Former National Football League player and children’s author Tim Green has added another book to his list of accomplishments: Unstoppable. The book tells the story of a 12-year –old boy named Harrison, who survives life in a cruel foster home before he finally finds a loving family. Once he settles in and realizes his natural football ability, tragedy strikes again and he loses his leg to a deadly bone cancer. Unstoppable follows Harrison’s incredible journey as he faces many challenges in his life.
Tim Green says he decided to write a novel about a kid facing cancer after watching how his wife fought to survive her own illness. “Her mental and physical toughness were more heroic to me than anything I’d ever seen in the national sports leagues,” Green told TFK Kid Reporter Zachary J. Lewis.
After watching his wife’s battle, Green said, he knew he needed to write about a person who struggled through a serious illness. But because the target age for his books is teen, he needed to tell the story through the eyes of someone that age.
When friends introduced Green to Jeffrey Keith, Green knew he had found the right person to help him“ capture the heroism that it takes to fight cancer”. Cancer-survivor Jeffrey Keith lost his leg to disease at age twelve, but went on to be the goalie (守门员)for the Boston College Division 1 Lacrosse(长曲棍球)Team and was also the first amputee to run 3,300 miles across the country. When Green heard Jeffrey Keith’s story, he knew it was the perfect narrative on which to base his next book.
TFK asked Keith what it felt like to read Unstoppable for the first time. “Tim captured what it felt like for me to go through this experience and battle back,” Keith said. “After I read the book, Tim asked me to describe it in one word, and I said ‘awesome’. Tim’s work sends a message to all the kids across the country that are facing obstacles that can have nothing to do with cancer: you are all unstoppable, as long as you believe it.”Who inspires Tim Green to write the novel Unstoppable?
A.A boy named Harrison. | B.His wife. |
C.Zachary J. Lewis. . | D.Jeffrey Keith |
The underlined word “amputee” in Paragraph 4 most probably means________
A.a person who has survived cancer |
B.a person who has had a leg or an arm cut off |
C.a person who looks different from others |
D.a person who has no arms or legs |
What do we know from the last paragraph?
A.Jeffrey Keith thinks highly of Unstoppable. |
B.Jeffrey Keith has read Unstoppable many times. |
C.Unstoppable will be one the best-sellers this year. |
D.Jeffrey Keith is fond of reading Tim Green’s novels. |
The novel Unstoppable intends to inspire kids that ________.
A.they should fight against disease fearlessly |
B.they should pursue their dreams |
C.they can become a writer if they want |
D.they can overcome any obstacles ahead |
A vegetarian(素食者)diet may help to protect people against cancer, a UK study suggests. Analysis of data from 52,700 man and women shows that those who did not eat meat had significantly fewer cancers than those who did.
Published in American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the findings were worth looking into .Although it is widely recommended that people eat some fruits and vegetables every day to reduce their risk of cancer and other diseases, there is very little evidence showing that a vegetarian diet can surely reduce cancers .
But surprisingly, the researchers also found a higher rate of colorectal(直肠的)cancer – a disease connected with eating red meat – among the vegetarians.
Study leader Professor Tim Key, a researcher at the University of Oxford, said no previous study had looked at the diet in this way and that there had been a lot of confusion about the issue.
“It’s interesting – it suggests there might be some reduction in cancers in vegetarians, but we need to look carefully at that”, said the professor.
More work is needed to show the connections between diet and cancer but such studies are very hard to do. Dr Joanne Lunn, a senior nutrition scientist at the British Nutrition Foundation, said the findings highlighted the fact that cancer is a complex disease and many different lifestyle factors play a part in determining a person’s risk.
73. What would be the best title for the passage?
A. Reasons for getting cancers.
B. Vegetarians get fewer cancers.
C. Tips on avoiding cancers.
D. A surprising discovery on colorectal cancer.
74. Why are the findings worth looking into?
A. They can encourage healthy eating.
B. They show that cancer is a complex disease.
C. they show a brand new discovery.
D. They have been published in American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
75. We can learn from the passage that _________.
A. people eating red meat are unlikely to get colorectal cancer
B. the diet is one of the many factors that determine a person’s health
C. the connections between a vegetarian diet and cancer are clear through the research
D. scientists will soon figure out the relationship between the diet and cancer
When scientists set out to explore the roots of human laughter, some apes(类人猿) were just tickled(胳肢)to help. That’s how researchers made a variety of apes and some human babies laugh. After analyzing the sounds, they concluded that people and great apes inherited laughter from a shared ancestor that lived more than 10 million years ago. Experts praised the work, it gives strong evidence that ape laughter and human laughter are related through evolution(进化).
Scientists have noted that apes make characteristic sounds during play or while being tickled, especially to signal that they’re interested in playing. It’s been suggested before that human laughter grew out of primate(灵长类动物) roots. But ape laughter doesn’t sound like human laughter. It may be slower noisy breathing. So what does that have to do with the human ha-ha? To investigate that, Marina Davila Ross and her colleagues carried out a detailed analysis of the sounds made by tickling three human babies and 21 other primates, apes included.
After measuring 11 features in the sound from each species, they tried to find out how these sounds appeared to be related to each other. The result looked like a family tree. Significantly, that tree matched the way the species themselves are related, the scientists reported online in the journal Current Biology. They also concluded that while human laughter sounds much different from ape laughter, their typical features could have come from the same ancestor.
Panksepp, who studies laughter-like responses in animals but didn’t participate in the new work, called the paper exciting. Panksepp’s own work concludes that even rats produce laughter in response to playing and tickling, with sounds that can hardly be heard by people. Robert Provine, a scientist, who wrote the book, Laughter: A Scientific Investigation, said the new paper showed some important clues, like ape sounds that hadn’t been realized before.
69. Why did the scientists analyze the laughter made by tickling human babies and apes?
A. To try to discover if they can make characteristic sounds.
B. To see if they interested in playing.
C. To find out if the laughter of apes and humans is related.
D. To find out the differences between humans and apes.
70. Based on Paragraph 3 we can know that researchers measured the features in the sound to ________.
A. find out ape sounds that hadn’t been realized before
B. find out relations among primates’ laughter
C. see what a family tree from each species looks like
D. make a report online in the journal Current Biology
71. What can be inferred from the last paragraph?
A. Panksepp spoke highly of the new research.
B. Rat laughter is likely to be related to ape laughter.
C. Robert Provine provided some new clues for the researchers.
D. Humans don’t enjoy listening to ape laughter.
72. What would be the best title for the passage?
A. Ape study explores evolution of laughter.
B. Apes like to laugh when being tickled.
C. Human laughter and ape laughter are different.
D. Laughter: A Scientific Investigation.
Ayesha and Latisha Jones need to take a break in their own homework to help their dad, because at the age of 52, John Jones is just now learning to read.
“I was so uncomfortable and so ashamed,” he said. For many years, unable to read a menu or a bus schedule, Jones was just one of the estimated 65,000 adults in Buffalo, New York who cannot read above a 5th-grade level.
And a new study shows the problem is getting worse in many states. California, New York and Florida have all shown surprising increases in illiteracy(文盲)rates. The situation has improved in a few states, like Mississippi, Rhode Island and Kentucky. But worldwide, the United States doesn’t perform well.
Fourteen countries rank higher in reading ability than the United States, including Finland, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Ireland, South Korea, UK, Japan, Sweden, Iceland, Belgium, Austria, France and Norway.
Back in Buffalo, a program called Read to Succeed targets the problem early, teaching preschoolers shapes, colors and letters.
“We have a lot of poverty and that means a lot of children don’t have the skills, but they have the potential(潜质),” said Helene Kramer of Read to Succeed. The theory is : you’re never too young or too old to learn.
Working with Buffalo’s literacy volunteers has given Jones a fresh start. “They gave me a chance to open a door that I could never open before,” he said. “I could never open it before, because I couldn’t read.” It’s not easy, but Jones says seeing his daughters read inspires him to try.
64. In America, which of the following states has seen an improvement in the situation of illiteracy?
A. New York. B. Mississippi. C. Florida. D. California
65. Helene Kramer would probably think that _______.
A. kids should not learn to read too early
B. old people aren’t able to learn to read
C .poverty contributes to poor reading ability
D. most poor kids have difficulty reading
66. What can we know about John Jones?
A. He is very tired of learning to read.
B. He is thankful for the chance to learn to read.
C. It is easy for him to learn to read.
D. His children don’t like to help him.
67. It can be inferred from the passage that _______.
A. Canadians perform better in reading than Americans
B. American children’s ability to solve problems is quite bad
C. the illiteracy rates in New York have dropped
D. Norway ranks the lowest in reading ability
68. What might be the best title for the passage?
A. America ranks higher in reading ability.
B. volunteers help a man live a new life.
C. Reading offers more chances to children.
D. Find inspiration to fight illiteracy.
A nine-year-old girl named Arwa lives with her parents and six brothers and sisters in an old, two-roomed house. She knows nothing of wealth and power but, in her own way, she has helped make history.
Arwa was the youngest of three Yemeni girls who recently went to court complaining they were married against their will and asking for a divorce(离婚). It forced the government to change its law on early marriage.
Her father Abdul Ali described how a stranger asked him in the market if he knew some marriageable girls. After visiting their home and seeing Arwa and her 15-year-lold sister, he chose the younger child. Abdul Ali said the man had promised he would wait for the girl to reach puberty(青春期)before calling her to his house but then changed his mind.
So why did he sell his daughter to a stranger? “He gave me $150 and promised another $2,000. I was really in need of money and thought it was a solution for the family,” he explained.
When Arwa fought against her husband, she was beaten. The pain only came to an end when her husband and father quarreled and Abdul Ali allowed her to seek outside help. Then she went looking for a neighbor to lend her money for the journey to court. The judge at court took pity on her and gave her freedom.
Yemen’s Minister for Social Affairs, Professor Amat al-Razak Hammed, recognizes that the government needs to make a change and will personally decide on a legal age of 16. She says that both fathers who marry their children off early and officials who sign the marriage contracts should be punished.
Arwa’s courage to seek a divorce was inspired by another young girl from the capital, Sana’a who has become a national famous person.
60. What does the underlined part in Paragraph 1 refer to?
A. Arwa’s behavior influenced the government to change the law on early marriage.
B. Arwa was the first girl to fight for the right of women to have freedom of marriage.
C. Arwa worked together with the government to draw up new marriage laws.
D. Arwa set a good example to other girls who have similar problems.
61. How much money did Arwa’s father probably get in total by selling her?
A. $150. B.$2,000. C.$2,150. D.$3,000.
62. Which of the following statements about Arwa is NOT true?
A. She is too young to know anything about wealth and power.
B. She got the money for the journey to court from her father.
C. She was one of the Yemeni girls who used the law to seek a divorce.
D. Her husband treated her very badly.
63. According to the new marriage law in Yemen, _______.
A. girls can’t get married until they are 20 years old
B. girls can get married without their parents’ permission
C. officials are forbidden to sign marriage contracts
D. fathers who marry their children off early will be punished
This weekly four-day physical activity schedule will get your kids excited about being active.
Tuesday
When the kids get home from school, don’t let them go straight to the TV and get settled in. Encourage them to get moving and get off the couch by giving them a pedometer(计步器). Pedometers are the most fun when parents also use one because that turns stepping, walking and running into a game to see who can get the most steps.
Thursday
The kids have done a great job so far this week, but now they are aching for a little more TV time. Instead of turning on cartoons, let them watch fitness movies made just for kids. These movies encourage watchers to get up and dance along to kid-friendly music.
Saturday
Get the whole family out of the house together and over to a park. Bring lots of sports equipment, pack a healthy picnic and have a family competitive sports day. Kids and adults get into groups and play against each other in tennis, basketball or soccer. After everyone has played hard for a couple of hours, stop for a picnic and then if your family isn’t too tired, go back and play some more.
Sunday
Every child loves to play video games and there is no better time to allow kids to play them than on Sunday when no homework is due. But don’t let them play a game that forces them to sit down for hours. Dance games with a floor mat(垫子)to help kids follow the dance moves are popular to kids.
56. What’s the best title for this passage?
A. How to make children like activities.
B. A weekly four-day physical activity plan for kids.
C. Physical activities are important to kids.
D. A plan that will do much good to kids.
57. Parents are advised to use a pedometer together with their kids because ______.
A. they can give their kids some advice about walking
B. it can prevent them from watching TV too much
C. this will allow them and their kids to have a fun competition
D. their kids will not use it if they don’t
58. On Thursday when a kid wants to watch TV, his parents should ______.
A. let him watch it for a short time
B. watch cartoons with him
C . take him out for a walk instead
D. show fitness movies to him
59. The author advises a family to have a meal on Saturday _______.
A. in a park B. in a mountain C. in a restaurant D. at home