托福阅读记笔记的六大要点

都知道听力需要做笔记，但其实笔记在我们的托福阅读备考中也是十分重要的。今天我们就一起来了解一下托福阅读如何做笔记吧。

托福阅读记笔记的六大要点

一、主题段和主题句的关键词

托福阅读文章中的主题段和主题句是每一个段落的主题，也是文章的要点，都是参与搭建文章结构的，因此记录它们中的几个关键词对于把握全文的结构非常重要。同时，文章中有很多的重要信息，而且阅读文章后面的题目大都是根据主题而出，考生在解答题目的时候，可以快速根据主题句找到对应的段落。

二、 时间和数字

一般来说，出现时间概念的文章或段落通常和时间顺序有关，作者会用不同的时间点串出一条时间线索。而个别数字的出现则意味着这个数字所阐述概念的重要性是不容忽视的。因此，除非文章中出现了数据堆积的现象，否则考生都需要把数字记录下来

三、 人名、地名和专有名词

人名、地名以及专有名词出现的时候，一般都会出现大写字母或引号等标记，非常有利于信息索引和定位。当提到这几个具体的概念时，文章通常是在用这些概念说明某个理论或者观点，因此记录下这些概念对于理解相关理论和观点可以起到一定的辅助作用。

四、举例主体

有的时候，为了说明某些理论和观点，文章中会出现大段的举例文字。实际上，托福阅读考试中考查这些例子具体内容的时候非常少，而更多的是考查作者使用这些例子的原因或它们所证明的观点。因此，考生在快速记录的笔记中只需要记录下例子是什么就可以了，至于例子中所阐述的具体信息，可以适当忽略。

五、新概念和核心概念

所谓“新概念”是指当考生读到文章某个位置时，之前没有出现过的概念。这种新概念的出现，说明之前出现的概念已经不能够说明问题。所以，新概念的出现必然也意味着一个重要信息的出现。而“核心概念”是指在连续的几个段落中集中阐述的主题概念，对于这种概念来说，无论是作为观点还是举例大家都应该注意，因为它显然是作为重点在文章中被强调的。

六、重要的逻辑关系

很多考生在托福阅读文章的时候只注意到了文章所阐述的重要内容，但是忽略了信息之间的逻辑关系，因而对信息关联理解不准确，这也是一种严重的错误。因此，在阅读过程中记录下信息之间所产生的逻辑关系可以避免考生丢失信息之间的关联信息。记录逻辑关系也可以帮助考生更加清晰地理清段落之间的关系。

托福双语阅读：鞋子透露性格

Researchers at the University of Kansas say that People can accurately judge 90 percent of a stranger's personality simply by looking at the person's shoes.

堪萨斯大学的研?a href="">咳嗽背疲恍杩纯匆桓鋈舜┑男湍茏既返嘏卸夏吧说?0%的性格。

"Shoes convey a thin but useful slice of information about their wearers," the authors wrote in the new study published in the Journal of Research in Personality. "Shoes serve a practical purpose, and also serve as nonverbal cues with symbolic messages. People tend to pay attention to the shoes they and others wear."

这项新研究发表在《个性研究杂志》上，作者写道：“鞋子可传达其主人的细微但有用的信息。鞋子有其实际用途，但也作为非言语信号传递着象征性信息。人们一般都会注意自己和他人穿的鞋。”

Medical Daily notes that the number of detailed personality traits detected in the study include a person's general age, their gender, income, political affiliation, and other personality traits, including someone's emotional stability.

《医学日报》指出，研究发现鞋子可透露的个性特征细节包括一个人的大概年龄、这个人的性别、收入、政治立场，还有包括情绪稳定性在内的其他个性特征。

Lead researcher Omri Gillath said the judgments were based on the style, cost, color and condition of someone's shoes. In the study, 63 University of Kansas students looked at pictures showing 208 different pairs of shoes worn by the study's participants. Volunteers in the study were photographed in their most commonly worn shoes, and then filled out a personality questionnaire.

首席研究员欧姆瑞·吉拉斯说，这些判断是基于所穿的鞋的样式、价格、颜色和新旧程度做出的。在研究过程中，63名堪萨斯大学的学生观看了研究参与者穿的208双不同的鞋的图片。参加该研究的志愿者都是穿着自己平日里最常穿的鞋拍的照，然后他们填写了一份性格调查问卷。

So, what do your shoes say about your personality?

那么，你的鞋反映了你的什么性格特点呢?

Some of the results were expected: People with higher incomes most commonly wore expensive shoes, and flashier footwear was typically worn by extroverts.

部分研究结果是在意料之中的：收入高的人大多穿价格昂贵的鞋子，而颜色鲜亮的鞋子通常是性格外向的人穿的。

However, some of the more specific results are intriguing. For example, "practical and functional" shoes were generally worn by more "agreeable" people, while ankle boots were more closely aligned with "aggressive" personalities.

不过，一些更具体的研究结果则十分有趣。例如，“实用、功能性的”鞋子通常是性格“随和”的人穿的，而短靴的主人则大多是性格“强势”的人。

The strangest of all may be that those who wore "uncomfortable looking" shoes tend to have "calm" personalities.

最奇怪的也许是那些爱穿“看起来不舒服的”鞋子的人竟然性格一般比较“沉着冷静”。

And if you have several pairs of new shoes or take exceptional care of them, you may suffer from "attachment anxiety," spending an inordinate amount of time worrying about what other people think of your appearance.

此外，如果你有好几双新鞋子或者格外爱惜保养这些新鞋，那么你可能患上了“依恋焦虑症”，因为你花了过多的时间来担心其他人对你外表的看法。

There was even a political calculation in the mix with more liberal types wearing "shabbier and less expensive" shoes.

研究甚至还发现了鞋子和政治立场之间的关系，那些穿“比较破旧和廉价”的鞋子的人更可能是自由党派。

The researchers noted that some people will choose shoe styles to mask their actual personality traits, but researchers noted that volunteers were also likely to be unaware that their footwear choices were revealing deep insights into their personalities.

研究人员指出，有些人会通过选择鞋子的样式来掩饰他们真实的性格特征，不过研究人员也指出，志愿者们一般都不会意识到自己对鞋的选择会让人窥见性格深处。

托福阅读训练：购物时的“姓氏效应”

According to a new study, people whose surnames start with letters late in the alphabet may be the fastest to buy. What could possibly explain this weird phenomenon, which the study authors dubbed "the last-name effect"? The research didn't provide a definitive reason, but the authors offer an intriguing theory.

一项新的研究显示，姓氏首字母在字母表中位置越靠后的人在购物时做决定越快。研究人员将这种现象叫做“姓氏效应”。至于为什么会有这样奇怪的现象，该研究没有提供明确的解释，不过研究人员给出了一个比较有趣的理论。

Since America's obsession with alphabetical order often forces the Z's to the back of the line in childhood, they suffer. They were always the last to get lunch in the cafeteria —sorry, Young, the other kids bought all the chocolate milk again —and had to beg for the teacher's attention from the back of the classroom. So later in life, when the Z's —and even onetime Z's who became A's through marriage —see an item they really like for sale or are offered a deal, they jump on it, afraid that supplies won't last.

因为美国人一直热衷于按照字母顺序排队，所以姓氏字母靠后的人从小就开始遭受排在队尾的境遇。中午吃饭的时候，他们总是排在最后，轮到他们的时候，巧克力奶都卖光了;坐在教室后排的他们还得想办法吸引老师的注意。所以，长大以后，当这些总是排在队尾的人看到他们喜欢的东西或者合适的交易，他们会立马出手，生怕晚了就没了。

托福阅读背景积累：The Civil War

Causes of the war

The American Civil War was fought between the northern and southern states from 1861 to 1865. There were two main causes of the war. The first was the issue of _lavery: should Africans who had been brought by force to the US be used as slaves. The second was the issue of states' rights: should the US federal government be more powerful than the governments of individual states.

The North and South were very different in character. The economy of the South was based on agriculture, especially cotton. Picking cotton was hard work, and the South depended on slaves for this. The North was more industrial, with a larger population and greater wealth. Slavery, and opposition to it, had existed since before independence (1776) but, in the 19th century, the abolitionists, people who wanted to make slavery illegal, gradually increased in number. The South's attitude was that each state had the right to make any law it wanted, and if southern states wanted slavery, the US government could not prevent it. Many southerners became secessionists, believing that southern states should secede from the Union (= become independent from the US).

In 1860, Abraham _incoln was elected President. He and his party, the _epublicans, were against slavery, but said that they would not end it. The southern states did not believe this, and began to leave the Union. In 1860 there were 34 states in the US. Eleven of them (South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee and North Carolina) left the Union and formed the _onfederate States of America, often called the Confederacy. Jefferson _avis became its President, and for most of the war _ichmond, Virginia, was the capital.

Four years of fighting

The US government did not want a war but, on 12 April 1861, the Confederate Army attacked _ort Sumter, which was in the Confederate state of South Carolina but still occupied by the Union army. President Lincoln could not ignore the attack and so the Civil War began.

Over the next four years the Union army tried to take control of the South. The battles that followed, _hiloh, Antietam, _ull Run and Chicamauga, have become part of America's national memory. After the battle of _ettysburg in 1863, in a speech known as the _ettysburg Address, President Lincoln said that the North was fighting the war to keep the Union together so that 'rnment of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth'. In the same year he issued the _mancipation Proclamation which made slavery illegal, but only in the Confederacy.

Slaves and former slaves played an important part in the war. Some gave information to Union soldiers, because they knew that their best chance of freedom was for the North to win the war. Many former slaves wanted to become Union soldiers, but this was not very popular among white northerners. In spite of this opposition about 185000 former slaves served in the Union army.

Women on both sides worked as spies, taking information, and sometimes even people, across borders by hiding them under their large skirts.

In the South especially, people suffered greatly and had little to eat. On 9 April 1865, when the South could fight no more, General Robert E _ee surrendered to General Ulysses S _rant at _ppomattox Court House in Virginia. A total of 620000 people had been killed and many more wounded.

The war was over but feelings of hostility against the North remained strong. John Wilkes _ooth, an actor who supported the South, decided to kill President Lincoln. On 14 April 1865 he approached the President in Ford's Theatre in Washington and shot him. Lincoln died the next morning.

The killing of President Lincoln showed how bitter many people felt. The South had been beaten, but its people had not changed their opinions about slavery or about states' rights. During the war, the differences between North and South had become even greater. The North had become richer. In the South, cities had been destroyed and the economy ruined.

Reconstruction

After the war the South became part of the United States again. This long, difficult period was called Reconstruction. The issues that had caused the war, slavery and states' rights, still had to be dealt with. The issue of slavery was difficult, because many people even in the North had prejudices against Blacks. The new state governments in the South wanted to make laws limiting the rights of Blacks, and the US government tried to stop them. Between 1865 and 1870 the 13th, 14th and 15th _mendments to the _onstitution were passed, giving Blacks freedom, making them citizens of the US and the state where they lived, and giving them, in theory, the same rights as white Americans.

Many northern politicians went to the South where they thought they could get power easily. These northerners were called _arpet-baggers. Both carpet-baggers and southern politicians were dishonest and stole money from the new governments, which hurt the South even more.

In 1870 the last three southern states were admitted to the Union again, and in 1877 the northern army finally left the South. The war lasted four years, but efforts to reunite the country took three times as long.

Effects of the Civil War

Differences between North and South are still strong. In the South the Confederate flag is still often used, and the state flags of _eorgia and _ississippi were made to look similar to it. The state motto is Audemus jura nostra defendere, which is Latin for 'We dare to defend our rights'. The Civil War helped to end slavery, but long afterwards Blacks were still being treated badly, and race relations continue to be a problem. The South was so angry with the _epublicans, the party of Lincoln and Reconstruction, that southerners voted _emocratic for a century. The war showed strong differences between parts of the US, but many people believe that the most important thing it did was to prove that the US is one country.