(Q).
Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: If sustainable competitive advantage depends on workforce skills, American firms have a problem. Human-resource management is not traditionally seen as central to the competitive survival of the firm in the United States. Skill acquisition is considered an individual responsibility. Labour is simply another factor of production to be hired--rented at the lowest possible cost--much as one buys materials or equipment. The lack of importance attached to human-resource management can be seen in the corporate management. In an American firm the chief financial officer is almost always second in command. The post of head of human-resource management is usually a specialized job, off at the edge of the corporate hierarchy. The executive who holds it is never consulted on major strategic decisions and has no chance to move up to Chief Executive Officer(CEO). By way of contrast, in Japan the head of human-resource management is central--usually the second most important executive, after the CEO, in the firm's hierarchy. While American firms often talk about the vast amounts spent on training their work force, in fact they invest less in the skills of their employees than do either Japanese or German firms. The money they do invest is also more highly concentrated on professional and managerial employees. And the limited investments that are made in training workers are also much more narrowly focused on the specific skills necessary to do the next job rather than on the basic background skills that make it possible to absorb new technologies. As a result, problems arise when new breakthrough technologies arrive. If American workers, for example, take much longer to learn how to operate new flexible manufacturing stations than workers on Germany (as they do), the effective cost of those stations is lower in Germany than it is in the United States. More time is required before equipment is up and running in production, and the need for extensive retraining generates costs and creates bottlenecks that limit the speed... Question: Which of the following applies to the management of human resources in American companies? - They hire people at the lowest cost with ly best skills. - They see the gaining of skills as their employees' own business. - They attach more importance to workers than to equipment. - They only hire skilled workers because of keen competition.
(A).
They see the gaining of skills as their employees' own business.

(Q).
Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: In tradition education, the teacher may feel that the students are not very grown up. Usually, teachers are older than students, and teachers feel that students are young and do not know much about the world. The teachers feel that they must tell the students what to do most of the time, and that they must also make the students study specific things. In open education, the teacher's methods are very different. These teachers feel that the students are human beings first, and students second. They expect the students to be responsible for the things that they do, just as adults are. A student's ideas and feelings are just as important as the teacher's. The teacher allows the students to decide what they want to do, and does not make them study what they do not want to. The teacher lets them decide what to study and how much to study. It's very important for the teacher to show how he or she feels about students. Question: In traditional education, the teachers consider that _ . - they should praise the students all the time - they should tell the students what to do all the time - the students should know much about the world - the students should learn much about the world from their teachers
(A).
the students should learn much about the world from their teachers

(Q).
Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: One day an ant was drinking at a small stream and fell in. She made desperate efforts to reach the side, but made no progress at all. The poor ant almost exhausted was still bravely doing her best when a dove saw her. Moved with pity, the bird threw her a blade of grass, which supported her like a raft, and thus the ant reached the bank again. While she was resting and drying herself in the grass, she heard a man come near. He was walking along barefooted with a gun in his hand. As soon as he saw the dove, he wished to kill it. He would certainly have done so, but the ant bit him in the foot just as he raised his gun to fire. He stopped to see what had bit him, and the dove immediately flew away. It was an animal much weaker and smaller than herself that had saved her life. Question: The ant could not reach the side though _ . - she could smell well - she asked the dove to save her - she tried very hard - she cried for help
(A).
she tried very hard