TOEIC改訂のねらいと対策(3)

　英語圏の小学高学年生が受験すると９００点位取れるTOEICは決して知的レベルの高い英語試験ではありません。TOEICの英文が難しく感じられるようならTOEICよりやさしいレベルの英文を多読すると、リーディングで時間が足りなくなって最後は塗り絵になるという悩みを大幅に解消できます。
　だいぶ昔に私が英語の童話を多読した後に準備なしでTOEICを受験したところ、初めて８００点を超えることができ、リーディングとリスニングはほぼ同じスコアでした。音読を超えるスピードで童話やTIMEFORKIDSのような子ども向け読み物を読める程度の英語頭があればTOEICのリスニングはさほど難しくはないと思います。しかし和訳しないと気が済まないようなことでは苦戦必至です。
　以下は、著作権の切れた童話「オズの魔法使い」の冒頭部分で、TOEIC頻出語彙には英英辞典の訳注をつけてみます。

THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ

1. The Cyclone

Dorothy lived in the midst of the great Kansas prairies, with Uncle
Henry, who was a farmer, and Aunt Em, who was the farmer's wife. Their
house was small, for the lumber to build it had to be carried by wagon
many miles. There were four walls, a floor and a roof, which made one
room; and this room ①contained a rusty looking cookstove, a cupboard for
the dishes, a table, three or four chairs, and the beds. Uncle Henry
and Aunt Em had a big bed in one corner, and Dorothy a little bed in
another corner. There was no garret at all, and no cellar--except a
small hole dug in the ground, called a cyclone cellar, where the family
could go in case one of those great whirlwinds arose, mighty enough to
crush any building in its path. It was reached by a trap door in the
middle of the floor, from which a ②ladder led down into the small, dark
hole.

When Dorothy stood in the doorway and looked around, she could see
nothing but the great gray prairie on every side. Not a tree nor a
house broke the broad sweep of flat country that reached to the edge of
the sky in all ③directions. The sun had baked the plowed land into a
gray mass, with little cracks running through it. Even the grass was
not green, for the sun had burned the tops of the long blades until
they were the same gray color to be seen everywhere. Once the house
had been painted, but the sun blistered the paint and the rains washed
it away, and now the house was as dull and gray as everything else.



①contain : if something such as a bag, box, or place contains something, that thing is inside it

②ladder : a piece of equipment used for climbing up to or down from high places

③direction : the way something or someone moves, faces, or is aimed

※語義の出典はロングマンオンラインです。英英辞典の定義文はTOEIC頻出単語の宝庫で、英英辞典片手に公式問題集を解くと着実に力を伸ばせます。英英辞典が使いにくければenglish x englishをお試しください。