DespitethepopularityofschoolspellingcompetitionsadultsintheUSperformedpoorlyinasurveycomparinghowEnglishspeakersonbothsidesoftheAtlanticdealwithcommonlymisspeltwords.Sixty­twopercentofAmericansgot“emba

Question

Despite the popularity of school spelling competitions adults in the US performed poorly in a survey comparing how English speakers on both sides of the Atlantic deal with commonly misspelt words.

Sixty­two percent of Americans got“embarrassed”wrong against 54 percent of Britons who struggled with the word in a survey last year. Adults in the US performed less well on most of the ten words tested including millennium (52 percent wrong against 43 percent in the UK) liaison (61 percent to 54 percent)and “accommodation”(42 percent to 36 percent)．Only “definitely”and “friend”were spelt correctly by more Americans.

Jack Bovill of the Spelling Society which sponsored(发起)the research said the high inaccuracy rates in both countries showed the need for the English spelling system to be modernized.“When asked only a quarter of adults thought they had a problem with spelling.The answers in the test prove that this_is_far_from_the_case，”he said.“What is holding the UK and the USA back is the irregular spelling system.”

Professor Edward Baranowski one academic consultant for the project said “We have different spellings for the same sound and a system which reflects how English was spoken in the 13th to 15th centuries not how it is spoken today.So many sound changes have occurred in the language which is not reflected in modern spelling that we are left with a ‘fossilized(僵化的)’system.”

The study found that 40 percent of the respondents would support updating words that caused problems while 16 percent opposed the idea.And 31 percent said it didn't matter.

The US survey involving a sample of 1，000 adults was carried out online by Ipsos MORI last month with the method based on a survey of 1，000 Britons in April last year.

1．The second paragraph is developed________．

A．by space                 B．by explanation

C．by time                  D．by comparison

2．The underlined word“inaccuracy”in Paragraph 3 can best be replaced by________．

A．success                  B．error

C．correctness              D．growth

3．The underlined part “this is far from the case” in Paragraph 3 implies that________．

A．most of the Americans can spell correctly

B．there are more people having spelling problems

C．adults perform worse in spelling than kids

D．it is difficult to create a new spelling system

4．Professor Baranowski seems to agree that________．

A．spelling should represent the sound of words

B．we should learn how English was spoken centuries ago

C．different countries should have different spellings

D．sound changes have nothing to do with spelling

5．What would be the most suitable title for the passage?

A．Who is responsible for our spelling

B．The English language to be blamed

C．Americans embarrassed by their spellings

D．Words needed to be modernized

Answer 1

【语篇解读】 一项调查发现，美国人在单词拼写方面不如英国人。

1．D　论述手法题。第二段对美国和英国成年人单词拼写情况进行了对比，故选D。

2．B　词义猜测题。根据本句的“showed the need for the English spelling system to be modernized”，联系第二段英美成年人较高的拼写错误率，可知inaccuracy可用error来代替，都是“错误”的意思。

3．B　推理判断题。联系上一句“When asked only a quarter of adults thought they had a problem with spelling”可知，Bovill是想说，这项研究表明，实际上很多人都存在拼写问题。

4．A　推理判断题。根据第四段Baranowski所说的话可知，他认为拼写应该表现单词的发音。represent意为“表现”，reflect意为“反映”，此处两者含义一致。

5．C　标题归纳题。C项标题一语双关，embarrassed一词既表明了美国人拼写的尴尬现状，又涉及了拼写调查的部分内容。