历年来高考试题中的生词量有增无减。《教学大纲》要求学生“读懂生词率不超过3%的传记、故事、记叙文、科普小品文和有关社会文史知识等不同题材的材料。”在英语阅读训练和测试中的生词障碍往往会成为学生理解的“绊脚石”，这些“绊脚石”的出现大致分五类：1．旧词新义，考查词汇表中未出现的词义；如：Nearby is the Indianapolisrace course, where the nation’s most famous car race is held each yearon May 30th.我们学过 course的意思是“过程，课程”等，在此显然不符句意。根据上下文 course是汽车赛举行的地方，可推断 course在该句是“车道”或“跑道”的意思。2．合成词、转化词与派生词，如shoplifting，heartbroken，computer-literate，decision-thinking，imperfect等；3．“灵活”的常用词增多，这些词必须根据具体的上下文语境才能正确理解；4．“新鲜”的外国人名、地名、专有名称增多，这些词有些带有一定的文化背景5．超纲生词。
有的学生在阅读训练和测试中存在着“生词恐惧心理”，一遇到生词就有读不下去的感觉。那么阅读理解时遇到大量生词该怎么办? 查词典当然是排除词义障碍的一种方法，当然这只有在平常的阅读训练中才可以使用。但是，频繁的查阅词典既影响阅读速度，又容易破坏学生阅读的思路和兴趣。况且，一词多义是英语词汇的主要特点，词典不一定能为学生提供单词在特定的上下文中的具体或确切的含义。平时的练习中遇到生词不要马上查词典，可以通过一定的方法来猜测理解。猜测词义不仅是一项阅读技巧，也是高考阅读能力考查的一个方面，每年在高考阅读中都有猜测词义的试题。掌握正确方法快速而又准确地猜测出生词的含义，对提高阅读速度和答题效率相当重要。
该类题常见的考查形式有：
1. The phrase “…”in the sentence could be replaced by ____.
2. The word “…” in the paragraph refers to ____.
3. What is the meaning of the underlined word in the paragraph? / What doesthe unlined word mean?
4. Which of the following is the closest in meaning to the phrase “…”?
5. The word “…” most nearly means ____.
对此类试题，考生应该进行大胆猜测，但这种猜测不是胡乱的，盲目的，而是有一定的方法和技巧。下面介绍几种常见的猜测词义的方法供同学们加以运用。
1．构词法猜词
阅读中常常会遇到一些由熟悉的单词派生或合成的新词。掌握构词法对猜测词义很有帮助。如：unforeseeable.这个词，可以根据构词法把它拆成un, fore, see , able；其中 see 是词根，fore是“先，前，预”的含义，un是否定，able是“能……的，可……的”，因此unforeseeable是“未能预见到的”意思。
70. The underlined word “outcome” in the lastparagraph most probably means .
A. value B.result
C. performance D. connection
【答案】B
【解析】运用“构词法”进行猜测。动词词组come out 的意义为“露出、出现、显露出”。再根据句子的语境，可猜测出其意义是：(实验的)结果。
2．利用同义近义词猜词
在生词所出现的上下文中，有时会出现与之同义或近义的词语或结构，这时可从熟悉的词语中推知生词的含义。统称在词或短语之间有并列连词and或or，这些词语或短语在句中作相同的成分，并且and或or连接的两项内容在含义上是接近的或递进的，由此确定同等关系中的某个生词所属的义域，甚至推出它的大致词义。…Fermat’s Last Theorem（定理）, first put forward by the French mathematician Pierre deFermat in the seventeenth century, the theorem had baffled and beatenthe finest mathematical minds, including a French woman scientists who made amajor advance in working out the problem, and who had to dress like a man inorder to be able to study at the Ecole Polytechnique. …
65. Which of the following best explains the meaningof the word “baffle” as it is used in the text?
A. To encourage people to raise questions.
B. To cause difficulty in understanding.
C. To provide a person with an explanation.
D. To limit people’s imagination.
【答案】B
【解析】由句中不难看出Fermat的定理使得最具有数学头脑的科学家绞尽脑汁（beat），并且在句中beaten和baffled处于同等的并列关系，根据这一信息可以推出baffle表示“使困惑、难倒、难以理解”的意思。
3．利用反义词猜词
对比是描述，说明事物的常用方式。在对比中，对比的事物是互为相反的，因此根据反义或对比关系可从已知推出未知。利用反义词来说明生词的意义，如反义词hot and cold,perfect and imperfect，甚至前、后句为肯定与否定或是与不是等，在句内词与词之间，在段内句与句之间的关系上起着互为线索的作用。
…A child’sbirthday party doesn’t have to be a hassle ; it can be a basket of fun,according to Beth Anaclerio, an Evaston mother of two, ages 4 and 18 months.…
74.What does the underlined word “hassle” probablymean?
A. A party designed by specialists.
B. A plan requiring careful thought.
C. A situation causing difficulty or trouble.
D. A demand made by guests.
【答案】C
【解析】根据前句的否定doesn’t与后句的肯定can be这一对比关系，可以判断出，为了庆祝孩子的生日，又不至于麻烦，可以买一个生日开心包。Hassle的意思应该与fun相反，而与difficulty,trouble相近。答案为C。
4．利用上下文语境猜词
任何一篇文章中的句子在内容上都不是绝对孤立的，都跟句子所在的段落及整整篇文章有关。利用上下文提供的情景和线索，进行合乎逻辑的综合分析进而推测词义，是阅读过程中的一大关键，这也是近年来高考考查的热点。【2019·天津卷，D】
Would you BET on the future of this man？He is53 years old. Most of his adult life has been a losing struggle against debtand misfortune. A war injury has made his left hand stop functioning，and hehas often been in prison. Driven by heaven-knows-what motives，hedetermines to write a book.
The book turns out to be one that has appealed to the world formore than 350 years. That former prisoner was Cervantes，andthe book was Don Quixote（《堂吉诃德》）. And the story poses an interesting question:why do some people discover new vitality and creativity to the end of theirdays，whileothers go to seed long before？
We’ve all known people who run out of steam before theyreach life’s halfway mark. I’m not talking about those who fail to get to thetop. We can’t all get there. I’m talking about people who have stopped learningon growing because they have adopted the fixed attitudes and opinions that alltoo often come with passing years.
……
52. What does theunderlined part in Paragraph 3 probably mean？
A. End one’sstruggle for liberty.
B. Waste one’senergy taking risks.
C. Miss theopportunity to succeed.
D. Lose the interestto continue learning.
【语篇解读】本文属于议论文，讲述要成功，就需要不断的学习，这样的生活才会有意义。
52.D
【解析】词义猜测题。根据第三段I’mtalking about people who have stopped learning on growing because they haveadopted the fixed attitudes and opinions that all too often come with passingyears.故可知，作者谈论的不是那些没有到达巅峰的人，而是谈论那些不再学习成长的人，故可知run outof steam可知，停止学习，故选D。
5．利用定义和解释猜词
有些文章，特别是科技文章，通常会对一些关键词给予定义，我们可以利用定义来猜测这些词的意思。释义法就是根据文章中的字里行间，对生词以定语（从句）、表语甚至用逗号、破折号等标点符号引出并加以解释说明的方式。“Organic produce is always better, ” Gold said. “The food is free ofpesticides (农药), and you aregenerally supporting family farms instead of large farms. And more often thannot it is locally (本地)grown andseasonal, so it is more tasty.” Gold is one of a growing number of shoppersbuying into the organic trend, and supermarkets across Britain arecounting on more like him as they grow their organic food business.
62. What is the meaning of “the organic trend” as thewords are used in the text?
A. Growing interest in organic food.
B. Better quality of organic food.
C. Rising market for organic food.
D. Higher prices of organic food.
【答案】A
【解析】由Gold is one of a growing number of shoppers buying something可以推断出，越来越多的顾客像Gold一样开始购买有机食物，其实也就是对这类食物产生了越来越浓厚的兴趣。答案为A。
6．根据语义转折猜词
有时文章的作者为了增强表达效果，会用一些含有表示意思转折的连词，副词或短语。如：though, although,still, but, yet, instead, instead of, however, while, on the contrary, on theother hand, unlike, rather than, for one thing, for another等，我们可以根据转折意思猜测词义。