Three wishes
A man and his wife were very poor. They kept hoping for new clothes and good food. The man enjoyed eating, and he especially liked cakes. One night an old woman came to their house and told them she would let them have three wishes. They could wish for anything they wanted.
The man had just finished eating a piece of bread for his dinner, but he was still hungry. He said, “I wish I had a big cake!”
Suddenly a cake appeared on his plate.
“You fool!” His wife cried. “You could have wished for a house full of wonderful food, but you wished for a cake. I wish that cake was on the end of your foolish nose! ”
Immediately the cake stuck to the end of his nose.
Then the man and his wife started blaming each other. “It’s your fault!” she man cried. “No, it’s your fault!” she answered. What could they do? The cake was still stuck to the husband’s nose.
“Oh!” the wife cried. “I wish none of this had ever happened!”
Immediately the cake was gone, and the man was saying, “I’m still hungry. How I wish I had some cakes! ”
But of course nothing happened.The man quarreled with his wife because ___.
A.he always enjoyed eating |
B.his wife hoped that he asked for a house |
C.the cake stuck to the end of his nose according to his wife’s wish. |
D.he didn’t want anything except cakes |
The wrong statement of the following is ___.
A.the man made his wishes before dinner |
B.the wife made two wishes, which worked |
C.the wife wanted her husband to wish for more than a big cake |
D.the man wished that the cake were not on his nose |
Why did the old woman not satisfy the man’s wish when he said he was still hungry and wanted some cakes?
A.Because the old lady was angry with them |
B.Because this was the fourth wish. |
C.Because the man had made this wish before. |
D.Because the cake had been gone. |
B
Oprah Winfrey, the queen of American daytime talk TV, is considered one of the most powerful women in the world. Now, after 25 years’ hosting The Oprah Winfrey Show, the star has announced she is calling it quits.
According to the Los Angeles Times, the move “signals the beginning of the decline for the daytime talk show.” More women are working full-time jobs, and people are turning to cable (有线电视) and pre-recorded shows for their entertainment.
It may be that Oprah isn’t quitting so much as moving on. She has created the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN), and will most likely move her show to the network. If audiences around the world need Oprah, they well know where to look.
Oprah Winfrey was born to a single teenage mother in a small town in rural Mississippi, US. As a child, she lived with poverty and abuse. But she got a job at a local radio station, where her honesty, emotional style won her many fans. She quickly rose through the ranks of radio and television before launching her own production company and starting her own show.
Oprah’s talk show was not the first of its kind, but it quickly became the best and most popular. It made talk shows popular, and others jumped in to start similar shows. But while other talk shows turned ugly, featuring guests who argued and attacked each other with chairs, Oprah rose above the mess.
“Part of her power lies in the fact that her life story resonates (产生共鸣) with her audience, as a kind of version of the American dream,” writes Kevin Connolly, a reporter with the BBC.
She became a star because of the way she opened up about her problems to her audience. She shared her own struggles with relationships and weight. She focused on self-help. Connolly believes “something in her honesty and her sometimes painfully emotional directness struck home with a certain type of American”.
60. Which of the following statements is NOT true?
A. The stop of Oprah’s show reflects the decrease of audience.
B. Oprah hosted her show for about 25 years.
C. American talk show was pioneered by Oprah.
D. Oprah used to be a radio presenter.
61. What does the underlined sentence mean?
A. Oprah could deal with the guests fighting very well.
B. Oprah’s show stood out with her unique style.
C. Oprah turned a deaf ear to other people’s quarrel.
D. Oprah’s fame rose because lots of people watch her show.
62. From Kevin Connolly, we know people like Oprah’s show for all the reasons EXCEPT ________.
A. Oprah always shares people’s life stories in her show
B. the audiences are touched by Oprah’s honesty and frankness
C. Oprah’s life story reflects the truth of American dream
D. some audiences are inspired by Oprah’s show
63. According to the text, Oprah ________.
A. always volunteers to help those who need help
B. has practiced presentational skills since she was young
C. believes that one should rely on himself to solve problems
D. calls on women to work full-time jobs
第三部分阅读理解 (共两节,满分40分)
第一节 (共15小题;每小题2分,满分30分)
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,并在答题卡上将该项涂黑。
A
Recently, one of my best friends, whom I’ve shared just about everything with since the first day of kindergarten, spent the weekend with me. Since I moved to a new town several years ago, we’ve both always looked forward to the few times a year when we can see each other.
Over the weekend, we spent hours and hours, staying up late into the night, talking about the people she was hanging around with. She started telling me stories about her new boyfriend, about how he experimented with drugs and was into other self-destructive behavior. I was blown away! She told me how she had been lying to her parents about where she was going and even stealing out to see this guy because they didn’t want her around him. No matter how hard I tried to tell her that she deserved better, she didn’t believe me. Her self-respect seemed to have disappeared.
I tried to convince her that she was ruining her future and heading for big trouble. I felt like I was getting nowhere. I just couldn’t believe that she really thought it was acceptable to hang with a bunch of losers, especially her boyfriend.
By the time she left, I was really worried about her and exhausted by the experience. It had been so frustrating, I had come close to telling her several times during the weekend that maybe we had just grown too far apart to continue our friendship,but I didn’t. I put the power of friendship to the final test. We’d been friends for far too long. I had to hope that she valued me enough to know that I was trying to save her from hurting herself. I wanted to believe that our friendship could conquer anything.
A few days later, she called to say that she had thought long and hard about our conversation, and then she told me that she had broken up with her boyfriend. I just listened on the other end of the phone with tears of joy running down my face. It was one of the truly rewarding moments in my life. Never had I been so proud of a friend.
56. In the writer’s opinion, her friend ________.
A. was a girl with no self-respect
B. could find a better boyfriend
C. was brave enough to stick to her own choice
D. didn’t value the writer’s suggestion
57. What did the writer worry about?
A. She would lose the friendship with her.
B. Her friend’s parents would be worried about their daughter.
C. Her friend would get into great trouble with the boy.
D. Her friend’s boyfriend would be in great trouble.
58. We may leam from Paragraph 3 that the writer ________.
A. didn’t want to go anywhere else
B. hated her friend’s hanging with her boyfriend
C. couldn’t believe that her friend’s choice was acceptable
D. doubted that she could in any way help her friend
59. What can be concluded from the passage?
A. Friendship starting from childhood is not reliable.
B. Friendship is a cure for any injury in life.
C. Friendship should be everlasting once begun.
D. Friendship can have magical power in life.
E
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 behaviour. 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 fades away. Other nearby ants then detect 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.
57. 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.
58. 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
59. 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.
60. Which of the following descriptions about Dong-Hwan Choe is right?
A. Choe did this study in order to stop ants from invading new places.
B.Choe is a biologist who is only interested in animals, especially in ants.
C. Choe first came up with an idea to explain this ant behavior,and then did some tests to prove his theory.
D. Choe did the research on this ant behavior on his own
D
COPENHAGEN—The world is gathered in Copenhagen for the U.N. climate summit, but Denmark’s bicycle-friendly capital has also given its name to a movement of cities trying to find a kinder way to travel to and from work.
Nearly 40 percent of Copenhagen’s population cycle to work or school on ubiquitous(无处不在的) paved cycle paths. Many residents take to their bikes year-round, braving rain and snow through the winter in a city where the bicycles outnumber the people.
Amsterdam and Beijing too are known for their bicycles, but the Danish capital is where urban planners from around the world have been looking for ways to get their people out of cars and up onto bikes, an effort known as Copenhagenisation.
Klaus Bondam, Copenhagen’s technical and environmental chief, calls himself a “mega cyclist” and says the bike’s popularity stems partly from high taxes on cars which meant working-class Danes could not afford to drive in the 1930s and 1940s. “Today you’ll meet everybody on the bicycle lanes — women and men, rich and poor, old and young.” Bondam said.
The local government has during the last three years invested more than 250 million crowns ($49.42 million) in bicycle lanes and to make the traffic safer for bicyclists. Today around a third of the population drive cars to work or study, another third take public transport, while 37 percent cycle -- a figure the city aims to increase to 50 percent by 2015.
There are many benefits when citizens choose bicycles over cars: pollution and noise decline, public health improves, and more people on bikes or walking creates a sense of safety in the city. Fewer parked cars leaves more space for playgrounds, parks, shopping areas and other useful public places.
53. According to the first paragraph, Copenhagen is better known as ___________.
A. a city without cars B. a bicycle-friendly city
C. Denmark’s capital D. the U.N. climate summit
54. We can learn from the second and the third paragraph, __________.
A. there is no path for cars during rainy and snowy days
B. citizens are limited to have only one bike for each person
C. two-thirds of people in Copenhagen cycle to work or school
D. city planners try their best to encourage more citizens to ride bikes
55. Bikes are popular in Copenhagen partly because ___________.
A. the citizens are unable to afford to buy a car
B. the rich tend to keep fit by cycling to work
C. young people regard cycling a fashion to follow
D. high taxes were paid for cars in the 1930s and 1940s
56. We can learn from the passage that __________.
A. cars are forbidden to park in Copenhagen
B. more citizens tend to choose cars in Copenhagen
C. Copenhagen becomes a model for cities’ traffic
D. living standards in Copenhagen are greatly declining
C
World Footballer of the Year 2009
Football experts from the world have chosen Steven Gerrard, Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Samuel Eto'o as the top footballers in the world. Now it's up to you to vote for the player you think is the king of World Football.
THE CANDIDATES
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Vote Now
WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY
*Why I'd vote for Gerrard
“Gerrard is clearly in his prime and quite rightly rated one of the finest midfield players of his generation.” says Steve Bates, chairman of the FWA.
*Why I'd vote for Cristiano Ronaldo
Johan Cruyff points out Ronaldo is better than George Best and Denis Law, who were two brilliant and great players in the history of United.
*Why I'd vote for Samuel Eto'o
Piers Edwards thinks the title of World footballer should go to Samuel Eto'o.
*Why I'd vote for Messi
Messi’s individual brilliance and year-long persistence has impressed Diego Maradona.
49. The passage is mainly intended to __________.
A. invite readers to vote for the World Footballer of 2009
B. predict the results of the vote of the World Footballer of 2009
C. tell the outstanding performance of the candidates of the World Footballer of 2009
D. share with readers the experts’ opinions on the candidates of World Footballer of 2009
50.Which of the following descriptions about the footballers is RIGHT?
A. Ronaldo has primarily played as a second attacker.
B. Eto'o scored 42 goals in the 2008-2009 season altogether.
C. Diego Maradona believed that Messi could never match him in playing style.
D. Gerrard plays an important role in Liverpool’s challenge to Premier League leaders.
51. We can learn from the passage that Ballon d'Or is __________.
A. an activity about football B. an organization of football
C. a title for excellent footballers D. a team name of football
52. Diego Maradona is more likely to vote___________ to be the World Footballer of the Year.
A. Lionel Messi B. Cristiano Ronaldo
C. Samuel Eto'o D. Steven Gerrard