1993年考研英语阅读理解第一篇全文解析—本文介绍儿童语言关键期
Is language, like food, a basic human need without which a child at a critical period of life can be starved and damaged? Judging from the drastic experiment of Frederick II in the thirteenth century, it may be. Hoping to discover what language a child would speak if he heard
no mother tongue, he told the nurses to keep silent.
All the infants died before the first year. But clearly there was more than lack of language here. What was missing was good mothering. Without good mothering, in the first year of life especially, the capacity to survive is seriously affected.
Today no such severe lack exists as that ordered by Frederick. Nevertheless, some children are still backward in speaking.
Most often the reason for this is that the mother is insensitive to the signals of the infant, whose brain is programmed to learn language rapidly. If these sensitive periods are neglected, the ideal time for acquiring skills passes and they might never be learned so easily again.
A bird learns to sing and to fly rapidly at the right time, but the process is slow and hard once the critical stage has passed.
Experts suggest that speech stages are reached in a fixed sequence and at a constant age, but there are cases where speech has started late in a child who eventually turns out to be of high IQ. At twelve weeks a baby smiles and makes vowel-like sounds; at twelve months he can speak simple words and understand simple commands; at eighteen months he has a vocabulary of three to fifty words.
At three he knows about 1,000 words which he can put into sentences, and at four his language differs from that of his parents in style rather than grammar.
Recent evidence suggests that an infant is born with the capacity to speak. What is special about man’s brain, compared with that of the monkey, is the complex system which enables a child to connect the sight and feel of, say, a toy-bear with the sound pattern “toy-bear.”
And even more incredible is the young brain’s ability to pick out an order in language from the mixture of sound around him, to analyze, to combine and recombine the parts of a language in new ways.
But speech has to be induced, and this depends on interaction between the mother and the child, where the mother recognizes the signals in the child’s babbling (咿呀学语), grasping and smiling, and responds to them.
Insensitivity of the mother to these signals dulls the interaction because the child gets discouraged and sends out only the obvious signals. Sensitivity to the child’s non-verbal signals is essential to the growth and development of language.
16.
[答案]B
[解析] 本题考核的知识点是：事实细节中的目的。
文章在第一段论述了Frederick I 的实验，并在该段最后一句话的前半句用分词形式引导的目的状语，直接说明该实验的目的：Hoping to discover what language a child would speak if he heard no mother tongue, he…。由此可见他要求保育员保持沉默，其目的就是为了发现婴儿在听不到母语的情况下会讲什么语言。[B]选项是原文的合理改写，为正确答案。
[A]选项与本段内容不符，况且文章第五段第一句Recent evidence suggests that an infant is born with the capacity to speak说明[A]选项的内容是现代人的发现，并非十三世纪的这个实验的目的。
[C]选项与实验毫不相干，尽管文中第二段提到此实验中孩子的死亡并不仅仅是因为缺乏语言，还因为缺少细心护理，但这不是Frederick I 实验的目的，而是实验后人们的分析。
[D]选项只是实验的结果，是人们在实验后得到的结论，并不是Frederick I 做这个实验的最初目的。
17.
[答案] C
[解析]本题考核的知识点是：细节中的原因。
第三段第二句提到“一些孩子在说话上迟钝”，随后指出原因：Most often the reason for this is that the mother is insensitive to the signals of the infant…。[C]选项是原文的改写。respond inadequately与Insensitive相应，their attempts to speak与the signals of the infant一致。因此[C]选项为正确答案。
[A]选项与第三段第三句whose brain is programmed to learn language rapidly含义相反。 [B]、[D]这两个选项都是文中没有涉及的内容。注意at once在这里为“同时”之意。
18.
[解析]本题考核的知识点是：细节归纳。
作者在第五段第一句和第二句都分别提到[A]选项和[B]选项。这两个选项都是儿童的普通能力特征，[B]选项更是所有人，包括成人的共有特征，因此都应排除。
第五段是后一句话中的even more incredible 表明后述内容比前述内容重要，即：the young brain’s ability to pick out an order in language…, to analyze, to combine and recombine the parts of a language in new ways为儿童最不可思议的方面。而[C]选项为原文的确切改写，为正确答案。
[D]选项与文章内容不符，文章第六段指出说话能力的引导有赖于母亲对孩子的交流，与“照顾”的概念不同。此外作者也没说它是最难以置信的能力。owe…to意思是“归功于，得感谢。”
19.
[解析]本题考核的知识点是：推理引申的是非判断。
本题可对选项直接进行排除。
[A]选项与第五段第一句话… an infant is born with the capacity to speak 相一致。faculty意为“能力”。
[B]选项与最后一段提出的“母亲应对孩子的信号给予回应、进行鼓励”不符。因此[B]为答案。Anything but 意思是“根本不”。
[C]选项中“儿童大脑的高度选择性”在第五段第三句the young brain’s ability to pick out an order in language from the mixture of sound around him得以说明。
第三段最后一句话以鸟为例说明儿童学习语言有关键期，此外，第四段首句… speech stages are reached in a fixed sequence and at a constant age也说明了这一点，与[D]选项一致。
20.
[答案]D
[解析] 本题考核的知识点是：推理引申。
文章第四段第一句话举出例子：speech started late in a child who eventually turns out to be of high IQ，这说明说话晚的孩子后来也可能具有高智商，也就是说，说话晚并不一定低智商。因此[B]选项不正确，而[D]选项正确。但这并不能说明凡是说话晚的孩子将来智商都高。因此[A]选项也不正确。文章并未涉及[C]选项的内容。
全文翻译
语言是否如同食物这种人们的基本需求一样，没有了它，在关键期的儿童会饿死和受到损害？从十三世纪弗雷德里克一世的极端实验来看，语言可能会是这样。弗雷德里克一世期望发现如果没有母语，儿童将说什么语言，他叫护士保持沉默。
所有的婴儿在第一年就夭折了。但是，显然这不仅仅是缺少语言的问题。（长难句①）真正缺乏的是良好的哺育。没有良好的哺育，尤其是在生命的第一年，人的生存能力会受到严重的影响。
当今不会再存在如同弗雷德里克那样欠缺的安排了。然而，一些儿童仍然在说话方面滞后。通常是母亲对婴儿发出的信号不敏感，而婴儿的大脑已经对快速学习语言做好了安排。（长难句③）如果这些敏感的阶段被忽略的话，那么学习技能的最佳时间将被错过，同时人可能再也不会那么容易地学习这些技能了。小鸟在合适的时候能够很快地学会唱歌和飞翔，但一旦关键期错过了，那么学起来就会既慢又难。
专家指出人按照固定的顺序并在一定的年龄进入说话阶段，但也有开始说话晚，最后成为高智商者的例子。（长难句②）十二周的时候，婴儿会笑并且发出类似元音的声音；在十二个月的时候，他会说简单的单词并且听懂简单的指令；在十八个月的时候他有三到五十个词汇量。在三岁的时候，他知道大约一千个能够用来造句的单词，到了四岁的时候，他的语言在风格而不是语法方面与他父母的语言迥异。
最近的研究结果表明，婴儿生来就有说话的能力。与猴子大脑相比，婴儿大脑之所以特殊在于其复杂的系统能使儿童把对玩具熊这样具体事物的视觉及感觉与“玩具熊”这个词语的声音模式连接起来。更让人难以置信的是这个小脑袋从周围混杂的声音里挑选出语言的顺序，对其对进行分析，再以新的方式对语言的各部分进行组合、再组合的能力。
但是说话需要引导，这依赖于儿童与母亲的交流，在此过程中，母亲识别儿童咿呀学语，抓东西和微笑等的信号并对这些信号做出反应。母亲对这些信号的不敏感性会削弱交流，因为儿童受挫，同时他们仅仅会发出明显的信号。对儿童非语言信号的敏感对语言的产生和发展是必要的。