The idea about the phoenix goes back to Ancient Egypt, where we find the phoenix described as a handsome, eagle-like bird, with part-golden, part-red plumage, that spent most of its life in the Arabian deserts. It was rarely seen and according to one version of the story, only appeared in Egypt once every five hundred years, when it flew to Heliopolis, “city of the sun”, and deliberately burnt itself to ashes by settling on the altar (祭坛) flame there! However, it seems it did not really die because from those same ashes a young, fully formed phoenix was born and flew away, apparently back to Arabia.
It is pretty obvious that no one has ever seen or will see a living phoenix. The interesting thing is that we can find certain clues which may explain one aspect of the Egyptians’ idea. It may sound unbelievable, but some birds are apparently quite charmed by flames and small fires, especially members of the crow family. One zoologist actually proved this by setting fire to some straw near to a tame（驯养的）rook, a large black bird like a crow. Far from becoming nervous and backing away, the bird deliberately stood over the flames, with raised and vibrating wings. It didn’t get burnt, but the image it presented by its strange behavior was almost exactly like that shown in illustrations of the mythical phoenix!
Why birds should occasionally behave in this strange way is not clear. One idea is that they carefully use the heat of the flames to relieve the annoyance caused by their feather mites (虱) which all birds have. Whatever the reason, it is quite possible that the Ancient Egyptians saw birds behaving in this way, from time to time, and used it as the basis of their phoenix myth, adding fanciful details which closely linked it to their worship of the sun and their belief in resurrection.
Nowadays, the phoenix is much less important to us than it was to the Egyptians. But the logo of modern fire insurance companies, which employ the phoenix as one of their symbols, refers that in one sense the idea of it remains. According to the passage, the phoenix _________ .
| A．is a handsome and eagle-like bird living in Arab |
| B．used to be seen when the Egyptians held religious activities |
| C．has never really existed in the world |
| D．is the king of all kinds of birds |
The reason why birds stand above flames is probably that _________ .
| A．the phoenix used to do so | B．they may get rid of the mites |
| C．they want to burn their feather | D．they can heat themselves |
Which of the following statements is NOT correct?
| A．The ancient Egyptians worshiped the phoenix. |
| B．The scientists have discovered why birds are attracted by fire. |
| C．The modern people still favor the idea of the phoenix. |
| D．The mythical tales about the phoenix were based on facts. |
Which of the following is closest to the underlined word “resurrection” in the 3rd paragraph?
| A．living forever | B．offering warmth |
| C．coming back to life | D．staying healthy |
What does the phoenix probably mean in the logo of a fire insurance company?
| A．Our company can protect you from being harmed by fire. |
| B．If your property is destroyed by fire, we will help you build it up again. |
| C．Our company will always be energetic and wealthy. |
| D．If needed, we will save you at the risk of losing lives. |
Zheng Pengyu: Interest is the best teacher. Classrooms that weren’t fixed could give students the chance to explore their interests. At the same time, they would be able to learn on their own because they would have to make their own decisions. All in all, the new system would be a good chance to inspire students’ passion for studying.
Sun Yao: Despite its benefits, I’m worried about whether the new system would work. Going to different classrooms would take up a big part of our break time and we would have less time to relax after class. Also, not all schools could offer so many diversified classes.
Shi Zhenghan: I support students learning in different classes. It would solve the problem of some students thinking the classes are too easy while some think they are too difficult. Teachers could also teach more effectively. What’s more, friendships built while in different classes might be a pleasant surprise.
Zhou Qingqing: In my opinion, studying in different classrooms might affect students’ psychological (心理的) development. They might find it difficult to develop deep and strong friendships with other students if they had to change classrooms constantly. They would also lose their sense of belonging to a certain class.
Hu Qile: I applaud the idea. It would help teachers set up special teaching plans for different classes. For students, making choices by themselves could encourage them to be responsible. Changing classrooms could also help relive the boredom of doing the same dull routine (惯例) every day.
Wang Xiaoqian: The new system might help with students’ individual development, but I still prefer the current system. Studying in one fixed classroom, students with different academic levels can help each other. Spending your senior middle school years with the same classmates is an unforgettable experience.According to Sun Yao, which of the following sentences is TRUE?
| A．The new system will work if great measures are taken. |
| B．All the schools can’t afford so many diversified classes. |
| C．Students will have more time to relax. |
| D．He supports the system because of its benefits. |
Sun Yao holds a(n) _____ attitude towards the new system.
| A．optimistic | B．doubtful | C．negative | D．neutral |
What is the passage about?
| A．Schools should offer diversified classes to students. |
| B．Students find it difficult to develop friendship. |
| C．Different opinions about changing classroom. |
| D．Changing classroom can help with students’ individual development. |
Which of the following can best replace the word “applaud” in paragraph 5?
| A．hate | B．oppose | C．favor | D．Benefit |
Sometimes it is difficult to talk to taxi drivers. They must give all their attention to the road as they work out the shortest way to the place where you are going. However, passengers from Wangfujing were in surprise when they took a taxi. The driver just would not stop talking ―in English.
Organized by the Cultural and Education Section of the British Embassy, “Dare to Speak” examines if Chinese people will speak English in “real-life” situations. Matthew Knowles, an acting student from South Carolina at Beijing Film Academy, acted the part as the “driver”. He collected six passengers on Saturday morning, most of whom were female white-collar workers.
“Of course they were surprised at first, wondering why I’m driving a taxi, and wondering whether this is a real taxi, but then most of them were pretty willing to speak,” he said. Knowles said he was also surprised by his “passengers”. “Apart from my first ‘passenger’, who could speak very little English, all the rest spoke English very well, and it was fun to communicate with them,” he said, adding that some “passengers” were quite talkative.
The “foreign taxi driver” project was just one of the “Dare to Speak” activities, which have been going on since the end of October. Other projects included a foreign store owner near a high school in Beijing, a cook in a Shanghai university canteen. They were testing the willingness of Chinese people, especially students and white-collar workers, to speak to foreigners in English. Rong Xin, senior manager of IELTS (雅思) with the British Embassy, said they hoped to let IELTS takers in China know that communication is the most important goal of IELTS.
“We hope that more and more IELTS takers in China can realize the importance of communicating in English in real life, instead of just getting high test scores,” she said. Why did Matthew Knowles drive a taxi?
| A．He enjoyed chatting with people in English. |
| B．He played the role of a taxi driver in a film. |
| C．He took part in the project “Dare to speak” |
| D．He wanted to improve his Chinese while driving. |
The Chinese may meet and talk to _______ in “Dare to speak” projects.
| A．a white-collar worker |
| B．a high school student |
| C．a restaurant manager |
| D．a foreign store owner |
The purpose of the project “Dare to Speak” is to _______ .
| A．draw Chinese people’s attention to IELTS |
| B．remind language learners of the goal of learning |
| C．attract more foreigners to start business in China |
| D．give more chances for English learners in China |
Can you believe your eyes? A recent experiment suggests that the answer to that question may depend on your age.
Martin Doherty, a psychologist at the University of Stirling in Scotland, led the team of scientists. In this experiment, Doherty and his team tested the perception(观察力) of some people, using pictures of some orange circles. The researchers showed the same pictures to two groups of people. The first group included 151 children aged 4 to 10, and the second group included 24 adults aged 18 to 25.
The first group of pictures showed two circles alone on a white background. One of the circles was larger than the other, and these people were asked to identify the larger one. Four-year-olds identified the correct circle 79 percent of the time. Adults identified the correct circle 95 percent of the time.
Next, both groups were shown a picture where the orange circles, again of different sizes, were surrounded by gray circles. Here's where the trick lies in. In some of the pictures, the smaller orange circle was surrounded by even smaller gray circles —making the orange circle appear larger than the other orange circle, which was the real larger one. And the larger orange circle was surrounded by even bigger gray circles—so it appeared to be smaller than the real smaller orange circle.
When young children aged 4 to 6 looked at these tricky pictures, they weren't fooled—they were still able to find the bigger circle with roughly the same accuracy(准确性) as before. Older children and adults, on the other hand, did not do as well. Older children often identified the smaller circle as the larger one, and adults got it wrong most of the time.
As children get older, Doherty said, their brains may develop the ability to identify visual context. In other words, they will begin to process the whole picture at once: the tricky gray circles, as well as the orange circle in the middle. As a result, they're more likely to fall for this kind of visual trick.Doherty and his team of scientists did an experiment to evaluate_____________.
| A．children's and adults' eye-sight |
| B．people's ability to see accurately |
| C．children's and adults' brains |
| D．the influence of people's age |
When asked to find the larger circle,_____________.
| A．children at 6 got it wrong 79 % of the time with no gray ones around |
| B．only adults over 18 got it right 95% of the time with gray ones around |
| C．children at 4 got it right about 79 % of the time with gray ones around |
| D．adults got it right most of the time with gray ones around |
According to the passage, we can know that_____________.
| A．a smaller orange circle appears bigger on a white background |
| B．an orange circle appears bigger than a gray one of the same size |
| C．a circle surrounded by other circles looks bigger than its real size |
| D．a circle surrounded by bigger ones looks smaller than its real size |
Why are younger children not fooled?_____________.
| A．Because their brain can hardly notice related things together. |
| B．Because older people are influenced by their experience. |
| C．Because people's eyes become weaker as they grow older. |
| D．Because they are smarter than older children and adults. |
American culture is unique because it is formed and developed under certain conditions. The major factors contributing to the making of this new nation and the forming of a new culture are the hard environment, ethnic diversity (多样性；差异) and plural religion, which is quite different from other nations in the world. What is more, these elements are still influencing the American culture.
The early immigrants（移民）who were English Puritans settled down in northeast part of America from 1607 to 1892. Frontiers were pushed further west. The frontiersmen looked for a land of rich resources and a land of promise, opportunity and freedom. Actually they looked for a better life. So individualism(个人主义), self-reliance, and equality of opportunity have perhaps been the values most closely associated with the frontier heritage（遗产）of America.
In history, people from different countries in the world rushed to America three times. They brought their own culture to America and later on, different cultures were mixed together. Thus the unique American culture was formed, a common cultural life with commonly shared values.
The fundamental American belief in individual freedom and the fight of individuals to practice their own religion is at the center of religious experience in the United States. The great diversity of ethnic backgrounds has produced religious pluralism(多元化); almost all of the religions of the world are now practiced in the United States.
Nowadays, we can see the continual influence of the three elements in the current American society. American family is typically parents and their unmarried children. Middle-aged and elderly people generally do not live with their married children. The people in America have a very strong desire to start a new life in a new place. Quite a number of people change residences every year. The average American moves fourteen times in his lifetime. We can learn from this article that ________.
| A．the population of the United States includes a large variety of ethnic groups |
| B．the early immigrants brought about the unique American culture |
| C．people in the world once rushed to America because of its unique culture |
| D．the American family members don't get along well with each other |
What's the author's attitude towards American culture?
| A．He is critical of it. |
| B．He admires it very much. |
| C．He just states the facts. |
| D．He looks down upon it. |
The last paragraph is about________.
| A．the family structure in American society |
| B．the influence of the three elements in the current American society |
| C．the new life style of American family |
| D．the reason why American people like to change residences |
What might be the most suitable title of this article?
| A．The Immigrants in America |
| B．Why American Culture Is Unique |
| C．The Influence of American Culture |
| D．Plural Religion and American Culture |
You're in a department store and you see a couple of attractive young women looking at a sweater. You listen to their conversation:
"I can't believe it-----a Lorenzo Bertolla! 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 deceptive (骗人的), but marketing executive Jonathan Ressler calls it creative. "Look at traditional advertising. Its effectiveness is decreasing." However, one might ask what exactly is "real" of young women pretending to be enthusiastic about a sweater? Advertising executives would say it's no less real than an ad. The difference is that you know an ad is trying to persuade you to buy something. You don' t know when 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．decide on buying the sweater |
| C．be admired by other shoppers |
| D．be heard by people around |
Lorenzo Bertolla is _____.
| A．a very popular male singer |
| B．an advertising agency |
| C．the brand name of a sweater |
| D．a clothing company in Rome |
Which of the following can be inferred from the passage?
| A．Traditional advertising will soon disappear in the market. |
| B．The MTV generation tend to be more easily influenced by ads. |
| C．Undercover marketing will surely be banned soon by the government. |
| D．Traditional advertising is becoming less effective because it's too direct. |
Which of the following would be the best title for the text?
| A．Two Attractive Shoppers |
| B．Lorenzo Bertolla Sweaters |
| C．Undercover Marketing |
| D．Ways of Advertising |