In modern society there is a great deal of argument about competition. Some value it highly, believing that it is responsible for social progress and prosperity, others say that competition is bad; that it sets one person against another; that it leads to unfriendly relationship between people.
I have taught many children who held the belief that their self – worth relied (依赖) on how well they performed at tennis and other skills. For them, playing well and winning are often life – and – death affairs. In their single – minded pursuit (追求) of success, the development of many other human qualities is sadly forgotten.
However, while some seem to be lost in the desire to succeed, others take an opposite attitude. In a culture which values only the winner and pays no attention to the ordinary players, they strongly blame competition. Among the most vocal are youngsters who have suffered under competitive pressures from their parents or society. Teaching these young people, I often observe in them a desire to fail. They seem to seek failure by not trying to win or achieve success. By not trying, they always have an excuse: “I may have lost, but it doesn’t matter because I really didn’t try.” What is not usually admitted by themselves is the belief that if they had really tried and lost, that would mean a lot. Such a loss would be a measure of their worth. Clearly, this belief is the same as that of the true competitors who try to prove themselves. Both are based on the mistaken belief that one’s self – respect relies on how well one performs in comparison with others. Both are afraid of not being valued. Only as this basic and often troublesome fear begins to dissolve (缓解) can we discover a new meaning in competition.What does this passage mainly talk about?
| A．Competition helps to set up self–respect. |
| B．Opinions about competition are different among people. |
| C．Competition is harmful to personal quality development. |
| D．Failures are necessary experiences in competition |
Why do some people favor competition according to the passage?
| A．It pushes society forward. |
| B．It builds up a sense of duty. |
| C．It improves personal abilities. |
| D．It encourages individual efforts. |
The underlined phrase “the most vocal” in Paragraph 3 means ________ .
| A．those who try their best to win |
| B．those who value competition most highly |
| C．those who are against competition most strongly |
| D．those who rely on others most for success |
What is the similar belief of the true competitors and those with a desire to fail ?
| A．One’s worth lies in his performance compared with others. |
| B．One’s success in competition needs great efforts. |
| C．One’s achievement is determined by his particular skills. |
| D．One’s success is based on how hard he has tried. |
Which point of view may the author agree to?
| A．Every effort should be paid back. |
| B．Competition should be encouraged. |
| C．Winning should be a life–and–death matter. |
| D．Fear of failure should be removed in competition. |
Homestay provides English language students with the opportunity to speak English outside the classroom and the experience of being part of a British home.
What to Expect
The host will provide accommodation（住宿） and meals. Rooms will be cleaned and bedcovers changed at least once a week. You will be given the house key and the host is there to offer help and advice as well as to take an interest in your physical and mental health.
Accommodation Zones
Homestays are located in London mainly in Zones2，3 and 4 of the transport system. Most hosts do not live in the town centre as much of central London is commercial and not residential(居住的). Zones 3 and 4 often offer larger accommodation in a less crowed area. It is very convenient to travel in London by Underground.
Meal Plans Available
♢ Continental Breakfast♢ Breakfast and Dinner ♢ Breakfast, Packed Lunch and Dinner
It’s important to note that few English families still provide a traditional cooked breakfast. Your accommodation includes Continental Breakfast which normally consists of fruit juice, cereal（谷物类食品），bread and tea or coffee. Cheese, fruit and cold meat are not normally part of a Continental Breakfast in England. Dinners usually consist of meat or fish with vegetables followed by dessert, fruit and coffee.
Friends
If you wish to invite a friend over to visit. you must first ask your host’s permission. You have no right to entertain friends in a family home as some families feel it is an invasion of their privacy.
Self-Catering Accommodation in Private Homes
Accommodation on a room-only basis includes shared kitchen and bathroom facilities and often a main living room. This kind of accommodation offers an independent lifestyle and is more suitable for the long-stay student. However, it does not provide the same family atmosphere as an ordinary homestay and may not benefit those who need to practise English at home quite as much.Which of the following will the host provide?
| A．Room cleaning. | B．Medical care. | C．Free transport. | D．Physical training. |
The passage is probably written for
| A．hosts willing to receive foreign students |
| B．foreigners hoping to build British culture |
| C．English learners applying to live in English homes |
| D．travellers planning to visit families in London |
According to the passage. What does continental Breakfast include?
| A．Dessert and coffee. | B．Fruit and vegetables. |
| C．Bread and fruit juice. | D．Cereal and cold meat. |
What can be inferred from Paragraph 3?
| A．Zone 4 is more crowded than Zone 2. |
| B．The business centre of London is in Zone 1. |
| C．Hosts dislike travelling to the city centre. |
| D．Accommodation in the city centre is not provided. |
Why do some people choose self-catering accommodation?
| A．To experience a warmer family atmosphere. |
| B．To enrich their knowledge of English. |
| C．To entertain friends as they like. |
| D．To enjoy much more freedom. |
I learned how our attitudes made a big difference in our everyday lives from my friend Mary.
She doesn’t have any pets. I happened to see her outside on a -30 degree morning walking a dog. I felt sorry for Mary, out there walking a dog that’s not hers in such cold weather. I thought maybe she was saying to herself, “Yeah, this is why I don’t have any pets! I hate walking dogs.”
Later that day I saw Mary and said, “I saw you out there walking a dog this morning. Are you unhappy because you had to walk it on such a cold day?” To my surprise, she said that she enjoyed getting out there and walking the dog and that she got good exercise because of the dog. She also said she had talked to her brother, the dog’s owner, who was on holiday in Orlando, Florida with his family. He said his children were enjoying Disney World and the resorts (胜地). His four-year-old son had breakfast with Mickey Mouse and said it was the best day in his life. Mary said, “If I can help my brother and his family have a wonderful time relaxing for a week, knowing that their pet is being loved and cared for, what more could I ask for?” She added, “It’s worth it for me to make the sacrifice (牺牲) so that they can go and have fun.”
I learned a lesson from Mary. What do we know about Mary?
| A．She liked exercising outside before that day. |
| B．In fact she likes taking care of dogs very much. |
| C．She likes helping others. |
| D．She was sorry for not going on holiday with her brother. |
Why did the author feel sorry for Mary?
| A．It was a cold morning. |
| B．He thought Mary was suffering because of others. |
| C．Mary didn’t have any pets. |
| D．He found Mary was unhappy to walk the dog. |
Mary’s brother and his family could have a wonderful holiday because __________.
| A．the children could have breakfast with Mickey Mouse |
| B．the children enjoyed Disney World and the resorts |
| C．Mary did not go with them |
| D．Mary looked after their dog |
What lesson did the author learn from Mary?
| A．Traveling is fun, and walking dogs is also fun. |
| B．Walking dogs will make you feel warm. |
| C．Helping others is also a kind of enjoyment. |
| D．Walking dogs is also a kind of exercise. |
What can we infer from the passage?
| A．The author mistook Mary that morning. |
| B．Mary would raise a dog after helping her brother. |
| C．Mary made a lot of sacrifices for her brother. |
| D．Mary disliked raising any pets. |
When I was seven, my parents gave me a doll, a doll’s house and a book. The Arabian Nights, came wrapped in red paper. I was just ready to read when my mother walked into my room．
“Isn’t your doll just beautiful?” my mother asked. I looked at the doll, with fair hair in a pink dress----I’ll have to call her “she” because I never gave her a name. I folded my lips and raised my eyebrows, not really knowing how to let my mother down easily.
“This doll is different.” My mother explained, trying to talk me into playing with it.
Thinking the doll needed love, I hugged her tightly for a long time. Useless, I said to myself. Finally, I decided to play with the doll’s house. But since rearranging the tiny furniture seemed to be the only active possible, I lost interest. I caught sight again of the third of my gifts The Arabian Nights, and I began to read it. From that moment, the book was my constant companion.
Every day I climbed our garden tree, nestled among its branches, I read the stories in The Arabian Nights to my heart’s content. My mother became concerned as she noticed I wasn’t playing with either the doll or the little house. She insisted that I take the doll up the tree with me.
Trying to read on a branch 15 feet off the ground while holding on to the silly doll was not easy. After nearly falling off twice, I tied one end of a long vine around the doll’s neck and the opposite one around the branch, letting the doll hang in mid air while I read. I always looked out for my mother, though. I sensed that my playing with the doll was of great importance to her. So every time I heard her coming, I lifted the doll up and hugged her. The smile in my mother’s eyes told me my plan worked.
The inevitable(不可避免的) happened one afternoon. Totally absorbed in the reading, I didn’t hear my mother calling me. When I looked down, I saw my mother staring at the hanging doll. Fearing the worst of scolding, I climbed down in a flash, reaching the ground just as my mother was untying the doll. To my surprise, she didn’t scold. She kept on staring at the doll．
The next day, my father came home early and suggested he and I play with the doll’s house. Soon I was bored, but my father seemed to be having so much fun, I didn’t have the heart to tell him. Quietly I slipped out, picking up my book on my way to the yard. So absorbed was he in arranging and rearranging the tiny furniture that he didn’t notice my quick exit.
Almost 20 years passed before I found out why the hanging-doll incident had been so significant for my parents. By then I was a parent myself. After recalling the incident, my mother said all those years she had been afraid whether I would turn out to be a most loving and understanding mother to my son．
My mother often thanks God aloud for making me a good parent, pointing out that with education I might have been a rich dentist instead of a poor poet. I look back on that same childhood incident, recalling my third gift, the book in red-paper, and I take advantage of the experiences that have made me who and what I am. Sometimes I pause to wonder at life’s wonderful ironies （讽刺）.Why didn’t the author give the doll a name?
| A．Because the gift was given by her parents. |
| B．Because the girl didn’t care much for the doll. |
| C．Because her parents would give the doll a name. |
| D．Because the doll had little in common with her. |
The author’s account of a childhood incident shows that, as a young girl, she viewed her parents as people who.
| A．hoped to shape their children’s future |
| B．were unconcerned about their behavior |
| C．ruined their children’s dreams completely |
| D．might withdraw their love at any moment |
What can we infer from the last paragraph?
| A．The mother is now satisfied with her daughter’s career. |
| B．The daughter now regrets what she did when she was a girl. |
| C．The mother thinks the daughter’s achievements are unsatisfactory. |
| D．The daughter wishes that she had been allowed more freedom as a child. |
Global warming is causing more than 300,000 deaths and about $125 billion in economic losses each year, according to a report by the Global Humanitarian Forum, an organization led by Kofi Annan, the former United Nations secretary general.
The report, to be released Friday, analyzed data and existing studies of health, disaster, population and economic trends. It found that human-influenced climate change was raising the global death rates from illnesses including malnutrition and heat-related health problems.
But even before its release, the report drew criticism from some experts on climate and risk, who questioned its methods and conclusions. Along with the deaths, the report said that the lives of 325 million people, primarily in poor countries,were being seriously affected by climate change. It projected that the number would double by 2030.
Roger Pielke Jr., a politicalscientist at the University of Colorado, Boulder, who studies disaster trends, said the Forum’s report was “a methodological embarrassment” because there was no way to distinguish deaths or economic losses related to human-driven global warming amid（在...中间） the much larger losses resulting from the growth in populations and economic development in vulnerable(易受伤害的) regions. Dr. Pielke said that “climate change is an important problem requiring our utmost attention.” But the report, he said, “will harm the cause for action on both climate change and disasters because it is so deeply flawed(有瑕疵的).”
However, Soren Andreasen, a social scientist at Dalberg Global Development Partners who supervised the writing of the report, defended it, saying that it was clear that the numbers were rough estimates. He said the report was aimed at world leaders, who will meet in Copenhagen in December to negotiate a new international climate treaty.
In a press release describing the report, Mr. Annan stressed the need for the negotiations to focus on increasing the flow of money from rich to poor regions to help reduce their vulnerability to climate hazards while still controling the emissions of the heat-trapping gases. More than 90% of the human and economic losses from climate change are occurring in poor countries, according to the report. What is the finding of the Global Humanitarian Forum?
| A．Rates of death from illnesses have risen due to global warming. |
| B．Global temperatures affect the rate of economic development. |
| C．Malnutrition has caused serious health problems in poor countries. |
| D．Economic trends have to do withpopulation and natural disasters. |
What do we learn about the Forum’s report from the passage?
| A．It caused a big stir in developing countries. |
| B．It was warmly received by environmentalists. |
| C．It caused a lot of interest in the scientific circles. |
| D．It was challenged by some climate and risk experts. |
What is Soren Andreasen’s view of the report?
| A．Its conclusions are based on carefully collected data. |
| B．It is vulnerable to criticism if the statistics are closely examined. |
| C．It will give rise to heated discussions at the Copenhagen conference. |
| D．Its rough estimates are meant to draw the attention of world leaders. |
What does Kofi Annan say should be the focus of the Copenhagen conference?
| A．How human and economic losses from climate change can be reduced. |
| B．How rich countries can better help poor regions reduce climate hazards. |
| C．How emissions of heat-trapping gases can be reduced on a global scale. |
| D．How rich and poor regionscan share responsibility in curbing global warming. |
Our grand China tour will show you a different China!
But you are required to present a US passport when entering China. For some important information on how to apply for a passport, see the following forms.
| YOU MUST SUBMIT FORM DS-11 IF ANY OF THE FOLLOWING ARE TRUE: ★You have never been issued（签发）a US passport or ★You are under aged 16 or ★You were under 16 when your previous passport was issued or ★Your most recent US passport was issued more than 15 years ago or ★Your most recent US passport was lost or stolen or ★Your name has changed since your previous US passport was issued. NOTE: If the above statements do not apply to you, you can apply for a US passport by mail! |
| STEPS TO SUBMITING FORM DS-11: Read and understand Steps 1 and 2 before leaving this page. STEP 1: Complete and Print Form DS-11 ★If completing Form DS-11 online, print the completed form using black ink on one-sided pages ★If completing Form DS-11 by hand, make sure that all the information is complete and correct. The form should be filled in black ink. Do so legibly(字迹清楚地) or the application processing time may be delayed. NOTE: Form DS-11 can be obtained from your local Passport Agency. STEP 2: Submit Completed Form in Person You must submit Form DS-11 and other required documents in person at a Passport Agency, Form DS-11 may not be submitted by mail. |
| NEED A US PASSPORT IMMEDIATELY? You should make an appointment to be seen at a Passport Agency only if: ★The US passport is needed in less than 2 weeks for international travel ★The US passport is needed within 4 weeks to obtain a foreign visa Call the National Passport Information Center to make an appointment or visit a Passport Agency. |
| If you are overseas and need to apply for or renew your US passport, please follow the instructions in Tips for Americans Traveling Abroad. |
What is most probably talked about before this passage?
| A．Matters needed to be dealt with before going to China. |
| B．The great changes happening in China. |
| C．An introduction to a journey to China. |
| D．International travel information. |
You can apply for a US passport by mail if you _________.
| A．have never had a US passport before |
| B．were 17 when you received your previous passport |
| C．got your most recent US passport 17 years ago |
| D．changed your name after getting your passport last time |
Before submitting Form DS-11, you should __________.
| A．fill the form in either black or blue ink |
| B．fill in all information on the form |
| C．connect the local agency by telephone first |
| D．print the form on both sides of the paper |
If you want to get the passport within half a month, you should _________.
| A．call the National Passport Information Center or visit a Passport Agency |
| B．be an adult of more than 18 years old |
| C．offer to present your foreign visa to a Passport Agency |
| D．not pay a visit to Passport Agency |