The other day my daughter brought home her math homework. "I have to subtract (减) 179 from 202," she said.
"It’s quite easy," I said. "You put the 202 over the 179."
"But we need a 10 here. Where is the 10?"
"I don’t know where the 10 is. Let’s just subtract 179 from 202. Nine from two is three. You carry one and add it to seven. Eight from zero is two. The answer is 23."
"We can’t do it that way. We have to use the 10."
"Well, I’m going to call your teacher to see how she subtracts 179 from 202."
Over the telephone, I said that I was having a bit of trouble with the homework she had given to my daughter. The teacher said, "In the right-hand column (栏) we have units of one. The two in that column counts for two ones. The zero in the center counts for zero tens. The two in the left-hand column counts for hundreds. Are you clear?" But I didn’t think I was clear.
I hung up and found my way to the medicine box. My head was now hurting. I started putting pills of medicine into my mouth. "How many did you take?" my wife asked. "I took one and then I took another...I know one and one was two, but don’t ask me what it is now."
1.The daughter wanted ______ the other day.
A. to give her father a lesson B. to show how difficult math was
C. her father to phone her teacher D. her father to help her with her homework
2.Which of the following sentences is not true?
A.The father had a different way to do the math problem.
B.The father couldn’t do his daughter’s homework.
C.The daughter couldn’t understand her father’s way.
D.The daughter had some trouble doing the math problem.
3.From what the teacher said, we know that the word "units" means ______ here.
A. whole numbers less than 10 B. whole things
C. groups of lessons D. the smallest numbers
4.What the teacher said made the father _________.
A. angry B. worried C. sad D. tired
5.Can you guess what would happen next in the story?
A.The father would go to school and begin to learn math.
B.The father would become very ill and have to take more medicine.
C.The father would never do his daughter’s math problems again.
D.The father would go to the school and fight with the teacher.
【答案与解析】
作者向我们讲述了很多人都可能遇到的一个问题：父母往往回答不上来小孩子问的一些非常简单的数学问题。文中作者的女儿向他询问怎样计算二百零二减去一百七十九这道题。结果，他的女儿不但弄不懂他的解释，而且他还无法解释清楚女儿提出的问题。他只好向女儿的老师求助，而自己被老师的解释搞得天昏脑胀......
1.D 细读第二段，再联系父女俩的谈话即可得出答案。
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