To the untrained eye it might seem like just a bit of a monkey trick. But when Milly the mandrill (山魈, 西非洲产的大狒狒) covers her face with her hand she is actually sending a serious message to her fellows: “Leave me alone!”
Experts believe the 15-year-old mandrill invented the gesture to warn other monkeys at Colchester Zoo to give her some space. And, surprisingly, the signal has been picked by other members of the group, who use it when they too require solitude.
Biologist Mark Laidre believes the behavior is evidence of social culture among the mandrills. Importantly, the sign language is unlikely to have been influenced by human activities because mandrills do not copy humans. Mr. Laidre expects further research will uncover other monkeys using cultural gestures — the ability to communicate with the hands in a meaningful way. “By covering their eyes with their hands, possibly conveyed to others that they wanted to be left alone and this message may have been respected as a ‘do not disturb’ sign,” said Mr. Laidre.
While the hand is in place, other monkeys are not likely to approach or touch the monkey. Those who rank lower in the social order also use the technique to avoid attacks from more powerful group members. As the discovery appears to be unique to Colchester Zoo, it suggests it is a local phenomenon that arose naturally in the community of 25 mandrills.
Curator （园长） Sarah Forsyth said: “We believe Milly made up the signal and over the past five years some of the younger mandrills have picked it up. We’re not sure why she started doing it but it could be as simple as ‘I can’t see them, so they can’t see me’. It really does show you how intelligent mandrills are.” What’s the text mainly about?
| A．How humans influenced monkeys. |
| B．A monkey invented a gesture. |
| C．A new social culture was discovered. |
| D．How experts made the new discovery. |
What does the underlined word “solitude” in the second paragraph mean?
| A．Aloneness. | B．Comfort. |
| C．Protection. | D．Respect. |
According to Mark Laidre, _____.
| A．human activities affect mandrills’ sign language |
| B．animals are slow in picking up information |
| C．mandrills’ social culture has nothing to do with humans |
| D．mandrills are the largest species of monkey in the world |
The monkeys can also use the “do not disturb” sign to _____.
A. protect themselves from being harmed
B. struggle against more powerful group members
C. show humans how intelligent they areWhat can be known from the text?
| A．Milly invented the gesture when she was 15. |
| B．Mandrills are best known for their social ability. |
| C．Why Milly first used the sign language is known to experts. |
| D．Only the mandrills in Colchester Zoo use the gesture. |
When 19-year-old Sophia Giorgi said she was thinking of volunteering to help the Make-A-Wish Foundation(基金会)，nobody understood what she was talking about .But Sophia knew just how important Make – A –Wish could be because this special organization had helped to make a dream come true for one of her best friends .We were interested in finding out more, so we went to meet Sophia and listened to what she had to say .
Sophia told us that Make – A –Wish is a worldwide organization that started in the United States in 1980.It’s a charity(慈善机构)that helps children who have got very serious illnesses. Make – A –Wish help children feel happy even though they are sick, by making their wishes and dreams come true,” Sophia explained .
We asked Sophia how Make – A –Wish had first started. She said it had all begun with a very sick young boy called Chris ,who had been dreaming for a long time of becoming a policeman .Sophia said lots of people had wanted to find a way to make Chris’s dream come true ----so, with everybody’s help , Chris, only seven years old at the time ,had been a “policeman” for a day .“ when people saw how delighted Chris was when his dream came true, they decided to try and help other sick children too ,and that was the beginning of Make–A –Wish,” explained Sophia.
Sophia also told us the Foundation tries to give children and their families a special, happy time. A Make-A-Wish volunteer visits the families and asks the children what they would wish for if they could have anything
in the world. Sophia said the volunteers were important because they were the ones who helped to make the
wishes come true. They do this either by providing things that are necessary, or by raising money or helping out in whatever way they can.Sophia found out about Make-A-Wish because her best friend had .
| A．benefited from it | B．volunteered to help it |
| C．dreamed about it | D．told the author about it |
According to Sophia, Make-A-Wish .
| A．is an international charity |
| B．was understood by nobody at first |
| C．raises money for very poor families |
| D．started by drawing the interest of the public |
What is said about Chris in Paragraph3?
| A．He has been a policeman since he was seven. |
| B．He gave people the idea of starting Make-A-Wish |
| C．He wanted people to help make his dream come true. |
| D．He was the first child Make-A-Wish helped after it had been set up. |
Which of the following is true about Make-A-Wish volunteers?
| A．They are important for making wishes come true. |
| B．They try to help children get over their illnesses. |
| C．They visit sick children to make them feel special. |
| D．They provide what is necessary to make Make-A-Wish popular. |
“People are ruder today because they are rushed and more ‘time poor’ than ever before,” says Patsy Rowe, “ Manners have fallen off the radar(雷达).” Due to our strong attraction to electronic equipment it is a wonder that more people don’t wake up each morning and greet the singing birds with a complaint（抱怨）about the noise. Here are some examples of rudeness.
Some people prefer to do almost everything over the internet. To them, dealing with an actual human is like an evolutionary step backward. It feels very slow because humans don’t work at 4G speeds. When you have dinner with friends, you will often notice someone paying more attention to his mobile phone. We have programmed ourselves to think that every new message brings life-changing news, so taking calls and checking our texts are more important than talking to the people we are with. What is worse, some people even tend to send anonymous（匿名的）rude messages by email.
However, rudeness is never acceptable. Don’t assume it is OK to be rude if the person you’re in touch with won’t recognize you. If you have something awful to say, have the courage to face the person and say it, write a letter or email and sign it, or forget it. Upsetting people with unsigned messages is cruel and disgusting.
We shouldn’t blame technology for our shortcomings. Technology is here to help us, but we should not allow it to take over our lives. An important step is acknowledging our shortcomings. People spend a lot of time pointing out bad manners but it would be even more help if we’d publicly acknowledge good manners when we see them.What can be inferred from the underlined sentence in Paragraph 1?
| A．People can tell good from bad behavior. |
| B．Radar is able to observe human behavior. |
| C．People care little about their behavior. |
| D．Radar can be used to predict human behavior. |
Some people are less willing to deal with humans because
| A．they are becoming less patient |
| B．they are growing too independent |
| C．they have to handle many important messages |
| D．they have to follow an evolutionary step backward. |
The author thinks sending unsigned awful messages is
| A．Ridiculous | B．disgusting | C．acceptable | D．reasonable |
What can we learn from the last paragraph?
| A．We should applaud good behavior. |
| B．Technology can never be blamed |
| C．We should keep pointing out mistakes. |
| D．Technology will take over lives one day. |
Argentina in the late nineteenth century was an exciting place. Around 1870, it was experiencing an economic(经济的)boom, and the capital, Buenos Aires, attracted many people. Farmers, as well as a flood of foreigners from Spain and Italy, came to Buenos Aires seeking jobs. These jobs didn’t pay well, and the people felt lonely and disappointed with their new life in the city. As the unhappy newcomers mixed together in the poor parts of the city, the dance known as the tango(探戈舞)came into being.
At the beginning the tango was a dance of the lower classes. It was danced in the bars and streets . At that time there many fewer women than men, so if a man didn’t want to be left out, his only choice was to dance with another man so that he could attract the attention of the few available women .Gradually, the dance spread into the upper classes of Argentinean society and became more respectable.
In Europe at this time, strong interest in dance from around the world was beginning .The interest in international dance was especially evident in Paris. Every kind of dance from ballet(芭蕾舞) to belly dancing could be found on the stages of the Paris theaters of the Paris theaters .After tango dances from Argentina arrive in Europe, they began to draw the interest of the public and they performed their exiting dance in cafes. Though not everyone approved of the new dance ,saying it was a little too shocking, the dance did find enough supporters to make it popular.
The popularity（流行）of the tango continued to grow in many other parts of the world. Soldiers who returned to the United States from World War I brought the tango to North America. It reached Japan in 1926,and in 2003 the Argentinean embassy in Seoul hired a local tango dancer to act as a kind of dance ambassador, and promote tango dancing throughout South Korea.The origin of the tango is associated with .
| A．Belly dances | B．American soldiers |
| C．Spanish city | D．the capital of Argentina |
Which of the following is true about the tango?
| A．It was created by foreigners from Spain and Italy. |
| B．People of the upper classes loved the tango most |
| C．It was often danced by two male in the beginning |
| D．A dancer in Seoul became the Argentinean ambassador. |
Before World War I, the tango spread to .
| A．America | B．Japan | C．France | D．South Korea |
What can be the best title for the text?
| A．How to Dance the Tango |
| B．The History of the Tango |
| C．How to Promote the Tango |
| D．The Modern Tango Boom |
We all know that the cost of heating our homes will continue to be a significant burden on the family budget. Now millions of people are saving on their heating bills with the EP Portable Heater. With over one million satisfied customers around the world, the new EP heats better and faster, saves more on heating bills, and runs almost silent.
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The advanced EP also heats the room evenly, wall to wall and floor to ceiling. it comfortably covers an area up to 350 square feet. Other heaters heat rooms unevenly with most of the heat concentrated to the center of the room. And they only heat an area a few feet around the heater. With the EP, the temperature will not vary in any part of the room.
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Now, we have a special offer for 10 days, during which you can enjoy a half price discount and a free delivery. If you order after that, we reserve the right to either accept or reject order requests at the discounted price.
Take action right now!What is mainly discussed in paragraph 2?
| A．the heat of the EP | B．the safety of the EP |
| C．the appearance of the EP | D．the material of the EP |
From the passage, we can learn that the EP .
| A．doesn’t burn up oxygen |
| B．runs without any noise |
| C．makes people get sleepy |
| D．is unsuitable for children and pets |
The underlined word “evenly” in paragraph 4 probably means .
| A．continuously | B．separately | C．quickly | D．equally |
The main purpose of the passage is to .
| A．persuade people to buy the product |
| B．advise people to save on heating bills |
| C．report the new development of portable heaters |
| D．compare the functions of different heater brands |
When we see well, we do not think about our eyes very often. It is only when we cannot see perfectly that we realize how important our eyes are.
People who are near-sighted can only see things that are very close to their eyes. Everything else seems blurry. Many people who do a lot of work, such as writing, reading and sewing become near-sighted. People who are far-sighted suffer from just the opposite problem. They can see things that are far away, but they have difficulty in reading a book unless they hold it at arm’s length. If they want to do much reading, they must get glasses, too.
Other people do not see clearly because their eyes are not exactly the right shape. They have what is called astigmatism (散光). This, too, can be corrected by glasses. Some people’s eyes become cloudy because of cataracts (白内障). Long ago these people often became blind. Now, however, it is possible to operate on the cataracts and remove them.
Having two good eyes is important for judging distances. Each eye sees things from a slightly different angle. To prove this to yourself, look at an object out of one eye; then look at the same object out of your other eye. You will find the object’s relation to the background and other things around it has changed. The difference between these two different eye views helps us to judge how far away an object is. People who have only one eye cannot judge distances as people with two eyes.We should take good care of our eyes .
| A．only when we can see well |
| B．only when we cannot see perfectly |
| C．even if we can see well |
| D．only when we realize how important our eyes are |
The underlined word blurry in the second paragraph probably means .
| A．obvious | B．possible | C．clear | D．unclear |
Having two eyes instead of one is particularly useful for .
| A．seeing at night |
| B．seeing objects far away |
| C．looking over a wide area |
| D．judging distances |
People who suffer from astigmatism have .
| A．one eye bigger than the other |
| B．eyes that are not exactly the right shape |
| C．a difficulty that can be corrected by an operation |
| D．an eye difficulty that cannot be corrected by glasses |