In the college-admission wars, we parents are the true fighters. We’re pushing our kids to get good grades, take SAT preparatory courses and build resumes so they can get into the college of our first choice. We’ve twice been to the wars, and as I survey the battlefield, something different is happening. We see our kids’ college background as a prize demonstrating how well we’ve raised them. But we can’t acknowledge that our obsession is more about us than them. So we’ve contrived various justifications that turn out to be half-truths, prejudices or myths. It actually doesn’t matter much whether Aaron and Nicole go to Stanford.

The percentage of immigrants (including those unlawfully present) in the United States has been creeping upward for years. At 12.6 percent, it is now higher than at any point since the mid-1920s.

We are not about to go back to the days when Congress openly worried about inferior races polluting America’s bloodstream. But once again we are wondering whether we have too many of the wrong sort of newcomers. Their loudest critics argue that the new wave of immigrants can’t and indeed do not want to, fit in as previous generations did.

 Imagine waking up and finding the value of your assets has been halved. No, you are not an investor in one of those hedge funds that failed completely. With the dollar slumping to 26-year low against the pound, already-expensive London has become quite unaffordable. A coffee at Starbucks, just as unavoidable in England as it is in the United States, runs about $ 8.

篇章结构分析

本文的主题是有关美国的非法移民问题。第一段引出非法移民这一矛盾的问题，即美国人不喜欢非法移民，但又依靠非法移民来做事情。第二、三段讲述了参议院最近对非法移民问题的讨论，及可能出台的法律措施。第四段提到了移民的支持者已在美国一些大城市开始采取激烈的行动来维护自己的利益。第五段继续论述了新法案通过的困难性。末段提出足够的签证有可能解决美国非法移民这一问题。

Several years ago, at the height of the dotcom boom, it was widely assumed that a publishing revolution, in which the printed word would be supplanted by the computer screen, was just around the corner. It wasn’t: for many, there is still little to match the joy of reading a printed book and settling down for one hour. But recently   some big technology companies, including Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Yahoo, contend that the dream of bringing books online is still very much alive.

参考译文

以前曾试图教黑猩猩说话的尝试最后都以失败而告终，大多数人认为这项研究就此结束了。但是卡德勒夫妇意识到说话和语言是两码事。比如说，许多聋哑人不能说话，但是却能熟练地用手势进行交流，这些手势都包含了人类语言的那些特点和复杂度。因此卡德勒夫妇认为前人研究的失败是因为黑猩猩生理上就不能说话。

因此，他们决定试着教一只黑猩猩掌握使用聋哑人的手势。他们选择的研究对象是一只名叫

篇章结构分析

本文是一篇说明文，通过两项研究来阐述了黑猩猩的语言能力，以及它们的手势和面部表情的一些特点。前两段介绍了卡德勒夫妇的研究成果并引出后两位学者对黑猩猩的其它特征的研究；第三、四段分别介绍了两位学者所提出的研究假设及其研究的结果；末段进一步阐述了手势对于人类大脑语言能力的进化作用。

核心词组记忆

  At the World Bank in Washington, officials have posted some new “help wanted” signs. The bank is looking for a few good specialists to focus on adapting to global warming. It’s a small start, perhaps. Still, the ads represent one signal that adaptation is emerging from the political doghouse to take its place among the front-rank options for dealing with climate change.

  At least in the developed world, the idea that people should start figuring out how to deal with the projected effects of warming has been overshadowed by calls to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions. Some environmentalists have viewed adaptation either as a white flag on the issue or as a refuge of contrarians who despise the broad consensus that human activity is warming the climate.

  But last week’s release of a report on the science of global warming----with its projections of warming based on emissions already in the air, as well as on potential future emissions trends

篇章结构分析

本文论述了肥胖在人与人之间的相互影响及其相互影响这一问题。第一段通过一个最新研究来引出人们越来越肥胖这一话题；第二段用具体数据进一步阐述了这一研究结果；第三段论述了朋友关系对于肥胖的不同影响及其原因；第四段指出家庭关系和兄弟姐妹关系对肥胖有影响，但并不重要，真正重要的原因是其社会标准。最后一段提出人与人之间的这种相互影响关系也同样适用于减肥。

核心词组

篇章分析

本文是一篇说明文，主要介绍了两位博士对午睡和健康关系的一项最新研究。第一段提出了有关午睡的话题，并以一些名人的午睡特点来加以例证，接着介绍了纳斯卡和特里克伯罗斯所进行的研究，说明午睡可以延长人的生命；第二段进一步详细地阐述其研究的结果；第三段作者驳斥了地中海饮食可能影响实验结果可信度的说法；在第四段里，特里克伯 罗斯博士建议人们为了健康尽量午睡。