托福阅读文章的脉络是不是清晰，这和文章的结构有很大的关系。大部分考生感觉托福阅读文章有难度，除了考生的英语水平实在太差这种原因之外，大都是因为托福考生在阅读时对文章的认识“支离破碎”，没有办法从宏观上俯视文章。这种只看到部分无法看清全局的感觉让考生感觉到困难。
托福阅读文章结构有很多种，但是大部分都是有章可循的。因为英语语言的逻辑很清晰，无论如何都可以把文章串联成一个整体。只是这需要大家足够的练习。今天前程百利小编为考生带来一篇最新的TPO文章，这篇文章是按照发展顺序来写的，从而可以帮助考生把握整个文章。希望大家可以从中看到托福阅读文章的一些规律。
文章来自TPO37 The Emergence of Civilization
Paragraph1 : Starting around 8000 B.C.E., the most extensive exploitation of agriculture occurred in river valleys, where there were both good soil and a dependable water supply regardless of the amount of rainfall. In the Near East, this happened in the Fertile Crescent, the region extending up the Nile Valley in Egypt, north through the Levant (Palestine, Lebanon, and Syria), and southeast into the Tigris and Euphrates river valleys of Mesopotamia. The richest soil was located in the deltas at the mouths of the rivers, but the deltas were swampy and subject to flooding. Before they could be farmed, they needed to be drained and irrigated, and flood-control systems had to be constructed. These activities required administrative organization and the ability to mobilize large pools of labor. In Mesopotamia, perhaps as a consequence of a period of drought, massive land-use projects were undertaken after 4000 B.C.E. to cultivate the rich delta soils of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. The land was so productive that many more people could be fed, and a great population explosion resuited. Villages grew into cities of tens of thousands of persons.
Paragraph2 : These large cities needed some form of centralized administration. Archaeological evidence indicates that the organization initially was provided by religion, for the largest building in each city was a massive temple honoring one of the Mesopotamian gods. In Uruk, for example, a 60-foot- long temple known as the White House was built before 3000 B.C.E. There were no other large public buildings, suggesting that the priests who were in charge of the temples also were responsible for governing the city and organizing people to work in the fields and on irrigation projects building and maintaining systems of ditches and dams.
Paragraph3:The great concentration of wealth and resources in the river valleys brought with it further technological advances, such as wheeled vehicles, multicolored pottery and the pottery wheel, and the weaving ofwool garments. Advances in metal technology just before 2000 B.C.E. resulted in the creation of bronze, a durable alloy (or mixture) of about 90 percent copper and 10 percent tin that provided a sharp cutting edge for weapons.
Paragraph4 :By 3000 B.C.E., the economies and administrations of Mesopotamia and Egypt had become so complex that some form of record keeping was needed. As a result, writing was invented. Once a society became literate, it passed from the period known as prehistory into the historic period. In fact, the word history comes from a Greek word meaning narrative people could not provide a detailed permanent account of their past until they were able to write.
Paragraph5:The totality of these developments resulted in the appearance, around 3000 B.C.E., of a new form of culture called civilization. The first civilizations had several defining characteristics. They had economies based on agriculture. They had cities that functioned as administrative centers and usually had large populations. They had different social classes, such as free persons and slaves. They had specialization of labor, that is, different people serving, for example, as rulers, priests, craft workers, merchants, soldiers, and farmers. And they had metal technology and a system of writing. As of 3000 B.C.E., civilization in these terms existed in Mesopotamia, Egypt, India, and China.
Paragraph6:This first phase of civilization is called the Bronze Age because of the importance of metal technology. The most characteristic Near Eastern Bronze Age civilizations, those of Mesopotamia and Egypt, were located in river valleys, were based on the extensive exploitation of agriculture, and supported large populations. ■ Bronze was a valuable commodity in these civilizations; the copper and tin needed for its manufacture did not exist in river valleys and had to be imported. Bronze was therefore used mainly for luxury items, such as jewelry or weapons, not for everyday domestic items, which were made from pottery, animal products, wood, and stone. ■ In particular, bronze was not used for farming tools. ■Thus, early civilizations based on large-scale agriculture, such as those of Mesopotamia and Egypt, were feasible only in soils that could be worked by wooden plows pulled by people or draft animals such as oxen. ■Other Bronze Age civilizations, however, such as those that arose in the Levant and eastern Mediterranean, took advantage of their location on communication routes to pursue economies based on trade.
分析：第一段首先说到在公元前8000年，农业在河谷地区发展。因为发展的需要，需要建立一些农业系统，这促使必须有管理。因为管理，农业发展了，人口增加了，出现了城市;第二段则按照发展的顺序继续说明这些城市需要集中管理;第三段讲到由于财富和资源积累，产生了技术的进步;第四段讲到到了公元前3000年(时间线索)，经济和管理都发展的很好了，这时候需要文字了，所以文字被发明了;第五段接着讲就是因为上面这一系列的进步和发展，在公元前3000年左右文明产生了(文章的主旨)，描述了一文明的特点;第六段说这一段文明的第一阶段就叫铜器时代。
以上就是前程百利小编为考生带来的托福阅读文章结构的相关分析及举例。只要大家能够看到在托福阅读文章中的结构线索，从整体上把握文章就没有困难了。希望大家可以准备充分，并有这种看清文章脉络的自信。预祝大家托福考试取得好成绩!
