原文

Spot-Dictation

When Americans think about hunger, we usually think in terms of mass-starvation in far-away countries, but hunger too often lurks in our backyards. In 2006, 35.1million people, including 12.4million children in the United States did not have access to enough food for an active healthy life. Some of these individuals relied on emergency food sources and some experienced hunger.

Although most people think of hungry people and homeless people as the same, the problem of hunger reaches far beyond homelessness. While the number of people being hungry or at the risk of hunger may be surprising, it is the faces of those hungry individuals that would probably most shock you. The face of hunger is the older couple who has worked hard for their entire lives, only to find their savings wiped out by unavoidable medical bills, or a single mother who has to choose whether the salary from her minimum wage job will go to buy food or pay rent, or a child who struggles to concentrate on his schoolwork because his family couldn’t afford dinner the night before.

At December 2006 survey estimated that 48 percent of those requesting emergency food assistance, were either children or their parents. Children are twice as likely to live in households where someone experiences hunger and food insecurity than adults. One in ten adults compared to one in five children live in households where someone suffers from hunger and some food insecurity. Child poverty is more wide spread in the United States than in any other industrialized country. At the same time, the US government spends less than any industrialized country to pull its children out of poverty. We have long known that the minds and bodies of small children need adequate food to develop properly. But science is just beginning to understand the full extent of this relationship. As late as the 1980s, conventional wisdom held that only the most severe forms of malnutrition actually alter brain development. The latest empirical evidence however shows that even relatively mild under-nutrition produces cognitive impairments in children which can last a life time.

答案及解析

左边为答案，答案后附有参考缩写法

单词复数，或过去式ed等小错误一般不扣分。

1）In our own backyard in our own bkyd or backY

2）12.4 million 12.4 M

3）some experienced hunger sm x hunger

4）Far beyond homelessness far bey homeX

5）at the risk of hunger at th rk of hg

6）most shock you +3 shk u

7）Older couple older cp

8）Wiped out by unavoidable medical bills wp out by unavd(b) mdc bl

9）Her minimum wage job her min wg job

10）Concentrate on his school work conctr on his schl wk

11）48% of

12）Are twice as likely r twi as lkly

13）One in ten adults 1 in 10 adt

14）Or food insecurity or fd insec(y)

15）Any other industrialized country any oth inds ctr

16）Pull its children out of poverty pl its chd out of pv(y)

17）Minds and bodies minds n bds

18）To develop properly to devp prp

19）Most severe forms of malnutrition +3 sevr fm of malnutri(n)

20）Produces cognitive impairments prdc cgn(v) impair~

本篇文章是关于食品短缺及食品安全类的话题，因为毕竟08年加沙地带食品短缺和亚洲含三聚氰胺牛奶事件影响很大。但是相关词汇不难，难词如melamine等并没有考到，因为这部分重点在于速记而不在词汇。只有最后两个 malnutrition 和 impairment 稍有难度。重点在于对速记的熟练使用。在新东方课堂上和考前串讲中列举的高频词多有考到。如and, you, most, experience, industrial, 等，其他词汇大部分为对“音节法”和“头尾法”这两大基本方法的灵活应用。所以这部分题的技巧在于对考试高频词（通常为非常熟悉词）的缩写。我在新东方09年新版的《高级口译考试笔试备考精要》一书中，对第一部分Spot Dictation的几种考试必备的速记法的详尽诠释，可供大家参考。