.
Among the four skills in learning English, which of these is the “Odd-Man-Out”? The answer is speaking. The other three you can do alone on your own. But you can't really speak alone! Speaking to yourself can be “dangerous” because men in white coats may come and take you away !
Where can you find people to speak English? And how can you practise speaking when you are alone? At school if you pay to go to a language school, you should use the chance to speak .If your teacher asks you to speak in pairs or groups with other students, try to say as much as possible. Don't worry about your mistakes. Just speak!
Conversation Clubs Many cities around the world have conversation clubs where people can exchange one language for another . Look in your local newspaper to find a conversation club near you .They are usually free although some may charge a small entrance fee.
Shopping Even if you don't want to buy anything ,you can ask questions about products that interest you in a shop. “How much does this cost?” “Can I pay by cheque?” Often you can start a real conversation—and it costs you nothing!
Cafe and Bars There are often American, Britain, Irish and Australian bars in many large cities .If you can find one, you'll probably meet many people speaking English as a first or second language.
Language is all around you Everywhere you go, you find language .Shop names, street names ,advertisements ,notices ,and car numbers....When you walk down the street , practice reading the words and numbers that you see .Say them to yourself .It's not exactly a conversation ,but it will help you to “think” in English .But don't speak too loud!
Songs and Video Repeat the words of an English-language song singing with the music until it becomes automatic. It's good practice for your memory and for the mouth muscles that you need for English.
Above all, speak as much as possible! Make as many mistakes as possible! When you know that you have made a mistake, you know that you have made progress!
57.What does “Odd-Man-Out” probably mean according to the passage?
A. Someone or something appearing different from others.
B. Someone or something standing out of the group.
C. Someone or something arranged in pairs.
D. Someone or something easily mistaken for another.
58.What might happen if you speak to yourself loudly in public?
A. The police will take you away and punish you.
B. The doctors will force you to stay in hospital.
C. You will have to pay to escape being punished.
D. You will be forbidden to be member of the club.
59.Why does the writer say “Make as many mistakes as possible”? Because _______.
A. everyone will make mistakes in learning English
B. everyone will meet people speaking English with some mistakes
C. making mistakes is a must in making progress in learning English
D. making mistakes can make one realize the importance of speaking
60.According to the passage, which way is not likely to be accepted by English beginners?
A .Recite poems loudly along the riverside.
B. Listen to some English pop songs and video.
C. Find an Englishman to speak English with.
D. Take to the TV showing programmes at home.
When you are little, the whole world feels like a big playground. I was living in Conyers, Georgia the summer it all happened. I was a second grader, but my best friend Stephanie was only in the first grade. Both of our parents were at work and most of the time they let us go our own way.
It was a hot afternoon and we decided to have an adventure in Stephanie’s basement. As I opened the basement door, before us lay the biggest room, full of amazing things like guns, dolls, and old clothes. I ran downstairs, and spotted red steel can. It was paint. I looked beyond it and there lay even more paint in bright colors like purple, orange, blue and green.
“Stephanie, I just found us a project for the day. Get some paintbrushes. We are fixing to paint.” She screamed with excitement as I told her of my secret plans and immediately we got to work. We gathered all the brushes we could find and moved all of our materials to my yard. There on the road in front of my house, we painted bit stripes (条纹) of colors across the pavement (人行道). Stripe by stripe, our colors turned into a beautiful rainbow. It was fantastic!
The sun was starting to sink. I saw a car in the distance and jumped up as I recognized the car. It was my mother. I couldn’t wait to show her my
masterpiece. The car pulled slowly into the driveway and from the look on my mother’s face, I could tell that I was in deep trouble.
My mother shut the car door and walked towards me. Her eyes glaring, she shouted, “What in the world were you thinking? I understood when you made castles out of leaves, and climbed the neighbors’ trees, but this! Come inside right now!” I stood there glaring hack at her for a minute, angry because she had insulted (侮辱) my art.
“Now go clean it up!” Mother and I began cleaning the road. Tears ran down my cheeks as I saw my beautiful rainbow turn into black cement.
Though years have now passed, I still wonder where my rainbow has gone. I wonder if, maybe when I get older, I can find my rainbow and never have to brush it away. I guess we all need sort of rainbow to brighten our lives from time to time and to keep our hopes and dreams colorful. What did the writer want to do when his mother came home?
| A.To introduce Stephanie to her. | B.To prevent her from seeing his painting. |
| C.To put the materials back in the yard. | D.To show his artwork to her. |
In his mother’s eyes, the writer_______.
| A.was a born artist | B.always caused trouble |
| C.was a problem solver | D.worked very hard |
The underlined word “rainbow” in the last paragraph refers to ______.
| A.the rainbow in the sky | B.the stripes on the pavement |
| C.something imaginative and fun | D.important lessons learned in childhood |
It can be learned from the passage that parents should ________.
| A.encourage children to paint | B.value friendship among children |
| C.discover the hidden talent in children | D.protect rather than destroy children’s dreams |
Apollo
For lovers of the arts, Apollo is a truly necessary magazine.Covering the ages and the great civilizations of the world, Apollo brings you well-illustrated yet academic articles by internationally famous scholars, as well as information on exhibitions and sales.Experience five monthly issues for as little as £ 5 each.
The Guardian Weekly
The Guardian Weekly gives you a global view with articles from four of the world's most respected newspapers.Read the news from different views and draw your own conclusions on the stories shaping our world. Try it for 3 months for just £ 15.55.Plus get a free copy of The Guardian Year 2003.
New Internationalist
Full of excellent writing and photography, the N1 covers one key subject each month, from Terrorism to Poverty to Climate Change.Reporters from around the globe provide you with a comprehensive world view.PLUS: masses of fresh reports and stories to keep you up-to-date on world affairs.3 months free and free World Map.
The Week
The Week is the only weekly summary giving you the best of the British and foreign newspapers in just 35 pages.Designed to be read in just 1 hour, it provides you with everything you need and want to know.Try The Week now with 13 issues for just £ 13.75.If you decide it's not for you, just tell us within the first 6 weeks and you can get your money back.Which of the following magazines will probably provide you with articles about music and paintings?
| A.Apollo. | B.The Week. |
| C.New Internationalist. | D.The Guardian Weekly. |
It is possible that most of the readers of the four magazines are ______.
| A.men | B.women | C.children | D.grown-ups |
Which of the following would you most probably read if you want to get information from the world’s most popular newspapers?
| A.Apollo & The Week. |
| B.Apollo & New Internationalist. |
| C.The Guardian Weekly & The Week. |
| D.The Guardian Weekly & New Internationalist. |
The purpose of writing these four texts is to ______.
| A.tell the readers the latest news |
| B.get more readers to subscribe (订阅) |
| C.show the importance of the four magazines |
| D.introduce the four magazines to new readers |
Pulling heavy suitcases all day in the summer is hard work, especially when you’re a thin 14-year-old. That was me in 1940—the youngest and smallest baggage boy at New York City’s Pennsylvania Railway Station.
After just a few days on the job, I began noticing that the other fellows were overcharging passengers.I’d like to join them, thinking, “Everyone else is doing it.”
When I got home that night, I told my dad what I wanted to do.“You give an honest day’s work,” he said, looking at me straight in the eye.“They’re paying you.If they want to do that, you let them do that.”
I followed my dad's advice for the rest of that summer and have lived by his words ever since.
Of all the jobs I've had, it was my experience at Pennsylvania Railway Station that has stuck with me.Now I teach my players to have respect for other people and their possessions.Being a member of a team is a totally shared experience.If one person steals, it destroys trust and hurts everyone.I can put up with many things, but not with people who steal.If one of my players were caught stealing, he'd be gone.
Whether you’re on a sports team, in an office or a member of a family, if you can’t trust one another, there’s going to be trouble.What can be inferred about the baggage boys?
| A.They could earn much, but they had to work hard. |
| B.Many of them earned money in a dishonest way. |
| C.They were all from poor families. |
| D.They were all thin, young boys. |
What does the father's advice imply?
| A.It is wrong to give more pay to the passengers. |
| B.Don’t believe them if they are paying you more. |
| C.Don’t follow others to overcharge the passengers. |
| D.It is difficult to work hard and live as an honest boy. |
The writer can't put up with stealing because he thinks that ______.
| A.it is a totally shared experience | B.it is considered as the most dangerous |
| C.it does great harm to human relationship | D.it may lead to the loss of his sports team |
It can be concluded from the text that ______.
| A.his father's advice helped him to decide which job to take up |
| B.working in the sports team was his most important experience |
| C.he learnt much from his shared experience with his team members |
| D.his experience as a baggage boy had a great influence on his later life |
Shopping is not as simple as you may think! There are all sorts of tricks at play each time we reach out for that particular brand of product on the shelf. Colouring, for example, varies according to what the producers are trying to sell.Health foods are packaged (包装) in greens, yellows or browns because we think of these as healthy colours.Ice cream packets are often blue and expensive goods, like chocolates, are gold or silver.
When some kind of pain killer was brought out recently, researchers found that the colours turned the customers off because they made the product look weak and ineffective.
Eventually, it came on the market in a dark blue and white package—blue because we think of it as safe, and white as calm. The size of a product can attract a shopper.But quite often a bottle doesn’t contain as much as it appears to.
It is believed that the better-known companies spend, on average, 70 per cent of the total cost of the product itself on packaging!
The most successful producers know that it’s not enough to have a good product.The founder of Pears soap, who for 25 years has used pretty little girls to promote (推销) their goods, came to the conclusion: “Any fool can make soap, but it takes a genius to sell it.”Which of the following may trick a shopper into buying a product according to the text?
| A.The cost of its package. | B.The price of the product. |
| C.The colour of its package. | D.The brand name of the product. |
The underlined part “the colours turned the customers off”(in Par A.3 ) means that the colours _____.
A.attracted the customers strongly B.had weak effects on the customers
C.tricked the customers into shopping D.caused the customers to lose interestWhich of the following is the key to the success in product sales?
| A.The way to promote goods. | B.The discovery of a genius. |
| C.The team to produce a good product. | D.The brand name used by successful producers. |
Which of the following would be the best title for this text?
| A.Choice of Good Products | B.Disadvantages of Products |
| C.Effect of Packaging on Shopping | D.Brand Names and Shopping Tricks |
If the world were a village of 1,000 people it would include:
• 584 Asians
• 124 Africans
• 95 Eastern and Western Europeans
• 84 Latin Americans
• 55 former Soviets (including Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians, and other national groups)
• 52 North Americans
• 6 Australians and New Zealanders
The people of the village would speak:
• 165 Mandarin
• 86 English
• 83 Hindu/Urdu
• 64 Spanish
• 58 Russian
• 37 Arabic
The above list covers the mother tongues of only half the village.
One-third of the people in the village are children, and only 60 are over the age of 65.Just under half of the married women in the village have access to modem equipments.
This year 28 babies will be born.Ten people will die, 3 of them for lack of food, 1 from cancer.Two of the deaths will be of babies born within the year.With the 28 births and 10 deaths, the population of the village next year will be 1,018.
In this village of 1,000 persons, 200 people receive 75 percent of the income; another 200 receive only 2 percent of the income.
About one-third have access to clean, safe drinking water.
Of the 670 adults in the village, half can not read nor write.
The village has a total yearly budget, public and private, of over $3 million—$ 3 ,000 per person if it is distributed evenly.Of the total $3 million:
$ 181,000 goes to weapons and warfare
$ 159,000 to education
$ 132,000 to health care
These weapons are under the control of just 100 of the people.The other 900 are watching them with deep anxiety, wondering whether they can learn to get along together.Which of the following is true about Mandarin according to the text?
| A.Nearly one-third of Asian people speak Mandarin in the village. |
| B.About 8.25 per cent of the people speak Mandarin in the village. |
| C.About 16.5 per cent of the people speak Mandarin in the village. |
| D.Nearly all the Mandarin-speaking people are from Asia in the village. |
Which of the following problems is NOT mentioned in the text?
| A.Poverty. | B.Education. | C.Environment. | D.Marriage. |
The underlined part “have access to” (in Para. 4) means_____.
| A.use | B.buy | C.produce | D.try |
The last sentence in the text implies that most of the people long for _____.
| A.a peaceful world | B.good education |
| C.better health care | D.a life without anxiety |