At five he was collecting old newspapers to make money. And when he was 15 he signed his schoolmates up to start a baby-sitting circle.
Now 20, third-year Cambridge University student, Peter Blackburn is managing director of a company with a £ 30,000 plan. And he thinks it will make more than $15,000 by next summer. He set up Peter Blackburn Ltd last year to bring out a new, color term-planner that now students all over the UK are using.
"I felt that most of the planners going around were pretty unimaginative," he says, "I believed that I could do a better job and decided to have a go".
Blackburn admits that he is putting far more effort into business than his computer studies course at university. While fellow students are out with their friends, he keeps in touch with his business office in Lancashire by movable phone. Before he set up the company he spent one holiday preparing a plan that would persuade his bank to lend him money.
"Most students work hard for a good degree because they believe that will help them get a job to support themselves," he says "I work hard at my company, because that is what will support me next year, after I leave college."
Friends believe that Blackburn will make £ 1 million within 5 years. He is not quite so sure, however. "There's a lot to be done yet," he says.
Choose the right order of the facts given in the passage.
a. He spent his holiday preparing a plan. b. He collected newspapers.
c. He set up his own company. d. He asked the bank for money.
e. He set up a babysitting circle.
| A．e, b, c, a, d | B．b, e, a, d, c |
| C．b, e, d, a, c | D．b, e, c, a, d |
When he was quite young, Blackburn _______ .
| A．already made a lot of money | B．already had a business brain |
| C．was already managing director of a company | D．already set up his own business |
The underlined expression in the fourth paragraph "have a go," here means _______ .
| A．give up this job and have a new one | B．leave the company |
| C．have a try | D．develop my business quickly |
In spite of（尽管） a college student, Blackburn _______ .
| A．spends more time on his business than on his studies course |
| B．keeps in touch with his business office by movable phone |
| C．seldom goes out with his friends |
| D．often spends whole holiday preparing business plan |
Which of the following best explain why Blackburn works hard at his company?
| A．He wants to do more business practice before he leaves college. |
| B．He wants to make more money before he leaves college. |
| C．He wants to get a good job like most students after he leaves the college. |
| D．he depends on the company for his living in the future. |
An environmental group called the Food Commission is unhappy and disappointed because of the sales of bottled water from Japan. The water, it angrily argues in public, has traveled 10,000 “food miles” before it reached Western customers. Transporting water halfway across the world is surely the extremely stupid use of fuel when there is plenty of water in the UK. It is also worrying that we were wasting our fuel by buying prawns from Indonesia (7,000 food miles ) and carrots from South Africa (5,900 food miles).
Counting the number of miles traveled done by a product is a strange way of trying to tell the true situation of the environmental damage due to industry. Most food is transported around the world on container ships that are extremely energy efficient. It should be noticed that a ton of butter transported 25 miles in a truck to a farmers’ market doesn’t necessarily use less fuel on its journey than a similar product transported hundreds of miles by sea. Besides, the idea of “food miles” ignores the amount of fuel used in the production. It is possible to cut down your food miles by buying tomatoes grown in Britain rather than those grown in Ghana. The difference is that the British ones will have been raised in heated greenhouse and the Ghanaian ones in the open sun.
What is the idea of “food miles” does provide, however, is the chance to cut out Third World countries from First World food markets. The number of miles traveled by our food should, as I see it, be regarded as a sign of the success of the global trade system, not a sign of damage to the environment.The Food Commission is angry because it thinks that ________.
| A．UK wastes a lot of money importing food products |
| B．some imported goods causes environmental damage |
| C．growing certain vegetables causes environmental damage |
| D．people wasted energy buying food from other countries |
The phrase “food miles” in the passage refers to the distance ________.
| A．that a food product travels to a market |
| B．that a food product travels from one market to another |
| C．between UK and other food producing countries |
| D．between a Third World country and a First World food market |
By comparing tomatoes raised in Britain and in Ghana, the author tries to explain that ________.
| A．British tomatoes are healthier than Ghanaian ones |
| B．Ghanaian tomatoes taste better than tomatoes ones |
| C．cutting down food miles may not necessarily save fuel |
| D．protecting the environment may cost a lot of money |
From the passage we know that the author is most probably ________.
| A．a supporter of free global trade |
| B．a member of a Food Commission |
| C．a supporter of First World food markets |
| D．a member of an energy development group |
You choose to be a winner!
The Winners Club is a bank account specially designed for teenagers. It has been made to help you better manage your money. The Winners Club is a transaction account (交易账户)where you receive a keycard so you can get to your money 24/7—that’s 24 hours a day, 7 days a week!
It’s a club with impressive features for teenagers：
● No account keeping fees!
You’re no millionaire so we don’t expect you to pay large fees. In fact, there are no account keeping or transaction fees!
● Excellent interest rates!
You want your money to grow. The Winners Club has a good rate of interest which gets even better if you make at least two deposits (存款) without taking them out in a month.
● Convenient
Teenagers are busy — we get that. You may never need to come to a bank at all. With the Winners Club you can choose to use handy tellers and to bank from home using the phone and the Internet...You can have money directly deposited into your Winners Club account. This could be your pocket money or your pay from your part-time job!
● Mega magazine included
Along with your regular report, you will receive a FREE magazine full of good ideas to make even more of your money. There are also fantastic offers and competitions only for Winners Club members.
The Winners Club is a great choice for teenagers. And it is so easy to join. Simply fill in an application form. You will have to get permission from your parent or guardian (so we can organize that cool keycard) but it is easy. We can’t wait to hear from you. It’s the best way to choose to be a winner!The Winners Club is a bank account aimed for ________.
| A．parents | B．teenagers | C．winners | D．adults |
The Winners Club provides magazines which ________.
| A．encourage spending |
| B．are free to all teenagers |
| C．are full of adventure stories |
| D．help to make more of your money |
If you want to be a member of the Club, you must ________.
| A．be an Internet user |
| B．be permitted by your parent |
| C．have a big sum of money |
| D．be in your twenties |
What is the purpose of this text?
| A．To set up a club. |
| B．To provide part-time jobs. |
| C．To organize keycards. |
| D．To introduce a new banking service. |
Television has turned 88 years old on September 7, 2015, and it has never looked better. In its youth, television was a piece of furniture with a tiny, round screen showing unclear pictures of low-budget programs. In spite of its shortcomings, it became popular. Between 1950 and 1963, the number of American families with a television jumped from 9% to 92% of the population.
As the audience got larger, the technology got better. Television sets became more reliable through the 1960s. The reception (接收效果) improved. The picture improved. The major networks started broadcasting programs in color.
Even greater improvements were coming according to Sanford Brown, who wrote an article for the Post in 1967. Surprisingly, just about every prediction he made in the article became a reality. For example: All sets in the not-distant future will be color instruments. He also predicted that TV sets would become smaller, simpler, more reliable and less expensive and may forever put the TV repairman out of work. Smaller sets do not, of course, mean smaller screens. TV engineers expect screens to get much bigger. However, today’s 3-D TV is even farther away, if it’s coming at all. There is some doubt whether the public would be eager to pay for it, in view of people’s cold reception given to 3-D movies.
But the technology with the greatest potential, according to Brown, was cable television (有线电视), which was still in its early stages then. As he predicted, the future of cable television was highly interactive (互动的). It wasn’t cable television that gave Americans their electronic connection to the world, however. It was the Internet. He even foresaw the future office: using picture phones, big-screen televisions for conferences, and computers providing information at the touch of a button.
Brown ever said, “The future of television is no longer a question of what we can invent. It’s a question of what we want.” What can we infer about television sets in the 1960s?
| A．They were very popular with Americans. |
| B．The reception showed no improvement. |
| C．They showed black-and-white pictures. |
| D．They were out of order now and then. |
Which of the followings did Sanford Brown fail to predict?
| A．Television’s good quality. |
| B．The invention of 3-D TV. |
| C．The future office’s model. |
| D．The potential of cable TV. |
What is the text mainly about?
| A．The shortcomings of television. |
| B．The bright future of television. |
| C．The development of television. |
| D．The invention of television. |
My 17-year-old daughter went off to college and having her away from home brought back memories of watching Peter Pan when she was little. In the classic TV production, one scene in particular impressed me: when Mrs. Darling puts her children into bed. As she turns off the last of the night light, she takes one last look at the bedroom and says, “Dear night lights, protect my sleeping children.” As a mother, I know how much she loves her children.
It has been several weeks since we took our daughter to college and she seems to be adjusting well after a short period of homesickness. For us, though, it’s another story. Like most parents, I love checking in on my children at night. But now she’s gone, and I find nighttimes the hardest. I miss her most at night.
In my neighborhood, most of the parents whose kids are off to college are dealing with similar melancholy. My husband is filled with anxiety. One friend talked about getting this sick feeling in her stomach as she prepared for the college drop-off. We complained that many of us were too busy to truly enjoy being with our children while we had them.
For us moms, seeing Toy Story 3 only made the sadness worse as we watched the character Andy, who is the same age as our kids, say goodbye to his childhood as he prepares to leave for college. And it’s not just “first-time” parents like me. Two moms who have kids already well into college said the separation didn’t get any easier. “You feel like something has been taken away from inside you，” said one of them.
I imagine things will get easier with time, especially as I see my daughter adjust to college life. Meanwhile, as I keep my cell phone close to me in bed and text my daughter goodnight and sweet dreams every night, I like to think at messages serve as a night light that keeps her safe.The writer was deeply impressed by the scene in Peter Pan because ________.
| A．she watched the scene with her daughter |
| B．the scene was very exciting and interesting |
| C．the scene taught her and her daughter a good lesson |
| D．the scene showed a mother’s deep love for her children |
After her daughter went to college, the writer ________.
| A．didn’t get used to the change for a long time |
| B．often cried as she missed her daughter so much |
| C．realized she hadn’t done enough for her daughter |
| D．failed to have a good sleep every night |
What is the underlined word “melancholy” in Paragraph 3 similar in meaning to?
| A．Happiness. | B．Anger. |
| C．Sadness. | D．Excitement. |
According to the last paragraph, why did the writer keep her cell phone close to her in bed?
| A．To call her daughter any time. |
| B．To wait for her daughter’s calls. |
| C．To say good night to her daughter. |
| D．To wait for her daughter’s messages. |
Having a great collection of books at home doesn’t really mean that you are a person who has a passion for literature and reading. It can be a family inheritance（继承） or it can be just to impress people around you about the fact that you are a person of culture. On the other hand, there are many persons who cannot afford to buy books, because some of them are quite expensive, but they usually go to libraries and spend hours reading something that interests them a lot, or just borrow books to read at home.
From my point of view, literature is very important in our lives from several points of view. For example, reading is a means of gaining culture and enriching our knowledge in different areas of activities. It can help us have a great imagination and it makes things easier when it comes to making compositions on different themes. It gives you the possibility to speak about science, even if you don’t work in this field, or you can express your opinion about a political aspect, just because you have read something connected to that.
Secondly, literature offers us the possibility to enter the world of imagination, and to leave apart the real one for a couple of hours. We come to meet kings and queens many years ago, dream in the world of the rich or imagine how life will be in the future. Sometimes, we identify ourselves with the characters in the stories we read and they can give us some clues to solve our problems and how to react in certain circumstances.
To conclude, I would like to say that literature is the perfect means to enrich our culture, to express correctly and have a rich vocabulary, to be able to interfere（干涉） in conversations in different fields of interest and to really be considered an erudite person.The people who are fond of literature are those that _________.
| A．go to libraries on weekends |
| B．buy expensive books in the bookstore |
| C．keep many books in their studies |
| D．have much interest in reading |
We can learn from the third paragraph that _________.
| A．we can bring kings and queens back to life |
| B．what we read can be useful in our daily life |
| C．it is very good for us to stay alone for some hours |
| D．we can make friends with the people in the stories |
The underlined word “erudite” in the last paragraph probably means_________.
| A．hard-working | B．enthusiastic |
| C．learned | D．creative |
What is the author’s purpose in writing the passage？
| A．To advise readers to like reading. |
| B．To explain the true meaning of reading. |
| C．To tell readers how to read a book. |
| D．To tell readers who has the real passion for literature. |