实例讲解如何快速理解托福阅读长句子

托福阅读遇到一些长句子是在所难免的，那么有什么好的方法可以帮助我们去理解这种句子呢？下面小编给大家带来实例讲解如何快速理解托福阅读长句子。

实例讲解如何快速理解托福阅读长句子

我们大家都知道托福阅读的时间是在60-80分钟之内完成3-4篇长度分别在700字左右的文章，我们平均算下来每篇文章我们在平时练习的时候一定要保证在20分钟之内完成，所以在做托福阅读时除了做题正确外，做题速度也是关键。那做题速度的快慢很大程度上就取决于我们读句子的快慢上了。那如何能够在尽可能短的时间内读更多的句子呢?很多同学认为是词汇量的问题，认为只要词汇量上去了，自然句子读的就快，但实际上在阅读的过程中我们会发现很多同学在读句子的时候，句子中的每个单词都认识，但是这些认识的单词在组成句子后反倒是不知道整句话的意思了。该如何解决这个问题呢?那今天我就给大家说一种比较简单的方法，通过一些小词来帮助大家在尽可能短的时间里读懂句子。

这种方法我给它起了个名字叫做解释说明法。看过《托福阅读专项进阶初级》这本书的同学都会有印象，在这本教材的第一单元词汇题部分，书中教给了我们一种如何认识陌生单词的方法—定义法，在书中还给我们举了一些标志词，比如means, is cAlled, is defines as，which is等，当我们看到这些标志词的时候就可以推出我们不认识的生词了，比如书中给我们举的例子：

Some wild animals hibernate, which is to sleep through winter. They enter their dens in late fall and do not come out until spring. Before hibernating, animals eat to gain fat. This fat sustains them through winter. When they come out in spring, the animals are very thin. They are also very hungry. Hibernation enables many wild animals to survive during the cold winter when there is no food to eat.

The word hibernate in the passage is closest in meaning to

A store

B sleep

C migrate

D awake

在这个题中我们通过画线的句子which is to sleep through winter来推出前面所问的那个生词hibernate的意思，既答案是B选项sleep.

这是书中词汇题部分对于不认识单词的一种解题方法，那么现在我们反过来想一下，如果我们不是在解词汇题，而是仅仅在读这样的句子的话我们应该怎么做呢?我们可以看到在刚才的例题中划线的句子就是对前面的那个词的一个解释，那既然划线的句子仅仅是为了说明前面的词，那我们在阅读句子的时候就可以省略掉不读，而在咱们的英语中有类句子就有这种解释说明的作用，那就是非限制性定语从句。我们可以简单的把这种句型写成：A, which/who/where/whose...,... 这个样子，在这个句型中A代表一个词，在这个词的后面是逗号加一个从句的格式，这个时候我们只要省略不看这个从句就可以了，因为这个从句仅是对前面这个词的解释说明，让我们来看托福阅读TPO中的两个句子：

1. The deserts, which already occupy approximately a fourth of the Earth’s land surface, have in recent decades been increasing at an alarming pace. (TPO2 Desert Formation)

Ediacara fossil formation, which contains the oldest known animal fossils, consists exclusively of soft-bodied forms. (TPO5 The Cambrian Explosion)

我们可以看到在第一个句子里面在desert的后面就出现了逗号加从句，所以我们可以直接省略掉这个从句部分，原句就变成了：The deserts have in recent decades been increasing at an alarming pace. 第二句话同理我们可以简化成：The Ediacara fossil formation consists exclusively of soft-bodied forms. 这样大家会看到原本比较长的两句话经过我们的简化就变得比较短了，阅读起来也就快了一些，既帮助我们节省了时间。

那除了这种句式之外呢，我们也看到在词汇题的这种方法中还列出了其他的标志词，比如：is called, is defines as....，放在句子中我们可以这样来表示：A is called B, A is defined as B. 在这种句式中我们根据A和B这两部分哪部分简单我们读哪部分的原理来进行快速阅读句子。我们还是通过两个句子来看一下：

1. The expansion of desert-like conditions into areas where they did not previously exist is called desertification. (TPO2 Desert Formation)

2. Alternatively, stability can be defined as the speed with which an ecosystem returns to a particular form following a major disturbance, such as a fire. (TPO3 The long-term stability of ecosystems)

我们分别来看一下在这两句中A和B分别代表句子中的哪一部分。在第一句中我们可以看到表示解释的词：is called, 所以A就是is called前面的那部分内容，既The expansion of desert-like conditions into areas where they did not previously exist ，而B就是desertification这个词，在这句话中我们可以看到A和B中B要简单的多仅有一个词，而这个词desertification的意思就是沙漠化，所以我们很容易知道这个句子就是告诉我们什么叫做沙漠化而已。我们再来看第二句话，在第二句中那个表示解释的词是be defined as,所以在这句中A就是stability,而B则是the speed with which an ecosystem returns to a particular form following a major disturbance, such as a fire。在这个句中，相比较B来说，A所代表的内容比较短仅有一个词stability，而这个词的意思就是稳定性，所以我们可以知道这句话就是告诉我们什么叫做稳定性。从这两个句子中我们会发现读一个词的时间一定会比读一个长句子的时间短，所以仍旧是帮助我们大大的节省了理解句子的时间。

托福阅读背景知识：全球变暖的影响

Rice yields falling under global warming

全球气候变暖也与亚洲的一些主要大米出产国的耕地面积减少有关。

Global warming is cutting rice yields in many parts of Asia, according to research, with more declines to come.

Yields have fallen by 10-20% over the last 25 years in some locations.

The group of mainly US-based scientists studied records from 227 farms in six important rice-producing countries such as Thailand, Vietnam, India and China.

This is the latest in a line of studies to suggest that climate change will make it harder to feed the world's growing population by cutting yields.

In 2004, other researchers found that rice yields in the Philippines were dropping by 10% for every 1C increase in night-time temperature.

That finding, like others, came from experiments on a research station.

The latest data, by contrast, comes from working, fully-irrigated farms that grow "green revolution" crops, and span the rice-growing lands of Asia from the Indian state of Tamil Nadu to the outskirts of Shanghai.

Describing the findings, which are published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), lead researcher Jarrod Welch said:

"We found that as the daily minimum temperature increases, or as nights get hotter, rice yields drop."

The mechanism involved is not clear but may involve rice plants having to respire more during warm nights, so expending more energy, without being able to photosynthesise.

By contrast, higher temperatures during the day were related to higher yields; but the effect was less than the yield-reducing impact of warmer nights.

However, if temperatures continue to rise as computer models of climate project, Mr Welch says hotter days will eventually begin to bring yields down.

We see a benefit of [higher] daytime temperatures principally because we haven't seen a scenario where daytime temperatures cross over a threshold where they'd stop benefiting yields and start reducing them," he told BBC News.

"There have been some recent studies on US crops, in particular corn, that showed the drop-off after that threshold is substantial," said the University of California at San Diego researcher.

The 2007 assessment of climate impacts from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that although a modest temperature rise could increase crop yields in some regions, for "temperature increases more than 3C, average impacts are stressful to all crops assessed and to all regions".

A study published at the begining of last year concluded that half of the world's population could face a climate-induced food crisis by 2100, with the most extreme summers of the last century becoming routine towards the end of this century.

托福阅读背景知识：无处不在的手机

Cellphone feels like a part of your body? A global survey has found that most people can't live without their mobiles， never leave home without them and， if given a choice， would rather lose their wallet.

是不是觉得手机已成为身体的一部分?一项全球调查显示，大多数人觉得离开手机无法生活，从来不会不带手机出门，如果非要有所取舍，则宁愿舍弃钱包。

Calling mobile phones the "remote control" for life， market research firm Synovate's poll said cell phones are so ubiquitous that by last year more humans owned one than did not.

这项由思纬市场调查公司开展的民调称，手机已成为人们生活中的“遥控器”，它们无处不在。截至去年，手机用户的数量已超过没有手机的人数。

Three-quarters of the more than 8，000 respondents polled online in 11 countries said they take their phone with them everywhere， with Russians and Singaporeans the most attached.

该公司共对来自11个国家的八千多位受访者开展了一项在线调查。调查结果显示，四分之三的受访者称自己无论去哪都会随身带手机。俄罗斯人和新加坡人对手机最为依赖。

More than a third also said they couldn't live without their phone， topped by Taiwanese and again Singaporeans， while one in four would find it harder to replace the mobile than their purse.

超过三分之一的受访者称他们生活离不开手机，其中最多的人来自台湾和新加坡，而四分之一的人觉得随身携带手机比携带钱包更为重要。

Some two-thirds of respondents go to bed with their phones nearby and can't switch them off， even though they want to， because they're afraid they'll miss something.

约三分之二的受访者睡前会把手机放在身边，而且他们即使想关机，也不会关掉，因为害怕错过电话。

"Mobiles give us safety， security and instant access to information. They are the number one tool of communication for us， sometimes even surpassing face-to-face communication. They are our connections to our lives，" Jenny Chang， Synovate's managing director in Taiwan， said in a statement.

思纬公司驻台湾常务董事Jenny Chang在一份声明中称：“手机给了我们安全感，让我们更安心，而且能随时接收信息。手机是我们第一大通讯工具，有时甚至超过了面对面的交谈。手机是联系我们生活的纽带。”

Mobiles have also changed the nature of relationships， with the survey finding nearly half of all respondents use text messages to flirt， a fifth set up first-dates via text and almost the same number use the same method to end a love affair.

手机还改变了人们谈情说爱的方式。调查发现，近一半的受访者利用短信调情，五分之一的受访者通过短信安排初次约会，另有相同比例的人用同样的方法结束一段恋情。

Apart from the obvious calling and texting， the top three features people use regularly on their mobile phones globally are the alarm clock， the camera and the games.

除通话和发短信这两个主要的功能外，从全球来看，人们最常使用的其它三项手机功能是闹钟、拍照和游戏。

As for email and Internet access， 17 percent of respondents said they checked their inboxes or surfed the Web off their phones， lead by those in the United States and Britain.

而至于发邮件和上网这两项功能，17%的受访者称他们利用手机查收邮件或浏览网页，这其中以美国人和英国人居多。

One in 10 respondents log onto social networking websites such as Facebook and MySpace regularly via mobile， again led by Britain and the United States.

十分之一的受访者经常通过手机登录Facebook和Myspace等社交网站，英美人在这一项所占的比例也是最高。

"As the mobile becomes more and more an all-in-one device， many other businesses are facing challenging times. The opportunities for mobile manufacturers and networks however are enormous，" said Synovate's global head of media， Steve Garton.

思纬公司全球媒体总裁史蒂夫?加顿说：“随着手机逐渐成为一种集多种功能为一体的通讯工具，很多其它行业正面临着挑战。然而这对手机制造商和网络来说却蕴含着巨大的机遇。”

Not everyone is tech savvy， however： 37 percent of respondents said they don't know how to use all the functions on their phone.

但并非所有人都是科技通。37%的受访者称，他们不知道如何使用手机上的所有功能。

Vocabulary：

ubiquitous： existing or being everywhere， esp. at the same time; omnipresent(无所不在的)

all-in-one：一体化，多功能

savvy：practical understanding; shrewdness or intelligence; common sense(在某一方面很在行)

现代生活中，手机几乎是人人都有，随身携带，一部分人甚至患上了严重的手机依赖症。关于手机使用调查的文章也成为一些时尚的焦点，大家可以多阅读一些类似的文章，大量的托福阅读背景知识积累对于托福阅读非常有帮助，不管是英文原版还是中文翻译版，同学们都可以大量去阅读，熟悉内容即可。

托福阅读背景材料：性格决定魅力

If you exhibit positive traits such as honesty and helpfulness， the chances are that you will be perceived as a good looking person， for a new study has found that the perception of physical attractiveness is influenced by a person's personality.

The study， led by Gary W. Lewandowski， Jr， found that people who exhibit negative traits， such as unfairness and rudeness， appear to be less physically attractive to observers.

In the study， the participants viewed photographs of opposite-sex individuals and rated them for attractiveness before and after being provided with information on personality traits.

After personality information was received， participants also rated the desirability of each individual as a friend and as a dating partner.

Information on personality was found to significantly alter perceived desirability， showing that cognitive processes modify judgments of attractiveness.

"Perceiving a person as having a desirable personality makes the person more suitable in general as a close relationship partner of any kind，" said Lewandowski.

The findings show that a positive personality leads to greater desirability as a friend， which leads to greater desirability as a romantic partner and， ultimately， to being viewed as more physically attractive.

The findings remained consistent regardless of how "attractive" the individual was initially perceived to be， or of the participants' current relationship status or commitment level with a partner.

What would you think of this lady's physical attractiveness if she exhibited bad personal traits?

"This research provides a more positive alternative by reminding people that personality goes a long way toward determining your attractiveness; it can even change people's impressions of how good looking you are，" said Lewandowski.

如果你表现出诚实和乐于助人等美好品质，那么别人会觉得你的外表也很迷人。一项最新研究发现，一个人的性格会影响别人对他或她的外表吸引力的看法。

该项由盖里?W?勒万多维斯基负责的研究发现，人们认为，表现出不诚实和粗鲁等恶劣品质的人外表也不够吸引人。

研究对象首先观看了一组异性的照片，随后分别在得知照片中人物的性格特点之前和之后给他们的外表评分。

研究对象在得知照片中人物的性格特点后，还对与其中每个人交朋友或做恋人的期望值进行了评分。

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勒万多维斯基说：“总的来说，如果人们认为一个人的性格较好，那么他们会觉得无论与这个人做朋友还是做恋人都更合适。”

研究结果表明，人们更期望与性格较好的人交朋友、成为恋人，从而会认为他们的外表更迷人。

无论照片中人物给人的“第一印象”怎样、或者研究对象目前的情感关系状况以及与伴侣的亲密程度如何，研究结果都是一致的。

勒万多维斯基说：“该研究提出了一个更为积极的观点，它提醒人们，性格在很大程度上能决定你的吸引力;性格甚至能够改变人们对于你外表的印象。”

大量的托福阅读背景知识积累对于托福阅读非常有帮助，不管是英文原版还是中文翻译版，同学们都可以大量去阅读，熟悉内容即可。