第三部分：阅读技能（共三节满分35）第一节阅读理解（共12小-优题课

Saving the Planet with Earth-Friendly Bamboo Products
Jackie Heinricher’s love affair with bamboo started in her backyard. “As a child, I remember playing among the golden bamboo my dad had planted, and when there was a slight wind, the bamboos sounded really musical.”
A fisheries biologist, Heinricher, 47, planned to work in the salmon industry in Seattle, where she lived with her husband, Guy Thornburgh, but she found it too competitive. Then her garden gave her the idea for a business: She’d planted 20 bamboo forests on their seven-acre farm.
Heinricher started Boo-Shoot Gardens in 1998. She realized early on what is just now beginning to be known to the rest of the world. It can be used to make fishing poles, skateboards, buildings, furniture, floors, and even clothing. An added bonus: Bamboo absorbs four times as much carbon dioxide as a group of hardwood trees and releases 35 percent more oxygen.
First she had to find a way to mass-produce the plants—a tough task, since bamboo flowers create seed only once every 50 to 100 years. And dividing a bamboo plant frequently kills it.
Heinricher appealed to Randy Burr, a tissue culture expert, to help her. “People kept telling us we’d never figure it out,” says Heinricher. “Others had worked on it for 27 years! I believed in what we were doing, though, so I just kept going.”
She was right to feel a sense of urgency. Bamboo forests are being rapidly used up, and a United Nations report showed that even though bamboo is highly renewable, as many as half of the world’s species are threatened with dying out. Heinricher knew that bamboo could make a significant impact on carbon emissions (排放) and world economies, but only if huge numbers could be produced. And that’s just what she and Burr figured out after nine years of experiments—a way to grow millions of plants. By placing cuttings in test tubes with salts, vitamins, plant hormones, and seaweed gel, they got the plants to grow and then raised them in soil in greenhouses.
Not long after it, Burr’s lab hit financial difficulties. Heinricher had no experience running a tissue culture operation, but she wasn’t prepared to quit. So she bought the lab.
Today Heinricher heads up a profitable multimillion-dollar company, working on species from all over the world and selling them to wholesalers. “If you want to farm bamboo, it’s hard to do without the young plants, and that’s what we have,” she says proudly.
56. What was the main problem with planting bamboo widely?
A. They didn’t have enough young bamboo.
B. They were short of money and experience.
C. They didn’t have a big enough farm to do it.
D. They were not understood by other people.
57. What does Heinricher think of bamboo?
A. Renewable and acceptable B. Productive and flexible.
C. Useful and earth-friendly. D. Strong and profitable.
58. The underlined word “renewable” in Paragraph 6 probably means “________”.
A. able to be replaced naturally B. able to be raised difficultly
C. able to be shaped easily D. able to be recycled conveniently
59. What do you learn from the passage?
A. Heinricher’s love for bamboo led to her experiments in the lab.
B. Heinricher’s determination helped her to succeed in her work.
C. Heinricher struggled to prevent bamboo from disappearing.
D. Heinricher finally succeeded in realizing her childhood dream.

If you enjoyed the spring-like sunshine over the weekend and thought the weather has finally turned a corner, you’re sadly mistaken.
Chilly (寒冷的) days and grey clouds are forecast for the week—making it far too early to pack away the winter woollies.
Temperatures will struggle to rise above zero at night and fail to make double figures during the day.
People enjoy the spring sunshine in Sefton Park, Aigburth, Liverpool. Forecasters have predicted a return to chilly weather this week.
Met Office forecaster Charlie said, “It was a nice, dry, bright weekend in many parts and Monday is going to be a similar affair for many.”
“Temperatures will be between 5℃and 8℃, which is below average for the start of spring.”
The sun will disappear from the south of the country after today, with dry but cloudy conditions forecast for tomorrow and Wednesday.
Wednesday will be warmest of the three, with temperatures peaking at 9℃.But this is still two degrees below the March average for the district.
Overnight, temperatures will drop sharply, with lows of minus 3℃for the next three nights.
“It will generally stay on the cold side of average,” said Mr. Powell.
The March misery comes at the end of the coldest winter for more than 30 years.
Temperatures in December, January and February struggled to stay above zero, with the UK’s average 1.5℃, making it the deepest freeze since 1978—79.
It claimed there was just a one-in-seven chance of a cold December to February.
The agency also sadly predicted a “barbecue summer”, saying it was “quite optimistic” that it would be warmer and drier than average.
Following the two mistakes, the Met Office has dropped its long-range seasonal forecasts and will instead publish a monthly prediction for Britain, updated once a week.
In its defense, it says that while short-term forecasts are extremely accurate, Britain’s size and geographical position makes long-term predictions much more challenging.
It also points out that it gave warning of any heavy falls of snow this winter.
60. According to the passage, the weather on Tuesday in the south might be _______.
A. dry but cloudy B. sunny but chilly C. sunny and warm D. cloudy and chilly
61. Which of the following statements is true according to the passage?
A. British people can put away their winter clothes now.
B. The Met Office has shortened its forecast range.
C. The weather forecast becomes more and more accurate.
D. The agency was quite confident of long-term predictions.
62. Which of the following would be the best title for the passage?
A. The big chill isn’t over yet B. A warm spring finally arrives
C. A heavy snow is on the way D. The Met Office drops forecasts
63. From the passage, we can conclude ________.
A. the weather report is more and more important
B. British people become worried about bad weather
C. Britain has just experienced a very freezing winter
D. The Met Office can always predict any heavy snow falls accurately

The Ivy League is an athletic conference comprising eight private institutions of higher education in the Northeastern United States. The term is most commonly used to refer to those eight schools considered as a group. The term is also connected with academic excellence, selectivity in admissions, and social elitism(精英主义).
The term became official, especially in sports terminology, after the formation of the NCAA Division I athletic conference in 1954, when much of the nation polarized around favorite college teams. “IV” was used because originally the league consisted only of four members. The use of the phrase is no longer limited to athletics, and now represents an educational philosophy inherent to the nation's oldest schools. In addition, Ivy League schools are often viewed by the public as some of the most prestigious universities worldwide and are often ranked amongst the best universities in the United States and worldwide. The eight institutions are Brown University, Columbia University, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, Harvard University, Princeton University, the University of Pennsylvania, and Yale University.
All of the Ivy League's institutions place near the top in the U.S. News & World Report college and university rankings and rank within the top one percent of the world's academic institutions in terms of financial endowment(捐助). Seven of the eight schools were founded during America's colonial period; the exception is Cornell, which was founded in 1865. Ivy League institutions, therefore, account for seven of the nine Colonial Colleges chartered before the American Revolution. The Ivies are all in the Northeast geographic region of the United States. All eight schools receive millions of dollars in research grants and other subsidies from federal and state government.
Undergraduate enrollments among the Ivy League schools range from about 4,000 to 14,000, making them larger than those of a typical private liberal arts college and smaller than a typical public state university. Ivy League university financial endowments range from Brown's $2.01 billion to Harvard's $26 billion, the largest financial endowment of any academic institution in the world.
71. From the passage, we know the word “Ivy” in “the Ivy League” was first chosen to refer to _______.
A. a plant B. a number C. a sport D. a spirit
72. What is special about Cornell University in the League?
A. It is the oldest one. B. It was founded by colonists.
C. It has the smallest endowment. D. It is the youngest one.
73. Which meaning can the term “the Ivy League” convey today?
A. The largest enrollment. B. The strongest government support.
C. The most expensive schools. D. First-class education.
74. Which of the following statements is true?
A. There is no longer sports competition in the Ivy League.
B. Seven colleges were set up before the USA was founded.
C. Brown University has the smallest number of students.
D. Typical public state universities are larger than the Ivies.
75. Which of the following can be the best title of the passage?
A. The ABC of “The Ivy League”
B. Best Universities in the USA
C. The Financial Income of American Universities
D. How to Apply to an Ivy League University

The World Trade Organization came into existence in the 1990s. It operates a system of trade rules. It serves as a place for nations to settle disagreements and negotiate agreements to reduce trade barriers. The newest of its 150 members, Vietnam, joined in January.
But the roots of the W.T.O. date back to World War Two and the years that followed. In 1944, the International Monetary(货币的) Conference agreed to create the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. But they could not agree on an organization to deal with international trade.
Three years later, in 1947, twenty-three nations approved the General Agreement on Tariffs (关税)and Trade, or GATT. It was meant to be temporary. Trade negotiations under GATT were carried out in a series of talks called rounds. The first round lowered import taxes on one-fifth of world trade. Later rounds produced additional cuts, and negotiators added more issues.
The sixth round began in 1963. It was called the Kennedy Round after the murder of President John F. Kennedy. The results included an agreement against trade dumping. This is when one country sells a product in another country at an unfairly low price.
The eighth round of talks began in Punta del Este, Uruguay, in 1986. The Uruguay Round lasted almost twice as long as planned. In all, 123 nations took part in seven-and-a-half years of work. They set time limits for future negotiations. They also agreed to create a permanent system to settle trade disagreements.
In April of 1994, most of those123 nations signed an agreement. It replaced GATT with the World Trade Organization.
The W.T.O. launched a new round on development issues in Doha, Qatar, in November of 2001. These talks were supposed to end by January of 2005. But negotiators could not agree on issues involving agricultural protections. The current round has been suspended since last July.
66. The WTO got this name in the year _____.
A. 1947 B. 1963 C. 1986 D. 1994
67. Which of the following statements about GATT is NOT true? http://wx.jtyjy.com/
A. It was set up after World War II.
B. It was first approved by less than 30 countries.
C. It was a branch of the World Bank.
D. It was meant to improve international trade.
68. What does the underlined sentence in the third paragraph mean? http://wx.jtyjy.com/
A. The founders wanted GATT to bring in money.
B. The founders didn’t expect GATT to last long.
C. GATT was ready to change its name at the very beginning.
D. GATT was open for more member countries.
69. What is one of the results of the Uruguay Round?
A. A permanent system was agreed on.
B. It lasted almost eight years.
C. More countries took part in it.
D. More disagreements than expected were settled.
70. Which of the following is the best title of the passage?
A. Why the WTO was Called GATT?
B. WTO Talk Rounds Last Longer
C. A Brief Introduction to the WTO
D. GATT or WTO? A Real Question

The year was 1985. Ronald Reagan was president. Mikhail Gorbachev became leader of the USSR. Back to the Future was boffo at the box office. “Born in the USA” was climbing the charts. Philanthropy(慈善业) and pop culture combined with LiveAid and “We Are the World.” And “.com”, which few people outside of the military or universities knew, came into this world.
Looking back, few could have predicted “.com” would become one of the biggest cultural touchstones of the century. In March 1985, the Information Sciences Institute at the University of Southern California assigned the first .com domain address to symbolics.com. That seemingly nominal（象征性的） event set into motion forces that would change our world forever.
.com wasn’t the birth of the Internet, but it was the budding computer network’s coming-out party. It made it pretty and inviting. It did away with the need to have complex “maps” that were the equivalent of writing a phone number on your hand, and opened it up for a mainstream audience.
After 1985, all it takes is a simple .com name to get into business. “.com” became part of our daily lexicon and drove its own economic boom and depression. It helped create a whole new family of industries, facilitated global commerce and connected people around the world in ways never before possible.
It’s now 2010. Barack Obama is president, thanks in part to his smart use of the Internet. There is no USSR. A computer-generated Avatar has set new box office records. “TiK ToK” tops the charts. We’re sending robots to find water on Mars. And that once-obscure computer communications system is one of our civilization’s most prominent features.
61. This passage was written to mark _____.
A. the change of American presidency
B. the development of entertainment
C. the 25th anniversary of .com
D. the anniversary of the internet
62. What does the underlined word “boffo” probably mean?
A. Successful. B. Changeable. C. Tough. D. Novel.
63. Which of the following can be the main contribution of “.com”?
A. It gave birth to the Internet.
B. It combined politics, entertainment and space science.
C. It made the Internet accessible to ordinary people.
D. It helped produce more domain addresses.
64. We can infer that before 1985, getting on-line was _____.
A. impossible B. complex C. expensive D. popular
65. The first and last paragraphs were intended to _______.
A. make comparison B. provide details
C. list arguments D. stimulate readers’ interest