Solving the Discourse Structure "Puzzle" on the UEE

Today I went back to NHSH to teach as a substitute teacher for one day.  After discussing the test items of the 2011 UEE, I offered the students tips on solving the Discourse Structure "puzzle" on the UEE. 

This new section is what makes the UEE different from the SAT.  Students are given a passage with five sentences missing, and they have to find from the six choices below the passage the proper sentence to fill in each blank.  In fact, this part is meant to test not only the English ability but also the discourse logic and organization in writing.  I told them when doing this part, the most important words to look for as a clue are usually not content words, but function words. such as "he/his/him," "the N," "this/these N," etc.  For example, when they see "them" in a choice sentence, the sentence must follow a sentence with a plural noun in it.  Of course, the content words, when repeated, can serve as a clue, too.  The following is an example from the 2011 UEE:

 

四、篇章結構（10分）

說明：第31題至第35題，每題1個空格。請依文意在文章後所提供的(A)到(F)選項中分別選出最適當者，填入空格中，使篇章結構清晰有條理，並將其英文字母代號標示在答案卡之「選擇題答案區」。每題答對得2分，未作答、答錯、或畫記多於1個選項者，該題以零分計算。

第 31 至 35 題為題組

The effect of bullying can be serious and even lead to tragedy. Unfortunately, it is still a mostly unresearched area.

  31   That year two shotgun-wielding students, both of whom had been identified as gifted and who had been bullied for years, killed 13 people, wounded 24 and then committed suicide. A year later an analysis by theUS government found that bullying played a major role in more than two-thirds of the campus violence.

  32   Numerous dictators and invaders throughout history have tried to justify their bullying behavior by claiming that they themselves were bullied.   33   Although it is no justification for bullying, many of the worst humans in history have indeed been bullies and victims of bullying.

Since bullying is mostly ignored, it may provide an important clue in crowd behavior and passer-by behavior.   34   Many of them have suggested bullying as one of the reasons of this decline in emotional sensitivity and acceptance of violence as normal. When someone is bullied, it is not only the bully and the victim who are becoming less sensitive to violence.   35      In this sense, bullying affects not only the bullied but his friends and classmates and the whole society.

(A) Hitler, for example, is claimed to have been a victim of bullying in his childhood.

(B) Campus bullying is becoming a serious problem in some high schools in big cities.

(C) The friends and classmates of the bully and the victim may accept the violence as normal.

(D) Research indicates that bullying may form a chain reaction and the victim often becomes the bully.

(E) Psychologists have been puzzled by the inactivity of crowds and bystanders in urban centers when crimes occur in crowded places.

(F)  The link between bullying and school violence has attracted increasing attention since the 1999 tragedy at aColoradohigh school.