[G]Students’test-form preferences vary,too,often depending on the subject and course difficulty.“I prefer take-home essays because it is then really about the writing,so you have time to edit and do more research,”says Elizabeth Dresser,a junior at Barnard.Then there is the stress factor.Francesca Haass,a senior at Middlebury,says,“I find the in-class ones are more stressful in the short term,but there is immediate relief as you swallow information like mad,and then you get to forget it all.Take-homes require thoughtful engagement which can lead to longer term stress as there is never a moment when the time is up.”Meanwhile,Olivia Rubin,a sophomore at Emory,says she hardly even considers take-homes true exams.“If you understand the material and have the ability to articulate(说出)your thoughts,they should be a breeze.”

[H]How students ultimately handle stress may depend on their personal test-taking abilities.There are people who always wait until the last minute,and make it much harder than it needs to be.And then there those who,not knowing what questions are coming at them,and having no resources to refer to,can freeze.And then there are we rare folks who fit both those descriptions.

[I]Yes,my advanced age must factor into the equation(等式),in part because of my inability to

access the information as quickly.As another returning student at Columbia,Kate Marber,told

me,“We are learning not only all this information,but essentially how to learn again.Our

fellow students have just come out of high school.A lot has changed since we were last in

school.”

[J]If nothing else,the situation has given my college son and me something to share,When I

asked his opinion on this matter,he responded,“I like in-class exams because the time is

already reserved,as opposed to using my free time at home to work on a test,”he responded.

It seems to me that a compromise would be receiving the exam questions a day or two in

advance,and then doing the actual test in class the ticking clock overhead.

[K]Better yet,how about what one Hunter College professor reportedly did recently for her final

exam:She encouraged the class not to stress or even study,promising that,“It is going to be a

piece of cake.”When the students came in,sharpened pencils in hand,there was not a blue

book in sight.Rather,they saw a large chocolate cake and they each were given a slice.

36.Elderly students find it hard to keep up with the rapid changes in education.

37.Some believe take-home exams may affect students'performance in other courses.

38.Certain professors believe in-class exams are ultimately more helpful to students.

39.In-class exams are believed to discourage cheating in exams.

40.The author was happy to learn she could do some exams at home.

41.Students who put off their work until the last moment often find the exams more difficult than

they actually are.

42.Different students may prefer different types of exams.

43.Most professors agree whether to give an in-class or a take-home exam depends on type of

course being taught.

44.The author dropped out of college some forty years ago.

45.Some students think take-home exams will eat up their free time.

Section C

Directions:There are 2 passages in this section.Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements.For each of them there are four choices marked A),B),C)and D).You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre.

Passage One

Questions 46 and 50 are based on the following passage.

That people often experience trouble sleeping in a different bed in unfamiliar surroundings is a phenomenon known as the“first-night”effect.If a person stays in the same room the following night they tend to sleep more soundly.Yuka Sasaki and her colleagues at Brown University set out to investigate the origins of this effect.

Dr.Sasaki knew the first-night effect probably has something to do with how humans evolved.The puzzle was what benefit would be gained from it when performance might be affected the following day.She also knew from previous work conducted on birds and dolphins that these animals put half of their brains to sleep at a time so that they can rest while remaining alert enough to avoid predators(捕食者).This led her to wonder if people might be doing the same thing.To take a closer look,her team studied 35 healthy people as they slept in the unfamiliar environment of the university’s Department of Psychological Sciences.The participants each slept in the department for two nights and were carefully monitored with techniques that looked at the activity of their brains.Dr.Sasaki found,as expected,the participants slept less well on their first night than they did on their second,taking more than twice as long to fall asleep and sleeping less overall.During deep sleep,the participants’brains behaved in a similar manner seen in birds and dolphins.On the first night only,the left hemispheres(半球)of their brains did not sleep nearly as deeply as their right hemispheres did.

Curious if the left hemispheres were indeed remaining awake to process information detected in the surrounding environment,Dr.Sasaki re-ran the experiment while presenting the sleeping participants with a mix of regularly timed beeps(蜂鸣声)of the same tone and irregular beeps of a different tone during the night.She worked out that,if the left hemisphere was staying alert to keep guard in a strange environment,then it would react to the irregular beeps by stirring people from sleep and would ignore the regularly timed ones.This is precisely what she found.

46.What did researchers find puzzling about the first-night effect

A)To what extent it can trouble people.C)What circumstances may trigger it.

B)What role it has played in evolution.D)In what way it can be beneficial.

47.What do we learn about Dr.Yuka Sasaki doing her research

A)She found birds and dolphins remain alert while asleep.