A native English speaker ________ limited English speakers finds it hard to talk with African people even though they speak English too.

1. A.
   is used to deal with
2. B.
   used to deal with
3. C.
   is used to dealing with
4. D.
   used to dealing with

In today’s world, English is the most wildly used language. It is our duty to learn English in the new situation of the reform and opening (改革开放) to the outside world. How can we master the English language ? I’d like to give you some good advice.
First, get interested in it. I enjoy listening to foreign friends talking when I was a child. At the same time I watched the English programme Follow Me on TV. From then on, I kept on learning English. The more I learned, the more progress I made.
Second, practice makes perfect. Many people study English very hard, but they are very shy to speak it in public, for they are afraid of making mistakes. Remember you have to make a mistake before you can correct it. A native English speaker makes mistakes sometimes, too.
Third, the beginners should be encouraged to pay attention to idioms. The English language has many idioms. For example, you should say “ He is as strong as a cow.”
【小题1】The writer wants to tell us ____________. 

Learners of English, especially self-taught learners may have trouble in understanding the speeches made by native speakers. The following ways might help improve your listening skills.

First of all, do things step by step. It is not good to listen to something beyond your level. Better choose a suitable course and start with the first book. Don’t go on to the second book until you are sure you understand the first one.

Secondly, keep studying one course. Don’t change books often. Never let your attention be attracted by another course just because it seems to be more popular.

Thirdly, listen to the English news over the radio from time to time. Better look through the news stories in Chinese-language newspapers first. That will make it easier for you to understand the English news on the radio.

Fourthly, if you have time, listen to some interesting stories in Special English from the V.O.A or other listening materials of the same level as those of your textbook.

76. What does the passage mainly talk about?

A. How to speak English correctly.        B. How to read fast.

C. How to improve your writing skills.     D. How to improve your listening skills.

77. What does the underlined part “beyond your level” mean?

A. Easy for you.              B. Too difficult for you.

C. Just all right for you.        D. Neither difficult nor easy for you.

78. What should you do if you want to understand the English news on the radio?

A. Practise speaking very often.    

B. Read the news stories in Chinese-language newspapers first.

C. Listen to some interesting stories in Special English from the V,O.A.

D. Ask others to explain it to you.

79. How many pieces of advice does the writer give?

A. Four           B. Three.          C. Two.          D. Many.

80. Which of the following is NOT right?

A. English learners may have difficulty in understanding native English.

B. To improve our listening skills, we should choose popular courses from time to time.

C. Chinese-language newspapers are good for us to understand the English news on the radio..

D. We can only improve our listening skills step by step.

Oral English , also known as spoken English , is the form of English that is used when people are speaking to one another . Students who are learning English as a second language often feel uncomfortable using oral English because they fear that they will not be understood . It is important that a person who is learning to speak English practice using the language .   【小题1】  
Listening is important to learning spoken English .    【小题2】  Pay attention to conversations that happen around you while you are shopping . Watch the news every evening while you have supper .
Part of learning spoken English is in understanding how English words are formed . Watch the mouths and tongues of native English speakers carefully .                         【小题3】    Notice how the lips form certain sounds . Imitate （ 模仿）what you see .
Rent movies over the weekend . Try to follow the story line of comedy shows .   【小题4】    Not having to respond in English lets you concentrate on simply understanding what is being said . Understanding how English is used in conversation will help you to better communicate in the language .
  【小题5】    When you are reading , pay more attention to the correct pronunciation of the words you are reading rather than comprehension of each word . Read easy books that were written for children . Reading simple books takes away the frustration of sounding out hard words .    

According to US research, it can take up to ten years to become a near-native English speaker. Asian and Spanish students took between five and ten years to reach native speaker performance in English-only schools. Fluency obviously doesn’t happen overnight. But time can definitely make you a better speaker.
After testing his own memory, German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus discovered that humans forget most of what they learn in the first 20 minutes.
So cramming right before a speaking exam is not likely to be as effective as practicing regularly over time. The more you practice, the more familiar new words will become. In the classroom, studies have also shown that repeating oral tasks improves a speaker’s performance.
One of the best repetition exercises is the 4/3/2 technique. Speakers give the same talk to three different listeners with a progressive decrease in delivery time, starting at four minutes, then three, and finally two minutes. This exercise has been proven to help learners speak faster. It can also result in less hesitation and more grammatical accuracy. While time dose make a difference when it comes to speaking perfect English, it would not hurt to brush up on your other language skills.
Studies have also shown that reading can increase your speaking vocabulary. After one month of an extensive reading program, a 27-year-old student of French became more familiar with 65 percent of the new words.
Aside from choosing the right learning methods, having certain personality traits may also help. US linguistics expert Stephen Krashen believes those with high motivation, self-confidence and a low level of anxiety are better equipped for speaking success.
Krashen says students who don’t have these qualities are more likely to have a “mental block”. “Even if they understand the message, the input will not reach the part of the brain responsible for language acquisition,” he writes in his book Principles and Practice in second Language Acquisition.
【小题1】According to the passage, if you want to be a near-native speaker, you need _____.