The Winter Olympics proved no match for television's gold-medal winner, "American Idol". Fox's unbelievable successful contest crashed the Olympics in head-to-head competition on Tuesday night, 27 million viewers to 16.1 million, according to Nielsen Media Research.
The Olympics recovered a bit after "Idol" went off the air, but its overall audience of 18.6 million was the least-watched winter Olympics telecast since Nagano's closing ceremonies in 1998, Nielsen said.
Since its opening on Friday, the Turin games have been running well below the 2002 Salt Lake City games in viewership interest. Much of that was expected, but Tuesday's rating was the first alarming sign for NBC that increased TV competition has taken a toll.
"The competition from 'Idol' is heavier than the Olympics has ever seen," said NBC Sports spokeswoman Alana Russo.
It doesn't figure to get any easier, with "Idol" and ABC's "Lost" on the air Wednesday. CBS' "Survivor" and "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" offer more competition on Thursday.
Even figure skating, the most popular winter Olympics sport for viewers, didn't help much on Tuesday. NBC filled about two-thirds of the hour during which it competed with "American Idol" with tape of the men's figure-skating competition.
Through five nights of Olympics coverage, NBC's average prime time rating is 12.7 ( a rating point represents 1,102, 000 households, or 1 percent of the nation's estimated 110.2 million TV homes). NBC said before the games started that it had promised its advertisers a rating of between 12 and 14. If it slips below that, NBC will have to make it up to advertisers with free commercial time.
" ‘American Idol' is clearly a phenomenon," said Randy Falco, president of the NBC Universal Television Group. "But we expected it and are tracking fight where we planned to be at this point." Between NBC and its networks, about 65 percent of the nation's television homes have tuned in at least some of the games.How many viewers watched the Winter Olympics on Tuesday night?
| A．110.2 million | B．12.7 million |
| C．27million | D．16.1million |
What did NBC do on Tuesday night to attract more viewers?
| A．To ask the "idol" to go off the air. |
| B．To play the tapes of men's figure skating. |
| C．To add "Survivor" to its program. |
| D．To do more advertising. |
If the rating slips below 12, NBC will .
| A．do more advertising for nothing |
| B．stop running normally |
| C．never cover the Olympics |
| D．pay extra money for advertisers |
What does the underlined word "taken a toll" mean?
| A．paid off. | B．caused loss. | C．broken out. | D．picked up. |
Ali is from a Middle Eastern country. He now stays in the USA. He smokes a lot of cigarettes (香烟) every day. He has smoked for nine years. Ali says, “ I tried to quit (放弃) smoking in my hometown, but it was impossible. My brothers smoke. All my friends smoke. At parties and at meetings, almost all the men smoke. Here in the United States, not as many people smoke. It will be easier to change my habit here.”
Many smokers are like Ali: they want to stop smoking. The smokers know that smoking is bad for their health. They know it can cause cancer and heart disease. But it is difficult for them to give up smoking because cigarettes have a drug in them. The drug is nicotine (尼古丁). People who smoke a lot need nicotine.
When a person first begins to smoke, he usually feels terrible. The nicotine makes him sick. In a few days, the smoker’s body is used to the nicotine, and he feels fine. Later, the smoker needs nicotine to keep feeling fine. Without nicotine, he feels bad.
It is very hard to quit smoking, and many people who quit will soon smoke again. At a party or at work they will decide to smoke “just one” cigarette. Then they will smoke another cigarette, and another. Soon they become smokers again. Maybe there is only one easy way to quit smoking: never start.Many smokers want to stop smoking because they ______.
| A．want to go to parties |
| B．can’t smoke at work |
| C．know that smoking is bad for their health. |
| D．need nicotine and drugs |
For some people，it is difficult to give up smoking because
| A．cigarettes have a nicotine (尼古丁)in them |
| B．they don’t want to give up. |
| C．The nicotine makes them sick. |
| D．They needs nicotine to keep feeling fine. |
By writing this text, the writer hopes that people will ______.
| A．stay in their hometown | B．never start smoking |
| C．eat less and smoke more | D．not live in the United States |
Studies show that children who eat breakfast do better in school. It doesn’t take much further thought to know that adults will feel better and do better at work as well. Whether you work at home, on the farm, at the office, at school, or on the road, it is not a good idea to have no breakfast.
If we have no breakfast, we are likely to become tired when our brains and bodies run low on fuel (食物). By mid-morning, a lot of us grab a cup of coffee or eat a sugary candy bar to wake up again. This might work for a few minutes, but by lunch time we are hungry. Eating a good breakfast sets the tone for the rest of the day.
Having no breakfast is a popular way to lose weight, but not a smart one. Many people believe that they will lose weight if they have no meals, but that just isn’t true; the body expects to be refueled a few times a day, starting with a healthy breakfast. Eating breakfast is good for losing weight. In fact, people who eat breakfast are more likely to keep a healthy weight.
A healthy breakfast should have some protein (蛋白质) and some fiber (纤维). Protein can come from low fat meats, eggs, or beans. Fiber can be found in whole grains, vegetables and fruits. A good example of a healthy breakfast might be something simple like a hard boiled egg, an orange, and a bowl of whole grain cereal with low fat milk. Stay away from sugary foods and white bread because they are digested (消化) quickly and will leave you hungry and tired in several hours. Protein and fiber will keep you feeling full until lunch time.The first paragraph mainly tells us that ______.
| A．it is necessary to have a good breakfast every day |
| B．many adults are too busy to have breakfast every day |
| C．many adults go to work without having breakfast |
| D．many children go to school without breakfast |
According to the passage, we feel tired at work probably because ______.
| A．we need to have a cup of coffee |
| B．we don’t have a good breakfast |
| C．our brains don’t work any longer |
| D．we don’t have enough sleep at night |
What does the underlined sentence in Paragraph 2 mean?
| A．Having a good breakfast can help you to finish your work. |
| B．Eating a good breakfast is enough for the whole day. |
| C．Breakfast is really the most important meal in a day. |
| D．You will be happier if you have a good breakfast. |
We can learn from the last paragraph that ______.
| A．it is healthy only to have beans and eggs for your breakfast |
| B．you mustn’t have meat for your breakfast |
| C．you should eat sugary foods if you feel hungry |
| D．you should eat something which has protein and fiber for breakfast |
At a meeting, a well-known speaker lifted up a bill of 20 dollars before starting his speech.
Facing 200 people, he asked, “Who wants this 20-dollar bill?” A great many hands were put up. Then he continued to say, “I intended to give it to any one of you, but allow me to do a thing before giving it to you.” Suddenly he crumpled （揉）it into a round mass. Then he asked, “Who wants it?” Still some hands were lifted up.
He asked again, “Well, how could it be if I do it like this?” he threw the bill onto the ground, stepped on it and twisted it. As he picked it up, the bill had become not only dirty but wrinkled.
“Who still wants it?” Still a few people put up their hands.
“My dear friends, you have had a meaningful class. No matter how I treated this bill, you still want it, because it is worth 20 dollars. On your life road, you may be knocked down（击垮） or even broken into pieces by your determination or unfavorable situations. We may feel ourselves worth nothing, but, my darling, remember that whatever happens in the future, you should never lose your value（价值） in the God’s heart. You’re particular ---- never forget it.”How many times did the speaker ask the people whether they wanted the bill?
| A．Once | B．Twice |
| C．Three times | D．Four times |
The underlined word “wrinkled” in the third paragraph probably means ________.
| A．broken | B．having small lines or folds in it |
| C．flat | D．having holes on it |
The speaker did this test in order to _____________.
| A．tell the audience that one should never lose one’s own value |
| B．tell the audience that gold values money most |
| C．test if some of the audience were extremely interested in money |
| D．play a trick on the audience |
What would the speaker probably talk about next?
| A．How money can make people crazy. |
| B．How to avoid being knocked down in one’s life. |
| C．How to keep one’s value of life. |
| D．How to give a meaningful class |
I hate nosy (爱管闲事的) neighbors and it’s very unlucky that I had one for myself. They moved in a couple of months back and although I never felt that they were a strange family, I’ve always hated the way they get “too close” to me, my house, my garden, and even my garbage cans(垃圾桶).
One day, my neighbors were mowing their lawn (草坪). My garbage cans are near their lawn. For some strange reason, I found the wife looking through my garbage cans. I felt angry but since they were from a different culture, I thought that maybe it was “normal” from their ideas.
That afternoon, the couple knocked on my front door. When I opened, they gave me a plastic bag. Inside were my old daily bills, credit cards and bank statements, and an old birthday card that my old uncle sent. They said that they were returning them to me because these documents contained very private information that may be used by others.
I’ve heard it before. I asked them how those documents can be used by others and they started telling me their very own experience, which forced them to leave their home and move next door to us. The wife told me that she never destroyed the bills. They also had a “nosy neighbor” who looked through their garbage cans which they actually thought was pretty strange. Little did they know that this “nosy neighbor” was collecting their personal information from their rubbish. Then all their money was taken out from the bank by their neighbor.
It was a very painful experience for all of them and they wanted to leave them all behind so they left. I was very thankful. They were not nosy neighbors. They simply didn’t want us to experience the same thing that they did.What made the author angry?
| A．His neighbor’s wife was looking through his rubbish. |
| B．His neighbors were mowing their lawn one morning. |
| C．His neighbors got too close to his own home. |
| D．His neighbors came to knock at his door at night. |
Why did the couple come to the author’s home?
| A．To introduce themselves to the author. |
| B．To get to know each other better. |
| C．To return the documents to the author. |
| D．To borrow some money from the author. |
The neighbors came to live next door to the author because .
| A．they no longer had money to live in their former home |
| B．they didn’t want to live in such a noisy home as before |
| C．their personal documents were used by their former neighbor |
| D．they thought the author was much better than their former neighbor |
Which of the following can we infer from the last paragraph?
| A．The author was kind and helpful to the neighbors. |
| B．The neighbors had to move from place to place. |
| C．The neighbors didn’t have enough money. |
| D．The author changed his idea about his neighbors. |
How to describe the rising philosophy of the day ? I’d say it is data-ism . We now have the ability to gather huge amounts of data . This ability seems to carry with it certain cultural assumptions—that everything that can be measured should be measured ; that data is a transparent and reliable lens that allows us to filter out emotionalism and ideology ; that data will help us do remarkable things—like foretell the future . At the outset let me celebrate two things data does really well .
First , it’s really good at exposing when our intuitive（直觉的）view of reality is wrong . For example , nearly every person who runs for political office has an intuitive sense that they can powerfully influence their odds of winning the election if they can just raise and spend more money . But this is largely wrong .
After the 2006 election , Sean Trende constructed a graph comparing the incumbent（在任的）campaign spending advantages with their eventual victory . There was barely any relationship between more spending and a bigger victory .
Likewise , many teachers have an intuitive sense that different students have different learning styles : some are verbal and some are visual , some focus on details and some on whole . Teachers imagine they will improve outcomes if they tailor their presentations to each student . But there’s no evidence to support this either .
Second , data can clarify patterns of behavior we haven’t yet noticed . For example , I’ve always assumed people who frequently use words like “ I , ” “ me , ” and “ mine ” are probably more self-centered than people who don’t . But as James Pennebaker of the University of Texas notes in his book , The Secret Life of Pronouns , when people are feeling confident , they are focused on the task at hand , not on themselves . High-status , confident people use fewer “ I ” words , not more .
In sum , the data revolution is giving us wonderful ways to understand the present and the past . Will it transform our ability to predict and make decisions about the future ? We’ll see .What do people running for political office think they can do ?
| A．Use data analysis to predict the election result . |
| B．Win the election if they can raise enough funds . |
| C．Manipulate public opinion with favorable data . |
| D．Increase the chances of winning by foul means . |
Why do many teachers favor the idea of tailoring their presentations to different students ?
| A．They think students prefer flexible teaching methods . |
| B．They will be able to try different approaches . |
| C．They believe students learning styles vary . |
| D．They can accommodate students with special needs . |
What does James Pennebaker reveal in The Secret Life of Pronouns ?
| A．The importance of using pronouns properly . |
| B．Repeated use of first-person pronouns by self-centered people . |
| C．Frequent use of pronouns and future tense by young people . |
| D．A pattern in confident people’s use of pronouns . |
Why is the author skeptical of the data revolution ?
| A．Data may not be easily accessible . |
| B．Errors may occur with large data samples . |
| C．Data cannot always do what we imagine it can . |
| D．Some data may turn out to be outdated . |