题目内容
Proper arrangement of classroom space is important to encouraging interaction. Most of us have noticed how important physical setting is to efficiency and comfort in our work. College classroom space should be designed to encourage the activity of critical thinking.
We are in the 21st century now, but step into almost any college classroom and you step back in time at least a hundred years. Desks are normally in straight rows, so students can clearly see the teacher but not all their classmates. The assumption behind such an arrangement is obvious: Everything of importance comes from the teacher.
With a little imagination and effort, unless desks are fixed to the floor, the teacher can correct this situation and create space that encourages interchange among students. In small or standard-size classes, chairs, desks, and tables can be arranged in a variety of ways: circles, U-shapes or semicircles. The primary goal should be for everyone to be able to see everyone else.
Arrangement of the classroom should also make it easy to divide students into small groups for discussion or problem-solving exercises. Small classes with movable desks and tables present no problem. Even in large lecture halls, it is possible for students to turn around and form groups of four or six. Breaking a class into small groups provides more opportunities for students to interact with each other, think out loud, and see how other students’ thinking processes operate---all these are essential elements in developing new modes of critical thinking.
In courses that regularly use a small group format, students might be asked to stay in the same small groups throughout the course. A colleague of mine, John, allows students to move around during the first two weeks, until they find a group they are comfortable with. John then asks them to stay in the same seat, with the same group, from that time on. This not only creates a comfortable setting for interaction but helps him learn students’ names and faces.
1.The final purpose of arranging desks in circles or U-shapes is __________.
A. for teachers to divide students into small groups
B. to make it possible for students to interact with each other
C. for teachers to find out how students think
D. to give students more opportunities to practice speaking
2.The expression “step back in time at least a hundred years” is intended to convey that________.
A. college classrooms often reminded people of their past
B. critical thinking was encouraged even one century ago
C. desk arrangement in a classroom was quite different from that a hundred years ago
D. today’s arrangement of college classroom space has little difference from past’s
3.The way of arranging desks in classrooms in straight rows indicates that ________.
A. students can be easily prevented from cheating during tests
B. it is convenient for teachers to monitor students
C. teachers play a significant role in a classroom
D. it is good for students to concentrate on listening to teachers
ill need some kind of preparation and task so that they can be actively engaged. They might be asked to check predictions that arose from a warm-up discussion, to compare their suggested rhyming couplets with the poet’s, or to identify stressed words and syllables.
s about poems. This can, for example, take the form of a couple of teachers or a group of students giving their views on a poem, or even an interview with the poet.
groups
to share what they have learned.任务型阅读
阅读下列短文并根据所读内容在文章后表格中的空格里填入最恰当的单词，每空格1词
Zebras have their own bug repellent(驱虫剂)?
Eww bugs! They are so annoying! We humans are lucky that we can apply repellents to avoid nasty bites. But what’s an animal to do? They have no choice but to spend their days shooing them off with their tails, unless, of course, they are zebras, who apparently have their own automatic repellent--- their striped skin!
Scientists had originally thought that the reason why the animal had developed the black and white lines was to help protect itself from predators (食肉动物)in the African savannah(大草原), because the stripes make it difficult to single out one zebra that is traveling with a herd.While that may be true, the theory has never been tested or proven. Now the experts have another---that the stripes have evolved to repel the annoying horse flies that not only feed off their blood, but also, transmit dangerous germs into the bodies of these innocent animals.
The study was performed by a team of Swedish scientists. One of the clues that got them thinking along these lines was the fact that darker horses got bitten more often than light-colored or white ones.
The fact that zebras are born black and only develop stripes as they grow older made the scientists theorize that the stripes may be something the animals have developed to make themselves less attractive to flies.
To test if this may be the case, they painted some boards at a horse-infested(寄生的) horse farm in Budapest with patterns of black and white stripes of varying widths and applied a layer of glue on them. What they noticed was that the places where the black and white stripes were at their narrowest (similar to what zebras have) attracted the fewest flies. They achieved similar results when they painted horses with black and white zebra-like stripes.
While the research are not sure why this may be the case, they believe it may be something to do with the way insects operate---horseflies are attracted to horizontally polarized light(偏振光); since white does not reflect it, white horses are luckier than black ones. But zebras seem to be the luckiest of all. When the researchers measured the polarized light reflected from real zebra skins, they found that it matched light patterns that were the least attractive to horseflies.
While this theory does make logical sense, nobody is 100 percent sure that it is really true, given that it has never been tested on a real zebra. If it is true, it does raise the question of why a horse, a close relative of the zebra has failed to develop stripes. The researchers believe that this could be because there are more horseflies in Africa, where zebras reside, then anywhere else in the world.
Title | Zebras have their own bug repellent? | |
Reasons why zebras develop their strips | Original belief | With the black and white lines, one zebra is difficult to single out while traveling with a herd, thus ___1.__ it from its enemies. |
New theory | Zebras, residing in Africa where there are most horseflies in the world have developed strips to ___2.___ being attacked. | |
A study | Researchers | A team of scientists from ___3.___ |
_4.___ | To test if strips are developed to make zebras less attractive to flies. | |
Clues | *White or light-colored horses are less __5._ to get bitten than dark ones. *Zebras develop strips as they grow older though born black. | |
Method | *Some boards at a horse farm are painted with patterns of black and white stripes variously ___6.__ , a layer of glue applied on them. *Measured the polarized light reflected from real zebra skins. | |
_7.___ | *The places where the black and white stripes at the narrowest were similar to the __8.__zebras have attracted the fewest flies. *Strips of zebras matched light patterns that were the least attractive to horseflies. | |
Principle of zebras’ black and white strips repelling the flies | Horizontally polarized light, which white does not reflect, ___9.__ to horseflies. | |
Conclusion | ___10.___tested on real zebras, the theory isn’t definitely true. | |