小编为大家整理收集了，并附上详细的真题解析，此次考试真题中有新题的出现，文中有标注，请各位同学在备考的时候多多注意！
一、考试回忆
此次考试阅读重考2012年5月10日的试卷，三篇均为旧题。
Passage1:
History of Coins
文章大意：介绍了硬币的制造流程、生产工艺以及当时的时代背景。
题型：TRUE/FALSE/NOT NOT GIVEN
Flow-chart completion
Short Answer Questions
Passage2:
文章大意：介绍了鸟类的迁徙情况。
题型：List of Headings
Blank Filling
Passage3:
Take Over Your Time
文章大意：介绍了美国工人工作时间过长的问题，谈论到美国人的生活方式等。
题型：Information Containing
Multiple Choice
Summary
二、类似阅读推荐
Guide to the History of US Coinage
Everyday we use coins and we don't even really think about how they evolved or where they came from. Occasionally though, we do look twice when we notice an older date imprinted on a coin. Unlike many older civilizations, US coinage only came about fairly recently during the late 1700s. Before that, people simply traded for goods, such as tobacco, with foreign coins. Of course, with the birth of a new country, it had to have its own unique currency. Let's have a look at how coins in the United States evolved over the last few centuries.
Beginning of Coins in the U.S.
In 1792, American Congress passed the country's first coinage act. This meant that the United States Mint was officially responsible for creating coins for public use. Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin were two of the men who contributed research and ideas towards the early versions of the coins. The Treasury Seal that was developed actually remained quite the same even until today.
Dollar Coin History
Today the word "dollar" is synonymous with American currency, but did you know that it is actually derived from a medieval European coin? When masses of Dutch settlers moved over to the New World, they brought the concept of leeuwendalers, a Dutch coin, with them.The idea of US coinage by way of a dollar coin was developed to discourage people from trading with other foreign currencies. When U.S. coins were introduced, there was a transitional period of a few years before foreign coins were officially not recognized as legal tender any more. However, in the beginning the U.S. was experiencing a shortage of silver and gold; both vital for coin production at the time. To get around this, the government declared that Spanish coins would indefinitely be legally recognized even though it was a foreign currency. By the mid-1800s, the Californian Gold Rush produced a sudden influx of gold, thus allowing the Spanish coin exception to be revoked.
Sacagawea History
The Sacagawea dollar coin was released by the U.S. Mint to commemorate a native woman by the same name. Sacagawea history is popular since she joined Lewis and Clark on their expedition as their guide. Together they explored massive amounts of unknown territory in the Western States. In those days, and to some extent even by today's standards, it is a very impressive feat. The journey was difficult and dangerous; at some point the group even resorted to consuming tallow candles when they lacked sufficient food. Pomp, the baby that appears on Sacagawea's back, was the child that she had with her French husband, Toussaint Charbonneau. Sacagawea became so well known that she was later honored with statues in many different areas. The Sacagawea history coin named after her is a gold colored coin released intermittently between 2000 to the present.
Evolution of Coins Today
During the 1950s, a new act was issued to modify the metallic content of the coins. Since there was a shortage of silver, the new Coin Act allowed some coins, such as dimes and quarters, to be produced without any silver at all. Instead it was replaced by alloys made up of metals including manganese, copper, and nickel. Today in the U.S., the Mint issues new coins fairly regularly. Occasionally special coins are issued as a commemorative or collector's item. Some excellent examples are coins that feature past U.S. presidents. Even though they are legal tender, they are not specifically meant for casual use. Coin collecting is a major hobby in the United States and abroad. Many people enjoy collecting, cataloging, and studying historic American coins.
Is Work Taking Over Your Life?
By Jenny Ungless
How’s your work-life balance? Is work a rewarding and fulfilling part of your life, or is it something that has grown to take up so much of your time and energy that you resent, rather than enjoy it?
The pace of our lives today, and the fact that modern technology means we’re always contactable, can make it very difficult for us to “switch off” from work. Of course we all have times when we’re especially busy, and need to put in extra hours. But, for a healthy work-life balance, that situation needs to be the exception rather than the norm. In this article, we help you to identify the warning signs that work is taking over, and give you some practical tips to help you get your life back.
The Warning Signs
First, the warning signs! You really need to re-evaluate your situation if more than 2 or 3 of the following apply:
You are regularly working more than 10 hours a day.
However hard you work, you never, ever get to the bottom of your in tray.
You can’t remember the last time you had a really good laugh in the office.
You routinely suffer from “Sunday-night blues”.
When you get home from work, you feel physically and emotionally drained.
You can’t get through the working day without regular fixes of caffeine/chocolate/nicotine.
You’ve got a reputation among your friends for always cancelling at the last minute.
You take work home with you in the evening or at weekends.
If these statements describe you and your situation, you’re getting to the point where work is taking over your life. That’s no way to live. Work should be something that adds to, not detracts from, the quality of your life. Your work should interest you, energize you, and give you a buzz. But it should also leave you time to enjoy the other aspects of your life – your friends and family, your hobbies, and other interests. We work best when our lives are in balance.
So if you’ve allowed yourself to get into the situation where work is ruling your life and your nearest and dearest have almost forgotten what you look like, how do you get out of the rut? Here are our top tips:
You don’t have to be the first person in or the last person out every day to be effective: in fact, people who work ridiculously long hours are simply demonstrating that they aren’t able to cope with the job! Make an effort to leave on time at least 3 nights a week – your colleagues will thank you for it. A good way of making yourself stick to this is to put a specific appointment in your diary so that you have a reason to leave on time.
Learn to say “no”. Every time you say “yes” to a task, you are saying “no” to something else, so make sure that you choose the right things to say “no” to. Make a list of priorities and make decisions accordingly. Obviously this is more difficult in a situation where your boss has asked you to do 3 things at once – but don’t let them get away with passing their own inability to prioritize onto you: ask them which task is more important or needs to be completed first.
Remember the 80-20 rule: 80% of a task is completed with 20% of the overall effort, but getting that last 20% perfect takes a disproportionate amount of time. Use your judgement to decide when “good enough” is a better use of your time than ensuring that something is perfect in every detail. This is NOT an excuse for sloppy work, but it is important to be able to distinguish between situations where perfection is required and where it isn’t.
Eliminate “time-stealers”. For example, email is one of the biggest causes of inefficiency – we just can’t resist checking it, especially if our PC goes “ping” every time a new email arrives. Restrict yourself to checking email no more than 3 times a day. And apply the “once past the desk” rule with paperwork: read it once, then either bin it, deal with it then and there or decide when you are going to deal with it and put it away until then.
Just get started. Procrastination is one of the biggest time-wasters. Particularly if we are facing a large or daunting task, it’s tempting to keep putting off getting started on it. Use the “salami” technique: divide big tasks or projects up into smaller chunks and tackle these one by one. Once you’ve actually made a start, it’s much easier to maintain the momentum.
Finally, recognize that you will work much better if you regularly build in some time off for yourself. None of us can survive for long if we are running in top gear all the time. Give yourself some regular “space” – have an evening to yourself, pour a glass of wine, chill out with some mellow music – whatever it takes for you to get things back into perspective and focus on the bigger picture. If you regularly take time to recharge your batteries, you’ll cope much better when things are unavoidably busy or stressful at work. An important part of good time management is to take some time off now and then!
With a bit of thought, planning, and practice, you can free up hours every week to spend on the things that matter to you. And the irony is that spending less time at work will make you perform much better when you are there!
(编辑：suyan)