Mike Maietta was eating lunch when he got a text message from his mom.
“Notre Dame,” it said. “Big envelope!”
Mike, a senior at a Californian high school, shouted with joy. The big envelope meant that the excellent university in Indiana had offered him a place in its Class of 2013. But the $51,300 annual fee is a big obstacle. So Mike and his parents are considering offers from several other colleges and are calculating the costs of tuition, housing and holiday trips home.
This year, money is the driving factor for a growing number of high school seniors, who have to decide what colleges to attend this fall. Less jobs and plunging house prices have changed family spending.
“We’re excited that Mike got into eight great schools,” said Mike’s father, an engineer at Microsoft. “But if you consider going to school out of state, you’ve got to think about all of the other costs: moving, flying back and forth for the holidays. You’re looking at about $3,000 a year, just for travel.”
As families weigh their choices, some are going back to financial aid offices hoping help packages can be increased.
Rachel Brown was happy to get a thick envelope from New York University (NYU). Although she has always wanted to live in Manhattan, she is seriously considering the University of California San Diego (UCSD), because of the high cost in New York.
“The tuition for NYU is twice as much as UCSD,” said Rachel, 17. “My mom doesn’t want me to have a big debt when I graduate, and I don’t want that either. I’d have to take out a loan of $15,000. I’ll check and see if there’s any way that NYU can offer me any financial aid.”
More than 7.6 million American students have filled out the Free Application for Students Aid, a 19.9 percent increase over last year.
This month the Federal Department of Education urged college financial aid officers to give more help to certain families. A record 30,428 students applied for 2,300 places at Stanford, partly because the university increased financial aid for families earning below $10,000.
68. Mike may give up Notre Dame because of ______.
A. travel fees B. financial concerns
C. poor exam results D. worries about living far away from home
69. The phrase “Big envelope” in paragraph 2 probably refers to “______”.
A. A text message B. A large gift package
C. An admission letter D. A scholarship letter
70. What can we learn from the passage?
A. The number of American senior students applying for financial aid is increasing.
B. Rachel Brown has given up NYU because of its high tuition and big debts.
C. It is inevitably hard for college students to borrow money to cover costs.
D. An interest-free loan for students helps more students apply for Stanford.
71. The passage mainly focuses on ______.
A. the calculation of different costs including tuition
B. the extremely hard financial situation in America
C. the excitement of students’ being able to enter ideal colleges
D. the financial crisis of families over college entrance
Why do men die earlier than women? The latest research makes it known that the reason could be that men's hearts go into rapid decline when they reach middle age.
The largest study of the effects of ageing on the heart has found that women's longevity may be linked to the fact that their hearts do not lose their pumping power with age.
"We have found that the power of the male heart falls by 20--25 percent between 18 and 70 years of age,”said the head of the study, David Goldspink of Liverpool John Moores University in the UK.
"Within the heart there are millions of cells that enable it to beat. Between the age of 20 and 70，one-third of those cells die and are not replaced in men,”said Goldspink. "This is part of the ageing process."
What surprises scientists is that the female heart sees very little loss of these cells. A
healthy 70-year-old woman's heart could perform almost as well as a 20-year-old one's.
"This gender difference might just explain why women live longer than men,”said Goldspink.
They studied more than 250 healthy men and women between the ages of 18 and 80，focusing on healthy persons to remove the confusing influence of disease.
The team has yet to find why ageing takes a greater loss on the male heart, said Goldspink.
The good news is that men can improve the 
health of their heart with regular exercise. Goldspink stressed that women also need regular exercise to prevent their leg muscles becoming smaller and weaker as they age. The underlined word“longevity" in the second paragraph probably refers to ______.
| A．health | B．long life | C．ageing | D．effect |
The text mainly talks about ______.
| A．men's heart cells | B．women's ageing process、 |
| C．the gender difference | D．hearts and long life |
According to the text, the UK scientists have known that
| A．women have more cells than men when they are born |
| B．women can replace the cells that enable the heart to beat |
| C．the female heart loses few of the cells with age |
| D．women never lose their pumping power with age |
If you want to live longer, you should
| A．enable your heart to beat much faster |
| B．find out the reason for ageing |
| C．exercise regularly to keep your heart healthy |
| D．prevent your cells from being lost |
We can know from the passage that
| A．the reason why ageing takes a greater loss on the male heart has been found out |
| B．scientists are on the way to finding out why the male heart loses more of the cells |
| C．the team has done something to prevent the male from suffering the greater loss |
| D．women over 70 could lose more heart cells than those at the age of 20 |
I've been writing for most of my life. The book Writing Without Teachers introduced me to one difference and one practice that have greatly helped my writing processes. The difference is between the creative mind and the critical mind. While you need 
to use both of the creative mind and the critical (批判) mind to reach a finished result，they cannot work in parallel (平行，并行) no matter how much we might like to think so.
Trying to criticize writing on the fly is possibly the single greatest trouble with writing that most of us meet. If you are listening to a 5th grade English teacher correcting your grammar while you are trying to capture a fleeting（稍纵即逝的）thought, the thought will die. If you catch the fleeting thought and simply share it with the world in raw form, no one is likely to understand. You must learn to create first and then criticize if you want to make writing the tool for thinking as it is.
The practice that can help you overcome your learned bad habits of trying to edit as you write is what Elbow calls"free writing". In free writing, the goal is to get words down on paper non-stop，usually for 15-20 minutes. No stopping, no going back, no criticizing. The aim is to get the words flowing. As the words begin to flow，the ideas will come from the shadows and let themselves be captured on your notepad or your screen.
Now you have raw materials that you can begin to work with using the critical mind that you've persuaded to sit on the side and watch quietly. Most likely，you will believe that this will take more time than you actually have and you will end up staring blankly at the pages as the deadline draws near.
Instead of s 
taring at a blank start and filling it with words no matter how bad they could be，stop halfway through your available time and rework your raw writing into something closer to the finished product. Move back and forth until you run out of time and the final result will most likely be far better than your current practices.
| 1． |
When the author says the creative mind and the critical mind"cannot work in parallel"in the writing process，he means _______.
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| 2． |
What usually prevents people from
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| 3． |
What is the chief purpose of the first stage of writing？
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| 4． |
In what way does the critical mind help the writer in the writing process？
|
You’re in a department store and you see a couple of attractiv
e young women looking at a sweater. You listen to their conversation：
“I can’t believe it—a Lorenzo Betrolla! They are almost impossible to find. Isn’t it beautiful？And it’s a lot cheaper than the one Sara bought in Rome”.
They leave and you go over to see this incredible sweater. It’s nice and the price is right. You’ve never heard of Lorenzo Bertolla, but those girls looked really stylish. They must know. So，you buy it. You never realize that those young women are employees of an advertising agency. They are actually paid to go from store to store, talking loudly about Lorenzo Bertolla clothes.
Every day we notice what people are wearing, driving and eating. If the person looks cool，the product seems cool，too. This is the secret of undercover marketing. Companies from Ford to Nike are starting to use it.
Undercover marketing is important because it reaches people that don’t pay attention to traditional advertising. This is particularly true of the MTV generation—consumers between the age of 18 and 34. It is a golden group. They have a lot of money to spend, but they don’t trust ads.
So advertising agencies hire young actors to “perform” in bars and other places where young adults go. Some people might call this practice misleading, but marketing executive Jonathan Ressler calls it creative.“Look at traditional advertising. Its effectiveness is decreasing”.
However，one might ask what exactly is “real” about the young women pretending to be enthusiastic about a sweater. Advertising executives (主管) would say it’s no less real than flu ad. The difference is that y
ou know an ad is trying to persuade you to buy something. You don’ t know a conversation you overhear is just a performance.The two attractive young women were talking so that they could _______.
| A．get the sweater at a lower price | B．be heard by people around |
| C．be admired by other shoppers | D．decide on buying the sweater |
Lorenzo Bertolla is _______.
| A．a very popular male singer | B．an advertising agency |
| C．a clothing company in Rome | D．the brand name of a sweater |
Which of the following can be inferred from the passage？
| A．The two girls are in fact employed by the Lorenzo Bertolla Company. |
| B．The MTV generation tends to be more easily influenced by ads. |
| C．Traditional advertising is becoming less effective because it’s too direct. |
| D．Undercover marketing will surely be banned soon by the government. |
Which of the following would be the best title for the text？
| A．Two Attractive Shoppers | B．Lorenzo Bertolla Sweatersk.&s~5*u |
| C．Ways of Advertising | D．Undercover Marketing |
My House
My mother moved a lot when she was growing up on account of Grandpa being in the army. She hated having to adjust to new schools and make new friends. That’s why I thought she was joking when she put forward the idea of moving. But she was completely serious. “For just the two of us,” my mother said, “an apartment in the city will suit our needs much better.” Personally, I think she’s lost her mind. I guess I can understand why she would want to move, but what about me and what this house means to me?
I suppose if you looked at my house, you might think it was just another country house. But to me it is anything but standard. I moved into this house with my parents ten years ago. I can still remember that first day like it was yesterday. The first thing I noticed was the big front yard. To me it seemed like an ocean of grass—I couldn’t wait to dive in. The backyard was full of gnarled (扭曲的, 粗糙的) and scary trees that talk on windy nights. But I grew to like them and the shadows they cast in my room. My father and I even built a small tree house, where I often go to remember all the wonderful times we had before Father’s death.
This house is special—maybe only to me—but special nevertheless. It’s the little seemingly insignificant things that make this house so special to me: the ice-cold tile floors that make me tremble on midnight snack runs; the smell of my father’s pipe that still exists; the towering bookcases of my mother; the view outside my bedroom window.
This house holds too many memories, memories which would be lost if we gave it up. Why did the author’s mother decide to move?
| A．Because she hated the countryside. |
| B．Because Grandpa was on constant move. |
| C．Because Dad’s death made her lose her mind. |
| D．Because she thought a city flat more fit for them. |
What impressed the author when she first moved into the house?
| A．The tree house. | B．The big trees. | C．The cold floors. | D．The green grass. |
How did the author let us feel that the house was special to her?
| A．By arguing whether the house was standard. |
| B．By explaining why the house suited their needs. k.&s~5*u |
C．By describing the s mall things related to her house. |
| D．By comparing the differences between country and city life. |
My mother moved a lot when she was growing up because of ________.
| A．Grandpa being in the army. | B．their family’s liking moving |
| C．the life’s need | D．Mother’s work |
NOTICE 
CLEAN AND GREEN WEEK
The Social Studies Society and Library Club are working together to organize Clean and Green Weekactivities to encourage recycling.
(A) BEST INVENTION COMPETITION
The competition is divided into two parts: Individual (个人) and Team. Each team should be made up of three members. The inventions must be made out of small or used materials.
PRIZES
| Individual |
Team |
|
| First prize Second prize Third prize |
$ 50 book voucher (代金券) $ 30 book voucher $ 20 book voucher |
$ 180 book voucher $ 120 book voucher $ 90 book voucher |
You can get the application forms (申请表) from the library during opening hours.
Deadline for the submission (提交) of inventions: 31 January 2005.
Please call us at 792-4868 for further information.
(B) 'RECYCLE TO SAVE OUR EARTH' EXHIBITION CUM VIDEO SCREENING
An exhibition on recycling is now on in the library.
Videos on the subject will also be screened.
Please refer to the library notice board for the timetable of the screening dates and time.
DO YOUR PART TO SAVE THE EARTH
START RECYCLING TODAY
Organizers:
Library Club & Social Studies Society
| 1． |
If you want to know the screening dates, you can _______.
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| 2． |
What can we get from the notice?
|
| 3． |
What is the purpose of the activities?
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| 4． |
If you want more information, you can_________.
|
important