Question

【题目】Music lessons may improve memory and learning ability in your children by promoting different patterns of brain development, a study shows．

After a year of musical training, children aged between 4 and 6 performed better at a standard memory test than did children who were not taught music．The findings suggest that music could be useful for building the learning capacity of your minds．

Earlier studies have shown that older children given music lessons become better at IQ tests than those who are musically untrained, but this is the first to show such a benefit in children so young．

Professor Laurek Trainor, of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, also found clear differences in the ways in which children's brains responded to sound after a year of musical training．'This is the first study to show that brain responses in young, musically trained and untrained children change differently over the course of a year," she said．"These changes are likely to be related to the cognitive（ 认知的 ）benefit that is seen with musical training．"

Professor Trainer's team looked at 12 children, 6 of whom had just started extra-curricular （课程外） music lessons and 6 of whom were not being taught any music except that included as a standard part of their school curriculum （课程标准） ．

During the year all 12 children had their brains examined four times using magneto-encephalography （MEG）, and each child was played two types of sound —white noise and a violin tone．The MEG measurements showed that all children responded more to violin sounds than to white noise, reflecting a preferable for meaningful tones, and their response times fell over the course of the year as their brains matured．

【1】This passage is mainly about ____．

A．why music lessons are good for the memory

B．the benefit from extra-curricular training for younger children

C．a study on twelve young children's brains

D．new technology to examine children's brains

【2】It can be concluded from the text that ____．

A．the study is the first one on the effect of musical training on children's brains

B．scientists got no valuable results from the earlier studies on the topic

C．children musically trained remember things better than those untrained

D．older children get more benefit from musical training than younger ones

【3】What do we know about the twelve children tested in the study?

A．None of them had been musically trained before．

B．Only 6 of them had a knowledge of music before．

C．Not all of them had been taught some music in school．

D．All of them were required to learn some music in school．

【4】We know from the MEG measurements that ____．

A．the older a child is, the more quickly he/she responds to sounds

B．human brains prefer musical sounds to white noise

C．children of different ages respond to sounds at the same speed

D．all the twelve children like to learn to play the violin very much

Answer 1

【答案】

【1】A

【2】C

【3】D

【4】B

【解析】

试题分析:本文属于科普类短文，主要告诉我们音乐对于提高儿童学习能力方面的重要性。

【1】A 主旨大意题。根据文章主题段第一段Music lessons may improve memory and learning ability in your children by promoting different patterns of brain development, a study shows可知本文主要告诉我们音乐在提高儿童记忆力方面的重要性，在文章里作者还介绍了有关的实验。故A正确。

【2】C 细节题。根据第二段第一句After a year of musical training, children aged between 4 and 6 performed better at a standard memory test than did children who were not taught music．可知经过音乐培训的儿童要比没有经过音乐培训的孩子表现更好。故C正确。

【3】D 细节题。根据文章第五段Professor Trainer's team looked at 12 children, 6 of whom had just started extra-curricular （课程外） music lessons and 6 of whom were not being taught any music except that included as a standard part of their school curriculum （课程标准）。可知12各儿童中有6人接受了额外的音乐课程学习，另外6人接受了课程标准中的音乐教育。也就是说12名儿童都接受了音乐方面的培训。故D正确。

【4】B 细节题。根据最后一段第二句The MEG measurements showed that all children responded more to violin sounds than to white noise可知根据脑磁波描记器，儿童对于音乐的声音更喜欢。故B正确。