A famous doctor once received a little child who was badly ill. Thanks to his skill and care, his young patient got well and was soon able to get up and run about again.
The child's mother was very much obliged to the doctor, and she called on him to thank him for what he had done for her child. "Doctor," she said, "you have saved my little son. I don't know how to thank you enough. I feel that money alone cannot repay you, so I have made this little purse with my own hands, as a sign of my gratitude. I hope you will accept it." The doctor stood up and said coldly, "Madam, a little present like that is very nice between friends, but a doctor needs to be paid properly for what he has done." The lady was so surprised and hurt so much that she could not reply for a moment. Then she said quietly, "Perhaps you will tell me how much your fee is?"
"Fifty pounds", he answered.
The lady opened the little purse and took out four fifty-pound bank notes. She handed one of them to the doctor, and put the other three back into the purse. She put the purse into her handbag and, saying good bye to the doctor, went out of the room.The lady was thankful to the doctor because ________.
| A．he had saved her life | B．he had saved her son's life |
| C．he had lent her some money | D．he often called on her |
. The doctor refused the lady's purse because he thought ______.
| A．the purse should be given between friends |
| B．the purse was too small |
| C．the lady was not kind to him |
| D．the lady just gave him that purse and wouldn't give him the medical fee |
What the doctor said ______ the lady.
| A．worried | B．interested |
| C．frightened | D．hurt |
The money in the purse _______.
| A．was only 150 pounds |
| B．was less than 200 pounds |
| C．was much more than the medical fee |
| D．was not enough for the medical fee |
How do you think the doctor would feel in the end?
| A．Sorry and worried | B．Regret and proud |
| C．Excited and proud | D．Sorry and regret |
Recently a group of children in America poured some gasoline on a sleeping man and set him on fire. When caught, the children said they had done what they’d seen on TV.
The incidents make people angry who believe that American children are harmed by watching too much TV. They claim children can’t tell between the fiction of TV and reality, and TV distracts them from learning and makes them violent.
To estimate the impact of TV on young people, “Life” magazine hires a company to interview hundreds of school children in Nora Springs, Iowa and in Dallas, Texas. Although the two cities are very different, the company finds children in each city watch the same TV shows.
Many Iowa children, who watch an average of three hours of TV a day, recognizing that life on TV is rosier than what they experience. Their favourite shows are situation comedies about American families in trouble. Many boys like violent shows about police detectives or heroes, girls particularly soap operas-stories about families and friends.
On the whole, children find real violence on news programs hard to take. “If you see a bus crash on the news, it’s frightening,” one fifth grader says. By and large, the Iowa children agree that the best thing about TV is it makes you laugh.
Children in Dallas are savvier about programs of drug use on TV. “They don’t really show them doing it right. On TV they are not real.” A fifth grader says.
“Life” agrees with a 1988 study by the U. S Department of education that finds children are none the worse for watching TV. The study finds TV doesn’t have lasting effect on children. On the contrary, kids show good judgment about what they watch. “There are very few good shows on TV anymore,” a 10-year-old boy says.
While the debate about TV is so heated, the “Life” survey gives hope that American kids aren’t wasting three or four hours a day (what is worse, by the time young people enter college today, they will have devoted more time to watching television than they will spend in college). However, a child watching TV isn’t reading a good book or joining in healthful sports.The main idea of the passage is .
| A．children who watch more TV are smarter than those who watch only one hour a day |
| B．children learn about drugs from watching TV |
| C．watching too much TV can cause children to go out and kill people |
| D．children learn from TV and can tell reality from what they see on it |
Children who see real violence on TV news programs .
| A．change the channel to watch other programs | B．live in Iowa or Texas |
| C．are sometimes upset and scared | D．think TV gives a very positive image of friendship |
Children who enter college today.
| A．usually cause the satisfaction of the society |
| B．think life on TV is happier than their life at home |
| C．have spent more time watching TV than they will spend in college |
| D．watch most the same TV shows as children in Dallas |
The “Life” survey of children’s TV habits .
| A．concludes that watching up to seven hours a day of TV is good for children |
| B．agrees with the U.S. Department of Education study that finds few negative effects from watching TV |
| C．concludes that there aren’t any good shows on TV any more |
| D．concludes that children shouldn’t pour gasoline on sleeping man |
This year some twenty-three hundred teenagers (young people aged from 13-19) from all over the world will spend about ten months in U. S. homes. They will attend U.S. schools, meet U.S. teenagers, and form impressions of the real America. At the same time, about thirteen hundred American teenagers will go to other countries to learn new languages and gain a new understanding of the rest of the world.
Here is a two-way student exchange in action. Fred, nineteen, spent last year in Germany with George’s family. In turn, George’s son Mike spent a year in Fred’s home in America.
Fred, a lively young man, knew little German when he arrived, but after two months’ study, the language began to come to him. School was completely different from what he had expected-much harder. Students rose respectfully when the teacher entered the room. They took fourteen subjects instead of the six that are usual in the United States. There were almost no outside activities.
Family life, too, was different. The father’s word was law, and all activities were around the family rather than the individual(个人). Fred found the food too simple at first. Also, he missed having a car. “Back home, you pick up some friends in a car and go out and have a good time. In Germany, you walk, but you soon learn to like it.”
At the same time, in America, Mike, a friendly German boy, was also forming his idea. “I suppose I should criticize (批评) American schools”, he says. “It is far too easy by our level. But I have to say that I like it very much. In Germany we do nothing but study. Here we take part in many outside activities. I think that maybe you schools are better in training for citizens. There ought to be some middle ground between the two.”This year _____ teenagers will take part in the exchange programme between America and other countries.
| A．over three thousand | B．thirteen hundred |
| C．twenty three hundred | D．less than two thousand |
The whole exchange programme is mainly to _____.
| A．have teen-agers learn new languages |
| B．send students in America to travel in Germany |
| C．help teen-agers in other countries know the real America |
| D．let students learn something about other countries |
Fred and Mike agreed that _____.
| A．American food tasted better than German food |
| B．Americans and Germans were both friendly |
| C．German schools were harder than American schools |
| D．There were more cars on the streets in America |
What is particular in American schools is that _____.
| A．students go outside to enjoy themselves in a car |
| B．there are a lot of after-school activities |
| C．students usually take fourteen subjects in all |
| D．there is some middle ground between the two teaching buildings |
After experiencing the American school life, Mike thought _____.
| A．German schools trained students to be better citizens |
| B．a better education should include something good from both America and Germany |
| C．American schools were not as good as German schools |
| D．the easy life in the American school was more helpful to students |
Reading to oneself is modern activity which was almost unknown to the learned in the early days of the history, while during the fifteenth century the term “reading” undoubtedly meant reading aloud. Only during the nineteenth century did silent reading become popular.
One should be careful, however, of supposing that silent reading came about simply because reading aloud is distraction（分散注意力）to others. Examination of reasons connected with the historical development of silent reading shows that it became the usual mode of reading for most adult reading tasks mainly because the tasks themselves changed in character.
The last century saw a gradual increase in literacy（读写能力）and thus in the number of readers. As readers increased, so the number of listeners dropped, and thus there was some reduction in the need to read aloud. As reading for the benefit of listeners grew less common, so came the popularity of reading as a private activity in such public places as libraries, trains and offices, where reading aloud would disturb other readers in a way.
Towards the end of the century there was still heated argument over whether books should be used for information or treated respectfully, and over whether the reading of material such as newspapers was in some way mentally weakening. Indeed this argument remains with us still in education. However, whatever its advantages, the old shared literacy culture had gone and was replaced by the printed mass media on the one hand and by books and magazines for a specialized readership on the other.
By the end of the century students were being advised to have some new ideas of books and to use skill in reading them which were not proper, if not impossible, for the oral reader. The social, cultural, and technological developments in the century had greatly changed what the term “reading” referred to.Why was reading aloud common before the nineteenth century?
| A．Because silent reading had not been discovered. |
| B．Because few people could read for themselves. |
| C．Because there were few places for private reading. |
| D．Because people depended on reading for enjoyment. |
The development of silent reading during the nineteenth century showed .
| A．a change in the nature of reading | B．a change in the position of literate people |
| C．an increase in the number of books | D．an increase in the average age of readers |
Educations are still arguing about .
| A．the amount of information provided by books and newspapers |
| B．the importance of silent reading |
| C．the value of different types of reading material |
| D．the effects of reading on health |
What is the writer of this passage attempting to do?
| A．To show how reading methods have improved. | B．To encourage the growth of reading. |
| C．To change people’s way to read. | D．To explain how present-day reading habits developed. |
My father had returned from his business visit to London when I came in, rather late, to supper. I could tell at once that he and my mother had been discussing something. In that half-playful, half-serious way I knew so well, he said, "How would you like to go to Eton?"
"You bet," I cried quickly catching the joke. Everyone knew it was the most expensive, the most famous of schools. You had to be entered at birth, if not before. Besides, even at 12 or 13, I understood my father. He disliked any form of showing off. He always knew his proper station in life, which was in the middle of the middle class, our house was medium-sized; he had avoided joining Royal Liverpool Golf Club and went to a smaller one instead; though once he had got a second-hand Rolls-Royce at a remarkably low price, he felt embarrassed driving it, and quickly changed it for an Austin 1100.
This could only be his delightful way of telling me that the whole boarding school idea was to be dropped. Alas! I should also have remembered that he had a liking for being different from everyone else, if it did not conflict(冲突) with his fear of drawing attention to himself.
It seemed that he had happened to be talking to Graham Brown of the London office, a very nice fellow, and Graham had a friend who had just entered his boy at the school, and while he was in that part of the world he thought he might just as well phone them. I remember my eyes stinging(刺痛) and my hands shaking with the puzzlement of my feelings. There was excitement, at the heart of great sadness.
"Oh, he doesn't want to go away," said my mother, "You shouldn't go on like this.” “It's up to him," said my father. "He can make up his own mind."The house the writer's family lived in was ________.
| A．the best they could afford | B．right for their social position |
| C．for showing off | D．rather small |
His father sold his Roils-Royce because ________.
| A．it made him feel uneasy | B．it was too old to work well |
| C．it was too expensive to possess | D．it was too cheap |
The writer's father enjoyed being different as long as ________.
| A．it drew attention to him | B．it didn't bring him in arguments |
| C．it was understood as a joke | D．there was no danger of his showing off |
What was the writer's reaction to the idea of going to Eton?
| A．He was very unhappy. | B．He didn't believe it. |
| C．He was delighted. | D．He had mixed feelings. |
We can know from the passage that ________.
| A．Children who can go to Eton are very famous |
| B．Children can go to Eton if they will |
| C．It is very difficult for a child to get admitted by Eton |
| D．Children don't have the right to decide whether they will go to Eton |
Mr. Briggs got a job with an insurance company(保险公司) after he left school and went around visiting people in their homes to sell them life insurance. One day, after he had been working for the company for about a year, the insurance manager sent for him and said, “Mr. Briggs, I have been looking at your record as a salesman with our company, and there is one thing that surprises me about it. Why have you been selling insurance only to people over 95 years old, and why have you been giving them such generous（宽厚的）conditions? You’ll ruin our company if you go on like that.”
“Oh, no, sir,” answered Mr. Briggs at once, “Before I started work, I looked at the figures(数字) for deaths in this country during the past ten years, and I can tell you that few people die at the age of 95.”Before he worked in an insurance company, what was Mr.
Briggs?
| A．He was a worker. | B．He was an official. |
| C．He was a student. | D．He was a businessman. |
The word “ruin” in the first paragraph means .
| A．lose | B．break | C．leave | D．destroy |
As a salesman with the company, Mr. Brigs .
| A．visited people to ask them to work with him |
| B．called on people to make them join the company |
| C．saw old people in order to help them |
| D．visited many people so as to offer insurance |
What was it that surprised the manager?
| A．Mr. Briggs sold life insurance only to 95 people. |
| B．Mr. Briggs sold insurance only to people of more than 95. |
| C．Mr. Briggs had ruined the insurance company. |
| D．Mr. Briggs gave people generous conditions. |
Which of the following is true according to the passage?
| A．Mr. Briggs had studied the figures for deaths for several years. |
| B．Mr. Briggs began to look at the figures after he started work. |
| C．A great number of very old people die every year. |
| D．The number of the very old people who died every year is |
small.