托福听力材料表达方式有什么呢?
时态的表达方式
汉语中用副词表达时态，而英语中是用动词的变形来表达时态的。中国考生一般都对时态缺乏敏感度，这是很正常的，这就像外国人很难掌握我们汉语中的声调一样。
在托福听力中，尤其是在lecture(讲座)中，我们要特别注意时态的变化。因为在托福的lecture文段开头部分，教授常常会通过讨论过去讲的内容来引出本次讲座的内容，或者讨论过去的理论和观点与当前的新理论和新观点进行对比。如果不注意时态，一股脑地听下来，很容易会混淆lecture的主题，影响答题。
例如，托福听力中一篇lecture的开头如下
Up until now in our discussions and readings about the broken early classical periods, we’ve been talking about the development of musical styles and genres within the relatively narrow social context of its patronage by the upper classes…
But I think if I were asked to identify a single crucial development in European music of this time, it would be the invention of the piano…
这篇lecture主要讲的是钢琴的发明对西方音乐史的影响，教授在讲座开头回忆了上几节课谈到的出资人如何影响音乐家的创作风格。第一句中“we’ve been talking about…”这样的现在完成进行时，表明了教授在讨论过去讲过的内容。后面由表达转折的“But”引导的用一般现在时讲述的内容才是lecture的真正重心。
所以，如果在托福听力备考中能够抓住时态的变化，我们就能更好地把握文段的结构和层次，将文章听得更有调理。
否定含义的表达方式和双重否定
在否定意义的表达上，汉语和英语的表述方式有比较大的差别。
我们来假设一个场景：妈妈让小明吃菠菜补充营养，可是小明非常不喜欢菠菜的味道，于是小明对妈妈说：“妈妈，你别让我吃了，我_____菠菜了。”
如果根据场景，帮小明把话补全来表达对菠菜的厌恶和否定，那么汉语表达大概会是：“妈妈，你别让我吃了，我最不喜欢菠菜来了。”否定的语气会很直接的表达出来。
那么，美语的表达会是怎么样的呢，大概会是：“Mommy, please, the last thing I would like to eat is spinach. ”是的，美国人会说他想吃的东西中的最后一个是菠菜。这个逻辑对中国人来说是比较“曲折”的，但是我们必须适应，否则听力中的某些关键句就会反应不出来到底是什么含义。
另外，双重否定的形式在汉语的固定词组中比较常用，如“不得不”、“无不”等等。但是双重否定在英语中用得更为灵活，不单单以固定词组的形式出现。
约定俗成的表达方式
在托福听力中有很多约定俗成的表达方式，而且这些方式往往都是由简单的单词组成，非常容易望文生义。如果不知道这些表达方式的正确含义，以美式思维方式理解和记忆，就不能很好的理解听力文段。
上面结合托福听力说明了几种表达的方式，这些大家在托福听力备考中如果能熟练掌握相信一定对大家的托福听力能提供不小的帮助，希望各位能仔细斟酌。
托福听力练习对照文本
Today I want to talk to you about wasps and their nests.
今天我想和你们谈谈黄蜂(马蜂)和他们的巢。
You'll recall that biologists divide species of wasps into two groups: solitary and social.
你们会记得，生物学家把黄蜂的种类分成两组：独居的和群居的。
Solitary wasps, as the name implies, do not live together with other wasps.
独居的黄蜂，顾名思义，不和其他黄蜂生活在一起。
In most species the male and female get together only to mate, and then the female does all the work of building the nest and providing food for the offspring by herself.
在大多数的种群中，雄性和雌性在一起仅仅为了交配，然后雌性做所有筑巢的工作，并且她自己为后代提供食物。
Solitary wasps usually make nests in the ground and they separate the chambers for individual offspring with bits of grass, stone, or mud, whatever is handy.
独居的黄蜂通常在地下筑巢，并且它们为了个体的后代用少量的草，石头或泥，无论怎样(只要)是方便的(东西就行)，把窝分隔开来。
What about social wasps?
群居的黄蜂怎么样呢?
They form a community and work together to build and maintain the nest.
它们形成一个群落并且在一起工作来建造并维护(蜂)巢。
A nest begins in the spring when a fertile female, called the queen, builds the first few compartments of the nest and lays eggs.
(筑)巢始于春天，当一只能生育的雌性，被称作(蜂)后，建造蜂巢的开始的几个隔室并开始产卵。
The first offspring are small females that cannot lay eggs.
第一批后代是小个的雌性不能下蛋。
These females, called workers, then build a lot of new compartments, and the queen lays more eggs.
这些雌性，叫做工蜂，然后会建造很多新的隔室，然后蜂后产更多的卵。
They also care for the new offspring and defend the nest with their stingers.
它们也照顾新的后代并且使用它们的刺保护蜂巢。
By the way, only female wasps have stingers.
顺便说一下，只有雌性黄蜂有刺。
Most social wasps make nests of paper.
多数黄蜂用纸做巢。
The females produce the paper by chewing up plant fibers or old wood.
雌性(黄蜂)产生纸是通过嚼碎植物纤维或者老旧的木头。
They spread the paper in thin layers to make cells in which the queen lays her eggs.
他们把纸铺成薄层来制作单元格，在那里蜂后产下她的卵。
Most of you, I'm sure, have seen these nests suspended from trees.
你们大多数(人)，我相信，曾经见过这些蜂巢从树上悬挂下来。
They may also be built underground in abandoned rodent burrows.
它们也可能被建造在地下，在被抛弃的啮齿类动物的地洞中。
托福听力练习对照文本
One of the most popular myths about the United States in the nineteenth century was that of the free and simple life of the farmer.
关于美国在十九世纪的流传最广的传言之一是自由和简单的农民生活。
It was said that farmers worked hard on their own land to produce whatever their families needed.
据说农民在他们自己的土地上辛勤的劳作，生产他们家庭需要的一切。
They might sometimes trade with neighbors; but in general they could get along just fine by relying on themselves, not on commercial ties with others.
他们可能有时候同邻居交易，但通常他们能够自给自足(他们依靠他们自己生活的还好)，与他人没有商业关系。
This is how Thomas Jefferson idealized the farmer at the beginning of the nineteenth century, and, at that time, this may have been close to the truth, especially on the frontier.
这就是Thomas Jefferson如何理想化了的十九世纪初期的农民，并且，在那时，这也许已经接近了真相，特别是在边远地区。
But by mid-century, sweeping changes in agriculture were well under way as farmers began to specialize in the raising of crops such as cotton or corn or wheat.
但是在世纪中叶，当农民开始专门化种植农作物如：棉花或者玉米或者小麦的(产量的)时候，农业上的彻底变化已经充分开始，
By late in the century, revolutionary advances in farm machinery had vastly increased production of specialized crops.
在世纪末，农业机械上的革命性的改进，极大地增加了专业作物的产量。
And the extensive network of railroads had linked farmers throughout the country to markets in the East and even overseas.
而且广大的铁路网把全国的农民同东部的，甚至海外的市场连接了起来。
By raising and selling specialized crops, farmers could afford more and finer goods and achieve a much higher standard of living, but at a price.
通过种植和出售专门的作物，农民能够买得起更多和能好的商品，并且获得更高的生活标准，但是价钱很高。
Now, farmers were no longer dependent just on the weather and their own efforts.
现在，农民不再仅仅依靠天气和他们自己的努力。
Their lives were increasingly controlled by banks, which had power to grant or deny loans for new machinery, and by the railroads, which set the rates for shipping their crops to market.
他们的生活越来越多地受到银行的控制，(银行)有权利同意或拒绝给新机器贷款，受到铁路(的控制)，(铁路)为运输他们的作物到市场上设定价格。
As businessmen, farmers now had to worry about national economic depressions and the influence of world supply and demand on, for example, the price of wheat in Kansas.
作为商人，农民现在不得不担心国民经济萧条，以及世界的供应与需求的影响，举例来说，Kansas的小麦价格。
And so, by the end of the nineteenth century, the era of Jefferson's independent farmer had come to a close.
因此，在十九世纪末，Jefferson的独立的农民的时代已经终结。
托福听力练习对照文本
Before moving on to a new topic, I want to finish up our unit on arachnids by looking at what may seem a very unusual aspect of spider behavior, a species where the young spiders actually consume the body of their mother.
在转到新的主题之前，我想结束我们在蛛形纲上的单元，通过着眼于一个看似非常不同寻常的蜘蛛行为的方面，年幼的蜘蛛实际上消耗他们母亲的身体的一个种群。
Unlike most other spiders, this species lays one, and only one, clutch of 40 eggs in her lifetime.
不像大多数其他蜘蛛，这个种类在她的一生中下一窝，而且只下一窝，40只卵。
The young spiders hatch in mid-spring or early summer, inside a nest of eucalyptus leaves.
年幼的蜘蛛在仲春或初夏，在一个桉树叶的窝里面。
Their mother spends the warm summer months bringing home large insects—often 10 times her weight—for meal.
它们的母亲消耗了几个月的温暖的夏季(时光)将大型的昆虫带回家——通常10倍于她的重量——当食物。
The catch is always significantly more than her young spiders can eat.
捕获物总是大大地多于她的年幼的蜘蛛(幼仔)所能吃掉的。
So, the mother fattens herself up on this extra prey and stores the nutrients in her extra unfertilized eggs.
因此，(蜘蛛)母亲用这些额外的猎物把自己养肥，并且把营养素储存在她另外的非受精卵中。
As the weather turns colder, there are fewer insect prey to hunt.
随着天气转冷，能捕猎的昆虫猎物很少了。
That's when the nutrients stored in those extra eggs begin to seep into the mother's bloodstream.
那就是当储存在这些另外的卵中的这些营养素开始渗入到母亲的血流中的时候。
So, when there are no more insects to feed to the young spiders, they attach themselves to the mother's leg joints and draw nourishment by sucking the nutrient-rich blood.
所以，当没有更多的昆虫来喂养年幼的蜘蛛时，它们把它们自己贴在母亲的腿关节上，通过吮吸营养丰富的血液来吸取营养。
After several weeks, the mother is depleted of all nutrients and she dies.
几周之后，母亲被耗尽所有的营养并死去。
But then how do the young get nourishment?
然而幼仔如何获取营养呢?
They start to feed on one another.
它们开始以彼此为食。
Now, if you recall our discussion of Darwin, you'll see the evolutionary value of this: Only the strongest spiders of the clutch will survive this "cannibalism," and the mother spider will have ensured that her genes have an increased chance of survival through future generations.
现在，如果你记得我们关于达尔文的讨论，你将看到这种进化的价值：只有窝里最强壮的蜘蛛将会在这种“嗜食同类”中生存，蜘蛛母亲将会确保她的基因凭借未来的后代增加生存的机会。
