Try reading the following sentences as fast as you can. “She sells seashells by the seashore. The shells she sells are surely seashells. So if she sells shells on the seashore, I’m sure she sells seashore shells.”
Not very easy, was it? What you’ve just read is called a tongue twister (绕口令). It is an exercise made up of sounds that are hard to pronounce(发音，读) in order to help people pronounce words faster and more correctly. Try the next example.
“Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled pepper. Did Peter Piper pick a peck of pickled peppers? If Pete Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, where’s the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?”
Tongue twisters usually do not have much meaning. They are just designed to improve people’s ability to pronounce words. Although they may be very difficult, these exercises are very important to people who are trying to speak English correctly. This is because tongue twisters help people to tell the differences between similar sounds.
So if you wish to pronounce words more smoothly, you’d better try picking out some tongue twisters and practicing them.
| A．listening | B．writing | C．pronunciation | D．communication |
| A．it is very boring to read | B．it teaches us a lot of knowledge |
| C．we don’t know who “she” is | D．the sounds of “s” and “sh” are similar |
| A．Story Time | B．Study Garden |
| C．Latest News | D．Lost and Found |
任务型阅读
When people want to find something on the Internet, they often say,“Let’s Google it!”It means “Let’s search for it on the Internet!”
It all began in the summer of 1995, Larry Page, 24, and Sergey Brin, 23, met at Stanford University. In their project, the two students came up with a plan to make a new search engine(引擎). They founded(成立)Google a year later. It became a company on September 7,1998.
Google is not the first search engine, but it is certainly the most successful. Google’s worldwide market share(市场占有率)was as high as 82.8 percent last year, according to Marketshare. Hitslink.com.
Before Google,search engines ranked (排名) websites simply by how many times the webpage has been visited. Page and Bin used a completely different way, by the number of other websites that linked(链接) to that site. Google helps people find the most important site that connects to their key words.
As popular as Google in the English world, in China, Baidu is the most popular and biggest search engine. It held a market share of nearly 80 percent for web search in 2012.
Baidu was started in 2000 by Li Yanhong and Xu Yong. It offers searches for website, audio, images...It also provides the largest online Chinese encyclopedia(百科全书)，Baidu Baike.
1题为判断正误（“T”表示正确，“F”表示错误）；2题完成句子；3题简略回答问题；4题找出下面句子的同义句；5题将文中画线句子译成汉语。Google is the first search engine.( )
The word “Google”has the same meaning as.
When did Larry and Sergey make Google a company?
Google is the most successful search engine, but it isn’t the first one.(找近义句)
We have known for a long time that flowers of different plants open and close at different time of day. Yet no one really understands why flowers open and close like this at particular times. It is not as simple as we might think, as new experiments have shown. In one experiment, flowers were kept in darkness. We might expect that the flowers, without any information about the time of the day, did not open as they usually do. In fact, they continued to open at their usual time. This shows that they have some mysterious (神秘的) way of knowing the time.
Their sense of time does not depend on information from the outside world; it is, so to speak, inside them, a kind of “inner clock”. This discovery may not seem to be very important. However, it was later found that not just plants but also animals including man have this “inner clock”which controls working of their bodies and their activities.
Human beings, then, are also controlled by this mysterious power. Whether we wish it or not, it affects such things in our life as our need for sleep, our need for food. And our ability to concentrate(集中).One experiment was done for finding out.
| A．when different flowers open and close |
| B．if flowers have a mysterious way of knowing the time |
| C．how flowers are used to tell the time in the darkness |
| D．why flowers open and close at particular time |
Before the experiment arrived at a conclusion, people had thought that the flowers .
| A．would never open in darkness |
| B．would change their usual time to open |
| C．would continue to open at their usual time |
| D．would open earlier than the usual time |
That flowers have the sense of time is related to.
| A．sunlight |
| B．weak light |
| C．the “inner clock” |
| D．the information from the outside world |
From the passage, we know thatdon’t have mysterious power inside.
| A．wild animals | B．human beings |
| C．all creatures(生物) | D．lifeless things |
We may know that if we make good use of the ‘inner clock’,.
| A．we will have more strength to do our work. |
| B．clocks or watches are no longer useful to us |
| C．we will be able to live as long as we wish to |
| D．human beings will need less sleep, less food or less movement |
Soon computers and other machines will be able to remember you by looking at your eyes! The program works because everyone’s eyes are different. So in the future you won’t have to remember a number when you want to use a machine or take money out of a bank. You’ll just have to look at the machine and it will be able to tell who you are.
The eye-recognition(眼睛识别) program is already being tested in shops and banks in the USA, Britain and France. Soon, this technology(技术) will change all other ways of finding out who people are.
However, scientists are working on other systems. Machines will soon be able to know you from the shape of your face or hands or even your smell! We already have machines that can tell who you are from your voice or the mark made by your fingers.
Eye-recognition is better than other kinds because your eyes don’t change as you get older, or get dirty like hands or fingers. And even twins have different eyes, so the program can be up to 94％ correct, depending on(依靠) how good the technology is. Some programs may only be right 51％ of the time. In Britain, it was found that 91％ of people who had tried it said that they liked the idea of eye-recognition.
In the future your computer will be looking at you in the eye. So smile!The eye-recognition program has already been tested inin a few countries.
| A．shops and banks |
| B．libraries and schools. |
| C．banks and schools |
| D．hospitals and hotels |
How does the eye-recognition program work?
| A．You type a number. |
| B．You look at the machine. |
| C．The machine listens to your voice. |
| D．You need to walk with the machine. |
We already have machines that can tell who you are from .
| A．your eyes or your smell |
| B．your face or your voice |
| C．your face or your foot print |
| D．your voice or the mark made by your finger |
The eye-recognition program can be up tocorrect, depending on how good the
technology is.
| A．51% | B．14% | C．94% | D．49% |
Which of the following is true?
A.Eye-recognition program has already been tested in the USA.
B.Smell-recognition will take the place of all other ways of finding out who people are.
C.51% of people like the idea of eye-recognition program.
D.Computers can remember you by looking at your clothes.
At school many things happen to us. We may feel excited when we have success in a school play. We may feel sorry if we lose an important game. We want to keep the memory for the rest of our lives.
How to keep the memory? Our English teacher, Miss Wang, has taught us a good way of remembering things to make our own yearbook. What is a yearbook? A yearbook is a kind of book which is used to keep the memory of exciting moments. It's usually made at the end of the year.
Last December, we began to make our yearbook. First we chose the persons who had done something special, then some students interviewed (采访) them, some wrote down their stories, others took photos of them. Everyone in our class had something to do. Finally our teacher helped us to put the things together. We had our first yearbook.
All of us put a lot of love into making the yearbook. It is so wonderful that not only the students but also our parents and teachers will remember the special time for ever.We may feel ______if we lose an important game.
| A．sorry | B．happy |
| C．excited | D．interested |
Who has taught us a good way of remembering things to make our own yearbook?
| A．Miss Yang. | B．Miss Huang |
| C．Mr Wang | D．Miss Wang. |
A yearbook is made to ______.
| A．take notes | B．keep the memory |
| C．do our homework | D．remember English words |
A yearbook is usually made ______.
| A．at the beginning of the year |
| B．at the middle of the term |
| C．after the first exam in a term |
| D．at the end of the year |
Finally______helped us to put the things together.
| A．our parents | B．our brothers |
| C．our teacher | D．our friends |
任务型阅读（共5小题， 每小题2分，计10分）
阅读短文，完成表格中的内容。
People use the words “ mouse” and “ rat” when talking about small animals with round ears, a pointy(尖的)nose, and a long tail. However, there are many different kinds of rats and mice, such as the Norway rat, black rat, house mouse, and deer mouse. The most common(常见的)rat that people see is the Norway rat, while the house mouse is the most common mouse that people find in their homes.
If you can’t tell the difference between a rat and a mouse, you are not alone. The Norway rat and the house mouse both come from an animal, which lived millions of years ago. As a result, they have much in common. Both Norway rats and house mice have long tails, whiskers(须), and round ears.
However, there are many differences between Norway rats and house mice. The Norway rat is much bigger than the mouse. A Norway rat can weigh over ten times(倍) as much as a house mouse and is usually three times as large. Also , a Norway rat has big feet and small ears compared to the size of its body. And its tail is longer than its body, while a Norway rat’ s tail is shorter.
| The Norway rat and the house mouse |
|
| Similarities |
They both come from the same animal. They both have They have similar |
| Differences |
The Norway rat is _ The Norway rat is usually three times as The Norway rat has big feet and small ears compared to its body, while the house mouse has small feet and big ears compared to its body. The Norway rat’s tail is shorter than |