Schedules, as the 21st century people know, simply did not exist in the 17th and 18th centuries. We are upset if a plane arrives an hour late. Our ancestors weren’t upset if an April ship didn’t show up until June. They began to worry in July and were often happy when it showed up in August. When a long-distance ship finally did get to the port, the whole city became busy and excited. Businessmen hurried down to check the goods they had ordered. The ship would probably stay in port for at least three days, often a week, to take on businessmen, give the sailors a rest, find out about the latest news, weather conditions, and so on.
Travel time could only be approximate. One never knew when the winds would be good. So even though “average sailing time” was given, time could change considerably, shortening the voyage by up to 25% or putting it off by up to 500% or more! The average run from England to Boston was about a month and a half, but there were also voyages of three months. One voyage in 1640 lasted six months!
Travel time is not the same in both directions, due to the winds and currents. This is especially true in the Caribbean, where winds are from the southeast the entire year. Ships sailing west across the Atlantic spend longer than ships sailing east, and the contrary winds can prevent a ship from actually making it to the harbor even if it gets close. One ship was held off the North Carolina coast for 17 days before being able to land!
1. What can we learn from the first paragraph?
A. No sailor was allowed to have fun when the ship reached land.
B. People in ancient times didn’t care about other people’s safety.
C. The ship would leave for a voyage when all of the preparations were made.
D. A long-distance ship would create a lot of excitement in the place where it landed.
2. According to the passage, travel time can’t be fixed due to ___________ .
A. the people at the port B. average sailing time
C. the changeable climate D. the businessmen and the sailors
3. The underlined word “cu
rrents” in the third paragraph means __________ .
A. the movement of water B. the movement of winds
C. direction of the traveling ship D. travel time of ships
Each time I see a balloon, my mind flies back to a memory of when I was a six-year-old girl. It was a rainy Sunday and my father had recently died. I asked my mom if Dad had gone to heaven. "Yes, honey. Of course." she said.
"Can we write him a letter?"
She paused, the longest pause of my short life, and answered, "Yes."
My heart jumped. "How? Does the mailman go there?" I asked.
"No, but I have an idea." Mom drove to a party store and returned with a red balloon. I asked her what it was for.
"Just wait, honey. You'll see." Mom told me to write my letter. Eagerly, I got my favorite pen, and poured out my six-year-old heart in the form of blue ink. I wrote about my day, what I learned at school, how Mom was doing, and even about what happened in a story I had read. For a few minutes it was as if Dad were still alive. I gave the letter to Mom. She read it over, and a smile crossed her face.
She made a hole in the corner of the letter where she looped the balloon string. We went outside and she gave me the balloon. It was still raining.
"Okay, on the count of three, let go. One, two, three."
The balloon, carrying my letter, darted upward against the rain. We watched until it was swallowed by the mass of clouds.
Later I realized, like the balloon, that Dad had never let his sickness get him down. He was strong. No matter what he suffered, he'd persevere, dart up, and finally transcend this cold world and his sick body. He rose into sky and became something beautiful. I watched until the balloon disappeared into the gray and white and I prayed that his strength was hereditary. I prayed to be a balloon.When the girl asked her mother if they could write to her father, her mother _________.
| A．felt it hard to answer | B．thought her a creative girl |
| C．believed it easy to do so | D．found it easy to lie |
When the girl was told that she could send a letter to her father, she _________.
| A．jumped with joy |
| B．became excited |
| C．started writing immediately |
| D．was worried that it couldn't be delivered |
In the eyes of the author, what was the rain like?
| A．An incurable disease |
| B．An unforgettable memory. |
| C．The hard time her father had. |
| D．The failures her father experienced. |
When an ant dies, other ants take it out of the nest, often within an hour after its death. This behavior interests scientists and they wonder how ants know for sure—and so soon—that another ant is dead.
One scientist recently came up with a way to explain this ant behavior. Dong-Hwan Choe is a biologist, a scientist who studies animals and plants. He found that ants have a chemical on the outside of their bodies that signals to other ants, “I'm dead—take me away” when it is dead.
But there's a question to answer: As we know, if an ant is dead, it stops moving. But when an ant is sleeping or knocked unconscious, it is also not moving. However, other ants don't move the living ant out of the nest. How do they know this ant is not dead? Choe found that ants have another chemical on their bodies, which tells nearby ants something like, “Wait—I'm not dead yet” when it is not dead. Choe suspects that when an ant dies, the chemical that says, “Wait— I'm not dead yet” quickly goes away. When other ants detect the “dead” chemical without the “not dead yet” chemical, they move away the body.
To test his theory, Choe and his team put different chemicals on ants. When the scientists used the “I'm dead” chemical, other ants quickly moved the treated ant away. When the scientists used the “Wait—I'm not dead yet” chemical, other ants left the treated ant alone. Choe believes this behavior shows that the “not dead yet” chemical overrides the “dead” chemical when picked up by other ants. And that when an ant dies, the “not dead yet” chemical dies away. Other nearby ants then notice the remaining “dead” chemical and remove the body from the nest.
Understanding this behavior can help scientists figure out how to stop ants from invading new places and causing problems.What is the function of the first paragraph?
| A．Leading the following paragraphs. |
| B．Showing the main idea of the passage. |
| C．Introducing the background of the passage. |
| D．Giving a summary of the passage. |
Which of the following has the closest meaning to the underlined word “overrides” in the fourth paragraph?
| A．is weaker than | B．is stronger than | C．is better than | D．is worse than |
What can we learn from the passage?
| A．Living ants can also be taken away when they are not moving. |
| B．When an ant dies, it can tell others using a certain chemical. |
| C．A living ant can pretend to be dead using a special chemical. |
| D．Ants often use chemicals to communicate with each other. |
Israel has passed a law banning the use of underweight models in advertising. Known as the “Photoshop Law”, it also requires that agencies tell their audience if they’ve digitally changed pictures to make models look thinner.
The new law forbids the use of models with a body mass index of 18.5 or less, a standard based on internationally accepted measures. The figure matches the set of fixed limits by the U. S. Department of Health.
The law doesn’t set a money amount that can be gained in court from such a suit. Lawmakers realize that it may be a long and difficult process to prove in court that a company broke the new law, but they feel that simply having the law in place will accomplish what they want; stopping advertising companies from continuing to influence Israelis with images of unhealthy-looking models as the gold standard of beauty.
Some modeling agencies in Israel aren’t happy. They say that the indexes on which the law is based are arbitrary (任意的)and are not suitable for every model. Many models who are totally healthy girls might be disqualified because of the law. Some models are naturally thin and unable to gain weight and the new law would unfairly prevent them from finding jobs.
However, plus-size American supermodel Emme told CNN that she thinks the law will cause other countries to make similar measures against showing underweight models. “I think this is fantastic because so many young women and men are suffering to look in a way that is unrealistic and unhealthy,” she said.What is “Photoshop Law” about?
| A．Banning the use of underweight models. |
| B．Banning underweight models in advertising. |
| C．Banning changing pictures digitally. |
| D．Banning models in advertising. |
The underlined word “suit” in Paragraph 3 means .
| A．a set of clothing |
| B．a group of rooms |
| C．an action in court |
| D．a performance in advertising |
What can we know from the passage?
| A．All models are happy about the law. |
| B．All advertising agencies are happy about the law. |
| C．The law makes no sense. |
| D．There are arguments over the beauty standard of models. |
Pacing and Pausing
Sara tried to befriend her old friend Steve's new wife, but Betty never seemed to have anything to say. While Sara felt Betty didn't hold up her end of the conversation, Betty complained to Steve that Sara never gave her a chance to talk. The problem had to do with expectations about pacing and pausing.
Conversation is a turn-taking game. When our habits are similar, there's no problem. But if our habits are different, you may start to talk before I'm finished or fail to take your turn when I'm finished. That's what was happening with Betty and Sara.
It may not be coincidental that Betty, who expected relatively longer pauses between turns, is British, and Sara, who expected relatively shorter pauses, is American. Betty often felt interrupted by Sara. But Betty herself became an interrupter and found herself doing most of the talking when she met a visitor from Finland. And Sara had a hard time cutting in on some speakers from Latin America or Israel.
The general phenomenon, then, is that the small conversation techniques, like pacing and pausing, lead people to draw conclusions not about conversational style but about personality and abilities. These habitual differences are often the basis for dangerous stereotyping (思维定式). And these social phenomena can have very personal consequences. For example, a woman from the southwestern part of the US went to live in an eastern city to take up a job in personnel. When the Personnel Department got together for meetings, she kept searching for the right time to break in --- and never found it. Although back home she was considered outgoing and confident, in Washington she was viewed as shy and retiring. When she was evaluated at the end of the year, she was told to take a training course because of her inability to speak up.
That's why slight differences in conversational style --- tiny little things like microseconds of pause --- can have a great effect on one's life. The result in this case was a judgment of psychological problems --- even in the mind of the woman herself, who really wondered what was wrong with her and registered for assertiveness training.What did Sara think of Betty when talking with her?
| A．Betty was talkative. |
| B．Betty was an interrupter. |
| C．Betty did not take her turn. |
| D．Betty paid no attention to Sara. |
According to the passage, who are likely to expect the shortest pauses between turns?
| A．Americans. | B．Israelis. | C．The British. | D．The Finns. |
We can learn from the passage that ______.
| A．communication breakdown results from short pauses and fast pacing |
| B．women are unfavorably stereotyped in eastern cities of the US |
| C．one's inability to speak up is culturally determined sometimes |
| D．one should receive training to build up one's confidence |
Is your family interested in buying a dog? A dog can be a pleasant companion（伙伴） to your family, but if you choose the wrong kind of dog，you will have a lot of troubles.
Families should sit down and thoroughly discuss the possible problems before buying a dog. Even if the children in your family are the ones who want the dog, the parents are the ones who are really responsible for seeing that the animal is properly cared for. If you don’t know much about dogs, it is a good idea to go to the library for books about different kinds of dogs, as well as books about how to train a young dog. In reading about the different breeds(种类)you should know that a dog described(描述)as very alert(机敏灵活的)may be too active. When a book describes a dog as an excellent hunting dog, it probably means that the dog won’t be happy living in a small house. Dog breeds vary(变化)in popularity as the years go by. One of the most popular dogs these days is the German shepherd（牧羊犬）. This is because it provides protection as well as companionship（陪伴）. The family should be warned that these dogs grow up to be very big, and may be too powerful for children to control. If space is limited, a toy dog may be a good choice. These dogs are very small and easy to train. They don’t need to be walked daily, since they can exercise in the home.According to the passage, one can get information about different kinds of dogs.
| A．by going to the library |
| B．by asking someone who has enough experience about different kinds of dogs |
| C．by buying a dog and training it |
| D．by reading books about dogs |
The German shepherd is a popular dog.
| A．because it is easy to train |
| B．because it is big and strong |
| C．because it is powerful and friendly |
| D．because it is alert and active |
Which is the best topic of the passage?
| A．The care and proper selection of dogs for families. |
| B．Different breeds of dogs. |
| C．Responsibility for seeing that dogs are properly cared for. |
| D．Different kinds of books about dogs. |