托福阅读TPO-20-21阅读.doc

WESTWARDMIGRATION (TPO20-1)
Paragraph1 The story of the westward movement of population in the United States is, in the main, the story of the expansion of American agriculture-of the development of new areas for the raising of livestock and the cultivation of wheat, corn, tobacco, and cotton. After 1815 improved transportation enabled more and more western farmers to escape a self-sufficient way of life and enter a national market economy during periods when commodity prices were high, the rate of westward migration increased spectacularly.“Old America seemed to be breaking up and moving westward,” observed an English visitor in 1817, during the first great wave of migration. Emigration to the west reached a peak in the 1830’s. whereas in 1810 only a seventy of the American people lived west of the Appalachian mountains, by 1840more than a third lived there.

Paragraph2 Why were these hundreds of thousands of setters-most of them farmers some of them artisans-drawn away from the cleared fields and established cities and villages of the East? Certain characteristics of American society help to explain this remarkable migration. The European ancestors of some Americans had for centuries lived rooted to the same village or piece of land until some religious, political, or economic crisis uprooted them and drove them across the Atlantic. Many of those who experienced this sharp break thereafter lacked the ties that had bound them and their ancestors to a single place. Moreover, European society was relatively stratified; occupation and social status were inherited. In American society, however, the class structure was less rigid; some people changed occupations easily and believed it was their duty to improve their social and economic position. As a result, many Americans were an inveterately restless, rootless, and ambitious people. Therefore, these social and economic position. As a result, many Americans were an inveterately restless, rootless, and ambitious people. Therefore, these social traits helped to produce the nomadic and daring settlers who kept pushing westward beyond the fringes of settlement. In addition, there were other immigrants who migrated west in search of new homes, material success, and better lives.

Paragraph3 The west had plenty of attractions: the alluvial river bottoms, the fecund soils of the rolling forest lands, the black loams of the prairies were tempting to New England farmers working their rock, sterile land and to southeastern farmers plagued with soil depletion and erosion. In 1820 under a new land law, a farm could be bought for 100. The continued proliferation of banks made it easier for those without cash to negotiate loans in paper money. Western farmers borrowed with the confident expectation that the exploding economy would keep farm prices high, thus making it easy to repay loans when they fell due.

Paragraph4 Transportation was becoming less of a problem of those who wished to move west and for those who wished to move west and for those who had far surpluses to send to market. Prior to 1815,western farmers who did not live on navigable waterways were connected to them only by dirt roads and mountain trails. Livestock could be driven across the mountains, but the cost of transporting bulky grains in this fashion was several times greater than their value in eastern markets. The first step toward an improvement of western transportation was the construction of turnpikes. These roads made possible a reduction in transportation costs and thus agriculture along their routes.

Paragraph5 Two other developments presaged the end of the era of turnpikes and stared a transportation revolution that resulted in increased regional specialization and the growth of a national market economy First came the steamboat; although flatboats and keelboats continued to be important until the 1850’s, steamboats eventually superseded all other craft in the carrying of passengers and freight. Steamboats were not only faster but also transported upriver freight for about one tenth of what it had previously cost on hand propelled keelboats. Next came the Erie canal, an enormous project in its day, spanning about 350miles. After the canal went into operation, the cost per mile of transporting a ton of freight from Buffalo to New York City declined from nearly 20 cents to less that 1 cent. Eventually, the western states diverted much of their produce from the rivers to the Erie Canal, a shorter route to eastern markets.

Paragraph1
1 What can be inferred from paragraph 1 about western farmers prior to 1815?
○They had limited their crop production to wheat, corn, tobacco, and cotton.
○They were able to sell their produce at high prices.
○They had not been successful in raising cattle.
○They did not operate in a national market economy.
2 What is the purpose of the statement, “whereas in 1810 only a seventy of the American people lived west of Appalachian Mountains, by 1840 more than a third lived there”?
○To illustrate that generally population shifts occur rapidly
○To correct a mistaken impression of American agriculture from 1810 to 1840
○To emphasize the range and speed with which the westward migration occurred
○To demonstrate how attractive the Appalachian Mountains were to Americans

Paragraph2：
3 The word ‘fringes’ in the passage is closest in meaning to
○Borders
○Groups
○Types
○Directions
4 According to paragraph 2, all of the following are reasons why Americans migrated westward EXCEPT
○The desire to move from one pace to the next
○The hope of improving their socioeconomic status
○The opportunity to change jobs
○The need to escape religious or political crises

Paragraph3：
5 Which of the sentences below best expresses the essential information in the highlighted sentence in the passage? Incorrect choices change the meaning in important ways or leave out essential information.
○Because the West had more rivers and forests than the East, its soil was more productive.
○The fertile soils of the West drew farmers from regions with barren soils.
○Farmers living in western areas of the United States were more affected by soil erosion that farmers living in eastern areas.
○The soil in western areas of the United States was richer than soil in eastern areas.
6 According to paragraph 3, what was the significance of the land law passed in 1820?
○It granted government-supported loans to farmers.
○It provided farmland at an affordable price.
○It required banks to offer loans to farmers.
○It enabled farmers to sell their land for a profit.
7 The word “proliferation” in the passage is closest in meaning to
○Growth
○Cooperation
○Importance
○Success

Paragraph4：
8 Paragraph 4 suggests that turnpikes affected farmers by
○Making the price of grain uniform for both eastern and western farmers
○Making western farm products more profitable than eastern farm products.
○Allowing farmers to drive their livestock across mountain trails
○Allowing a greater number of farmers to sell their farm products in a commercial Market

Paragraph5：
9 The word “superseded” in the passage is closest in meaning to
○Replaced
○Reformed
○Equaled
○Increased
10 The word “diverted” in the passage is closest in meaning to
○Collected shifted
○Shifted
○Transported
○Sold
11 Which of the following can be inferred from paragraph 5 about flatboats and keelboats?
○They ceased to be used as soon as the first turnpikes were built.
○They were slower and more expensive to operate than steamboats.
○They were used for long distance but not for regional transportation.
○They were used primarily on the Erie Canal.
12 Paragraph 5 mentions that the Erie Canal led to a reduction in all of the following EXCEPT
○The length of the route that goods from the West traveled across to reach eastern markets
○The cost of transporting freight
○The price of produce from western states
○The amount of produce from western states that was shipped on rivers

Paragraph 4: Transportation was becoming less of a problem of those who wished to move west and for those who had far surpluses to send to market. █ Prior to 1815, western farmers who did not live on navigable waterways were connected to them only by dirt roads and mountain traits. █ Livestock could be driven across the mountains, but the cost of transporting bulky grains in this fashion was several times greater than their value in eastern markets. █ The first step toward an improvement of western transportation was the construction of turnpikes. █ These roads made possible a reduction in transportation costs and thus agriculture along their routes.
13 Look at the four squares [█] that indicate where the following sentence could be added to the passage.
In fact, goods could be shipped more cheaply across the much greater distance of the Atlantic Ocean than they could from western New York to coastal cities.
Where would the sentence best fit?
14 Directions: An introductory sentence for a brief summary of the passage is provided below. Complete the summary by selecting the THREE answer choices that express the most important ideas in the passage. Some sentences do not belong in the summary because they express ideas that are not presented in the passage or are minor ideas in the passage. This question is worth 2 points
The westward movement of population across the United States led to expanded agricultural production.

Answer choices
1. The desire to improve their livelihood often inspired people to move west.
2. Among the people who moved to the western United States were a number of artisans.
3. The fertility of western farmland as well as favorable government policies supported agricultural gains.
4. Steamboats were originally used to transport passengers rather than freight.
5. Commercial farming in the West was greatly enhanced by improvements in land and water transportation.
6. The transportation revolution resulted in regional economies that operated independently of a national market economy.

EARLY SETTLEMENTS IN SOUTHWEST ASIA(TPO20-2)
Paragraph1: The universal global warming at the end of the ice age had dramatic effects on temperate regions of Asia, Europe, and North America. Ice sheets retreated and sea level rose. The climatic changes in southwestern Asia were more subtle, in that they involved shifts in mountain snow lines, rainfall patterns, and vegetation cover. However, these same cycles of change and had momentous impacts on the sparse human populations of the region. At the end of the Ice Age, no more than a few thousand foragers lived along the eastern Mediterranean coast, in the Jordan and Euphrates valleys. Within 2,000years, the human population of the region numbered in the tens of thousands, all as a result of village life and farming. Thanks to new environmental and archaeological discoveries, we nowknow something about this remarkable change in local life.

Paragraph2:Pollen samples from freshwater lakes in Sria and elsewhere tell us forest cover expanded rapidly at the end of the Ice Age, for the southwestern Asian climate was still cooler and considerably wetter than today. Many areas were richer in animal and plant species than they are now, making them highly favorable for human occupation. About 9000 B.C., most human settlements lay in the area along the Mediterranean coast and in the Zagros Mountains of Iran and their foothills. Some local areas, like the Jordan River valley, the middle Euphrates valley, and some Zagros valleys, were more densely populated than elsewhere. Here more sedentary and more complex societies flourished. These people exploited the landscape intensively, foraging on hill slopes for wild cereal grasses and nuts, while hunting gazelle and other game on grassy lowlands and in river valleys. Their settlements contain exotic objects such as seashells, stone bowls, and artifacts made of obsidian (volcanic glass), all traded from afar. This considerable volume of intercommunity exchange brought a degree of social complexity in its wake.

Paragraph3:Thanks to extremely fine-grained excavation and extensive use of flotation methods (through which seeds are recovered from soil samples), we know a great deal about the foraging practices of the inhabitants of Abu Hureyra in Syria’s Euphrates valley. Abu Hureyra was founded about 9500B.C., a small village settlement of cramped pit dwellings (houses dug partially in the soil) with reed roofs supported by wooden uprights. For the next 1,500 years, its inhabitants enjoyed a somewhat warmer and damper climate than today, living in a well-wooded steppe area where wild cereal grasses were abundant. They subsisted off spring migrations of Persian gazelles from the south. With such a favorable
Paragraph4:location, about 300 to 400 people lived in a sizable, permanent settlement. They were no longer a series of small bands but lived in a large community with more elaborate social organization, probably grouped into clans of people of common descent.

Paragraph5:The flotation samples from the excavations allowed botanists to study shifts in plantcollection habits as if they were looking through a telescope at a changing landscape. Hundreds of tiny plant remains show how the inhabitants exploited nut harvests in nearby pistachio and oak forests. However, as the climate dried up, the forests retreated from the vicinity of the settlement. The inhabitants turned to wild cereal grasses instead, collecting them by the thousands, while the percentage of nuts in the diet fell. By 8200B.C., drought conditions were so severe that the people abandoned their long-established settlement, perhaps dispersing into smaller camps.

Paragraph6:Five centuries later, about 7700B.C., a new village rose on the mound. At first the inhabitants still hunted gazelle intensively. Then, about 7000 B.C., within the space of a few generations, they switched abruptly to herding domesticated goats and sheep and to growing einkorn, pulses, and other cereal grasses. Abu Hureyra grew rapidly until it covered nearly 30 acres. It was a close-knit community of rectangular, one-story mud-brick houses, joined by narrow lanes an courtyards, finally abandoned about 5000 B.C.. Many complex factors led to the adoption of the new economies, not only at Abu Hureyra, but at many other locations such as ‘Ain Ghazal, also in Syria, where goat toe bones showing the telltale marks of abrasion caused by foot tethering (binding)’ testify to earl herding of domestic stock.

Paragraph1:
1. The word “momentous” in the passage is closest in meaning to
○Numerous
○Regular
○Very important
○Very positive
2. Major climatic changes occurred by the end of the Ice Age in all of the following geographic areas EXCEPT
○temperate regions of Asia
○southwestern Asia
○North America
○Europe
3. The phrase “this remarkable change” in the passage refers to