2. 职称英语
  3. (1) We all want to succeed in life, and when we become parents, we want to d

(1) We all want to succeed in life, and when we become parents, we want to d

游客2024-08-23  54
问题     (1) We all want to succeed in life, and when we become parents, we want to do everything we can to make sure our kids are successful, too. Now a new study says there’s a single decision many parents make that can effect whether their kids have an advantage or a disadvantage for much of their entire academic career.
    (2) The question is a simple one, and it’s well-known to any mom or dad whose child has a late birthday: Do you enroll your child in school as soon as he or she is eligible, or do you wait a year?
    (3) Researchers at Stanford University say that kids whose parents hold them back a year have significant advantages over their peers.
    (4) In other words, in the "red-shirting versus not red-shirting" battle, red-shirting wins, hands down. Here’s why.
    (5) Many parents make this decision based on whether their kids will benefit academically by waiting a year or not. But the science on testable academic performance yields frustrating, inconsistent results.
    (6) That’s why Stanford researchers decided to set their sights on something different. Cast aside the test scores; how did being among the oldest kids or the youngest kids in the class affect things like mental health, discipline, and self-control? (All of which can ultimately have a greater effect on qualitative academic achievement.)
    (7) To assess the effect, which was reported recently in Quartz, they studied the experiences of elementary school students in Denmark, segmenting them into groups whose parents had enrolled them during the school year in which they were first eligible, and those whose parents decided to hold them back for a year.
    (8) Result? Kids who delayed attending kindergarten to the later year were far more likely to be able to pay attention in school and had "dramatically higher levels of self-control" than their peers. And that advantage was sustained for years afterward.
    (9) "We found that delaying kindergarten for one year reduced inattention and hyperactivity (多动) by 73 percent for an average child at age 11, " Thomas Dee, one of the co-authors, said. "And it virtually eliminated the probability that an average child at that age would have an ’abnormal, ’ or higher-than-normal rating for the inattentive-hyperactive behavioral measure."
    (10) Even if you don’t have kids, and even if you don’t remember your elementary school years particularly well, this whole debate might ring a bell. It was discussed thoroughly in the media a decade ago, after Malcolm Gladwell came out with his book, Outliers.
    (11) Malcolm studied the National Hockey League, and noticed a statistical anomaly (异常现象) about the number of players who were born in January and February. He traced it back to the fact that in Canada, youth hockey leagues most often used January 1 as the birthday cutoff date.
    (12) That meant that kids who were born in January and February were always the oldest kids in their age-group. Sure, that meant they were more mature and physically developed, but there was another advantage. Their advanced physiology led to more playing time and coaching attention. That in turn, led to more success on the ice.
    (13) The phenomenon, called the relative age effect, also occurs in academia (学术界). Previous studies have suggested that children with a late start, and whose birthdays were earlier in the year than their classmates, were more likely to attend college, and less likely to be put on a vocational track (as opposed to an academic track) in school.
    (14) In the United States, about 20 percent of kindergartners are red-shirted, meaning their parents decided to hold them back before entering school, so they experience kindergarten as six-year-olds, rather than five-year-olds.
    (15) All things being equal, it seems this gives them an advantage. But it’s worth looking at some of the reasons why "all things might not be equal."
    (16) First, wealthier families are much more likely to red-shirt their children. But this leads to a question whether wealthier red-shirted children might be benefiting in the self-control department from some other aspect of their more privileged childhoods.
    (17) Second, and related, there’s the question of what kids do during their "extra year." In Denmark, the researchers said, there is universal access to decent pre-kindergartens. Relatively few American cities and towns offer the same thing.
    (18) Still, if your kids are on the edge it seems red-shirting brings undeniable advantages. The difference in development between age five and age eight is significant, and as the study notes, even if they spend an extra year soaking up "an extended (and appropriately timed) exposure to such playful environments" might have a big advantage.
    (19) Besides, who wouldn’t want to give themselves an extra year to grow up? (本文选自 Inc. com) [br] It can be inferred from the Stanford study that________.
选项 A、the study was aimed at assessing the effect of red-shirting on test scores
B、the children participating in the study were randomly grouped
C、the red-shirted kids had lower likelihood of concentration in school
D、the study showed the persistent result of red-shirting
答案 D
解析 推断题。原文第八段前两句提到研究结果表明，与同龄人相比，推迟一年上幼儿园的孩子能够在学校里集中注意力的可能性更大，并且拥有“明显更高的自控水平”。紧接着第三句指出，在之后数年里，这一优势还在持续。由此可知，该研究表明了推迟一年入学的持续效果，故答案为D，同时排除C。第六段第二句指出，研究人员把测试分数放在一边，他们研究的是成为班里最大或最小的孩子是如何影响诸如心理健康、纪律和自制力这类东西的，由此可知，该研究的目的是评估推迟一年入学对心理健康、纪律和自制力这类东西的影响，而非对测试分数的影响，A与原文表述相反，故排除；第七段提到研究人员对丹麦小学生的经历进行了研究，将他们分为两个小组，即家长在他们刚符合入学资格的那一学年就让他们上学的小组和家长决定让他们推迟一年入学的小组，由此可知，这些参与研究的儿童并非随机分组，B与原文表述不符，故排除。
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