托福阅读的弦外之音

　　原文：

　　M: Do you know what time the train goes the city?

　　W: Normally it’s every 20 minutes. But it’s weekend, so I’m not sure.

　　选项：

　　(A) Listen to the traffic report on the radio

　　(B) Take a later train.

　　(C) Ron to catch the next train.

　　(D) Check the weekend schedule.

　　很显然这里的正确答案为D，因为原问题到了周末时间表与周1-5不同，因此，最好的选择方案是看一下周末的时间表，去找一下准确的时间。

　　很显然这里W并没有直接的告诉我们要去查询时间表，而是告诉我们周末的时间不确定，因此我们发现了她实际上是在暗示我们要Check the weekend schedule。这就是典型的弦外之音。

　　新托福阅读也继承了老托福听力的光荣传统:P，也开始为我们大张旗鼓的玩起了弦外之音这样的事情。这一点尤其在新托福TPO里面体现得尤为明显。

　　无老师当然还是拿真实例子说话，首先看一下新托福真题TPO1里面的一段。

　　Groundwater is the word used to describe water that saturates the ground, filling all the available spaces. By far the most abundant type of groundwater is meteoric water; this is the groundwater that circulates as part of the water cycle. Ordinary meteoric water is water that has soaked into the ground from the surface, from precipitation (rain and snow) and from lakes and streams. There it remains, sometimes for long periods, before emerging at the surface again. At first thought it seems incredible that there can be enough space in the “solid” ground underfoot to hold all this water.

　　题目：

　　Which of the following can be inferred from paragraph 1 about the ground that we walk on?

　　A It cannot hold rainwater for long periods of time.

　　B It prevents most groundwater from circulating.

　　C It has the capacity to store large amounts of water.

　　D It absorbs most of the water it contains from rivers.

　　很显然原文At first thought it seems incredible that there can be enough space in the “solid” ground underfoot to hold all this water. 为我们提到很难想象，在如此“坚实”的地下，会有足够的空间来盛如此之多的水，这里就很隐晦的告诉我们其实地下并不“坚实”，而是还有很多的空间，来盛放groundwater，因此我们得到的正确答案就是C选项，也就是原来我们行走的这片土地之下还有足够的能力来承载如此之多的水。

　　很显然，这里也是很隐晦的告诉我们地下空间其实是很大的。

　　下面这道题也是一样。

　　The same thing happens to this day, though on a smaller scale, wherever a sediment-laden river or stream emerges from a mountain valley onto relatively flat land, dropping its load as the current slows: the water usually spreads out fanwise, depositing the sediment in the form of a smooth, fan-shaped slope. Sediments are also dropped where a river slows on entering a lake or the sea, the deposited sediments are on a lake floor or the seafloor at first, but will be located inland at some future date, when the sea level falls or the land rises; such beds are sometimes thousands of meters thick.

　　All of the following are mentioned in paragraph 3 as places that sediment-laden rivers can deposit their sediments EXCEPT

　　A A mountain valley

　　B Flat land

　　C A lake floor

　　D The seafloor

　　本题问的是到底哪里没有沉积呢?

　　dropping its load as the current slows: the water usually spreads out fanwise, depositing the sediment in the form of a smooth, fan-shaped slope. 告诉我们，只有在流速缓慢的地点才会沉积。但是他不直接告诉我们具体在什么地点，而是让我们去用逻辑推理。

　　因此当我们寻找的时候，发现Flat land“平缓之地”毫无疑问是流速缓慢的，这样的地方不会沉积，然后再告诉我们a river slows on entering a lake or the sea，湖和海洋，也是流速缓慢的地点，自然也不会沉积。那么唯一会沉积的地方也就只有上游mountain valley才会沉积，因为河流流经的地点分别是from a mountain valley onto relatively flat land，以及a river slows on entering a lake or the sea。

　　自然当我们排出了Flat land、a lake以及the sea之后，也就只可能剩下mountain valley了。