Almost all cultures celebrate the end of one year and the beginning of another in some way. Different cultures celebrate the beginning of a new year in different ways, and at different times on the calendar.
In western countries, people usually celebrate New Year at midnight on January 1st. People may go to parties, dress in formal clothes—like tuxedos(小礼服)and evening gowns, and drink champagne at midnight. During the first minutes of the New Year, people cheer and wish each other happiness for the year ahead. But some cultures prefer to celebrate the New Year by waking up early to watch the sun rise. They welcome the New Year with the first light of the sunrise.
It is also a common Western custom to make a New Year’s promise, called a resolution. New Year’s resolutions usually include promises to try something new or change a bad habit in the new year.
Many cultures also do special things to get rid of bad luck at the beginning of a new year. For example, in Ecuador, families make a big doll from old clothes. The doll is filled with old newspapers and firecrackers. At midnight, these dolls are burned to show the bad things from the past year are gone and the new year can start afresh (again). Other common traditions to keep away bad luck in a new year include throwing things into rivers or the ocean, or saying special things on the first day o
f the new year.
Other New Year traditions are followed to bring good luck is to eat grapes on New Year’s Day. The more grapes a person eats, the more good luck the person will have in the year. In France, people eat pancakes for good luck at New
Year. In the United States, some people eat black– eyed peas(豇豆)for good luck——but to get good luck for a whole year you have to eat 365 of them!Which culture celebrates New Year in the morning?
| A．The United States. | B．Spain. |
| C．France. | D．The passage doesn’t say. |
According to the third paragraph, what is a resolution?
| A．Something you burn. | B．Something you eat. |
| C．Something you say. | D．Something you wear. |
What is the topic of the fourth paragraph?
| A．Bringing good luck. | B．Keeping away bad luck. |
| C．Planning for the next year. | D．Remembering the past. |
Which is probably true about eating black – eyed peas on New Year?
| A．Black-eyed peas taste bad. | B．The peas are very difficult to cook. |
| C．One pea brings one day of luck. | D．It is bad luck to eat a lot of black-eyed peas. |
.
Bill Gates was born on October 28th, 1955. He and his two sisters grew up in Seattle. Their father, William H. Gates II, was a Seattle lawyer. Mary Gates, their late mother, was a school teacher.
Gates attended public elementary school before moving on to the private Lakeside School in North Seattle. It was at Lakeside that Gates began his career in personal computer soft- ware, programming computers at age 13.
In 1973, Gates entered Harvard University as a freshman, where he lived down the hall from Steve Ballmer, who is now Microsoft's president. While at Harvard, Gates developed a version (版本) of the programming language BASIC for the first microcomputer---the MITS Astair. In his junior year, Gates dropped out of Harvard to devote his energies full-time to Microsoft, a company he had started in 1975 with his boyhood friend Paul Allen. Guided by a belief that the personal computer would be a valuable tool on every office desk-top and in every home, they began developing software for personal computers.
Gates' foresight has led to the success of Microsoft and the software industry. He plays an important role in the technical development of new products. Much of his time is devoted to meeting with customers and staying in touch with Microsoft employees around the world through e-mail.
In the dozen years since Microsoft went public, Gates has donated more than $ 800 million to charities (慈善机构), including $ 200 million to the Gates Library Foundation to help libraries in North America make use of new technologies and the Information Age.
50. Where did Bill Gates begin his career in personal computer software?
A. At public elementary school. B. At the private Lakeside School.
C. At Harvard University. D. At Microsoft Company.
51. Why did he drop out of Harvard?
A. To change school. B. To spend all his energies to Microsoft.
C. To find a full-time job. D. To earn money.
52. How does Gates spend much of his time?
A. Meeting with people. B. Travelling around the world.
C. E-mailing some friends.
D. Meeting with customers and e-mailing Microsoft employees.
53. What does the underlined word "donated" in the last paragraph mean?
A. gave. B. earned. C. made. D. received.
.
第三部分：阅读理解(共两节，16小题；每小题2分，满分32分)
第一节：阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项（A、B、C和D）中，选出最佳选项。
People enjoy talking about “firsts”. They like to remember their first love or their first car. But not all firsts are happy ones.
One of history’s bad but important firsts was the first car accident. Cars were still young when it happened. The accident took place in New York City in May 1896. A man from Massachusetts was visiting the city in his new car. At that time, bicycle riders were still trying to get used to the new set of wheels on the road. No one was sure who was to blame for it. Anyway, the bike and the car hit each other hard. The man on the bike was injured. The driver of the car had to stay in jail and wait for the hospital report on the bicycle rider. Luckily, the rider was not killed.
Three years later, another car accident took place. It was again in New York City. A man named Henry Bliss stepped off a streetcar(无轨电车). He was hit by a passing car. Once again, no one was sure just how it happened or whose fault it was. The driver of the car was put in prison. Poor Mr. Bliss became the first person to die in a car accident.
46. Which of the following is true?
A. The first driver came from New York City.
B. Both of the two car accidents killed a person.
C. The second car accident didn’t happen in the same city as the first one.
D. No one knew how the two accidents had happened.
47. In both accidents the drivers of the cars_______.
A. could not drive their cars very well
B. had to stay in prison for a while
C. tried to run away after the accidents took place
D. knew it was their fault
48. The word “jail” in this passage means ________.
A. police station B. prison C. school D. office
49. The main idea of the passage is ________.
A. not all firsts are happy ones B. two of the first car accidents
C. two unhappy “firsts” D. bicycle riders get used to cars
.
Al had been working in this factory only eleven months, but he excelled at everything he did. He looked for new tasks-as an opportunity to gain experience. To him, mistakes were not to be denied but considered an opportunity to learn. He was, by far, the most capable man among his workmates, One day, when he was finishing his work of the day, he heard Jack calling him.
“What are you going to do about…?” asked Jack.
“I’ll come off the end rail,” interrupted Al.
“No, I mean about Joe’s promotion?”
“I’m going back to school,” Al said.
“Excuse me!”
“I’m going back to school,” Al repeated.
“You mean you’re quitting!”
Was it that simple? Is this why there was so much misery in men’s lives? “I’m going back to school” was just an excuse, and Al knew it, thought Jack, or Al would not be drunk. It seemed that Al would rather get drunk than fight for his happiness. But why? Jack had no answer.
“Yes, and I’m going back to school. I don’t know what else to do. I can’t believe that this kind of thing can happen. Maybe if I get more education and a better job, it will be different.”
“Do you really believe that?”
“Well, what do you want we to do?” Al was getting angry: “I can’t stay here! I can’t work where the most incapable get the biggest reward! I can’t kill Joe and the boss like…”
Al stopped. They both knew what this meant.
“Like I did?”
Al did not answer.
“Yes, I killed two men with my bare hands; yes, I got punished and lost my job-but I kept my soul!”
Al understood the hidden statement. Al did not know whether it was his anger, or the beer, or both that made him less cautious in the face. He held his hands firmly. Then be heard Jack: “You’ve got the right idea, Al. You’ve got to fight.”
Al needed to think. Instead of taking the subway, he walked five miles back home. By the time he entered his bedroom, he climbed into bed. Turned off his mind, and fell asleep.
67．Choose from the following a right word to describe Jack.
A．Tough. B．Incapable. C．Lazy. D．Talkative.
68．Which of the following is NOT true according to the passage?
A．Jack was not happy about Joe’s promotion.
B．Al and jack were workmates.
C．The conversation between Al and Jack happened in their workplace.
D．The conversation between Al and Jack happened during the working hours.
69．What can we infer from the underlined part?
A．Jack thinks Al has lost his soul. B．Jack used to be a killer.
C．Al would be a killer. D．Don’t be a killer like Jack.
70．Which of the following is true about Al at the end of the story?
A．Al felt so tired from the long walk home and couldn’t help falling asleep.
B．Al and made up his mind and knew what to do.
C．Al forgot all that had happened.
D．Al was too confused to think further.
.
The massive 8.8 quake, the seventh strongest in recorded history, hit Chile and should have shortened the length of an Earth day by 1.26 milliseconds, More impressive is how much the quake shifted the Earth’s axis（地轴）.
The computer mode! Used to determine the effects of the Chile earthquake effect also found that it should have moved the Earth’s figure axis by about 8 cm. The Earth’s figure figure axis is not the same as its north-south axis, which Earth turns around once every day at a speed of about 1,604 kph. The figure axis is the axis around which the Earth’s mass is balanced. It is offset（偏离） from the Earth’s north-south axis by about 10 meters.
Strong earthquakes can change Earth’s days and its axis. The 9.1 Sumatran earthquake in 2004, which set off a deadly tsunami（海啸），should have shortened Earth’s days by 0.0068 milliseconds and shifted its axis by about 7cm.
One Earth day is about 24 hours long. Over the course of a year, the length of a day normally changes gradually by one millisecond, It increases in the winter when Earth more slowly, and decreases in the summer.
The Chile earthquake was much smaller than the Sumatran quake, but its effects on the Earth are larger because of its location. The fault（断层） responsible for the 2010 Chile quake also cuts through Earth at a larger angle that the Sumatran quake’s fault. This makes the Chile fault ore effective in moving the Earth’s mass vertically and hence more effective in shifting the Earth’s figure axis.
The findings are based on early date available on the Chile earthquake. The Chile earthquake has killed more than 700 people and cause widespread damage in the South American country.
64．What’s the biggest problem caused by the Chile quake?
A．It is the seventh strongest in recorded history. B．It should have shortened the length of an Earth day.
C．It shifted the Earth’s axis. D．It made the day longer on Earth.
65．Comparing the Sumatram earthquake with the Chile earthquake, we know that .
A．the Sumatram earthquake had more effect on Earth
B．the location of the Chile earthquake is responsible for its larger effects on Earth.
C．the Sumatram earthquake was less destructive
D．the Chile earthquake fault changed the Earth’s mass
66．What does the word “it” in the 4th paragraph refer to?
A．The length of a day. B．The axis. C．One millisecond. D．The change of the day.
.
We typically associate the word “science” with a person in a white coat doing experiments in a laboratory. Ideally, experiments should play as big a role in the human sciences as they do in the natural sciences; but in practice this is not usually the case. The are at least three reasons for this.
1．Human scientists are often trying to make sense of complex real world situations in which it is simply impossible to run controlled experiment.
2．The artificiality of some of the experiments that can be conducted may make the behavior of the participants abnormal.
3．There are moral reasons for not conducting experiments that have a negative effect on the people who participate in them.
Faced with the above difficulties, what are human scientists to do? One solution is to wait for nature to provide the appropriate experimental conditions. We can, for example, learn something about how a normal brain functions by looking at people who have suffered brain damage; and we can gain some understanding into the roles played by genes and the environment by studying twins, who have been separated at birth and brought up in different families. In the case of economics, economic history can provide us with a bank of-admittedly not very well-controlled-experimental data.
However, human scientists do not just sit around waiting for natural experiments to arise. They also think of some experiments of their own. Suppose you want to know how a baby sees the world. We cannot, of course, ask the baby since it has not yet learnt to speak. So it might seem that all we can do is guess. People usually won’t change their mind until it was found out that babies tend to stare at surprising things longer than at unsurprising ones. This key understanding was like opening a window on to the developing mind. There was now a way of testing babies’ expectations and getting some idea of how they are six months old, babies can already do the following things: figuring out that objects consist of parts that move together being aware of the difference between living and non-living things and even doing simple arithmetic work.
60．What is true about the natural sciences and the human sciences according to this passage?
A．Both human scientists and natural scientists can run controlled experiments.
B．Experiments done by human scientists and natural scientists are artificial.
C．Both human and natural science experiments should be of the same importance.
D．It’s not moral to conduct human science experiments.
61．What do we know about human scientists from this passage?
A．They are white coat scientists.
B．They have more experimental sources than natural scientists.
C．They conduct experiments passively.
D．They face more difficulties in carrying out their research.
62．Which of the following experiments belongs to human science experiment?
A． Vinegar Volcano Vinegar and baking soda make for a fun and easy science experiment. Try creating a vinegar volcano.
B． Taste Without Smell Put your senses to the test with this simple experiment that
shows the importance of your sense of smell.
C． Lung Function Observe your breath and confirm your lung volume by completing this experiment.
D． Make a Rainbow Use sunlight and water to make your own rainbow with this cool experiment that will teach kids how rainbows work while they enjoy a fun activity
63．What does the author tell us in this passage?
A．ABCs about the science experiment.
B．Some knowledge of science.
C．Some differences between the human sciences and the natural sciences.
D．The similarity of the natural sciences and the human sciences.