A man, who sometimes takes my bus, is in rags. His life seems different from that of the others. He looks exhausted and carries nothing. He appears along a downtown street, seemingly out of nowhere. We sometimes want to know where he sleeps at night.
A few weeks ago he boarded the bus. A few stops later, a young woman boarded. She swiped (刷) her bus-card, only to find the machine would not accept it. The driver told her to pay the $2.25 fare. “I just bought this card,” she said. “I paid the money...”
The driver said she could take the card back to the sales office and explain the problem. In the meantime she would have to pay the fare for that day. The woman became confused and distressed. The rest of us just watched, wondering how the problem would be solved. Suddenly the man rose from his seat, dropped a few coins into the fare box.
“You’re lucky,” the bus driver said quietly. “He paid for you.” Silence fell over the bus. The rest of us had watched the woman’s discomfort, but he felt it. We lawyers, journalists and business people headed downtown to help fix the world. He fixed her world.
I haven’t seen him since that day. Some people believe angels occasionally drop down and move among us. All I know is that I have a new respect for the simple act of kindness. It speeds us along on our way.According to the first paragraph, the author _______.
| A．thinks highly of the man | B．often gives the man some help |
| C．knows the man very well | D．considers the man strange |
What does the underlined word “distressed” probably mean?
| A．exited | B．generous | C．bored | D．anxious |
What did the writer learn from the man?
| A．to show concern for other people. |
| B．to lead a happy life like the man. |
| C．to share what he has with us. |
| D．to believe that people are born kind. |
Ｊａｓｏｎ
What I like best is seeing Arsenal win and playing football. If I am feeling sad I will play a football game on my Play Station 2. The best day I have ever had was when I finished first in the 800-metre race at my secondary school. It was a school record, although I didn’t know that at the time. My family makes me happy, too.
Ａｎｔｏｎｉｏ
My little sister makes me sad because she always tells tales on me to my mum. If I am having a bad day, food cheers me up. I like chili con carne and sweet chili crisps. It makes me happy because I want to be big and have lots of energy.
Ｕｓｍａｎ
I haven’t done anything very exciting in my life but one of my best achievements is that I got a good report from my school this year, because last year I got a bad one. People on TV make me laugh, particularly Eddie Murphy. If I am having a bad day I watch Ｂａｓｉｌ Ｂｒｕｓｈ. I am good at making other people happy. I just talk and my friends start laughing — they think I am silly.
Ａｓｈｌｅｉｇｈ
If I’m having a bad day, knowing that someone is there for me can make me happy. I wouldn’t say I’m the best at making other people happy, but I know that just being a good friend to other people is important. The things I like doing are singing, dancing, hanging out with my friends and just being lively and funny.
Ｋｉｎｚｅｙ
The most exciting thing I have ever done in my life was when I went abseiling in Wales. But that was a one-off. The things I do all the time are playing football, watching movies and going places with my friends. I know it sounds bad, but what I find funny is when people hurt themselves. If I am having a bad day and I see someone having a worse day than me, that makes me feel better. Food is very important for _________ when he has a bad day.
| A．Kinzey | B．Ashleigh | C．Antonio | D．Usman |
________ like playing football.
| A．Jason and Ashleigh | B．Jason and Usman |
| C．Kinzey and Usman | D．Kinzey and Jason |
Which of the following statements is TRUE?
| A．Kinzey finds it bad when people hurt themselves. |
| B．Jason knew he had set a new school record when he finished first in the 800-metre race. |
| C．When Usman talks, his friends start laughing because they think he is humorous. |
| D．Antonio likes food because he wants to be big and have lots of energy. |
Ashleigh mentions all the following things EXCEPT（除外）_________.
| A．to make other people happy |
| B．to play football with friends |
| C．to hang out with friends |
| D．to be lively and funny |
The passage is mainly about _________.
| A．what makes different people happy |
| B．what makes different people feel moved |
| C．relationships between different people |
| D．what different people think success is |
I went to the Chinatown market in London last Sunday. The first thing I did was to go to one of the Chinese green grocers’ shops. As soon as I entered the shop, I smelt mixtures of Chinese spices and saw the new season’s fruits. My son wanted a bag of sweets, so we popped into the shop next door which sells many kinds of candy.
There’s a lot of noise in the Chinatown market and you will see many tourists too. There are a lot of cars and trucks that never stop beeping. While people are loading and unloading their goods, most of them have their cars and trucks parked in the middle of the road. This causes great inconvenience for other drivers. Can you imagine that?
After we had done all our shopping, my son and I went to a restaurant for lunch. We enjoyed our meal very much. But the shopping made us both very tired at the end. We headed down the road to catch our bus home. My son and I enjoyed riding in the bus. We also enjoyed looking at different buildings and people walking by dressed in fancy outfits. Although Chinatown can be a busy place to shop, I do enjoy going there now and then. I can buy some of my necessities, and I can also look and browse around the other shops and department stores where I can indulge (使沉迷) myself with some nice things. Chinatown is located in the heart of central London where you can find tons of shops and other places to amuse you. And for me, I certainly don’t mind going back there again soon.The underlined words “popped into” most probably could be replaced by “_____”.
| A．broke into | B．rushed into | C．pushed into | D．walked into |
The author probably didn’t go to a ______.
| A．restaurant | B．grocery |
| C．clothing store | D．sweets shop |
What can we learn from the passage?
From the passage, we can infer that the author most probably went to Chinatown by_____
What does the last sentence of the passage imply?
Playing with toy blocks (积木) may lead to improved language development in young children, a new study reported.
Early childhood is an important period in the development of young minds. The newborn brain grows three times in size between birth and age 2. Scientists have said that certain activities during this important period may promote (促进) healthy development while others may hold it back, and development of memory and language may especially be helped by imaginative play.
After six months, language scores among half of the 175 children aged 1-1/2 to 2-1/2 who were sent plastic blocks were 15 percent higher than a matched group that did not receive the free blocks, according to the study by researchers at the University of Washington in Seattle.
Parents were given ideas about how to help their children play with the blocks, then were told 
to keep diaries of their children’s activities over four days. Finally, all the parents filled out questionnaires that judged their children’s vocabulary, grammar, and other language abilities. Study author Dimitri Christakis said unstructured play with blocks motivated children’s thinking, memory and physical skills at a time when a child’s brain is growing rapidly. “They are the foundation of thought and language,” he wrote of the skills learned from building blocks. “Older children begin to make up stories for these objects .”
Such play may also take the place of less helpful activities such as watching TV, he said, adding parents ought to have doubts about some toy-makers’ words. “An increasing number of media-based products are making ungrounded (无根据的) claims that they can make children smarter, more literate, and more musical,” Christakis said.What can we learn from the second paragraph?
| A．Parents should allow their children to play as long as they want. |
| B．The brains of kids develop very quickly before they are two years old. |
| C．Playing blocks can help children do well in sports at school. |
| D．Activities, like imaginative play, may delay the development of the brain. |
According to the study, about ________ children’s language scores were 15 percent higher than those of children who didn’t play with blocks.
| A．87 | B．55 | C．23 | D．157 |
Building blocks helps kids gain language skills because _________.
| A．young children always talk to themselves while building blocks |
| B．their parents can teach them when they are playing with blocks |
| C．their parents are given ideas on how to develop their brains |
| D．it can help them improve thinking, memory and physical skills |
The aim of the passage is probably to _______.
| A．raise the present level of children’s language ability |
| B．encourage parents to let their babies play with blocks |
| C．improve parents’ knowledge of raising children |
| D．encourage makers of blocks to develop more toys |
We can infer from what Mr Christakis said that _____.
| A．television will be definitely replaced by blocks |
| B．the market will be full of media-based toys |
| C．we can’t always believe what toy makers say |
| D．toy makers care about kids’ development very much |
Today, innovations(创新) to make our lives more eco-friendly can be found everywhere. There are energy-efficient automobiles, eco-friendly light bulbs, and clothes made by fashion designers using sustainable(可持续的) environmental practices. Industries around the world have also begun to take a serious look at how their operations affect the local and global environment.
The university of Colorado has been named one of the top green colleges and universities in the United States. This university was one of the first to start a student-led recycling program in the 1970s and toda
y supplies students with reusable shopping bags to use both on and off campus. The entire University of Colorado also uses low flow wa
ter fixtures(设备) and has reduced water usage by 40 percent since 2002.
When it comes to going green, Warren Wilson College has been recognized in many places. The Sierra Club and The Princeton Review have named the college as one of America’s greenest colleges and universities, while the school has also received the Outstanding College Recycling Award from the Carolina Recycling Association, as well as awards from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education(AASHE). For a small college, Warren Wilson has made enormous efforts to be an eco-friendly campus since its beginning, and today owns a campus farm, a seeding program, and an extensive recycling program. Warren Wilson was also the first College to have an LEED platinum certified(白金认证的) residence hall, and its building services department is also 100 percent GreenSeal certified. According to College Stats, Warren Wilson College is one of the first institutions in the United States to be almost completely self-sufficient(自给自足的) while also engaging students to incorporate sustainability into all academic programs.
Going green efforts at Oberlin College have not gone unnoticed. Oberlin College spends 22 percent of its food budget on buying food from local farmers, with most of the food raised or harvested with organic and sustainable practices. Oberlin has also stopped selling bottled water on campus and offers discounts to students who use their own storage containers when purchasing beverages and food items. Among Oberlin’s other eco-friendly accomplishments is a green graduation ceremony, which includes programs printed on 100 percent recycled paper. The author writes the first paragraph mainly to tell us that ____.
| A．we can find new ways to be eco-friendly |
| B．everyone is aware of being eco-friendly |
C．industries are reducing their influence on the environment |
| D．American colleges and universities care much about environmental issues |
What do we know about the University of Colorado?
| A．Its recycling program is followed by other universities. |
| B．It produces reusable shopping bags by itself. |
| C．It uses special systems to save water. |
| D．It is the most eco-friendly university. |
Which of the following about Warren Wilson College is TRUE?
| A．The Princeton Review praised it for its teaching methods. |
| B．Its residence hall’s building material is platinum. |
| C．It owns a campus garden and a seeding program. |
| D．It sustains itself almost without help from others. |
Students in Oberlin College can _____.
| A．grow their own food on campus |
| B．pay less with their own containers |
| C．help the college make its food budget |
| D．recycle paper at their graduation ceremony |
How is the text organized?
| A．Main idea – Comparison. |
| B．Opinion – Discussion – Description |
| C．Introduction – Supporting examples. |
| D．Introduction – Explanation – Conclusion. |
Please help! I live in Germany with my wife and three kids. My parents live in the UK. I want my kids to have as much contact with their grandparents as possible. The kids all use e-mail, Skype and SMS but my parents won’t. I’ve bought them a laptop, paid for broadband, given them both mobile phones and a digital camera, but they won’t use them. My parents say they hate computers and new technology. What can I do with these “technophobes”?
Daniel, Buremburg, Germany
Actually, the original technophobes were the Luddites, a group of cloth workers in 19th century Britain during the Industrial Revolution. The Luddite cloth workers, who traditionally made cloth by hand, were worried that machines were going to take away their jobs and way of life. These machines could make cloth much faster and cheaper than humans. In 1811 and 1812 the Luddites destroyed the machines that they hated so much, but the British government supported th
e factory owners. Many Luddites were arrested. Charlotte Bronte’s novel Shirley will tell your parents all about it.
Laura, Valencia, Spain
Laura makes some
interesting points, I think. Technophobes has been a common theme in science fiction. Frankenstein, one of the first science fiction, is a warning of what could happen if humans began to experiment with human life.
Freda, Copenhagen, Denmark
One thing you could try is to find hardware that is designed for older people to use. An example is the mob
iles made by the US company, Jitterbug. Instead of icons and menus the Jitterbu
g phones ask users simple “yes/no” questions and have larger keypads. The company realized that there are potentially 100 million older users in the US alone.
Graham, Patras, Greece The underlined part “the technophobes” in the passage refers to ______.
A．those who are rea dy to try new technology |
| B．those who are addicted to the Internet |
| C．those who refuse to use modern technology |
| D．those who are devoted to inventing new things |
Which of the following is TRUE of the Luddites?
| A．They called themselves the technophobes. |
| B．They got full support from their factory owners. |
| C．They preferred to keep their traditional working methods. |
| D．They were killed by the government. |
Who has put forward a practical and useful suggestions?
| A．Laura. | B．Freda. | C．Daniel. | D．Graham. |
The passage is probably taken from _____.
| A．a personal blog | B．a letter between friends |
| C．a personal diary | D．a speech on new technology |
What can we infer from the passage?
| A．Daniel would buy her parents a novel written by Shirley. |
| B．Charlotte Bronte wrote about technophobes in her novel Shirley. |
| C．Daniel would buy her parents cell phones with icons and menus. |
| D．Daniel worried about her children using e-mails. |