Family traditions were important in our house, and none was more appreciated than the perfect Christmas tree
"Dad, can we watch when you trim（修剪）the tree?" My eldest son. Dan, nine, and his seven -year-old brother John, asked
"I won't be cutting this year," my husband Bob said. "Dan, you and John are old enough to measure things. Do it all by yourselves. Think you boys can handle it?
Dan and John seemed to grow six inches in their chairs at the thought of such an amazing responsibility. "We can handle it." Dan promised. "We won't let you down." .
A few days before Christmas. Dan and John rushed in after school. They gathered the tools they'd need and brought them out to the yard .where the tree waited. I was cooking when I heard the happy sounds as the boys carried the tree into the lying room. Then I heard the sound that every mother knows is trouble: dead silence I hurried out to them. The tree was cut too short. John crossed his arms tight across his chest. His eyes filled with angry tears.
I felt worried The tree was central to our holiday. I didn't want the boys to feel ashamed every tune they looked at it. I couldn't lower the ceiling, and I couldn't raise the floor either. There was no way to undo the damage done. Suddenly, a thought came to my mind, which turned the problem into the solution. www..com
“We can't make the tree taller." I said. "But we can put it on a higher position"
Dan nodded his head sideways. "We could put it on the coffee table. It just might work! Let's try it!“
When Bob got home and looked at the big tree on top of the coffee table, Dan and John held their breath.
"What a good idea!" he declared "Why didn't I ever think of such a thing?"
John broke into a grin Dan's chest swelled with pride.Who trimmed the Christmas tree this year?
| A．The writer | B．Bob | C．Dan and John | D．The whole family |
The underlined part "grow six inches" (Para. 4) implies the brothers felt ______.
| A．proud | B．nervous | C．worried | D．scared |
What happened after the brothers moved the Christmas tree into the living room?
A. They rushed into school.
B They began to decorate the tree.
C. They got angry with each other
D. They found the tree was cut shortWhat the writer's husband said in the end showed________.
| A．he expected too much of the brothers_ |
| B．he should not have given the brothers the task to trim the Christmas |
| C．he was too stupid to think of such an idea_ |
| D．he really appreciated what the brothers had done. |
Great white sharks! Just hearing that name makes many people’s hair stand on end. In reality, these big fish have more to fear from us than we do from them. For many years, people killed countless great white sharks in the waters around the United States.
But thanks to conservation (保护) efforts, great whites are making a comeback in the U.S. Two recent studies show that the population of these sharks is rising along the east and west coast.
Why is the growing population of a killer fish something to celebrate? “When you fish too many of them, you start to lose balance in the environment,” says shark researcher Tobey Curtis. As the biggest killer, sharks help keep the populations of fish, seals, and other creatures they eat from growing too large.
In spite of their importance, great white sharks had long been hunted for their meat and their fins (鳍). Then, in 1997, the U.S. government passed a law that didn’t allow the hunting of great whites. Afterwards, the numbers of these sharks in the U.S. waters started to increase.
The law wasn’t the only thing that has helped great whites. Conservationists have also played a part in the sharks’ comeback. The research group OCEARCH is using a method called tagging (加标签) to help change people’s attitudes about great white. They let the public follow each shark as it travels the world’s oceans. OCEARCH also gives each tagged shark a name to help people form a closer connection with the big fish.
The group’s most well-known shark is named Katharine. She was tagged last year near Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Since then, thousands of people have tracked Katharine’s movements on Twitter and the OCEARCH website.
This helps people see sharks in a new way. Chris Fischer, the founder of OCEARCH believes learning to appreciate great whites will encourage people to do more to protect them.The underlined part “makes many people’s hair stand on end” in Paragraph 1 can best be replaced by______.
| A．worries many people | B．bores many people |
| C．frightens many people | D．interests many people |
The law passed in 1997 ______.
| A．seemed very helpful |
| B．let scientists down |
| C．needed to be changed |
| D．made people like great whites |
Katharine’s example is used to show that ______.
| A．great whites are in fact lovely animals |
| B．the OCEARCH website has a lot of visitors |
| C．the number of great whites is growing quickly |
| D．OCEARCH help people get closer to great whites |
The main purpose of the passage is to ______.
| A．introduce an experiment result |
| B．make an advertisement for OCEARCH |
| C．remind us that big killers are dying out |
| D．inform us that great whites are making a comeback |
The worst days of any summer are the rainy ones. We spend all year looking forward to nice weather and long, hot days. In winter, with its cloudy days and bitter cold, we dream of those days at the beach, lying on the sand and enjoying the bright and burning sun. And then, summer comes, and it rains.
As a child, I would wake up to rainy summer days and come close to crying. It wasn’t fair. We suffered through months of school and experienced bad weather for those short ten weeks of freedom.
On those rainy summer days, I had nothing fun to do and could only sit inside, staring out at the rain like a bird in a cage. I was an only child, so there was no one else to play with. My father worked from home, so I was not truly alone, but he could not actively play with me since he was at work. It was those days that I would watch whatever was on television or read any books that I could find lying around. I’d pray each night that the rain would not be there the next day.
As an adult, though, my opinion of summer rain has changed. When you have to work every day, summer is not as exciting. Everything seems uninteresting. Such a mindset makes you cheer for anything new or different. I spend the winter dreaming of summer and the summer dreaming of winter. When summer comes, I hate how hot it is. And then I look forward to the rain, because the rain brings with it a cold front, which makes me comfortable. Rainy days are still the worst days of the summer, but summer rain today means positively beautiful — and quite cooler — weather tomorrow.When the author was a child, he ______.
| A．liked staying indoors | B．hated rainy days |
| C．dreamed on summer days | D．preferred cooler weather |
We can learn from the passage that the author ______.
| A．could enjoy the brilliant sun in winter |
| B．preferred reading to playing outside |
| C．had no brothers or sisters |
| D．was often left alone at home |
As an adult, the author views summer rain differently because ______.
| A．rain makes the weather cooler |
| B．his summer holiday is very short |
| C．he knows it won’t last long |
| D．he can better deal with his spare time |
My wife and I have always been friendly with the clerks at the local store. I don’t think many people appreciate what a difficult job these clerks have. They work for a little money and I often wonder how they make ends meet.
One of the clerks, Charlie, was always wearing his glasses but he didn’t one day. I asked him about it and he said they’d been out of order and that he couldn’t afford a new pair. His family needed money. It was clear that he was having a difficult time.
We wanted to help him, so we turned to our own eye doctor for help with a plan. We had his secretary contact him, asking him to come in for an eye exam for free. We told the doctor to let him order whatever glasses he wanted and that we would pay for them. Although Charlie questioned what was going on, the doctor just told him that someone had offered the money for his new glasses. When we went in to pay the bill, the doctor told us he was touched by our idea so that he waived the exam fee and only charged us for half the price of the glasses!
It was so wonderful to see Charlie in his new glasses and he enjoyed telling all the regular customers how the gift came about. I’m sure that upon hearing his story, ideas of kindness may have come in the minds of many people.Why didn’t the clerk Charlie wear glasses one day?
| A．It was very warm and fine. |
| B．His glasses were missing. |
| C．His old glasses were broken. |
| D．He forgot to wear his glasses. |
From the passage, we can infer that ______.
| A．Charlie was a young man with skills |
| B．Charlie knew who paid the money for the new glasses |
| C．Charlie completely accepted the money for the new glasses |
| D．Charlie couldn’t support his family with enough money |
The underlined word “waived” in the third paragraph can be replaced by ______.
| A．took up | B．gave up |
| C．cut down | D．put off |
Which of the following could be the best title for the passage?
| A．Customers’ Gift to an Employee |
| B．A Friendly Clerk — Charlie |
| C．The Wonderful Feeling of Helping others |
| D．An Expensive Pair of Glasses |
Windows8, apart from Windows95, is the biggest surprise and the only version of Microsoft’s operating system that has been changed from the core（核心）when compared to its former one.
However, a recent study has shown that under 20% of business owners would be willing to upgrade to the new version of Windows. The reason for this remains to be discussed and debated, and we will try to throw light on this research by providing you with some of the most common advantages and disadvantages of Windows8.
Generally speaking, there are a great number of plus sides related to upgrading from Windows7 to Windows8.
Speed—This is the biggest advantage to mention. Boot time has been reported to be up to nine times shorter than that with Windows7.
New passwords—Instead of typing your passwords, Windows8 will let you use gestures on your favorite photos to enter your password. This is not only practical but also extremely cool!
Windows8 experience—Apart from computers, Windows8 will be used on all devices, including smart phones, tablet PCs and so on. Also, owing to the fact that it has been specifically designed with touch screen users in mind, Windows8, besides using keyboard and mouse, will offer a whole new user experience.
However, there are still some disadvantages.
The first one that has to be mentioned is that there is no Start Menu from Windows. Yes, there is no Start button in the lower left corner, and this might be a real puzzle of many Windows users. Also, many users have had a problem to get used to the new interface introduced by Windows8. The biggest problem that is worth noticing is that Windows8 was originally designed for touch screen users, and this may have a bad effect on desktop users who have gotten used to doing everything with the help of their keyboard and mouse.What does “plus sides” in Paragraph 3 probably refer to?
| A．Math symbols. | B．Strengths. |
| C．New rules. | D．Messages. |
According to the text the greatest advantage of Windows8 is its ______.
| A．complex passwords | B．high speed |
| C．unique experience | D．new interface |
From the text we can learn that Windows8 ______.
| A．no longer requires a password |
| B．was upgraded from windows95 |
| C．will be popular with desktop users |
| D．can be used on more than computers |
Many Windows8 users face the problem that ______.
| A．Start Menu is hidden in the lower left corner |
| B．they have to use fingerprints instead of button |
| C．keyboard and mouse can’t be used any longer |
| D．they don’t get accustomed to the new interface |
It is quite reasonable to blame traffic jams, the cost of gas and the great speed of modern life, but manners on the road are becoming horrible. Everybody knows that the nicest men would become fierce tigers behind the wheel. It is all right to have a tiger in a cage, but to have one in the driver’s seat is another matter.
Road politeness is not only good manners, but good sense too. It takes the most cool-headed drivers great patience to give up the desire to beat back when forced to face rude driving. On the other hand, a little politeness goes a long way towards reducing the possibility of quarreling and fighting. A friendly nod or a wave of thanks in answer to an act of politeness helps to create an atmosphere of good will and calm and becomes so necessary in modern traffic conditions. But such behaviors of politeness are by no means enough. Many drivers nowadays don’t even seem able to recognize politeness when they see it．
However, misplaced politeness can also be dangerous. Typical examples are the driver who waves to a child crossing the street at a wrong place into the path of oncoming cars that may be not able to stop in time. The same goes for encouraging old ladies to cross the road wherever and whenever they want to.
An experienced driver, whose manners are faultless, told me it would help if drivers learnt to correctly join in traffic stream without causing total blockages that give rise to unpleasant feelings. Unfortunately, modern drivers can’t even learn to drive, let alone master good skills. Years ago, experts warned us that the fast increase of the car ownership would demand more give-and-take from all road users. It is time for all of us to take this message to heart．The passage mainly talks about ______.
| A．road politeness | B．traffic jams |
| C．good manners | D．modern drivers |
According to the writer, a good driver should ______.
| A．beat back when forced to face rude driving |
| B．be able to recognize politeness when he sees it |
| C．encourage old ladies to cross the roads whenever they want to |
| D．join in traffic stream quickly however other people feel |
The following statements are right EXCEPT that ______.
| A．some modern drivers are not good at driving |
| B．road politeness is good sense as well as good manners |
| C．it is also right to have a tiger in the driver’s seat |
| D．a friendly driver should nod or wave thanks in answer to an act of politeness |