英语畅谈中国文化 50 主题 第 38 章 TOEFL or No TOEFL？考不考托福？A: Chinese students are good at taking exams and TOEFL has never been a problem for them. It's not uncommon that many students scored as much as 670 in the paper- based TOEFL exams. After TOEFL introduced its new, computer-based test format, the highest score was once again achieved by a Beijing High School student.B: Many Chinese people knew how to take examinations more than 1,000 years ago. At that time, exams were the best way to improve one's life. You'd be fooled if you think a high TOEFL score means the student can speak English equally as well. About 10 years ago, a student scored 650 in his TOEFL test and was admitted to a fairly well-known university in the United States. When someone greeted him at the airport and said, "How do you do?" he replied, "I do." This is a good example to show the kind of problems that exist in such examinations. A: I heard that the University Entrance examination in China is very difficult. Are they any different from TOEFL?B: These examinations are given in two categories, one for students of science and the other for arts students. In order to prepare for these exams, high school students are reorganized into arts and science classes two years in advance. Chinese, mathematics, English and politics are shared tests. Science students will take additional tests in physics and chemistry, while arts students will take history and geography. In comparison, TOEFL is only a language test. Nowadays, a lot of students are taking the TOEFL examination because they want to attend overseas Universities to avoid facing the more challenging University Entrance exams. Also, more people can afford the tuition at a foreign university. A: In order to cater to the increasing need for the TOEFL test, many training centershave been established. The most well-known is probably the New Oriental.B: Such training centers have even developed solutions to TOEFL questions. For example, if you are not sure of the correct answers of multiple choice questions, they recommend you follow the BDCA pattern. That method allowed people to do fairly well in the exams.A: Once TOEFL found out about the practice, they decided to introduce a new test format, by putting more emphasis on language proficiency.B: Ironically, the best scorers of this new format are still Chinese students and training centers are once again trying to figure out solutions.
