全新版大学英语第二册UNIT 1.docVIP

UNIT 1 Ways of Learning Part I Pre-Reading Task Listen to the recording two or three times and then think over the following questions: 1. Who should teach whom? Is learning a one-way street? 2. Should we share our dreams for a better life with our parents or keep them to ourselves? 3. Can children ever understand their parents completely? 4. From the song can you guess what the theme of the unit, way of learning, chiefly refers to? Part II Text A Howard Gardner, a professor of education at Harvard University, reflects on a visit to China and gives his thoughts on different approaches to learning in China and the West. LEARNING, CHINESE-STYLE Howard Gardner For a month in the spring of 1987, my wife Ellen and I lived in the bustling eastern Chinese city of Nanjing with our 18-month-old son Benjamin while studying arts education in Chinese kindergartens and elementary schools. But one of the most telling lessons Ellen and I got in the difference between Chinese and American ideas of education came not in the classroom but in the lobby of the Jinling Hotel where we stayed in Nanjing. The key to our room was attached to a large plastic block with the room number on it. When leaving the hotel, a guest was encouraged to turn in the key, either by handing it to an attendant or by dropping it through a slot into a box. Because the key slot was narrow, the key had to be positioned carefully to fit into it. Benjamin loved to carry the key around, shaking it vigorously. He also liked to try to place it into the slot. Because of his tender age and incomplete understanding of the need to position the key just so, he would usually fail. Benjamin was not bothered in the least. He probably got as much pleasure out of the sounds the key made as he did those few times when the key actually found its way into the slot. Now both Ellen and I were perfectly happy to allow Benjamin to bang the key near the key slot. His exploratory behavior seemed harmless enough.