作者：武汉新航道教学管理部 托福口语组 李菁老师

10月考试一共五场，其中三场均为往年原题。五道题涉及到的主题分别为商业，学习与科技，其中商业一题，学习与科技各两题，符合以往出题规律。本月题目难度适中，没有出现冷门话题，均可以使用口语常用理由开展论证，如社交，释放压力，提高效率等。原题出现占比超过新题，说明往年真题刷题练习对于学生提分非常重要，考生需要进行大量刷题练习，确保刷过的题能想出完成思路，如若能保证练习量，口语则会有质的飞跃，学生即使遇到新题也能沉着应对。对于处于瓶颈期，尚在寻求突破的学生，则需要旧瓶装新酒，尽可能脱离范文思路，用自己的观点去完成回答，做到千篇一律中的。

2020年10月10日 T1（原题）

Do you agree or disagree with the following statement? Business owners should maintain good relationships with their employees?

Agree:

I think it’s an absolute yes for company owners to keep close relationship with employees. First of all, it helps to lighten work atmosphere. Imaging working in front of the eyes of a Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge, tough feelings right? A strict, unfriendly boss or manager can easily suck all the lives out of their employees, literally. If the owner is willing to make friends with the rest of the crew, it will actually increase work efficiency rather than lowering it. What’ more is that when a boss is having nice connections with his men, things will be easier, like how everyone actually thinks of him, how to make alterations, how their families are doing. Believe it or not, these are all in fact quite essential if a business wants to grow larger, core spirit that is.

Disagree:

I disagree with the statement that business owners should be friends with employees and the reasons are as follows. Being a boss means that one needs to take in charge of the whole company, being too close to employees can sometimes sabotage the boss’s image of being authoritative, to put it in simple words, employees might not regard his boss as, well, a person he or she directly answers to. The result would be employees will not be compliant. And if one staff member is making mistakes, well, disciplining or sacking him will be difficult. To put it in one sentence, being too friendly to workers would blur the line between the two parties, leading to a situation that a boss cannot handle. (123)

2020年10月14日 T1 (原题)

Do you agree or disagree with the following statement that kids should learn to use computer as early as possible?

Agree:

I do believe kids should do so. Some surveys suggest that computer related skills will continue to dominate the industry for at least 10 years worldwide. It’s not like everyone needs to become a computer guru or something close, it’s just that our work, our daily life has already been filled with smart devices,——we chat, work, upload or transfer files, creating PowerPoint slides, write essays and reports, have online meetings, watch online-streaming videos etcetera. Staying away from doing these would be like throwing Robinson Crusoe in a modern concrete jungle. With that being said, it is an absolute yes for kids to learn to use computers, be it basic or advanced knowledge. One simple example that fits our current situation perfectly would be attending online courses, tell that to those who disagree. (133)

Disagree:

Nah, kids will shouldn’t spend too much time on computers. Hence，I disagree with such statement. A person has a whole life learning new things including using computers, why in such hurry? Judging from my own experience, staying away from all the disturbance and enjoy nature itself, is priceless. By disturbance I mean electronic devices that draws kids’ attention from discovering raw beauty in life. Using a computer, whether to learn to use it all play games on it, gets in the way of making friends with kids in the neighborhood, which means a kid can lose some life-time friends. Plus, another simple, undoubtful reason- it hurt’s a child’s eyesight, is learning to use a smart device worth this price? Let’s put a question mark on that. (127)

2020年10月17日 T1

When students are reading, some choose the books from the reading list their schools give, other choose books by themselves. Which do you prefer?

Preferring the 1st one:

Personally speaking, I think it’s better for students to read materials provided by schools. Grownups, especially wise ones, know what’s best for young generations most of the time. Teachers, deans or president of schools, have the ability，to tell if a book really has something or is just a bluff. With rapid development of today’s publishing business, writing a book and publishing it has become much easier, at least to us ordinaries. This well could have a downside – anyone can write something and make a profit from selling copies, students with their young age and limited life experience, will not be able to tell a great book from its lousy competitors. (112)

Preferring the 2nd one:

I think students should choose books by themselves. There are millions of books on this planet, I don’t think school will let its students read them all. I myself have a say in that. When I was little, our school gave us reading lists to buy books, I still remember some of the book names on that list, there was Look, Listen and Learn, How to Simple Calculate, 100 Ways to Draw a Watermelon etc., I mean there was nothing wrong with these books at all, in fact they were some of the best educational books on the market. It’s just that, my interests lied in somewhere else. Growing up like a tomboy, I was into speed racers and architectures, none of the books recommended by our school can satisfy my cravings for learning those. Had I ever the chance to read them as a kid, I may have been a speed racer now. (154)

2020年10月24日 T1

There is a two-professor team teaching one course together. One of them gives the lecture and the other one gives the assignment. Do you think this is a good idea? Why or why not?

Good idea:

I think it’s quite a good idea to have two professors teaming up and teach one course together, because student now have the chance to experience different teaching styles without having to pay for the course twice. Some teachers are tough, other teachers are softer, different characters of professors result in distinct teaching styles. I’m sure students would love to see this two-professor thing come true. On the other hand, scoring assignment or quiz will be a lot quicker, because one professor is focusing on doing it, thus students wouldn’t have to wait for too long to get their marks. If they want to drop a course before the deadline, they’d better have their marks quick. (116)

Bad idea:

In my opinion, this is not the smartest idea. For a course to be successfully taught, its consistency should be guaranteed. And that I mean, the consistency of course material, the continuous logic of its instructor etc. We’ve all had the experience that, sometimes, tutors gave us homework different than that of the professors’, yep, that’s exactly what I’m talking about- a lack of consistency or coherence between in-class and after-class. Furthermore, there’s even no need for two teachers really, collecting regular assignment and finish scoring them is not as demanding as saving the world. It is ， actually, a teacher’s responsibility to check students’ homework and give feedback. (108)

2020年10月31日T1 (原题)

Do you agree or disagree with the following statement? Employees shouldn’t send personal text or emails during work hours.

Agree：

I agree with the idea that employees shouldn’t send personal texts or emails during work hours. Sending text messages or emails is okay by itself, but it should be work-related. I mean, work efficiency would be seriously decreased if everyone in the office is minding his own business. What would the supervisor think if she walks in and discovers that someone is sending selfies to friends? Another reason is that one can easily send wrong or inappropriate messages or emails to the wrong person. What if you accidentally send confidential files of your company to your friend? This could create serious disasters. (102)

Disagree:

I disagree with such policy. Dealing with personal affairs like sending text messages or emails doesn’t seem like a problem at all，as long as employees are fulfilling tasks as requested by their boss. Working long hours each day can be stressing and busy, it would actually，be better for workers to socialize with friends, to bond with families, to let out all the negativities in work life. I’m sure they’d be happy to get back to work after some quality chatting sessions. Some famous real-life examples would be companies like Google, Facebook and Oracle, their staff members have the freedom to use smart devices if they feel the need to, whether to chat over social media apps or sending emails. (122)