2024届甘肃省靖远县第一中学高三下学期模拟预测英语试题

2024年高考名师预测

英语

一、阅读

A

Texan 81-year-old good friends Ellie Hamby and Sandy Hazelip toured the world in 80 days, proving that adventure doesn’t have an age limit.

Their first stop was a location challenging even many experienced travelers: the Antarctic. Getting to the southernmost continent first required crossing the Drake Passage, the waters between the southern tip of South America and the Antarctic’s South Shetland Islands. “For almost two days, we were rocking and rolling, slipping and sliding through the Drake Passage and we were holding on for dear life, “Hamby said. The voyage, however, faded from their mind as they set foot on the ground of the Antarctic, fascinated by the breathtaking beauty of penguins, icebergs and glaciers.

Since that first venture, the pair have visited 18 countries across all seven continents. And despite the challenges international travel presented, the good friends said they had finished their trip without any argument. Though they’re both independent and stubborn, they respect each other’s feelings. And what they remember the most are the people that they met. “We met some of the most wonderful, kindest, friendliest people. We just have friends now all over the world that we love dearly,” Hamby said.

The two shared a crucial piece of advice for travelers worrying about the language barrier on their own adventures.” You know, people often ask us about it,” said Hamby.” We tell them there’s one universal language, and that’s the smile. We found it worked wonders because we were often aware that English was not always spoken and that the smile could cover all languages.”

They also encouraged other older people not to let age hold them back. Aside from some minor changes in plans, their age didn’t affect their itinerary(旅程)abroad. They said they felt confident that if they were injured during their trip, their children would have been at peace knowing that they were doing what they absolutely wanted. And Hazelip described 81 as the perfect age to embark on a trip.”Getting older does give us a little bit of wisdom of making decisions,” she said.

1. What might the pair think of their trip to the Antaretic?

A. Brief but exciting. B. Tough but worthwhile.

C. Interesting but fruitless. D. Unpleasant but memorable.

2. What is the highlight of the pair’s adventures for themselves?

A. Meeting nice people along the way.

B. Experiencing many challenging activities.

C. Learning about different cultures from travelers.

D. Avoiding conflicts despite their stubborn nature.

3. What helped the pair communicate with people during the adventure?

A. English. B. The smile.

C. Crucial advice. D. Universal gestures.

4. What can we infer about the pair from the last paragraph?

A. They fell down when riding a bike in Bali.

B. They regretted not exploring the world earlier.

C. Their children understood and supported them.

D. Their wisdom saved them lots of time during their trip.

B

On March 7, 1907, the English statistician Francis Galton published a paper which illustrated what has come to be known as the “wisdom of crowds” effect. The experiment of estimation he conducted showed that in some cases, the average of a large number of independent estimates could be quite accurate.

This effect capitalizes on the fact that when people make errors, those errors aren’t always the same. Some people will tend to overestimate, and some to underestimate. When enough of these errors are averaged together, they cancel each other out, resulting in a more accurate estimate. If people are similar and tend to make the same errors, then their errors won’t cancel each other out. In more technical terms, the wisdom of crowds requires that people’s estimates be independent. If for whatever reasons, people’s errors become correlated or dependent, the accuracy of the estimate will go down.

But a new study led by Joaquin Navajas offered an interesting twist (转折) on this classic phenomenon. The key finding of the study was that when crowds were further divided into smaller groups that were allowed to have a discussion, the averages from these groups were more accurate than those from an equal number of independent individuals. For instance, the average obtained from the estimates of four discussion groups of five was significantly more accurate than the average obtained from 20 independent individuals.

In a follow-up study with 100 university students, the researchers tried to get a better sense of what the group members actually did in their discussion. Did they tend to go with those most confident about their estimates? Did

they follow those least willing to change their minds? This happened some of the time, but it wasn’t the dominant response. Most frequently, the groups reported that they “shared arguments and reasoned together”. Somehow, these arguments and reasoning resulted in a global reduction in error. Although the studies led by Navajas have limitations and many questions remain, the potential implications for group discussion and decision-making are enormous.

5. What is paragraph 2 of the text mainly about?

A. The methods of estimation. B. The underlying logic of the effect.

C. The causes of people’s errors. D. The design of Galton’s experiment.

6. Navajas’ study found that the average accuracy could increase even if ________.

A. the crowds were relatively small B. there were occasional underestimates

C. individuals did not communicate D. estimates were not fully independent

7. What did the follow-up study focus on?

A. The size of the groups. B. The dominant members.

C. The discussion process. D. The individual estimates.

8. What is the author’s attitude toward Navajas’ studies?

A. Unclear. B. Dismissive. C. Doubtful. D. Approving.

C

Language gives us the power to describe countless actions, properties and relations that compose our experiences, real or imagined. As for how languages were created, scientists found iconicity might play a key role.

People can’t bridge language gap and understand each other without iconicity. When playing a game of charades (猜字谜) , we act out our meaning, using our hands and bodies to describe the sizes and shapes of objects. The key to this process of forming new symbols is the use of iconicity. Not limited to gesturing, iconicity appears in our visual communication too. Traffic signs, food packaging, maps. . . wherever there are people communicating, you will find iconicity.

According to our research, iconicity might also exist in our voices. We organized a contest in which we invited contestants to record a set of sounds to express different meanings. The winner of the contest was determined by how well listeners could guess the intended meanings of the sounds based on a set of written options. Critically, the sounds that contestants submitted couldn’t include actual words or onomatopoeias (拟声词) .

Listeners were remarkably good at interpreting the meanings of the sounds. Yet, all of the contestants and listeners were speakers of English. Thus, it was possible that listeners’ success relied on some cultural knowledge