One day Mr. Brown sees a young woman in the street with children. He is very surprised because all the children are wearing the same clothes. White caps, blue coats and yellow trousers.
“Are all these children yours?” he asks the woman.
“Yes, they are.” she answers.
“Do you always dress them in the same clothes ?” asks Mr. Brown.
“Yes,” answers the mother. “When we have four children, we dress them in the same clothes because we don’t want to lose any of them. It is easy to see our children among other children because they are all wearing the same clothes.
And now we have ten, we dress them like this because we don't want to take other children home by mistake. When there are other children among ours, it is easy to see them because their clothes are different.How many people does Mr. Brown see in the street one day? He sees ____in all.
| A．twelve | B．eleven | C．four | D．ten children |
Why is Mr. Brown surprised? Because ________ .
| A．all the children are boys |
| B．all the children are in the same clothes |
| C．all the children are lovely |
| D．all the children are wearing the same trousers |
Why does the woman dress her children in the same clothes? Because ___________.
| A．she has so many children |
| B．she loves her children |
| C．she doesn't want to take her children home |
| D．she wants to see her children easily among others |
The following are letters to the editor of a school newspaper.
Dear editor,
I’d like to express my opinion about grades. Students should be allowed to study without worrying about grades. Fortunately, most educators are becoming aware of the fact that students have different interests and abilities. I understand that grades are useful, but grades often limit creativity. Competing for better grades causes many students to turn down opportunities to pursue music, dramatics and sports. Grades force an arbitrary(武断的) standard of success on everyone. I do not demand as some extremists do, that grades be removed immediately. However, I do believe that less emphasis should be placed on grades. I hope that someday grades will become optional at Village High School.
Magdalena Smith
Drama Club
Dear editor,
I’d like to say something about grades. Let’s face the facts about grades. Grades perform three basic functions. First, grades motivate(激发) students to work at their highest level of competence（能力）. Second, they act as a reward for hardworking students and as a punishment to students who do not work hard. Finally, grades are used as an effective standard by which to measure students’ achievement. Good grades help students to get jobs and to get into university. I've spoken with a number of students who have jobs, and most of them say that they were hired primarily on the basis of their grades. My grades helped me land a part-time job and will help me get into university next year. I think grades are extremely important at Village High School.
Simon Harper
Science ClubWhich of the following is not Magdalena Smith’s opinion?
| A．Grades should not be used to measure a person’s success. |
| B．Students may give up the chance to learn music and sports for grades. |
| C．Students’ creativity may not be developed for grades. |
| D．Grades should be taken away at once. |
We can learn Simon Harper _____.
| A．is concerned about students' creativity |
| B．believes in the benefits of good grades |
| C．doesn't work too hard at his studies |
| D．supports students' interests and abilities |
From the second letter, we can infer that Simon Harper is a/an_____.
| A．student | B．teacher |
| C．headmaster | D．advertiser |
Mom’s birthday present? It may be a difficult thing for some people, but for me, it is an easy thing. Mom loved flowers, so every year I sent her flowers. Actually she had a bed of irises (鸢尾花) in the backyard of her small, Indiana farm. They were beautiful. “Take some,” she said, “Dig some up and plant them on the side of your own house.”
But in my yard they became lacking in energy. A year passed, then two, but not one flower appeared. I cut back all their green leaves. I was tired of seeing them so lonely. Finally, I dug the irises up and threw them away.
About that time Mom died unexpectedly. My sister and I sold the farm. I never went back to see the irises. I just couldn’t stand seeing another family living in our home—Mom’s home. Autumn came, then winter. The following spring, as Mom’s birthday approached, I struggled with the question of how to remember her. I stared out of the window and saw a few stubborn irises in my side yard sprouting (发芽), —tall, thin but flowerless. Because of seeing them, I decided to order flowers as I always did on Mom’s birthday, and send them to my sister. I wished so badly I could still send flowers to Mom. But that was impossible.
On the morning of Mom’s birthday, I was in my car ready to work. Something in the yard caught my eye. The irises! One had bloomed with flowers, big, showy and purple, as lovely as they ever had been on Mom’s farm. I smiled and turned my eyes upward. I could no longer send flowers to Mom. But somehow, she’d been able to send them to me.According to the first paragraph, Mom ________.
| A．didn’t like the presents from the author |
| B．wanted to give the author some flowers |
| C．lived with the author on an Indiana farm |
| D．got different birthday presents from the author every year |
At first, the irises in the author’s yard ________.
| A．all died quickly |
| B．grew as well as on Mom’s farm |
| C．didn’t bloom at all |
| D．grew better than those on Mom’s farm |
What troubled the author?
| A．She didn’t know how to grow irises. |
| B．She regretted they had sold Mom’s farm. |
| C．She couldn’t bear others living in Mom’s home. |
| D．She didn’t know what to do in memory of Mom. |
What can be learned from the last paragraph?
| A．All the irises in the author’s yard bloomed. |
| B．The author went to see the irises in Mom’s yard. |
| C．It was Mom who took care of these irises in the author’s yard. |
| D．The author thought the blooming irises were gifts from Mom. |
I am a good mother to three children. I have tried never to let my profession stand in the way of being a good parent.
I no longer consider myself the center of the universe. I show up. I listen. I try to laugh. I am a good friend to my husband. I have tried to make marriage vows (誓约) mean what they say. I am a good friend to my friends, and they to me. Without them, there would be nothing to say to you today.
So here's what I wanted to tell you today: get a life. A real life, not a desire of the next promotion (提升), the bigger paycheck, the larger house.
Get a life in which you are not alone. Find people you love，and who love you. And remember that love is not leisure(休闲) but work. Pick up the phone. Send an email. Write a letter. And realize that life is the best thing and that you have no business taking it for granted.
It is so easy to waste our lives，our days，our hours，and our minutes. It is so easy to exist instead of living. I learned to live many years ago. Something really，really bad happened to me，something that changed my life. If I had my choice，it would never have been changed at all. And what I learned from it is what，today，seems to be the hardest lesson of all.
I learned to love the journey，not the destination. I learned to look at all the good in the world and tried to give some of it back because I believed in it，completely and totally. And I tried to do that，in part，by telling others what I had learned.
By telling them this：read in the backyard with the sun on your face. Learn to be happy. And think of life as a deadly illness，because if you do，you will live with joy and passion(激情) as it ought to be lived.How did the author form her view of life?
| A．Through social experience. |
| B．By learning from her friends. |
| C．Through an unfortunate experience. |
| D． From her children and husband. |
By the underlined sentence “It is so easy to exist instead of living.” in the fifth paragraph，the author really means that people tend to________.
| A．make a living rather than live a real life |
| B．work rather than enjoy life |
| C．waste a lot in life |
| D．forget the most important lesson in life |
What’s the author’s attitude towards work?
| A．Do it well to serve others. |
| B．Earn enough money to make life better. |
| C．Try your best to get higher position and pay. |
| D．Don’t let it affect your real life. |
It can be inferred from the passage that________.
| A．the author is a success in personal life |
| B．the author doesn’t try her best to work well |
| C．the author spends all her time caring for her children |
| D．the author likes traveling very much |
As a boy I was always small for my age. I was also five years younger than one of my brothers and seven years younger than the other. As a result I often felt left out when their friends came over to play. I was either too small or too young for whatever they were doing and they didn't want their younger brother listening to their conversations either. More often than not I found myself outside playing alone and feeling forgotten.
I remember one spring afternoon feeling especially lonely as I sat in the yard behind our house. We lived miles from town and I hardly saw my own friends outside of school. I heard my brothers laughing from inside the house and felt a single tear coming down my cheek. At that moment I saw a large brown dog walking over to me. He looked happy and his tail was wagging as well. Even though he didn't know me he greeted me like a long lost friend, licking(舔) my chin and sitting beside me on the spring grass. It must have been at least an hour that I patted and talked to this four-legged angel. He let me pour out all my troubles and share my deepest thoughts before he kissed my cheek goodbye and ambled off either to Heaven or his home. I went back inside feeling happy, knowing that no matter what life may hold I was loved. Now over 40 years later I still remember that angel with a smile.
I believe that God sent him at that moment of sadness to remind me just how much he loved me. There is nothing more important than knowing we are loved. When we are loved, we will learn to love others. Learning to love helps us to understand ourselves and other people better.How did the writer feel when his brothers’ friends came?
| A．Proud. | B．Worried. |
| C．Lonely. | D．Happy. |
The writer shared his troubles and thoughts with the dog because ______.
| A．it was his friend | B．it could understand him |
| C．it looked like an angel | D．it was friendly to him |
From Paragraph 2, we can learn that ______.
| A．the boy met a long lost friend |
| B．the boy had no friends at school |
| C．the dog spent the afternoon with the boy and his brothers |
| D．the dog helped the boy realize that he was loved |
The author wrote the story to______.
| A．encourage people to talk about their troubles |
| B．show knowing you are loved is the most important |
| C．tell people they should treat animals friendly |
| D．share his unforgettable experience with us |
Speak, speak, speak!
Practise speaking as often as you can. Speaking to yourself is good practice.
Try recording yourself whenever you can.
Compare your pronunciation with the master version（原版）to see how you can do better and have another go. If you do this several times, you will find that each time is better than last.
Why not learn with someone else?
It helps if you can learn with someone else. If you can persuade a friend or family member to study with you, it will make you keep working.
Don't get stuck by a word you don't know.
Practise improving ways of getting your meaning across when speaking spontaneously（本能地），even if you don't know the exact words or phrases. Think of things you might want to say whenever you have spare time. Use facial expressions, hand movements, anything to make yourself understood.
Language learning is also about intuition（直觉）．
Guesswork is an important way to learn a new language. When listening to recorded material, you aren't expected to understand everything first time round. If you play the same piece several times, you will most probably understand something new each time.
Build up your vocabulary.
A wide vocabulary is the key to successful language learning but don’t try to learn too much at once. It’s best to study frequently for short periods of time. Take at most six or seven items of vocabulary and learn them. Put them into sentences to fix them in your mind, and then come back to them later.
And above all, have fun!What’s the purpose of this passage?
| A．To tell us the importance of practicing speaking as often as we can. |
| B．To tell us a few tips to help us learn a new language well. |
| C．To tell us that guesswork is an important way to learn a new language. |
| D．To tell us that a wide vocabulary is the key to successful language learning. |
What’s the meaning of the underlined phrase in the first part?
| A．Have another try or attempt. |
| B．Move away from a place to another. |
| C．Enter a certain state or condition. |
| D．Follow or take a certain course. |
To learn English well, we shouldn’t _______ according to the passage.
| A．practice speaking as often as possible |
| B．study frequently for short periods of time to build up our vocabulary |
| C．try to understand everything and stop when we meet a new word |
| D．try to persuade a friend or family member to study with us |