和谐英语

2009年6月英语四级模拟题和答案下载(四)

2009-06-17来源:和谐英语
  [2] 快速阅读
  Part Ⅱ Reading Comprehension (Skimming and Scanning) (15 minutes)
  Directions: In this part, you will have 15 minutes to go over the passage quickly and answer the questions on Answer Sheet 1.
  For questions 1-7, mark
  Y (for YES) if the statement agrees with the information given in the passage;
  N (for NO) if the statement contradicts the information given in the passage;
  NG (for NOT GIVEN) if the information is not given in the passage.
  For questions 8-10, complete the sentences with the information given in the passage.
  Unemployment ‘Blessings’
  Community Involvement
  For Lisa Perez, the wakeup call was burned pork chops. An executive who previously hadn’t been particularly interested in home and health had become obsessed with homemaking during a stint of unemployment.
  Ms. Perez, 35, resolved to become an active volunteer for the duration of her search. She gave her time to a health-care concern, a housing program and a political campaign.
  The work bolstered her self-confidence. "Volunteering takes the focus off of you. One thing you have that’s still valuable is your time. And, of course, you learn that there are thousands of people with a life that’s much worse than yours," she says.
  Volunteer assignments are also great ways to meet powerful and well-connected people. Over a six-month period, her volunteering evolved into working as a paid consultant and then as a full-time employee, a job she still holds today. In all, she was unemployed for eight months.
  Continuing Education
  Even as the economy improves, a jobless executive may face up to a year or more of unemployment. This is a lot of time, especially for hard-charging high-performers who are not used to having any free time.
  When laid off from the position of executive in a steel company near Cleveland, Mr. Bellavance, single and virtually debt free, shifted his finances into survival mode. He cashed out his pension, sold his house, unloaded things he didn’t need at garage sales, and rented an apartment with a roommate. Then, he says, "I signed up for every benefit I could find."
  But he wasn’t just waiting out the year. He spent the rest of his search updating his skills, including becoming certified in new database, project-management software and other related areas.
   "People should not feel guilty about accepting government aid," he says, "I saw this in a lot of people. They felt they were some kind of loser for taking benefits. My advice is: Get all you can. You’ve been paying for these programs in your entire career, and you may as well start to benefit from them."