to combine family and career. They often compromise by having just one child.J And if fertility in ageing countries does not pick up? It will not be the end of the world, at ledifferent place. Older societies may be less innovative and more strongly disinclined to take risks than younger ones. By 2025 at the latest, about half the voters in America and most of those in western European countries will be over 50and older people turn out to vote in much greater numbers than younger ones. Academic studies have found no evidence so far that older voters have used their power at the ballot box to push for policies that specifically benefit them, though if in future there are many more of them they might start doing so.K Nor is there any sign of the intergenerational warfare predicted in the 1990s. After all, older people themselves mostly have families. In a recent study ogrown-up children in 11 European countries, Karsten Hank of Mannheim University found that 85% of them lived within 25km of each other and the majority of them were in touch at least once a week.LEven so, the shift in the centre of gravity to older age groups is bound to have a profound effect on societies, not just economically a of other ways too. Richard Jackson and Neil Howe of Americas CSIS, in a thoughtful book called The Graying of the Great Powers, argue that, among other things, the ageing of the develop dcountries will have a number of serious security implications.MFor example, the shortage of young adults is likely to make countries more reluctant to commit the America will find itself playing an ever-increasing role in the developed worlds defence effort. Because Americas population will still be growing when that of most other developed countries is shrinking, America will be the only developed country that still matters geopolitically (地缘政治上). Ask me in 2020N There is little that can be done to stop population ageinlive with it. But sbelieve that given the right policies, the effects, though grave, need not be catastrophic. Most countries have recognised the need to do something and are beginning to act.O But even then there is no guarantee that their efforts will work. What is happening now is historicallyEconomics and Demography of Ageing at the University of California, Berkeley, puts it briefly and clearly: “We dont really know what population ageing will be like, because nobody has done it yet.”注意：此部分试题请在答题卡2上作答。46. Employers should realise it is important to47.A recent study found that most old people in some European countries had48.Few governments in rich countries have launc49.In a report published some 2050.Countries that have a shortage of young adults wi51.One-c52.A series of books, mostly authored by Americans, warned o53.Compared with younger ones, olde54.The best solu55.Immigration as a means to boost the shrinking labour force maySection CDirections:questions choices marked A), B), C) and D). You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre.Questions 56 to 60 are based on the following passage.For most of the 20th century, Asia asked itself it could learn from the moderm.innovating west.Now the question must be reversed:what can the Wests overly indebated and sluggish (经济滞长的) nations learn from a flourishing Asia? Just a few decades ago, Asias two giants were stagnating (停滞不前) under faulty economic ideologies. However, once China began embracing free-mark rms in the 1980s, followed by India in the 1990s, both countries achieved rapid growth. Crucially, as they opened up their markets, they balanced market economy with sensible government direction. As the Indian economist Amartya Sen has wisely said, “The invisible hand of the market has often relied heavily on the visible hand of government.”Contrast this middle path with America and Europe, which have each gone ideologically oeasingly clinging to the ideology of uncontrolled free markets and dismissing the role of governmentfollowing Ronald Reagans idea that “government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.” Of course, when the markets came crashing down in 2007, it was decisive government intervention that saved the day. Despite this fact, many Americans are still strongly opposed to “big government.” If Americans could only free themselves from their antigovernment doctrine, they would beral measures could put the country back on the right path. A simple consumption tax of, say, 5% would significantly reduce the countrys huge government deficit without damaging productivity. A small gasoline tax would help free America from its dependence on oil imports and create incentives for green energy development. In the same way, a significant reduction of wasteful agricultural subsidies could also lower the deficit. But in order to take advantage of these common-sense solutions, Americans will have to put aside their own attachment to the idea of smaller government and less regulation. American politicians will have to develop the courage to follow what is taught in all American public-policy schools: that there are good taxes and bad taxes. Asian countries have embraced this wisdom, and have built sound long-term fiscal (财政的) policies as a result. Meanwhile, Europe has fallen prey to a different ideological trap: the belief that European governments would always have infiniteowing as if there were no tomorrow. Unlike the Americans, who felt that the markets knew best, the Europeans failed to anticipate how the markets would react to their endless borrowing. Today, the European Union is creating a $580 billion fund to ward off sovereign collapse. This will buy the EU time, but it will not solve the blocs larger problem.56. What has contributed to the rapid economic growth in China and India?B) Heavy reliance on the hand of government.C) Copying western-style economic behavior.D) Timely reform of government at all levels.What does Ronald Reagan mean by saying “goA) Government action is key to solving economic problems. B) ManyC) Many social ills are caused by wrong government policies.D) Government regulation h