Directions: You are expected to study this section in class. Don’t preview.

Word Pretest

For each italicized word or expression, choose the best meaning below.

1. Can you give me some tips on the retrieval of the file on the floppy disk? Every time I tried to get the file back, I failed.
A. recovery B. editing C. deletion
2. Children must have access to good books.
A. money to buy B. ability to read C. means of approaching
3. Great efforts have been made to tap the natural resources of this area.
A. pat B. make use of C. records
4. The reporter wanted to know as much as possible about the meeting, so he asked to read the minutes.
A. issues B. conclusions C. records
5. The children progressed in the acquisition of basic skills.
A. achievement B. obtaining C. acquaintance
6. The guitar needs to be fine-tuned.
A. adjusted B. played C. changed
7. The tiny woman has an incredible appetite.
A. ordinary B. unbelievable C. increasing
8. He compresses a lifetime as a soldier into a few sentences.
A. oppresses B. condenses C. comprises

Key: 1. A 2. C 3. B 4. C 5. B 6. A 7. B 8. B

Text A

1. Background Information
2. Text: 　　

The Management of Knowledge:
Libraries Can Transform Communities

　　With 150 000 new users joining the Internet, every month my local public radio station has started giving periodic traffic reports about data flow on the popular networks!
　　In private homes, businesses, and schools, people are trying new ways to obtain, process, and use information. That raises new challenges for libraries. The speed with which information is created and the expansion of human knowledge are increasing the demand for libraries.
　　Librarians, in turn, are challenged to make operations more efficient and better equipped. At the same time, they face decreasing resource Historian David McCullough pointed out recently that not one public library closed during the Great Depression, but, today, dozens of libraries across the nation are shutting their doors for good. McCullough argues that a nation that spends $ 59.4 million on lawn care annually ---- more than double what is spends on public libraries ---- can certainly do better. He is right. We can do better.
　　Libraries face difficult challenges. But they also can glimpse the possibility of providing everyone with access to any information they need. The networking facilities at Ameritech help tap the full power of library automation by linking scattered information collections, making each library an information center within a worldwide network.
　　Everywhere you look, you see articles about the information superhighway and how large communication companies are trying to find the best route to the fast lane. For the most part, the public attention is on entertainment.
　　The information superhighway, however, will do much more than provide people with electronic pinball games, or serve up endless movies on demand. At Ameritech, a variety of applications are being explored that go far beyond entertainment services. The aim is to understand what consumers and businesspeople really want and need.

Services to libraries
　　Ameritech Library Services offers four library automation system. For school libraries, Ameritech provides Dynix Scholar software that places a public school’s library/media facility at the center of the instructional program. For public academic and special libraries, the host-based solution is Dynix software. In 1991, Dynix introduced Marquis, the first client/server automated library system. For academic institutions using IBM main-frame system, the NOTIS LMS system is used. Dynix companies in addition offer specialized auxiliary services to libraries worldwide.
　　Ameritech meets often with educators, librarians, business and government leaders, health-care professionals, consumers, and others to identify key issues that can be addressed with communications technology. From those meetings, they have identified four trends that relate to the demands of the library marketplace.
　　• Increased use of electronic resources and a diminishing dependency on paint.
　　• Increased interconnectivity f resources.
　　• Growing number of information users who are “remote” to library facilities.
　　• Increased expectations by remote users for access to online catalogs, full-text documents, and multimedia formats.

Demand for localized information
　　Libraries also are responding to the public’s demand for localized information. This is a great opportunity for the local library to strengthen its position as a community’s chief information resource. Consider the value of providing access to city counsel minutes, club news, community calendars, or bus and commuter train schedules.
　　In many communities, such information is scattered over dozens or hundreds of bulletin boards hanging in supermarkets, city halls, train stations, and senior centers. Public library can join all that information in a highly accessible online directory to a community’s resources. The focus of libraries on local information files is balanced by their growing global reach. In 20 years, library automation has moved from systems that managed circulation and online catalogs to navigation and retrieval tools that give instant access to world resources.
This interconnectivity also encourages greater cooperation among libraries, enabling them to respond to requests for information. Open systems free libraries to go into partnership with other institutions. They facilitate interlibrary loan, coordinated collection development, and shared acquisition of rare or expensive titles. With interlibrary loan, partner libraries can fine-tune their collections, spend their acquisition dollars more effectively, and provide users with convenient access to their joint collections.
　　At the same time that libraries are able to conserve resources through sharing, they are also able to purchase better library systems and store more information, because the cost of hardware is dropping and information technology is developing.
　　In this digital world, the public library can become a community’s information crossroads, providing the focal point for all community-based cultural and educational multimedia services. Though the library, users could request literacy programs, language classes, science instructions, or join special reading clubs. The library could also use this supernetwork to create a virtual neighborhood and provide electronic community bulletin boards.
　　On-demand services provide an extraordinary opportunity for libraries to make an even greater contribution to the communities they serve. Librarians could provide, for example, a selection of “how-to” videos that users could select from home to learn how to fix a leaky faucet or build a backyard deck.
　　Ameritech’s Think Link is also providing the value of on-demand services. Think Link enables students to connect with the school and school library to do homework and research from home, using full-motion video. Upon the introduction of the program, it was discovered that parents became much more involved in their children’s education. In a short time, parents began using the system for themselves.
　　We will see incredible growth in these on-demand services because of the advantage of technology and greater cooperation throughout the industry. For example, adoption of the Motion Pictures Expert Group (MPEG) standard of digital compression will increase by a factor of 10 the amount of full-motion video that users can carry over copper, fiber optic, and wireless networks.
　　With a common standard, it will soon be cost-effective for equipment manufactures to make their hardware compatible to that standard. Thus, more and more people will be able to receive digitized information from libraries and other information providers. It also means that it will be more practical for libraries to deliver such services.
　　Another advance that is speeding the communications revolution is ATM, or Asynchronous Transfer Mode. This networking technology allows us to transmit integrated video, data and voice communications much as voice is transmitted today. The ease and cost-effectiveness of using the public network for video and data transmission will be a tremendous help to libraries that wish to avoid more costly approaches such as private line networks.
　　All this means libraries will have to become more familiar with emerging technologies and their benefits. As users become more comfortable with the technology, their expectations will rise. They will insist on more online content. They will demand easier and quicker access to global resources. And they will want navigational tools that are vivid and intuitive to search databases.
　　As they become more sophisticated, users will also focus on utility and value. That will require libraries to identify the applications that will benefit users most. That is not as easy as it sounds.

Total Words: 1140 words
Total Reading Time ________
_______
The text is based on “The Management of Knowledge: Libraries Can Transform Communities” by Greg Brown in American Libraries, Vol.26, No. 3, 1995.

Detailed Study of Text A

◆ Reading Skill ─ Scanning
Read the questions first, locate the relevant part of the text, and then find the correct answers.　

1. Which of the following is NOT listed in the text as one of the new challenges faced by libraries?
A. The speed with which information is created
B. The coming of the Internet
C. Diminishing resources.
2. How much money does the United States spend on public libraries annually?
A. $ 59.4 million.
B. $ 29.7 million.
C. Less than $ 29.7 million.
3. The focus of most large communications companies is on _______.
A. education B. entertainment C. profits
4. For school libraries, American provides _______.
A. Dynix scholar software
B. The Marquis software
C. The NOTIS LMS system
5. Ameritech’s research findings suggest that all the following have increased EXCEPT _______.
A. the use of electronic resources
B. the number of information users who are “remote” to library facilities
C. the dependency on print
6. The chief information resource of a community is _______.
A. the city council minutes
B. the bulletin boards
C. the local library
7. Libraries are able to purchase better library systems and store more information, because _______.
A. the cost of software is dropping
B. interlibrary loan saves them a lot of acquisition money
C. the price of hardware is decreasing
8. Ameritech’s Think Link provides _______ services.
A. automation
B. interlibrary loan
C. on-demand
9. The MPEG standard is based on _______.
A. fiber optic network
B. digital compression
C. the transmission of integrated communications
10. As users become more sophisticated, they will pay more attention to _______.
A. private line networks
B. emerging technologies
C. utility and value

Key: 1. B 2. C 3. B 4. A 5. C 6. C 7. C 8. C 9. B 10. C

Vocabulary Building

I. Give the other parts of speech of each given word.

Key:

Fill in the blanks with the right form of the words listed in the chart.
1. In Charlie Chaplin’s view, those working on the assembly line are nothing but _______.
2. AIDS stands for _______ immune deficiency syndrome.
3. Modern inventions _______ housework.
4. Far from being an inexperienced young girl, she is woman of _______.
5. He is one good at _______ all the available resources.
6. The party _______ because of internal conflict.
7. His father bought him a _______ watch.
8. Blood _______ in human body.
9. Dr. White is an eye _______.
10. Greed and honesty cannot possibly exist in _______.
11. The Forbidden City used to be _______ to ordinary people.

Key: 　1. automation/automaton 2. acquiring 3. facilitate 4. specialization 5. utilizing
　　　 6. integrates 7. automatic 8. circulate 9. digit 10. compatibility 11. accession

II. Fill in the blanks with words that are often confused.
1. adopt, adapt
a. This machine has been specially _______ for use underwater.
b. Having no children of their own, they decided to _______ an orphan.
c. The government has _______ a hard line towards terrorists.
d. She _______ herself quickly to the new climate.
2. council, counsel
a. The local _______ is in charge of repairing roads.
b. Listen to the _______ of your elders.
c. I would _______ caution in such a case.
d. A _______ of elders governs the tribes.

Key:　 1. a. adapted b. adopt c. adopted d. adapted
　　　2. a. council b. counsel c. counsel d. council

Ⅲ. Glossary
The Canterbury Tales 　　Hamlet　　　 　　　　　　Paradise Lost
Gulliver’s Travels 　　　　David Copperfield 　　　　Tess of the d’Urbervilles
Pygmalion 　　　　　　　　Ulysses 　　　　　　　　The Scarlet Letter
Sister Carrie 　　　　　　The Great Gatsby 　　　　　A Farewell to Arms
The Native Son　　　　　　Light in August 　　　　　　Beloved
Water Margin 　　　　　　Pilgrimage to the West
A Dream of Red Mansions 　　　　　　　　　　　　Romance of the Three Kingdoms


4. Cloze
Fill in each blank with one suitable word.　

The library of Congress is the largest _______ in the world. Its books, documents, manuscripts, official papers, photographs, and prints amount to some 86 million items ---- a number that swells daily ---- housed on 535 miles of shelves.
Congress authorized a library in 1800, which _______ to three thousand books and a few maps when it was destroyed when the British burned the Capitol in 1814. To replace it, Thomas Jefferson sold the government his _______ library of almost 6,500 volumes ---- the finest in the nation at the time. The collection, again housed in the Capitol, had grown to 55,000 when a fire _______ more than half of it. In 1866 a portion of the Smithsonian Institution’s library was added to the Library of Congress, and in the _______ year the government entered an international program by which copies of U.S. documents were exchanged for those of other _______. The copyright law of 1870 ensured the library would always be up to date by requiring publishers to _______ two copies of each book published to the library in order to obtain copyright.
By 1870 the collection had outgrown its Capitol quarters. A _______ to raise the Capitol dome and fill it with bookshelves was rejected, and in 1873 Congress authorized a competition for the design of a _______ building. A variety of disputes delayed construction for more than a decade, but the library’s Thomas Jefferson Building was finally opened in 1897.

Key: 1. library  2. reduced  3. own  4. destroyed  5. next 
6. copies  7. send  8. suggestion  9. new