Read the following passage andmark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correctanswerto each ofthe questions from 43 to 50.

Most of us know a little about how babies learn to talk. From the time infants are born, they hear language because their parents talk to them all the time. Between the ages of seven and ten months, most infants begin to make sounds. They repeat the same sounds over and over again. This is called babbling. When babies babble, they are practicing their language.

What happens, though, to children who cannot hear? How do deaf children learn to communicate? Recently, doctors have learned that deaf babies babble with their hands. Laura Ann Petitto, a psychologist, observed three hearing infants with English-speaking parents and two deaf infants with deaf parents using American Sign Language (ASL) to communicate. Dr. Petitto studied the babies three times: at 10, 12, and 14 months. During this time, children really begin to develop their language skills.

After watching and videotaping the children for several hundred hours, the psychologist and her assistants made many important observations. For example, they saw that the hearing children made varied motions with their hands. However, there appeared to be no pattern to these motions. The deaf babies also made different movements with their hands, but these movements were more consistent and deliberate. The deaf babies seemed to make the same hand movements over and over again. During the four-month period, the deaf babies' hand motions started to resemble some basic hand-shapes used in ASL. The children also seemed to prefer certain hand-shapes.

Hearing infants start first with simple syllable babbling, then put more syllables together to sound like real sentences and questions. Apparently, deaf babies follow this same pattern, too. First, they repeat simple hand- shapes. Next, they form some simple hand signs and use these movements together to resemble ASL sentences.

Linguists believe that our ability for language is innate. In other words, humans are born with the capacity for language: It does not matter if we are physically able to speak or not. Language can be expressed in different ways - for instance, by speech or by sign. Dr. Petitto believes this theory and wants to prove it. She plans to study hearing children who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent. She wants to see what happens when babies have the opportunity to learn both sign language and speech. Does the human brain prefer speech? Some of these studies of hearing babies who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent show that the babies babble equally with their hands and their voices. They also produce their first words, both spoken and signed, at about the same time. More studies in the future may prove that the sign system of the deaf is the physical equivalent of speech.

Adapted from “Issues for Today” by Lorraine C. Smith and Nancy Nici Mare

According to paragraph 1, babies begin to babble ___________.

A. at their first moment after birth

B. at their first experience of language

C. when they are more than 6 months old

D. when they first hear their parents talk to them

Read the following passage andmark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correctanswerto each ofthe questions from 43 to 50.

Most of us know a little about how babies learn to talk. From the time infants are born, they hear language because their parents talk to them all the time. Between the ages of seven and ten months, most infants begin to make sounds. They repeat the same sounds over and over again. This is called babbling. When babies babble, they are practicing their language.

What happens, though, to children who cannot hear? How do deaf children learn to communicate? Recently, doctors have learned that deaf babies babble with their hands. Laura Ann Petitto, a psychologist, observed three hearing infants with English-speaking parents and two deaf infants with deaf parents using American Sign Language (ASL) to communicate. Dr. Petitto studied the babies three times: at 10, 12, and 14 months. During this time, children really begin to develop their language skills.

After watching and videotaping the children for several hundred hours, the psychologist and her assistants made many important observations. For example, they saw that the hearing children made varied motions with their hands. However, there appeared to be no pattern to these motions. The deaf babies also made different movements with their hands, but these movements were more consistent and deliberate. The deaf babies seemed to make the same hand movements over and over again. During the four-month period, the deaf babies' hand motions started to resemble some basic hand-shapes used in ASL. The children also seemed to prefer certain hand-shapes.

Hearing infants start first with simple syllable babbling, then put more syllables together to sound like real sentences and questions. Apparently, deaf babies follow this same pattern, too. First, they repeat simple hand- shapes. Next, they form some simple hand signs and use these movements together to resemble ASL sentences.

Linguists believe that our ability for language is innate. In other words, humans are born with the capacity for language: It does not matter if we are physically able to speak or not. Language can be expressed in different ways - for instance, by speech or by sign. Dr. Petitto believes this theory and wants to prove it. She plans to study hearing children who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent. She wants to see what happens when babies have the opportunity to learn both sign language and speech. Does the human brain prefer speech? Some of these studies of hearing babies who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent show that the babies babble equally with their hands and their voices. They also produce their first words, both spoken and signed, at about the same time. More studies in the future may prove that the sign system of the deaf is the physical equivalent of speech.

Adapted from “Issues for Today” by Lorraine C. Smith and Nancy Nici Mare

According to paragraph 4, hearing infants learn to talk first by ___________

A. hand-shapes

B. babbling

C. hand motions

D. eye movements

Read the following passage andmark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correctanswerto each ofthe questions from 43 to 50.

Most of us know a little about how babies learn to talk. From the time infants are born, they hear language because their parents talk to them all the time. Between the ages of seven and ten months, most infants begin to make sounds. They repeat the same sounds over and over again. This is called babbling. When babies babble, they are practicing their language.

What happens, though, to children who cannot hear? How do deaf children learn to communicate? Recently, doctors have learned that deaf babies babble with their hands. Laura Ann Petitto, a psychologist, observed three hearing infants with English-speaking parents and two deaf infants with deaf parents using American Sign Language (ASL) to communicate. Dr. Petitto studied the babies three times: at 10, 12, and 14 months. During this time, children really begin to develop their language skills.

After watching and videotaping the children for several hundred hours, the psychologist and her assistants made many important observations. For example, they saw that the hearing children made varied motions with their hands. However, there appeared to be no pattern to these motions. The deaf babies also made different movements with their hands, but these movements were more consistent and deliberate. The deaf babies seemed to make the same hand movements over and over again. During the four-month period, the deaf babies' hand motions started to resemble some basic hand-shapes used in ASL. The children also seemed to prefer certain hand-shapes.

Hearing infants start first with simple syllable babbling, then put more syllables together to sound like real sentences and questions. Apparently, deaf babies follow this same pattern, too. First, they repeat simple hand- shapes. Next, they form some simple hand signs and use these movements together to resemble ASL sentences.

Linguists believe that our ability for language is innate. In other words, humans are born with the capacity for language: It does not matter if we are physically able to speak or not. Language can be expressed in different ways - for instance, by speech or by sign. Dr. Petitto believes this theory and wants to prove it. She plans to study hearing children who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent. She wants to see what happens when babies have the opportunity to learn both sign language and speech. Does the human brain prefer speech? Some of these studies of hearing babies who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent show that the babies babble equally with their hands and their voices. They also produce their first words, both spoken and signed, at about the same time. More studies in the future may prove that the sign system of the deaf is the physical equivalent of speech.

Adapted from “Issues for Today” by Lorraine C. Smith and Nancy Nici Mare

It is stated in paragraph 3 that both the deaf and the hearing children made movements with their hands, but _________.

A. only the hearing children made different movements

B. the deaf children made less consistent hand movements

C. the hearing children only repeated the same hand motions

D. only the deaf children repeated the same hand motions

Read the following passage andmark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correctanswerto each ofthe questions from 43 to 50.

Most of us know a little about how babies learn to talk. From the time infants are born, they hear language because their parents talk to them all the time. Between the ages of seven and ten months, most infants begin to make sounds. They repeat the same sounds over and over again. This is called babbling. When babies babble, they are practicing their language.

What happens, though, to children who cannot hear? How do deaf children learn to communicate? Recently, doctors have learned that deaf babies babble with their hands. Laura Ann Petitto, a psychologist, observed three hearing infants with English-speaking parents and two deaf infants with deaf parents using American Sign Language (ASL) to communicate. Dr. Petitto studied the babies three times: at 10, 12, and 14 months. During this time, children really begin to develop their language skills.

After watching and videotaping the children for several hundred hours, the psychologist and her assistants made many important observations. For example, they saw that the hearing children made varied motions with their hands. However, there appeared to be no pattern to these motions. The deaf babies also made different movements with their hands, but these movements were more consistent and deliberate. The deaf babies seemed to make the same hand movements over and over again. During the four-month period, the deaf babies' hand motions started to resemble some basic hand-shapes used in ASL. The children also seemed to prefer certain hand-shapes.

Hearing infants start first with simple syllable babbling, then put more syllables together to sound like real sentences and questions. Apparently, deaf babies follow this same pattern, too. First, they repeat simple hand- shapes. Next, they form some simple hand signs and use these movements together to resemble ASL sentences.

Linguists believe that our ability for language is innate. In other words, humans are born with the capacity for language: It does not matter if we are physically able to speak or not. Language can be expressed in different ways - for instance, by speech or by sign. Dr. Petitto believes this theory and wants to prove it. She plans to study hearing children who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent. She wants to see what happens when babies have the opportunity to learn both sign language and speech. Does the human brain prefer speech? Some of these studies of hearing babies who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent show that the babies babble equally with their hands and their voices. They also produce their first words, both spoken and signed, at about the same time. More studies in the future may prove that the sign system of the deaf is the physical equivalent of speech.

Adapted from “Issues for Today” by Lorraine C. Smith and Nancy Nici Mare

The writer mentions “American Sign Language (ASL)” in paragraph 2 as a language

A. used by the deaf to communicate

B. especially formed by infants

C. used among psychologists

D. widely used by American children

Read the following passage andmark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correctanswerto each ofthe questions from 43 to 50.

Most of us know a little about how babies learn to talk. From the time infants are born, they hear language because their parents talk to them all the time. Between the ages of seven and ten months, most infants begin to make sounds. They repeat the same sounds over and over again. This is called babbling. When babies babble, they are practicing their language.

What happens, though, to children who cannot hear? How do deaf children learn to communicate? Recently, doctors have learned that deaf babies babble with their hands. Laura Ann Petitto, a psychologist, observed three hearing infants with English-speaking parents and two deaf infants with deaf parents using American Sign Language (ASL) to communicate. Dr. Petitto studied the babies three times: at 10, 12, and 14 months. During this time, children really begin to develop their language skills.

After watching and videotaping the children for several hundred hours, the psychologist and her assistants made many important observations. For example, they saw that the hearing children made varied motions with their hands. However, there appeared to be no pattern to these motions. The deaf babies also made different movements with their hands, but these movements were more consistent and deliberate. The deaf babies seemed to make the same hand movements over and over again. During the four-month period, the deaf babies' hand motions started to resemble some basic hand-shapes used in ASL. The children also seemed to prefer certain hand-shapes.

Hearing infants start first with simple syllable babbling, then put more syllables together to sound like real sentences and questions. Apparently, deaf babies follow this same pattern, too. First, they repeat simple hand- shapes. Next, they form some simple hand signs and use these movements together to resemble ASL sentences.

Linguists believe that our ability for language is innate. In other words, humans are born with the capacity for language: It does not matter if we are physically able to speak or not. Language can be expressed in different ways - for instance, by speech or by sign. Dr. Petitto believes this theory and wants to prove it. She plans to study hearing children who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent. She wants to see what happens when babies have the opportunity to learn both sign language and speech. Does the human brain prefer speech? Some of these studies of hearing babies who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent show that the babies babble equally with their hands and their voices. They also produce their first words, both spoken and signed, at about the same time. More studies in the future may prove that the sign system of the deaf is the physical equivalent of speech.

Adapted from “Issues for Today” by Lorraine C. Smith and Nancy Nici Mare

It is mentioned in the last paragraph that Dr. Petitto plans to study __________.

A. what happens when babies have the opportunity to learn both speech and sign language

B. whether all children speak and make motions with their hands at the same time

C. the assumption that the human brain prefers sign language to speech

D. whether the sign system of the deaf is the physical equivalent of speech

Read the following passage andmark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correctanswerto each ofthe questions from 43 to 50.

Most of us know a little about how babies learn to talk. From the time infants are born, they hear language because their parents talk to them all the time. Between the ages of seven and ten months, most infants begin to make sounds. They repeat the same sounds over and over again. This is called babbling. When babies babble, they are practicing their language.

What happens, though, to children who cannot hear? How do deaf children learn to communicate? Recently, doctors have learned that deaf babies babble with their hands. Laura Ann Petitto, a psychologist, observed three hearing infants with English-speaking parents and two deaf infants with deaf parents using American Sign Language (ASL) to communicate. Dr. Petitto studied the babies three times: at 10, 12, and 14 months. During this time, children really begin to develop their language skills.

After watching and videotaping the children for several hundred hours, the psychologist and her assistants made many important observations. For example, they saw that the hearing children made varied motions with their hands. However, there appeared to be no pattern to these motions. The deaf babies also made different movements with their hands, but these movements were more consistent and deliberate. The deaf babies seemed to make the same hand movements over and over again. During the four-month period, the deaf babies' hand motions started to resemble some basic hand-shapes used in ASL. The children also seemed to prefer certain hand-shapes.

Hearing infants start first with simple syllable babbling, then put more syllables together to sound like real sentences and questions. Apparently, deaf babies follow this same pattern, too. First, they repeat simple hand- shapes. Next, they form some simple hand signs and use these movements together to resemble ASL sentences.

Linguists believe that our ability for language is innate. In other words, humans are born with the capacity for language: It does not matter if we are physically able to speak or not. Language can be expressed in different ways - for instance, by speech or by sign. Dr. Petitto believes this theory and wants to prove it. She plans to study hearing children who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent. She wants to see what happens when babies have the opportunity to learn both sign language and speech. Does the human brain prefer speech? Some of these studies of hearing babies who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent show that the babies babble equally with their hands and their voices. They also produce their first words, both spoken and signed, at about the same time. More studies in the future may prove that the sign system of the deaf is the physical equivalent of speech.

Adapted from “Issues for Today” by Lorraine C. Smith and Nancy Nici Mare

Which of the following could best serve as the title of the passage?

A. Education for Deaf Children

B. How do Children Master Language

C. Language: Is It Always Spoken

D. American Sign Language

Read the following passage andmark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correctanswerto each ofthe questions from 43 to 50.

Most of us know a little about how babies learn to talk. From the time infants are born, they hear language because their parents talk to them all the time. Between the ages of seven and ten months, most infants begin to make sounds. They repeat the same sounds over and over again. This is called babbling. When babies babble, they are practicing their language.

What happens, though, to children who cannot hear? How do deaf children learn to communicate? Recently, doctors have learned that deaf babies babble with their hands. Laura Ann Petitto, a psychologist, observed three hearing infants with English-speaking parents and two deaf infants with deaf parents using American Sign Language (ASL) to communicate. Dr. Petitto studied the babies three times: at 10, 12, and 14 months. During this time, children really begin to develop their language skills.

After watching and videotaping the children for several hundred hours, the psychologist and her assistants made many important observations. For example, they saw that the hearing children made varied motions with their hands. However, there appeared to be no pattern to these motions. The deaf babies also made different movements with their hands, but these movements were more consistent and deliberate. The deaf babies seemed to make the same hand movements over and over again. During the four-month period, the deaf babies' hand motions started to resemble some basic hand-shapes used in ASL. The children also seemed to prefer certain hand-shapes.

Hearing infants start first with simple syllable babbling, then put more syllables together to sound like real sentences and questions. Apparently, deaf babies follow this same pattern, too. First, they repeat simple hand- shapes. Next, they form some simple hand signs and use these movements together to resemble ASL sentences.

Linguists believe that our ability for language is innate. In other words, humans are born with the capacity for language: It does not matter if we are physically able to speak or not. Language can be expressed in different ways - for instance, by speech or by sign. Dr. Petitto believes this theory and wants to prove it. She plans to study hearing children who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent. She wants to see what happens when babies have the opportunity to learn both sign language and speech. Does the human brain prefer speech? Some of these studies of hearing babies who have one deaf parent and one hearing parent show that the babies babble equally with their hands and their voices. They also produce their first words, both spoken and signed, at about the same time. More studies in the future may prove that the sign system of the deaf is the physical equivalent of speech.

Adapted from “Issues for Today” by Lorraine C. Smith and Nancy Nici Mare

The phrase “the babies” in paragraph 2 refers to _________ in the study.

A. the hearing infants

B. the deaf infants

C. the hearing and deaf infants

D. the disabled infants

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions from 43 to 50.

Long before they can actually speak, babies pay special attention to the speech they hear around them. Within the first month of their lives, babies' responses to the sound of the human voice will be different from their responses to other sorts of auditory stimuli. They will stop crying when they hear a person talking, but not if they hear a bell or the sound of a rattle. At first, the sounds that an infant notices might be only those words that receive the heaviest emphasis and that often occur at the ends of utterances. By the time they are six or seven weeks old, babies can detect the difference between syllables pronounced with rising and falling inflections. Very soon, these differences in adult stress and intonation can influence babies' emotional states and behavior. Long before they develop actual language comprehension, babies can sense when an adult is playful or angry, attempting to initiate or terminate new behavior, and so on, merely on the basis of cues such as the rate, volume, and melody of adult speech. Adults make it as easy as they can for babies to pick up a language by exaggerating such cues. One researcher observed babies and their mothers in six diverse cultures and found that, in all six languages, the mothers used simplified syntax, short utterances and nonsense sounds, and transformed certain sounds into baby talk. Other investigators have noted that when mothers talk to babies who are only a few months old, they exaggerate the pitch, loudness, and intensity of their words. They also exaggerate their facial expressions, hold vowels longer, and emphasize certain words.

More significant for language development than their response to general intonation is observation that tiny babies can make relatively fine distinctions between speech sounds. In other words, babies enter the world with the ability to make precisely those perceptual discriminations that are necessary if they are to acquire aural language.

Babies obviously derive pleasure from sound input, too: even as young as nine months they will listen to songs or stories, although the words themselves are beyond their understanding. For babies, language is a sensory-motor delight rather than the route to prosaic meaning that it often is for adults

The word "They" refers to ______________. 

A. words 

B. mothers 

C. investigators 

D. babies 

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions from 43 to 50.

Long before they can actually speak, babies pay special attention to the speech they hear around them. Within the first month of their lives, babies' responses to the sound of the human voice will be different from their responses to other sorts of auditory stimuli. They will stop crying when they hear a person talking, but not if they hear a bell or the sound of a rattle. At first, the sounds that an infant notices might be only those words that receive the heaviest emphasis and that often occur at the ends of utterances. By the time they are six or seven weeks old, babies can detect the difference between syllables pronounced with rising and falling inflections. Very soon, these differences in adult stress and intonation can influence babies' emotional states and behavior. Long before they develop actual language comprehension, babies can sense when an adult is playful or angry, attempting to initiate or terminate new behavior, and so on, merely on the basis of cues such as the rate, volume, and melody of adult speech. Adults make it as easy as they can for babies to pick up a language by exaggerating such cues. One researcher observed babies and their mothers in six diverse cultures and found that, in all six languages, the mothers used simplified syntax, short utterances and nonsense sounds, and transformed certain sounds into baby talk. Other investigators have noted that when mothers talk to babies who are only a few months old, they exaggerate the pitch, loudness, and intensity of their words. They also exaggerate their facial expressions, hold vowels longer, and emphasize certain words.

More significant for language development than their response to general intonation is observation that tiny babies can make relatively fine distinctions between speech sounds. In other words, babies enter the world with the ability to make precisely those perceptual discriminations that are necessary if they are to acquire aural language.

Babies obviously derive pleasure from sound input, too: even as young as nine months they will listen to songs or stories, although the words themselves are beyond their understanding. For babies, language is a sensory-motor delight rather than the route to prosaic meaning that it often is for adults

According to the author, why do babies listen to songs and stories, even though they cannot understand them?

A. They can remember them easily

B. They focus on the meaning of their parents' word

C. They enjoy the sound

D. They understand the rhythm