A growing number of workers at Google Inc., Facebook Inc. and other employers are trading in their sit-down desks for standing ones, saying they feel more comfortable and energized. They also are motivated by medical reports saying that sitting for too long leads to increased health risks.
A standing desk sits high off the floor so a worker can either stand at it or sit on a high stool to use it. Officials at Palo Alto-based Facebook say a number of employees asked about standing desks after news articles were published about the health risks of sitting all day.
The stories cited medical studies that tied excessive sitting to increased obesity and other health problems because of factors including a drop in physical activity. A 2010 study by the American Cancer Society found that women who sat more than six hours a day were 37% more likely to die prematurely than women who sat for less than three hours, while the early-death rate for men was 18% higher. The American College of Cardiology released a study in January that found increased mortality (死亡率) among people who sat longer at home than those who didn't.
No one seems to compile statistics on the standing-desk trend. But anecdotal reports suggest Silicon Valley is embracing the movement.
Facebook officials say they have seen an upsurge in requests for standing desks to five to eight a week with a total of between 200 and 250 deployed (配置) at the company of more than 2,000 employees. Facebook also is trying out a treadmill station ─ where a worker can walk or run on a treadmill while tapping at a computer.
Google spokesman Jordan Newman said that 'many employees at Google opt for standing desks, and we offer them as part of our wellness program' though he said he didn't know the exact number.
Greg Hoy, 39 years old, asked for a standing desk shortly after joining Facebook seven months ago as a design recruiter. 'I don't get the 3 o'clock slump anymore,' he said. 'I feel active all day long.'The underlined word “motivated” in paragraph 1 can be replaced by .
| A．frightened | B．inspired | C．missed | D．discouraged |
According to paragraph 3, we can know that .
| A．a drop in physical activity was the only reason why excessive sitting caused increased obesity. |
| B．women who sat longer were more likely to die prematurely according to a 2010 study by American College of Cardiology |
| C．according to the study, the early-death rate for men was 18% higher than that for women. |
| D．the mortality among people who didn’t sat long at home was lower than that among people who did. |
According to paragraph 5, which of the following statements is true about a treadmill station ?
| A．is a computer that a worker can take along when he walks or runs |
| B．has been tried out by Facebook and now is very popular with other companies |
| C．is a place where workers can exercise while working. |
| D．is a treadmill on which workers can run or walk only after work |
The passage mainly talks about .
| A．sitting for too long leads to increased health risks |
| B．standing desks have replaced sit-down ones in Facebook Inc. |
| C．more and more workers choose standing desks instead of sit-down ones |
| D．many employees at Google opt for standing desks |
I suddenly heard an elephant crying as though frightened．Looking down，I immediately recognized that something was wrong，and ran down to the edge of the near bank．There I saw Ma Shwe with her three-month-old calf(young elephant)struggling in the fast-rising water，and it was a life-and-death struggle．Her calf was floating and screaming with fear．Ma Shwe was as near to the far bank as she could get，holding her whole body against the rushing water，and keeping the calf pressed against her huge body．Every now and then the rushing water would sweep the calf away.
There was a sudden rise in the water and the calf was washed clean over the mother’s body and was gone ．Ma Shwe turned quickly to reach it and pressed the calf with her head and trunk(象鼻)against the rocky bank．Then with a huge effort，she picked it up in her trunk and tried until she was able to place it on a narrow shelf of rock．
Just at this moment．she fell back into the river．If she were carried down, it would be certain death．I knew，as well as she did，that there was one spot where she could get up the bank，but it was on the other side from where she had put her calf．While I was wondering what I could do next，I heard the sound of a mother’s love．Ma Shwe had crossed the river and got up the bank and was making her way back as fast as she could，roaring(吼叫)all the time，but to her calf it was music.
64．The moment the author got down to the river bank he saw．
A．the calf was about to fall into the river
B．Ma Shwe was placing the calf on the rock
C．the calf was washed away by the rising water
D．Ma Shwe was holding the calf against the rushing water
65．How did Ma Shwe manage to save her calf from the fast-flowing water?
A．By pressing it against her body．
B．By putting it on a safe spot．
C．By taking it away with her．
D．By carrying it on her back．
66．How did the calf feel about the mother elephant's roaring?
A．It was a great comfort. B．It was a sign of danger．
C．It was a call for help． D．It was a musical note．
67．What could be the best title for the text?
A．A Brave Act B．A Mother's Love
C．A Deadly River D．A Matter of Life and Death
When Li Jinyu went back from Brazil after years of hard training, he seemed to see a new starting point in front of him. Li, a key player of Jian Li Bao Football Team, has a round and lovely face. When talking to people, he often says, “I’ve got a lot of dreams, and the biggest one is to help to develop our national football.”
Li began to play football 17 years ago. In 1985 a football coach was looking for little players in a school. Li tried to win the coach’s favor. His father, a football fan, asked the coach to give his son another chance to have a test. This time, the coach agreed to take Li as a player. Every day, his father would take him to the training school, and carry him back when the training was over, whether it was raining or shining. With the help of his coach, Li quickly grew into a good young player. He is said to have the sharpest mind on the playground among all Chinese football players.
The only child of the family as he is, Li loves his parents as much as they love him. During the spare time of the training course or after a game, he has often called home to ask after his parents.
Li also enjoys good relations with his fans. He has received many letters from across the country, but he said he felt sorry because he could not answer every letter. “However, I have taken good care of every letter from my fans. This is perhaps the best way to show my thanks,” he said.
Now at the age of 24, Li likes to go shopping after days of hard training on the playground. He is also interested in bowling and tennis. Dreaming of becoming a first-class player, he is now working very hard on the road to success.
60. When did Li begin to play football?
| A．At the ege of 13. | B．At the age of 7. | C．Before starting school. | D．After leaving school. |
61. We can learn from the passage that Li’s father .
has been encouraging him to play football
taught him to play football in 1985
used to be a football player
was his first coach
62. It seemed that Li after years of hard training in Brazil.
had got sharp mind on the playground
had made much greater progress
was considered as the best player
began to play football
63. Li has worked hard at football so as to .
show his thanks to his parents
keep good relations with his fans
develop our national football
play abroad
The faces of the elderly, happily-married people sometimes look like each other. Dr. Aiken studied a number of couples who had been married for at least twenty-five years. Each couple provided four photographs—one photo of each partner at the time of their marriage and another photo to remove any clues. The photos were then displayed in groups: a random（随意的）grouping of the persons at the time of their marriage and another random grouping of the same persons who took photographs later. Some judges were asked to pick out the partners. They failed totally with the first group. Their judgments were no better than chance. But with the photos taken twenty-five or more years after the marriage, the judges were quite successful at deciding who was married to whom. They were particularly successful with the most happily-married couples.
Dr. Aiken believes there are several reasons why couples grow alike. One reason has something to do with imitation. One person tends to copy or do the same as someone else without knowing it. He says human beings copy the expressions of the faces of their loved ones. Another possible reason, he says, is the common experience of the couples. There is a tendency for people who have the same life experience to change their faces in similar ways. For example, if a couple suffered a lot of sad experiences, their faces are likely to change in a similar way.
56. The main purpose of the passage is to .
tell how couples look like each other
show the life experience of husband and wife
explain why couples grow alike
describe the study on a number of married people
57. The judges failed to .
tell couples by looking at their photos taken when they got married
tell happily-married couples from sadly-married couples
discover the difference of each partner
understand Dr. Aiken’s study
58. The underlined sentence “Their judgments were .
| A．quite successful | B．based on facts | C．only by luck | D．totally wrong |
59. From the passage we can draw a conclusion that .
happily-married couples are often richer than other couples
couples who look alike can live longer
the influence between couples can be quite strong
all couples have been proved to grow alike
B
For almost two months Dominic York, a 23-year-old hairdresser, wandered about hospitals all night, wearing a white coat and pretending he was a doctor. Yesterday he proudly claimed in court that despite his complete lack of medical experience or qualifications, he had saved several people’s lives. He had even been allowed to assist a surgeon during an emergency operation on a patient who was about to die on something she had swallowed.
“I watched one of those TV dramas about a hospital and suddenly I felt like playing one of the roles myself. So I put on a white jacket and a stethoscope(听诊器)and walked around one of the biggest hospital in London. At first I just watched. Once you learn how doctors talk to patients, nurses and others doctors, it’s easy to take people in,” he said.
One of the patients he treated was Laura Kennan. She had been knocked down by a car and fainted. When she came to in hospital, York was standing over her.
“He looked very professional. He told me his name was Doctor Simon. Then he gave me some sort of injection,” she said. And then he suddenly cleared off when a nurse asked who he was. She didn’t think there was anything wrong. “I would never have realized he was a fake if a policewoman hadn’t showed me his photograph a week later. When the policewoman told me who he really was, I could hardly believe my ears.”
Judge Raymond Adams told York that he was. “ shocked and horrified” that he got away with his deceiving for so long, and then sentenced him to eighteen months in a special prison for criminal with mental disorders.
“I can only hope that this will not lead to further problems. After all, you will have considerable opportunity to study the behaviour of the psychiatrists(精神科医生)who will look after you while you are there. If you try to persuade people that you yourself are a psychiatrist after you are set free, I shall make sure that you are given a much longer sentence.” Judge Adams warned York.
5. York was proud of the fact that ___________.
A. a surgeon let him watch an operation.
B. he could perform some duties of a doctor.
C. he had cheated doctors for so long
D. people thought he could become a real doctor
6. York learned how to behave like a doctor by __________.
A. watching other doctors workB. talking to doctors and nurses
C. getting some training and experience D. observing doctors while he was a patient
7. Why was Laura Kennan in hospital?
A. She had swallowed something and almost died.
B. She had to have and emergency operation.
C. She had been injured in a road accident.
D. She had lost consciousness while driving.
8. The judge’s remark implied that York would be more severely punished if he _________.
A. pretended to be a psychiatrist B. tried to get away from prison
C. was proud of what he had done D. studied the behaviour of the psychiatrist
四．阅读理解：
A
Professor Reason recently persuaded 35 people to keep a diary of all their absent-minded actions for two weeks. When he came to analyze(分析) their embarrassing errors , he was surprised to find that nearly all of them fell into a few groups .
One of the women, for instance, on leaving her house for work one morning threw her pet dog her ear-rings and tried to fix a dog biscuit on her ear. “ The explanation for this is that the brain is like a computer, ” explains the professor, “ People programme themselves to do certain activities regularly. It was the woman’s custom every morning to throw her dog two biscuits and then put on her ear-rings. But somehow the action got reversed(颠倒) in the programme .” About one in twenty of the incidents the volunteers reported were these “ programme assembly failures.”
Twenty per cent of all errors were “ test failures ”—primarily due to not verifying the progress of what the body was doing . A man about to get his car out of the garage passed through the back yard where his garden jacket and boots were kept , put them on —much to his surprise . A woman victim reported : “ I got into the bath with my socks on .”
The commonest problem was information “ storage failures”. People forgot the names of people whose faces they knew, went into a room and forgot why they were there, mislaid something, or smoked a cigarette without realizing it.
The research so far suggests that while the “ central processor” of the brain is liberated from second-to-second control of a well-practiced routine, it must repeatedly switch back its attention at important decision points to check that the action goes on as intended. Otherwise the activity may be “ captured ” by another frequently and recently used programme, resulting in embarrassing errors.
1. The purpose of Professor Reason’s research is .
A. to show the difference between men and women in their reasoning
B. to classify and explain some errors in human actions
C. to find the causes which lead to computer failures
D. to compare computer functions with brain workings .
2. Which of the following might be grouped under “ programme assembly failures ”?
A. A woman went into a shop and forgot what to buy.
B. A man returning home after work left his key in the lock.
C. A lady fell as she was concentrating on each step her feet were taking.
D. An old man, with his shoes on, was trying to put on his socks.
3. The word “ verifying ” in paragraph 3 can be replaced by .
A. improving B. changing C. checking D. stopping
4. According to the passage, the information “ storage failures ” refer to .
A. the destruction of information collecting system
B. the elimination of one’s total memory
C. the temporary loss of part of one’s memory
D. the separation of one’s action from consciousness