TPO24 托福阅读 Passage3  Moving into Pueblos 文本+题目原文+答案解析

Moving into Pueblos

In the Mesa Verde area of the ancient North American Southwest, living patterns changed in the thirteenth century, with large numbers of people moving into large communal dwellings called pueblos, often constructed at the edges of canyons, especially on the sides of cliffs. Abandoning small extended-family households to move into these large pueblos with dozens if not hundreds of other people was probably traumatic. Few of the cultural traditions and rules that today allow us to deal with dense populations existed for these people accustomed to household autonomy and the ability to move around the landscape almost at will. [■] And besides the awkwardness of having to share walls with neighbors, living in aggregated pueblos introduced other problems. [■] For people in cliff dwellings, hauling water, wood, and food to their homes was a major chore. [■] The stress on local resources, especially in the firewood needed for daily cooking and warmth, was particularly intense, and conditions in aggregated pueblos were not very hygienic. [■]

Given all the disadvantages of living in aggregated towns, why did people in the thirteenth century move into these closely packed quarters? For transitions of such suddenness, archaeologists consider either pull factors (benefits that drew families together) or push factors (some external threat or crisis that forced people to aggregate). In this case, push explanations dominate.

Population growth is considered a particularly influential push. After several generations of population growth, people packed the landscape in densities so high that communal pueblos may have been a necessary outcome. Around Sand Canyon, for example, populations grew from 5 -12 people per square kilometer in the tenth century to as many as 30 - 50 by the 1200s. As densities increased, domestic architecture became larger, culminating in crowded pueblos. Some scholars expand on this idea by emphasizing a corresponding need for arable land to feed growing numbers of people: construction of small dams, reservoirs, terraces, and field houses indicates that farmers were intensifying their efforts during the 1200s. Competition for good farmland may also have prompted people to bond together to assert rights over the best fields.

Another important push was the onset of the Little Ice Age, a climatic phenomenon that led to cooler temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere. Although the height of the Little Ice Age was still around the corner, some evidence suggests that temperatures were falling during the thirteenth century. The environmental changes associated with this transition are not fully understood, but people living closest to the San Juan Mountains, to the northeast of Mesa Verde, were affected first. Growing food at these elevations is always difficult because of the short growing season. As the Little Ice Age progressed,farmers probably moved their fields to lower elevations, infringing on the lands of other farmers and pushing people together, thus contributing to the aggregations. Archaeologists identify a corresponding shift in populations toward the south and west toward Mesa Verde and away from higher elevations.

In the face of all these pushes, people in the Mesa Verde area had yet another reason to move into communal villages: the need for greater cooperation. Sharing and cooperation were almost certainly part of early Puebloan life, even for people living in largely independent single-household residences scattered across the landscape. Archaeologists find that even the most isolated residences during the eleventh and twelfth centuries obtained some pottery, and probably food, from some distance away, while major ceremonial events were opportunities for sharing food and crafts. Scholars believe that this cooperation allowed people to contend with a patchy environment in which precipitation and other resources varied across the landscape: if you produce a lot of food one year, you might trade it for pottery made by a distant ally who is having difficulty with crops—and the next year, the flow of goods might go in the opposite direction. But all of this appears to have changed thirteenth century. Although the climate remained as unpredictable as ever between one year and the next, it became much less locally diverse. In a bad year for farming, everyone was equally affected. No longer was it helpful to share widely. Instead, the most sensible thing would be for neighbors to combine efforts to produce as much food as possible, and thus aggregated towns were a sensible arrangement.

TPO24托福阅读 Passage3 Moving into Pueblos 题目

Question 1 of 14: The word “traumatic” meaning to

A. Essential

B. highly stressful

C. highly unusual

D. unwise

Question 2 of 14: The word “intense” in the passage is closest in meaning to

A. strong

B. questionable

C. obvious

D. deliberate

Question 3 of 14:  According to paragraph 1, before the thirteenth century the people of southwestern North America lived in

A. shared daily chores with neighboring households

B. occupied dwellings that were built into the sides of cliffs

C. were largely free to conduct their lives as they pleased

D. enforced common standards of behavior and cooperative conduct within their communities

Question 4 of 14: Which of the following best indicates the organization of paragraph 1?

A. It presents the conditions that caused a change in a population' s living patterns and then explains why those conditions got worse.

B. It identifies certain present-day cultural traditions and rules and then traces them to their roots in the thirteenth century.

C. It casts doubt on one explanation of the move to pueblos and then introduces an alternative explanation that the passage will defend.

D. It describes a major change in a population' s living patterns and then presents a number of problems that resulted from that change.

Question 5 of 14: According to paragraph 3, which of the following was one of the consequences of increasing population densities?

A. People were increasingly crowded into collections of large housing units.

B. People stopped planting crops that have relatively low yields.

C. Domestic buildings were pushed beyond the canyon limits.

D. The natural landscape was destroyed.

Question 6 of 14:Which of the sentences below best expresses the essential information in the highlighted sentence in the passage? Incorrect choices change the meaning in important ways or leave out essential information.

A. Some scholars even claim that the intensification of farmers' various efforts during the 1200s led to further population growth and the consequent need for more arable land.

B. Evidence of intensifying agriculture in the 1200s indicates a need to feed a larger population and soextends the argument that a growing population was the cause of the move to pueblos.

C. During the 1200s, farmers met the demand for more arable land, but they also succeeded in cultivating existing land more intensively with the help of agricultural construction projects.

D. Some scholars feel strongly that the construction of small dams, reservoirs, terraces, and field houses in the thirteenth century is independent evidence for growth in the number of people.

Question 7 of 14: The word “transition” in the passage is closest in meaning to

A. change

B. climate

C. decline

D. problem

Question 8 of 14: Why does the author state that "Growing food at these elevations is always difficult because of the short growing season"?

A. To explain why the higher elevations were always relatively sparsely populated

B. To suggest that any worsening of conditions would have significant consequences

C. To emphasize how resourceful the people growing food at these elevations were

D. To argue that farming was not the primary source of food at high elevations

Question9 of 14 ：According to paragraph 4, what did farmers do in response to falling temperatures during the Little Ice Age?

A. Moved to areas away from Mesa Verde

B. Moved closer to the northeastern part of Mesa Verde

C. Began to cultivate crops adapted to a short growing season

D. Gave up the cultivation of the highest-lying lands

Question10 of 14:  According to paragraph 5, major ceremonial events were occasions for

A. leaders to persuade people from the countryside to move into a pueblo

B. farmers to collect information about where crops could be reliably grown

C. people to develop better techniques for producing pottery and crafts

D. people in the early Puebloan era to share farm and craft products

Question11 of 14: According to paragraph 5, which of the following was a reason people in the Mesa Verde area formed communal villages in the thirteenth century?

A. The climate in the Mesa Verde area became more locally diverse.

B. Individuals were no longer interested in exchanging pottery and food.

C. Cooperation between people became more important for survival.

D. Bad years of farming began to occur more frequently.

Question 12 of 14:   Paragraph 5 supports which of the following statements about cooperation among the people in the Mesa Verde area from the eleventh through the thirteenth century?

A. Cooperation allowed many households to give up farming and to specialize in making pottery and crafts.

B. People went from exchanging food and crafts they individually produced to sharing in a cooperative effort to produce as much food as possible.

C. Overtime there was less cooperation as farmers competed with each other for trade with distant areas.

D. Individuals stopped cooperating with each other because they did not have enough food for themselves.

Question13 of 14: Look at the four squares [■] that indicate where the following sentence could be added to the passage.

Performing everyday household tasks required more effort.

Where would the sentence best fit? Click on a square to add the sentence to the passage.

A. And besides the awkwardness of having to share walls with neighbors, living in aggregated pueblos introduced other problems. B. For people in cliff dwellings, hauling water, wood, and food to their homes was a major chore. 

C. The stress on local resources, especially in the firewood needed for daily cooking and warmth, was particularly intense, and conditions in aggregated pueblos were not very hygienic.

D. /

Question14 of 14: In the thirteenth century, the people in the Mesa Verde area went from living in scattered independent households to living in large pueblos.

Answer Choices

A. Because the thirteenth-century inhabitants of the Mesa Verde area did not have the cultural expectations of today's city dwellers, they easily adapted to communal life.

B. Even though living in pueblos had disadvantages, the population of the area had grown so large that there may have been no other arrangement that would have met its needs.

C. From the eleventh century onward, farmers began to increase food production on existing farmland and started bringing more land under cultivation.

D. A development that contributed to increasing population densities was a cooling climate that led many people to leave the coldest areas and crowd into climatically more favorable areas.

E. The primary reason for moving to pueblos was the social benefits associated with communal life.

F. People were brought together by the need to produce food cooperatively, as the use of food surpluses in one place to relieve shortages in another ended due to a change in climate.

TPO24托福阅读Passage3Moving into Pueblos真题解析

Question 1 of 14

答案：B

解析：traumatic“受伤的，外伤的，不顺心的”，所以正确答案是highly stressful。原句阐述了改变传统的大家庭居住模式到跟很多人一起住在镇上是怎么样的。接着下句说没有人有跟很多人住在一起的经验，又说了其他很多问题，所以这个词一定是不好的，所以不是B就是D，而wise是原文没体现出来的，所以正确答案是B。‘

’

Question 2 of 14

答案：A

解析：intense“强烈的，紧张的”，所以正确答案是strong。原文提到本地资源所受的压力是非常 的，而且住在镇上卫生条件也不好，又是要一个不好的结论，所以questionable和deliberate完全不合文意；obvious压力很明显还不够，一定是压力很大才行，所以正确答案是A。

’

Question 3 of 14

答案：C

解析：此题可采用排除法。A的chore做关键词定位至倒数第二句，但原文只是列举了chore，没提到选项说的share，A错误；B的dwelling和sides of the cliffs做关键词定位至第一句，但建在cliff的是pueblo，不是十三世纪之前，所以B错误；C在原文中没有明确说明，但看首句会发现十三世纪变化了，十三世纪以后大家一起住，有很多问题，也就是说十三世纪之前大家都是自己住自己的，也就是C说的conduct their lives as they pleased，C正确；D原文完全未提及，不选。

Question 4 of 14

答案：D

解析：提问全段的题，看头尾。第一句提到十三世纪人们的生活方式发生了变化，很多人都搬到了pueblo；而后半段从倒数第三句到最后都在说这种现象产生的一系列问题，所以是先陈述现象，再陈述这种现象产生的问题，答案是D。A的why those conditions get worse，B的present cultural condition和C的an alternative explanation原文都未提及。

Question 5 of 14

答案：A

解析：以density做关键词定位至第二句，提到经过若干代人口增长，density实在太大，使得pueblo成为一个不可避免的结果，所以正确答案是A，crowd into collections of large housing units。B的crop，C的canyon limits和D的destroy原文都未提及。

Question 6 of 14

答案：B

解析：原文的结构是scholar强调需要耕地来保证增长人口的食物，答案是B，A的efforts lead to人口增长不合文意；C的转折不正确，而且farmer满足耕地需要也不正确；D的independent evidence不正确。

Question 7 of 14

答案：A

解析：transition“过渡，变化”，所以答案是change。从单词本身看，因为单词的前半部分是trans，所以词义必然与“变换”有关；因为原文有this transition，所以往前看。前文说有证据表明温度在十三世纪有所下降，所以应该是一种变化，答案是A。尽管decline代入也说得通，但与trans是转变的意思对不上，所以不选，B和D完全不合文意。

Question 8 of 14

答案：B

解析：修辞目的题，修辞点所在的句子仅仅是一个例子，所以往前看，但前一句仍然是例子，所以看首句。首句说Little Ice Age对push有影响，而选项中提到影响的只有B的consequence，所以正确答案是B，而且最后一句话提到人口迁徙也可以说明Little Ice Age的影响。A的sparsely populated，C的resourceful和D的primary source of food原文都没有任何相关信息。

Question 9 of 14

答案：D

解析：此题通过找关键词不是特别方便，可以结合首尾句扫描全段，第一句提到cooler temperature，最后一句从south and west toward MESA，离开了高地，所以正确答案是D，放弃了高地。A与原文相反；B错在不是MESA的东北部，而是朝向MESA；C的crop原文未提及。

Question 10 of 14

答案：D

解析：以major ceremonial events做关键词定位至第三句的最后半句，提到ceremonial event提供了share food和crafts的机会，所以正确答案是D，其他都完全不合文意。

Question 11 of 14

答案：C

解析：以thirteenth century做关键词定位至倒数第四句，说一切都在十三世纪发生了变化，接着所有的内容都在说十三世纪变化之后的事儿。最后一句特别指出最有效的方式是neighbor联合生产更多食物，因此aggregated town成为最好的arrangement，所以形成communal village的原因是C。A说反；B和D未提及。

Question 12 of 14

答案：B

解析：此题不用回原文定位，因为题目问的是十一世纪到十三世纪MESA人的cooperation怎么变的，而上题已经说了十三世纪人们合作，也就是以前是不怎么合作的，四个答案中只有B提到了合作生产更多食物，所以B是正确答案。

Question 13 of 14

答案：B

解析：两个过渡点，分别是名词everyday household tasks和名词more effort，根据名词everyday household tasks可以确定B或者C是答案，因为原文的hauling water, wood, and food是everyday household tasks的同义词；而require more effort跟B插入点前的problem对应，可以确定答案是A或者B，综上，正确答案是B。

Question 14 of 14

答案：BDF

解析：A选项与原文第一段开头部分的内容相反，原文提到traumatic，也就是不容易适应城镇生活，而答案说容易适应，不选；C选项与原文第四段最后一句相反，原文说放弃了原来的high elevation，而不是选项说的开垦更多土地，所以不选；E选项不正确，作者也没明确说哪个是首要原因，即使按顺序，第三段首句先说的是population growth，不是benefit，所以不选；B选项正确，因为第一段最后一句说到了城镇居住的缺点，对应选项的前半句，而第五段最后说到了城镇居住是最sensible的arrangement，所以这个答案正确；D选项对应原文第四段第一句和最后一句，正确；F选项对应原文第五段的倒数四句，正确。

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