No one knows for sure when advertising first started. It is possible that it grew out of the discovery that some people did certainkinds of work better than others did them. That led to the concept ofspecialization, which means that people would specialize, or focus, on doing one specific job.
It's take a man we'll call Mr. Fielder, for example. He dideverything connected with farming. He planted seeds, tended thefields, and harvested and sold his crops. At the same time, he didmany other jobs on the farm. However, he didn't make the bricks forhis house, cut his trees into boards, make the plows(犁),or any ofthe other hundreds of things a farm needs. Instead, he got them frompeople who specialized in doing each of those things.
Suppose there was another man we shall call Mr. Plowright. Usingwhat he knew about farming and working with iron, Mr. Plowright in-vented a plow that made farming easier. Mr. Plowright did not reallylike farming himself and wanted to specialize in making really goodplows. Perhaps, he thought, other farmers will trade what they grow forone of my plows.
How did Mr. Plowright let people know what he was doing?
Why, he advertised, of course. First he opened a shop and then heput up a sign outside the shop to attract customers. That sign mayhave been no more than a plow carved into a piece of wood and asimple arrow pointing to the shop door. It was probably all the information people needed to find Mr. Plowright and his really goodplows.
Many historians believe that the first outdoor signs were usedabout five thousand years ago. Even before most people could read, they understood such signs. Shopkeepers would carve into stone, clay, or wood symbols for the products they had for sale.
A medium, in advertising talk, is the way you communicateyour message. You might say that the first medium used in advertising was signs with symbols. The second medium was audio, orsound, although that term is not used exactly in the way we use ittoday. Originally, just the human voice and maybe some kind ofsimple instrument, such as a bell, were used to get people's attention.
A crier, in the historical sense, is not someone who weeps easily. It is someone, probably a man, with a voice loud enough to beheard over the other noises of a city. In ancient Egypt, shopkeepersmight hire such a person to spread the news about their products. Often this earliest form of advertising involved a newly arrived shiploaded with goods. Perhaps the crier described the goods, explainedwhere they came from, and praised their quality. His job was, inother words, not too different from a TV or radio commercial intoday's world. What probably led to the start of advertising?
A.The discovery of iron. |
B.The specialization of labor. |
C.The appearance of new jobs. |
D.The development of farming techniques. |
To advertise his plows, Mr. Plowright _________.
A.praised his plows in public |
B.placed a sign outside the shop |
C.hung an arrow pointing to the shop |
D.showed his products to the customers |
The writer makes up the two stories of Mr. Fielder and Mr. Plowright in order to _________.
A.explain the origin of advertising |
B.predict the future of advertising |
C.expose problems in advertising |
D.provide suggestions for advertising |
In ancient Egypt, a crier was probably someone who _________.
A.owned a ship |
B.had the loudest voice |
C.ran a shop selling goods to farmers |
D.functioned like today's TV or radio commercial |
The last two paragraphs are mainly about _________.
A.the history of advertising |
B.the benefits of advertising |
C.the early forms of advertising |
D.the basic design of advertising |
第二部分:阅读理解(第一节20小题,第二节5小题;每小题2分,满分50分)
第一节:阅读下列短文, 从每题所给的四个选项 (A、B、C和D) 中, 选出最佳选项。
Being the head of a high school for many years, I grew tired of budget meetings, funding cuts, and many other administrative chores (杂务). I started to dream of retirement. Sitting in traffic on a weekday morning, I would find my mind wandering. I would imagine spending time with my grandchildren, quiet evenings with my wife, traveling, or rediscovering some great books. I told myself that I wouldn’t sign myself up for any committees, any classes, or anything requiring a schedule.
My first day of retirement came at last! I cooked a great breakfast for my wife and me, leisurely read the paper, cleaned a bit of the house, and wrote a few letters to friends. On the second day, I cooked breakfast, read the paper … On the third day, … This is retirement? I tried to tell myself that it was just the transition (过渡), that those golden moments were right round the corner, and that I would enjoy them soon enough. But something was missing.
A former colleague asked a favor. A group of students was going to Jamaica to work with children in the poorest neighborhoods. Would I interrupt my newfound “happiness” and return to the students, just this once? One trip. That’s all. My bags were packed and by the door.
The trip was very inspiring. I was moved not only by the poverty I saw but also by the sense of responsibility of the young people on the trip. When I returned home, I offered to work one day a week with a local youth organization. The experience was so positive that I was soon volunteering nearly full-time, working with students across North America to assist them in their voluntary work.
Now, it seems, the tables have turned。Some days I am the teacher, other days I am the student. These young people have reawakened my commitment (责任感) to social justice issues by challenging me to learn more about the situation in the world today, where people are still poor and suffer because of greed, corruption and war. Most important, they have given me the opportunity to continue to participate in helping to find solutions. In return, I help them do their charitable projects overseas. I’ve gone from running one school to helping oversee the construction of schools in twenty-one countries!
41. What did the writer expect to do after he retired?
A. To stay away from busy schedules.
B. To write some great books.
C. To teach his grandchildren.
D. To plan for his future.
42. Why did the writer decide to go to Jamaica?
A. He missed his students in that country.
B. He couldn’t refuse his colleague’s favor.
C. He was concerned about the people there.
D. He was not satisfied with his retired life.
43. The underlined part “the tables have turned” (Paragraph 5) means that the writer _________.
A. improved the situation in his school
B. felt happy to work with students again
C. became a learner rather than a teacher
D. changed his attitude toward his retired life
44. What does the writer think of his retired life now?
A. Disappointing. B. Troublesome. C. Relaxing. D. Meaningful.
Last year, Jack Bleed cut through the bone of his ring finger while working. The 31-year-old resident of North Little Rock, Arkansas, waited for about six hours at a nearby medical center while the medical staff there called all over town — even as far away as Dallas and Memphis — to find a hand surgeon to reattach his finger. Finally, a willing doctor was located in Louisville, Kentucky. But even though Bleed had insurance (保险), he would have to hire a private plane to get himself there, at a cost of $4,300. In the end, he charged the cost to two credit cards, and his finger was saved. His insurance company eventually covered the cost of the plane, but his experience makes people aware of the fact that trauma (外伤) care in the United States is not only geographically limited, but in many places, non-existent.
Only eight states — New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Illinois, New Mexico, California, Oregon, and Washington — have local, fully functional trauma systems. The remaining states have partial systems, and 12 — including Arkansas — have no trauma system at all.
Although the President has signed a bill of $12 million for the purpose of supporting trauma care systems nationwide, many in Congress (国会) are unwilling to spend government money for a service they think should be paid for by states, says Wayne Meredith, medical director for trauma programs at the American College of Surgeons. Meanwhile, many states have also failed to find the dollars to support trauma systems. To make matters worse, many people without insurance depend heavily on the emergency care services, placing a huge financial burden on the medical centers that serve them.
For the same reason, doctors, too, often go unpaid. They are unwilling to perform emergency care, worsening critical shortages of neurosurgeons, orthopedists, and hand surgeons — the very types of specialists Bleed needed at short notice.
Supporting a trauma care system doesn’t take much. A half-penny sales tax in Miami-Dade County makes its outstanding system work. In Arkansas alone, says Wayne Meredith, a well-funded trauma system would possibly prevent 200 to 600 deaths each year. If trauma care systems were to work well across the nation, experts say, many thousands of lives each year could be saved. “You don’t get much better return on your investment than that,” Meredith says.
57. In Paragraph 1, the writer uses Bleed’s case to ________.
A. make a comparison
B. introduce a topic
C. describe a person
D. tell a story
58. Many people in Congress argue that trauma care systems should be supported by ________.
A. each state
B. the President
C. insurance companies
D. the US government
59. The example of Miami-Dade County shows that ________.
A. its tax policy is admirable
B. a trauma system is not expensive
C. running a trauma system is profitable
D. sales tax is not heavy in small counties
60. Why are the present trauma care systems in some states not satisfactory?
A. They are short of financial support.
B. They are shared by all the states.
C. The doctors are not well trained.
D. The hospitals can’t provide low-cost services.
When you think about math, you probably don’t think about breaking the law, solving mysteries or finding criminals. But a mathematician in Maryland does, and he has come up with mathematical tools to help police find criminals.
People who solve crimes look for patterns that might reveal (揭示) the identity of the criminal. It’s long been believed, for example, that criminals will break the law closer to where they live, simply because it’s easier to get around in their own neighborhood. If police see a pattern of robberies in a certain area, they may look for a suspect who lives near the crime scenes. So, the farther away from the area a crime takes place, the less likely it is that the same criminal did it.
But Mike O’Leary, a mathematician at Towson University in Maryland, says that this kind of approach may be too simple. He says that police may get better clues to the location of a criminal’s home base by combining these patterns with a city’s layout (布局) and historical crime records.
The records of past crimes contain geographical information and can reveal easy targets — that is, the kind of stores that might be less difficult to rob. Because these stores are along roads, the locations of past crimes contain information about where major streets and intersections are. O’Leary is writing a new computer program that will quickly provide this kind of information for a given city. His program also includes information about the people who live in the city, and information about how a criminal’s patterns change with age. It’s been shown, for example, that the younger the criminal, the closer to home the crime.
Other computer programmers have worked on similar software, but O’Leary’s uses more math. The mathematician plans to make his computer program available, free of charge, to police departments around the country.
The program is just one way to use math to fight crime. O’Leary says that criminology — the study of crime and criminals — contains a lot of good math problems. “I’m the only one who knows what gold looks like,” he says. “It’s a lot of fun.”
49. To find criminals, police usually _________.
A. check who are on the crime scene
B. seek help from local people
C. depend on new mathematical tools
D. focus on where crimes take place
50. O’Leary is writing a computer program that _________.
A. uses math to increase the speed of calculation
B. tells the identity of a criminal in a certain area
C. provides the crime records of a given city
D. shows changes in criminals’ patterns
51. By “I’m the only one who knows what gold looks like”, O’Leary means that he _________.
A. is better at finding gold than others
B. is the only one who uses math to make money
C. knows best how to use math to help solve crimes
D. has more knowledge of gold than other mathematicians
52. What is the main idea of the text?
A. Math could help police find criminals.
B. Criminals live near where crimes occur.
C. Crime records could be used to fight crime.
D. Computer software works in preventing crimes.
45. What does the phrase “green shoots” mean in “Green shoots have begun to appear in different markets”?
A. Change in policy. B. High prices.
C. Environmental protection. D. Signs of recovery.
46. Fill in the blank in the sentence “I can’t believe this is Joshua — he’s ________ since we last met!”
A. shot out B. shot up C. shot through D. shot down
47. When you are talking about unimportant things, we say you are ________.
A. shooting the breeze B. shooting yourself in the foot
C. shooting your mouth off D. shooting questions at somebody
48. Choose a word to complete the sentence “The ________, which killed a policeman and wounded a passer-by, was reported to have lasted only 13 seconds.”
A. shooter B. shoot C. shooting D. shot
A child-like robot, Wakamaru, developed by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries of Japan and combining the roles of nurse, companion and security guard, will soon be in the market to look after the growing number of old people with no one to look after them.
Cameras implanted under the “ eyebrows” of the robot enable it to “see’’ as it moves around in a house. The images can be sent to the latest mobile telephones, which can show the pictures. Wakamaru speaks with either the voice of a boy or a girl. It is also designed to provide companionship, greeting its “ papa”, when he comes home. Based on a vocabulary of around 10 000 words, it is the first household robot which is able to hold simple conversations. It can not only speak, but also understand answers and react accordingly. It will ask“ Are you all right?” if its owner does not move for some time. If the answer is no, or there is no answer, it will telephone preset numbers, send images and work as a speakerphone. It can recognize up to 10 faces. It can be set to remind forgetful people when it is time to take medicine, eat and sleep.
However, like most robots, it cannot climb stairs. Mitsubishi developed Wakamaru from robots which have already been made to go around nuclear power facilities(设施). “ Looking at the ageing of society and the falling birth rate we decided that this could work as a business. We want to offer it as a product that helps society,’’ said the project chief. The developers plan to sell the robot from April next year at between 5,000 and 6,000 pound.
The life expectancy of Japanese women has shot up to almost 85, the highest in the world. At the same time, extended families are being replaced by nuclear families. This has left many Japanese anxious about their elderly parents. Therefore, the technology has gained nation-wide publicity in Japan.Which of the following is TRUE about Wakamaru?
A.It is used in some nuclear power facilities. |
B.It can speak but cannot understand answers. |
C.It can go up and down the stairs easily. |
D.It can recognize as many as 10 people. |
The passage is written with the purpose to ______.
A. introduce a new product
B solve the aging problems.
C. tell people how to use the robot
D show the rapid development of technologyWhat can be inferred from the passage ?
A.The robot can dial proper numbers for help |
B.The robot is likely to have a promising market. |
C.The robot enables the Japanese to live longer |
D.Many elderly Japanese are anxious about their future |