2022年考研英语二|外刊英语阅读-家庭作业政策改革

考研人数逐年增加，竞争之激烈使得我们不得不加急复习的日程。众所周知，阅读理解占据了考研英语二100分试卷的一半分值，而考研英语阅读文章大多来自英美国家的主流报刊杂志，所以如果能在日常就多多阅读这些文章，对以后读懂文章做对题目来说会大有裨益。

学习步骤如下：

1.不看汉语译文自己看一遍短文做理解

2.看汉语译文比对自己理解的意思与之出入

3.强化记忆重点单词（以记忆其汉语意思为主）

Homework has never been terribly popular with students and even many parents, but in recent years it has been particularly scorned. School districts across the country, most recently Los Angeles Unified, are revising their thinking on this educational ritual. Unfortunately, L.A. Unified has produced an inflexible policy which mandates that with the exception of some advanced courses, homework may no longer count for more than 10% of a student’s academic grade.

This rule is meant to address the difficulty that students from impoverished or chaotic homes might have in completing their homework. But the policy is unclear and contradictory. Certainly, no homework should be assigned that students cannot complete on their own or that they cannot do without expensive equipment. But if the district is essentially giving a pass to students who do not do their homework because of complicated family lives, it is going riskily close to the implication that standards need to be lowered for poor children.

District administrators say that homework will still be a part of schooling; teachers are allowed to assign as much of it as they want. But with homework counting for no more than 10% of their grades, students can easily skip half their homework and see very little difference on their report cards. Some students might do well on state tests without completing their homework, but what about the students who performed well on the tests and did their homework? It is quite possible that the homework helped. Yet rather than empowering teachers to find what works best for their students, the policy imposes a flat, across-the-board rule.

At the same time, the policy addresses none of the truly thorny questions about homework. If the district finds homework to be unimportant to its students’ academic achievement, it should move to reduce or eliminate the assignments, not make them count for almost nothing. Conversely, if homework matters, it should account for a significant portion of the grade. Meanwhile, this policy does nothing to ensure that the homework students receive is meaningful or appropriate to their age and the subject, or that teachers are not assigning more than they are willing to review and correct.

The homework rules should be put on hold while the school board, which is responsible for setting educational policy, looks into the matter and conducts public hearings. It is not too late for L.A. Unified to do homework right.

短文翻译

家庭作业从来都不是特别受学学生甚至很多家长的欢迎，但近年来它更是饱受诟病。全国各地的学区,尤其是洛杉矶联合学区,最近正在改变他们对这项教育惯例的看法。不幸的是,洛杉矶联合学区出台了一项缺乏弹性的政策,该政策规定除了一些高级课程外,家庭作业在学生学业成绩中的占比不得超过10%。

这条规定旨在解决来自贫困家庭或家庭关系复杂的学生在完成家庭作业时可能遇到的困难。但这项政策非但不明确,还自相矛盾。当然,老师不应该布置学生无法独立完成的作业,也不应该布置学生没有昂贵设备就无法完成的作业。但是,如果学区实际上是给那些因家庭生活复杂而不能完成家庭作业的学生提供便利通道的话,那么这就意味着可能需要降低对贫困学生的标准。

学区管理人员表示,家庭作业仍是学校教育的一部分,教师可以自行决定家庭作业的量。但是,由于家庭作业在学生成绩中所占的比例不超过10%,学生可以很容易地跳过一半的家庭作业,而这在成绩单上很难看出差异。有些学生可能在没有完成家庭作业的情况下在国家级考试中表现良好,但是那些完成了家庭作业并在考试中表现良好的学生呢?很有可能是家庭作业起了作用。然而,这项政策并没有赋予教师权力,让他们去探寻对学生最有利的方法,而是强加了一条“一刀切”的规则。

与此同时,这项政策并没有解决家庭作业中真正棘手的问题。如果学区发现家庭作业对学生的学业成绩不起重要作用,就应该减少或取消这些作业,而不是让它们变得无足轻重。相反,如果家庭作业很重要,那么它应该占总成绩的很大一部分。同时,这一政策并不能确保学生需要做的家庭作业是有意义的,或是与他们的年龄和学科相适应,也不能保证老师布置的作业不会超过他们愿意批阅的量。

学校董事会负责教育政策的制定,在它调查此事并举行公开听证会期间,应该暂停该规定的实施。洛杉矶联合学区现在认真处理家庭作业这件事还为时不晚。

真题练习

*一定要做题哦

25. A suitable title for this text could be _____.

[A] Wrong Interpretations of an Educational Policy

[B] A Welcomed Policy for Poor Students

[C] Thorny Questions about Homework

[D] A Faulty Approach to Homework

题目解析

25.【解析】文章第一段介绍了关于家庭作业的新政策的背景信息和该政策的内容；第二段提出该政策制定的目的，但该政策目的不明确且自相矛盾；第三、四段进一步指出该政策存在的问题及弊端；第五段提到应该修正关于家庭作业的规定。综合以上内容，选项 D 项高度概括了该项关于家庭作业政策的错误，故为正确选项。整篇文章表达的是这项新政策本身存在的问题和弊端，即政策本身的错误，而没有提到误读政策的问题，所以 A 项属于偷换概念。B 项提到了poor students,回顾文章对应讨论poor students的篇幅只有一段，太过片面；C 项在文章中虽然提到“棘手问题”，但只是文章中的某个细节信息，并不能概括全文的主题，重点还是在讲作业的政策与方式的错误。