Three Central Texas men were honored with the Texas Department of Public Safety’s Director’s Award in a Tuesday morning ceremony for their heroism in saving the victims of a serious twocar accident.
The accident occurred on March 25 when a vehicle lost control while traveling on rainsoaked State Highway 6 near Baylor Camp Road. It ran into an oncoming vehicle, leaving the occupants trapped inside as both vehicles burst into flames.
Bonge was the first on the scene and heard children screaming. He broke through a back window and pulled Mallory Smith, 10, and her sister, Megan Smith,9, from the wreckage.
The girls’ mother, Beckie Smith, was not with them at the time of the wreck, as they were traveling with their baby sitter, Lisa Bowbin.
Beckie Smith still remembers the sickening feeling she had upon receiving the call informing her of the wreck and the despair as she drove to the scene.
Bozeman and Clemmons arrived shortly after Bonge and helped rescue the other victims and attempted to put out the fires.
“I was nervous,” Bozeman said. “I don’t feel like I’m a hero. I was just doing what anyone should do in that situation. I hope someone would do the same for me.”
Everyone at the accident made it out alive, with the victims suffering from nonlifethreatening injuries. Mallory Smith broke both femurs(股骨), and Megan had neck and back injuries. Bowbin is still recovering from a broken pelvis(骨盆), ankle and foot.
The rescuers also were taken to the hospital and treated for cuts and smoke breathing, Bonge said.
In addition, Bozeman got to meet accident victim Anthony Russo in the hospital after the accident, where Russo presented him with a glass frame inscribed with “Thank you”, Bozeman said. Those involved in that fateful encounter on Highway 6 credited God blessing for bringing them together.
“Whatever the circumstances, Tuesday’s ceremony provided a time to be grateful for those who put their lives on the line for the lives of complete strangers,” Beckie Smith said, “We’re calling it The Miracle on Highway 6.” What’s the main idea of the passage?
| A．Three persons were awarded for rescuing victims in a car accident. |
| B．Three ordinary people were regarded as great heroes. |
| C．Several victims were carried to safety from the burning cars. |
| D．A car accident occurred on rainsoaked State Highway 6. |
Who saved Megan Smith from the damaged car?
| A．Clemmons. | B．Anthony Russo. |
| C．Bozeman. | D．Bonge. |
Which of the following can be used to describe Bozeman?
| A．Kind. | B．Modest. |
| C．Excited. | D．Smart. |
Which of the following is TRUE according to the passage?
| A．Luckily, no one received too serious injuries in the accident. |
| B．All the victims received slight injuries in the accident. |
| C．The rescuers were taken to the hospital to visit the victims. |
| D．The injured will soon recover from their injuries. |
An Earthship is a home that is built of materials such as old tires and aluminum cans. It is the idea of a man named Michael Reynolds. Many Earthships are more or less self-sufficient because they provide their own heat, air and water. They often have gardens watered and fed by waste water. They are comfortable and ecologically friendly.
The main material used in building Earthships is tires. Tires are plentiful and
can't be recycled like paper, plastic, and metal. While building supplies for most houses can be very expensive, old used tires are free.
First, the tires are packed tightly with dirt. Each full tire weighs as much as
400 pounds. The tires are then stacked like bricks. The walls are extremely strong. They also help keep an even temperature in the house (between 60 and 70 degrees) without heating and cooling systems.
The walls inside the Earthship are made of aluminum cans that are held together by cement. Then they are coated with adobe or stucco.
The roofs of Earthships are sloped so that rain and snow run into large tanks. These tanks hold all the water for the house, and pumps push the water through the pipes. Sometimes, water flows in certain areas of the house as waterfalls! Water that has been used is pumped out into the gardens where owners grow much of their own food.
In most of these houses, the southern side has huge windows that take in winter sunlight as a source of heat. Summer sun does not come in through the south windows, so it doesn't get too hot in the summer. The house also has solar panels that gather energy for lights and hot water and cooking. The Earthships have all the comforts of a regular house without the high cost of electric bills!
In a time when we are running out of energy resources, pollution is bad, and waste is piling up, Earthships are the best places to live in. For people who truly care about the environment,Earthships provide a great alternative to traditional houses. You won't be giving up any comforts, and the styles are attractive. We all hope that more and more people will build Earthships and take a huge step toward helping the environment and saving our planet.What is the main idea of this passage?
| A．Earthships are a good way to live and protect the environment. |
| B．Tanks hold water collected from rain and snow. |
| C．It's important to grow your own food in a vegetable garden. |
| D．People who live in Earthships usually live in the desert. |
Which of the following is NOT explained in the passage?
| A．How an Earthship is built. |
| B．What an Earthship is mainly made of. |
| C．Why the Earthship is so called. |
| D．How an Earthship is heated in winter. |
Which evidence best supports the idea that Earthships are environmentally friendly?
| A．They were invented by Michael Reynolds. |
| B．Water that has been used is pumped out into the garden. |
| C．They are comfortable and ecologically friendly. |
| D．The tires are packed tightly with dirt. |
It can be inferred from the passage that ________.
| A．a large population are already living in Earthships |
| B．the idea of Earthships will attract the attention of governments |
| C．the materials for the Earthships will be harmful to the dwellers(居住者) |
| D．the northern side of the Earthship has no window |
A new study finds that the animal known as man’s best friend can also be a good friend to the heart. Researchers in California say they have found that even just a short visit with a dog helped ease the worries of heart patients.
The study divided the patients into three groups. In Group A, a dog and a person visited each patient for twelve minutes. Patients in Group B received just a human visitor for twelve minutes. And members of Group C received no visitor, human or canine(犬的).
The dogs would lie on the hospital bed so the heart patients could touch them. The researchers say some patients immediately smiled and talked to the dog and the human visitor. Dogs, in her words, “make people happier, calmer and feel more loved.”
The researchers examined the patients before, during and after the visits. They measured stress levels based on blood flow and heart activity. They say they found a twenty-four percent decrease in the group visited by both a dog and a person. They reported a ten percent decrease in the group visited by a person only. There was no change in the patients without any visit. These patients, however, did have an increase in their production of the hormone epinephrine (epinephrine肾上腺素). The body produces epinephrine during times of stress.
The increase was an average of seven percent. But the study found that patients who spent time with a dog had a seventeen percent drop in their levels of epinephrine. Patients visited by a human but not a dog also had a decrease, but only two percent.The author believes that _______.
| A．the dog can take the place of most medicines |
| B．the dog is the most popular pet for man |
| C．the findings of the research cannot be trusted |
| D．visits by a human work better than visits by a dog |
Which of the following best shows the stress level changes in the groups of patients? BACC
From the research findings we may conclude that _______.
| A．the less the body produces epinephrine, the better |
| B．the longer a visit lasts, the happier the patient should be |
| C．the patients enjoyed the dogs’ company more than the human visitors’ |
| D．it’s impossible for heart patients to recover without dogs’ visits |
Which of the following is the best title for the passage?
| A．Worried Heart Patients | B．Epinephrine and Stress |
| C．Good Friend to the Heart | D．Three Groups of Patients |
“Creativity is the key to a brighter future,” says education and business experts. Here is how schools and parents can encourage this important skill in children.
If Dick Drew had listened to his boss in 1925, we might not have a product that we now think of as of great importance: a new type of tape. Drew worked for the Minnesota Mining Company. At work he developed a kind of material strong enough to hold things together. But his boss told him not to think more about the idea. Finally, using his own time, Drew improved the tape, which now is used everywhere by many people. And his former company learned from its mistake. Now it encourages people to spend 15 percent of their work time just thinking about and developing new ideas.
Creativity is not something one is just born with, nor is it necessarily a character of high intelligence. The fact that a person is highly intelligent does not mean that he uses it creatively. Creativity is the matter of using the resources one has to produce new ideas that are good for something.
Unfortunately, schools have not tried to encourage creativity. With strong attention to test results and the development of reading, writing and mathematical skills, many educators give up creativity for correct answers. The result is that children can give back information but can’t recognize ways to use it in new situations. They may know the rules correctly but they are unable to use them to work out practical problems.
It is important to give children choices. From the earliest age, children should be allowed to make decisions and understand their results. Even if it’s choosing between two food items for lunch, decision-making helps thinking skills. As children grow older, parents should let their children decide how to use their time or spend their money. This is because the most important character of creative people is a very strong desire to find a way out of trouble. What did the company where Drew once worked learn from its mistake?
| A．They should encourage people to work a longer time. |
| B．People should be discouraged to think freely. |
| C．People will do better if they spend most of their work time developing new ideas. |
| D．It is necessary for people to spend some of their work time considering and improving new ideas. |
According to the passage, creativity is ________.
| A．something that most people are born with |
| B．something that depends mainly on intelligence |
| C．a way of using what one has learned to work out new problems |
| D．something that is not important to the character of a person at all |
Why do schools tend to fail to encourage creativity?
| A．They give children too many choices. |
| B．They are not strict enough with children. |
| C．They care too much about examination marks. |
| D．They don’t understand the importance of education. |
Which of the following skills is the most important in developing creativity?
| A．Reading. | B．Writing. | C．Mathematical skill. | D．Decision-making. |
Fidenzio Salvatori is determined that the city of Toronto will have an outdoor marketplace for merchants from its immigrant community, complete with dancing and other forms of amusement form their native countries. “Toronto is truly multicultural (多元文化的)，” he said in a newspaper interview. “It’s a city from many places, and multicultural marketplace will help Torontonians to understand and appreciate the rich variety of cultural groups in our city.”
Salvatori, aged 23, will soon complete his studies at the University of Toronto. He was eleven years old when he came to Canada from Italy with his parents. “Most of Toronto’s immigrants are from lands where the marketplace has always been part of daily life,” he said.
Salvatori has been interested in getting an open-air market for Toronto for the last three years. This year, with the help of two fellow students, he prepared a proposal on the subject and presented it to the city’s Executive committee, asking for their support. The proposal pointed out Toronto’s rich variety of national groups, “whose customs include market shopping.”
Under a Canadian government program for multiculturalism, the three students have received two thousand dollars with which they will do a study to find out whether Toronto’s immigrant businessmen would support an open-air market. They hope the merchants will support the plan strongly. “A study done earlier this year showed that 90 percent of shoppers would be in favor of it,” Salvatori said. “At first it would be an experiment. But we think it will prove to be good business for the merchants, as well as tourist attraction.”What is Fidenzio Salvatori’s purpose of having an outdoor marketplace for Toronto?
| A．To provide different forms of amusement. |
| B．To keep the cultural variety of the city. |
| C．To inspire its immigrant community. |
| D．To satisfy its immigrant merchants. |
Fidenzio Salvatori, with two other students, has got two thousand dollars from the government ______.
| A．to make an experiment | B．to perform a research |
| C．to start a marketplace | D．to operate a business |
According to Salvatori, the marketplace may also help to improve Toronto’s ______.
| A．market management | B．travel industry |
| C．community service | D．city planning |
It can be inferred from the text that the Canadian government supports ______.
| A．the protection of different cultures | B．the plan of an open-air market |
| C．the request of merchants | D．the attitude of shoppers |
Last August, Joe and Mary Mahoney began looking at colleges for their 17-year-old daughter, Maureen. With a checklist of criteria in hand, the Dallas family looked around the country visiting half a dozen schools. They sought a university that offered the teenager’s intended major, one located near a large city, and a campus where their daughter would be safe.
“The safety issue is a big one,” says Joe Mahoney, who quickly discovered he wasn’t alone in his worries. On campus tours other parents voiced similar concerns, and the same question was always asked: what about crime? But when college officials always gave the same answer — “That’s not a problem here.” — Mahoney began to feel uneasy.
“No crime whatsoever?” comments Mahoney today. “I just don’t buy it.” Nor should he: in 1999 the U.S. Department of Education had reports of nearly 400,000 serious crimes on or around our campuses. “Parents need to understand that times have changed since they went to colleges,” says David Nichols, author of Creating a Safe Campus. “Campus crime mirrors the rest of the nation.”
But getting accurate information isn’t easy. Colleges must report crime statistics （统计数字) by law, but some hold back for fear of bad publicity, leaving the honest ones looking dangerous. “The truth may not always be obvious,” warns S. Daniel Carter of Security on Campus, Inc., the nation’s leading campus safety watchdog group.
To help concerned parents, Carter promised to visit campuses and talk to experts around the country to find out major crime issues and effective solutions.The Mahoneys visited quite a few colleges last August ______.
| A．to express the opinions of many parents |
| B．to choose a right one for their daughter |
| C．to check the cost of college education |
| D．to find a right one near a large city |
It is often difficult to get correct information on campus crime because some colleges
______.
| A．receive too many visitors | B．mirror the rest of the nation |
| C．hide the truth of campus crime | D．have too many watchdog groups |
The underlined word “buy” in the third paragraph means ______.
| A．mind | B．admit | C．believe | D．expect |
We learn from the text that “the honest ones” in the fourth paragraph most probably
refers to colleges ______.
| A．that are protected by campus security | B．that report campus crimes by law |
| C．that are free from campus crime | D．the enjoy very good publicity |
What is the text mainly about?
| A．Exact campus crime statistics. | B．Crimes on or around campuses. |
| C．Effective solutions to campus crime. | D．concerns about kids’ campus safety. |