We all need friends and we always have．Our ancestors found that gaining the basic necessities of life was easier in a group．It’s estimated that the maximum number of people who lived in early communities of hunter-gatherers was 150．
Friends aren’t bound（受……限制）by blood or family bonds, employment contracts or legal obligations．Our circle of associates includes work colleagues and people we meet at parties, in the pub or on the train to work．Some associates are much more important than our family．We are capable of exchanging an email with these associates, and may have mutual acquaintances with a good number of them, providing common ground．We do things for one another because we want to．Whether writing an answer to a photo put on Facebook, sending a birthday card by post, or making a hospital visit, the efforts we have made for our friends are out of kindness．It is this nature of friendship which requires nothing in return that makes it beneficial and valuable．
Friendships take work, and they need to be nurtured, nourished and maintained．We feel good about helping our friends because we are friends．However, we often lose touch with our friends because of a lack of time and energy．When we are carrying a heavy load at work, involved in a serious relationship or raising children, it’s hard to spare time for friends．In these situations, we need to remind ourselves of what friends are for and why they can be so important in our lives．
In a survey of more than 2,000 married couples aged 55 or older, for both men and women, having friends was the best predictor of being satisfied in marriage — possibly because they were more satisfied with their lives as a result of having friends．
Researchers suggest social relationships are the reason why women live longer than men, Social bonds reduce the risk of disease by reducing blood pressure, cholesterol（胆固醇）and heart rate．A lack of good friends is as harmful to your health as smoking or being overweight．Indeed, people without friends are more likely to die younger．Not only do friendships prolong（延长）our lives, they make us happier too．People who are socially active don’t feel so stressed or feel they can not enjoy anything easily — they also tend to feel better about their lives and who they are．What makes friendship beneficial and valuable?
| A．Its being not bound by blood or family bonds． |
| B．Its being easy to maintain． |
| C．The good we have done to our friends． |
| D．That we make efforts for friends out of kindness． |
What should we do when we have no time for friends?
| A．Quit our jobs． |
| B．Give our friends calls． |
| C．Remind ourselves of what friends are for． |
| D．Turn to our friends for help． |
What can we infer from the survey in the fourth paragraph?
| A．Having friends makes people satisfied in marriage． |
| B．The older people are, the more satisfied they are in marriage． |
| C．Married couples are more satisfied with their lives． |
| D．Married couples are easier to have friends． |
What is the main idea of the last paragraph?
| A．Friendships prolong our lives and make us happy． |
| B．Men should learn to be socially active． |
| C．Women live longer than men． |
| D．Women tend to be less stressed． |
Last month we reported about a study that showed eating even a little less salt could greatly help the heart. The study was published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The scientists used a computer model to predict how just three grams less salt a day would affect heart disease in the United States.
The scientists said the results would be thirteen percent fewer heart attacks, eight percent fewer strokes（梗塞）, four percent fewer deaths and eleven percent fewer new cases of heart disease And two hundred forty billion dollars in health care savings. Researchers said it could prevent one hundred thousand heart attacks and ninety-two thousand deaths every year.
They and public health professionals in the United States are interested in a national campaign to persuade people to eat less salt. Such campaigns are already in place in Britain, Japan and Finland.
Michael Alderman is among the critics. He is a high blood pressure expert and professor at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. Doctor Alderman says that eating less salt results in lower blood pressure. But he says studies have not clearly shown that lowering salt means fewer heart attacks or strokes. And he says salt has other biological effects. He says calling for reduction in the national diet could have good effects, but it could also have harmful results. He says there is not enough evidence either way.
Another critic is David McCarron, a nutrition and kidney disease expert at the University of California, Davis. He and his team looked at large studies of diets in thirty-three countries. They found that most people around the world eat about the same amount of salt. Most of them eat more salt than American health officials advise. Doctor McCarron says the worldwide similarity suggests that a person’s brain might decide how much salt to eat.
Both Doctor McCarron and Doctor Alderman have connections to the Salt Institute, a trade group for the salt industry. Doctor Alderman is a member of an advisory committee. But he says he receives no money from the group. Doctor McCarron is paid for offering advice to the Salt Institute.What’s the best title of the passage?
| A．The argument over salt and health. |
| B．Less salt, fewer heart attacks. |
| C．National campaign for less salt. |
| D．Bad effects of salt. |
What does the second paragraph mainly talk about?
| A．The most likely results of the study made last month. |
| B．The results of eating less salt. |
| C．The results of eating three grams less salt a day. |
| D．The results of eating even a little less salt could greatly help the heart. |
Which of the following about Michael Alderman is NOT TRUE?
| A．He is a high blood pressure expert. |
| B．He says eating less salt results in lower blood pressure. |
| C．He agrees lowering salt means fewer heart attacks or strokes. |
| D．He is a professor at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. |
What does the underlined part “either way” refer to?
A. Reductions in the national diet could have good effects.
B. Reductions in the national diet could have harmful results.
C. Salt has other biological effects.
D. Both A and B.Which of the following about David McCarron is NOT TRUE?
| A．He is a nutrition and kidney disease expert. |
| B．His team found that most people around the world eat about the same amount of salt. |
| C．He says the worldwide similarity suggests that a person’s brain might decide how much salt to eat. |
| D．He says he receives no money from the Salt Institute. |
Have you ever thought of joining a book club and buying new books through the post? Here at the International Book Club, we already have many members buying books from us by mail.
Immediate benefits：
●As a special offer, you may choose any reduced-price books from our new members' book list, to the value of $6 in total (plus postage and packing). By doing this, you will save pounds on the publishers' prices.
●Tick the box on your form to order a free watch.
●If you reply within seven days, we will send you another free gift carefully chosen from our book list by our staff.
●Order a DVD from the many on offer in our list, at half the recommended(推荐) retail price.
●When you've joined：
As a member, you'll enjoy savings of between 30% and 50% off the publisher's price on every book you buy, and what's more, they'll come straight to your door. Your free club magazine arrives once a month, to keep you up-to-date with the latest bestsellers. This means that every year we offer over 1,000 books to choose from. On the Internet, you can find all our titles for the year on our exclusive members' website.
Being a member：
All we are asking you to do while you are a member is to choose four books during your first year. After that, you can decide on the number of books you wish to take.
In each of our monthly club magazines, our experienced staff choose a Club Choice book — a work of fiction or a reference title which they feel is particularly worth buying, and which is offered at an extra-special price. However, if you do not want this book, just say so in the space provided on the form. We will always send the book if we do not receive this.
So, return your application form today, but hurry — it's not every day we can make you an offer like this. To apply to become a member, all you need to do is simply fill in the enclosed form and return it in the envelope supplied.
Before you know it, your books will be with you. Please don't send any money now, as we will send you your bill with the books. And remember, you have up to a fortnight to decide if you wish to keep the books you have ordered. You should then either return the books or send your payment.Which of the following doesn't belong to the benefits of being a club member?
| A．Order a free watch. |
| B．Get a gift for nothing. |
| C．Get four books for free in the first year |
| D．Order a DVD at a low price. |
Every month the club provides a free club magazine in order to ________.
| A．Let readers know the number of books to be sold |
| B．Attract more and more readers to join the club |
| C．Make readers know the club's development |
| D．Keep readers well informed of recent best-selling books |
If a book is worth $100, how much will a member probably save if he buys one?
| A．$40. | B．$60. | C．$20. | D．$70. |
What should you do if you want to join the book club?
| A．Just send the club an email. |
| B．Ask other club members to recommend you to the club. |
| C．Fill in an application form and return it to the club. |
| D．Apply for a membership card. |
After you get your books, you should ________.
| A．Choose whether to keep them or not after you read them carefully |
| B．Decide whether to keep them or not within a certain period of time |
| C．Express your idea in the space provided in the book |
| D．Send money to the club at once |
As we all know, getting benched(板凳) in sports is usually a bad thing. But at one school in Florida, a girl has taken a bench and turned it into something entirely different – a place to find friends. It’s called the Friendship Bench. And it’s the brainchild of a sixth grader at Palm Bay Elementary – a girl named Acacia Woodley.
Acacia’s attitude toward life might be summed up best by a question she recently asked members of the Brevard County School Board – “what if we spend as much time putting the spotlight on kindness as we do on cruelty?” It’s a truth Acacias has learned to live her own life –in spite of having a lot of people would consider a handicap (残疾). She was born without a right hand. And her left hand did not form properly. But Acacia says that she has not stopped her from achieving her goals. “You need to believe in your dreams. If you don’t believe in you dreams, I can definitely tell you that they are not going to come true.” She said.
Acacia came up with the idea for the Friendship Bench after seeing kids getting bullied (欺凌) at school. She says she has also experienced bullying herself – kids whispering about her or picking on her because she is different. “Some people say they feel sorry for me. I tell them not to,” she said. “I don’t care that I’m different. I like being different.”
The Friendship Bench looks like a lot of other benches. It has arm sets and a place to lean on. But there are also words painted on it – words such as “hope”, “respect”, “listen” and “dream”. Acacia put the benches together with the help from her mother and brother.
Any time a kid feels he or she needs a friend, all that kid needs to do is sit on the bench. It is then up to the other kids – or grown-ups – to fill that need. “It’s a perfect idea,” Palm Bay Elementary Principal Lori said. “It’s something we’ve needed so badly.”
The Friendship Bench has been such a success at Palm Bay Elementary that other schools are now interested in installing（安装） one too. “There’s a saying in my teacher’s classroom,” Acacia said. “It says, ‘it you can dream it, you can achieve it.’”What is the function of the first sentence in Paragraph One?
| A．To explain the meaning of getting benched is sports. |
| B．To introduce the important role “bench” plays in sports. |
| C．To introduce what the author wants to say in the text to us. |
| D．To tell us that the passage is connected with the word “bench”. |
Which of the following statements is NOT true according to the passage?
| A．Acacia has also suffered from other kids’ bullying. |
| B．The kids who sit on the bench feel they need friends. |
| C．Grown-ups are allowed to offer their help to the one in need. |
| D．The Friendship Bench is different from others in the arm sets. |
What can we infer from the passage?
| A．More Friendship Benches will be installed in other schools soon. |
| B．Students stop bullying other schoolmates at Palm Bay Elementary. |
| C．The students at Palm Bay Elementary have become more friendly. |
| D．Acacia has become a very important figure at Palm Bay Elementary. |
What is the best title of this passage?
| A．Acacia’s New Invention | B．The Friendship Bench |
| C．Help from a Special Bench | D．Getting Benched in School |
Do you want to live with a strong sense of peacefulness, happiness, goodness, and self-respect? The collection of happiness actions broadly categorized as "honor" help you create this life of good feelings.
Here's an example to show how honorable actions create happiness.
Say a store clerk fails to charge us for an item. If we keep silent, and profit from the clerk's mistake, we would drive home with a sense of sneaky excitement. Later we might tell our family or friends about our good fortune. On the other hand, if we tell the clerk about the uncharged item, the clerk would be grateful and thank us for our honesty. We would leave the store with a quiet sense of honor that we might never share with another soul.
Then, what is it to do with our sense of happiness?
In the first case, where we don't tell the clerk, a couple of things would happen. Deep down inside we would know ourselves as a type of thief. In the process, we would lose some peace of mind and self-respect. We would also demonstrate that we cannot lie trusted, since we advertise our dishonor by telling our family and friends. We damage our own reputations by telling others. On the contrary, bringing the error to the clerk's attention causes different things to happen. Immediately the clerk knows us to be honorable. Upon leaving the store, we feel honorable and our self-respect is increased. Whenever we take honorable action we gain the deep internal rewards of goodness and a sense of nobility.
There is a beautiful positive cycle that is created by living a life of honorable actions. Honorable thoughts lead to honorable actions. Honorable actions lead us to a happier existence. And it's easy to think and act honorably again when we're happy. While the positive cycle can be difficult to start, once it's started, it's easy to continue. Keeping on doing good deeds brings us peace of mind, which is important for our happiness.According to the passage, the positive action in the example contributes to our___.
| A．self-respect | B．financial rewards |
| C．advertising ability | D．friendly relationship |
The author thinks that keeping silent about the uncharged item is equal to___.
| A．lying | B．stealing | C．cheating | D．advertising |
The phrase "bringing the error to the clerk's attention" (in para. 5) means___.
| A．telling the truth to the clerk |
| B．offering advice to the clerk |
| C．asking the clerk to be more attentive |
| D．reminding the clerk of the charged item |
How will we feel if we let the clerk know her mistake?
| A．We'll be very excited. |
| B．We'll feel unfortunate. |
| C．We'll have a sense of honor. |
| D．We'll feel sorry for the clerk. |
Which of the following can be the best title of this passage?
| A．How to Live Truthfully |
| B．Importance of Peacefulness |
| C．Ways of Gaining Self-respect |
| D．Happiness through Honorable Actions |
We all love our parents and turn to them when we’re in need, but would you like them to hear the conversations you have with your friends in the school playground or lunch queue? Social networking sites, such as micro-blog, blog and the Facebook, have actually become extensions of the school hallways（走廊）, so would you add your parents as “friends” and allow them to view your online activities and conversations with friends?
In the past the generation gap included a technology gap, where children were up to date with latest technology and parents were left behind, content to continue their day to day lives as they always had because they had no need to be good at new technology. However, more and more parents are beginning to realize just how important social networks are in their lives. This realization has given many parents the motivation (动机) to educate themselves about social networking sites.
These days many people are attracted to social networking sites because they can choose who they have around them; there’s also a certain amount of control over privacy that we don’t get in real life. Sometimes we feel that privacy is invaded when we must accept a “friend” request from a parent or family member.
It’s a difficult choice whether or not to allow a parent to become a part of our online lives. On the one hand we don’t want to “refuse” their request because that might hurt their feelings or make them feel you have something to hide. On the other hand if you do accept, then you could have a sense of being watched and no longer feel free to comment or communicate the way you did before.
A recent survey suggested that parents shouldn’t take it personally if their child ignores their request: “When a teen ignores a parent’s friend request, it doesn’t necessarily mean that they are hiding something, but it could mean that this is one part of their life where they want to be truly independent.”
Perhaps talking with parents and giving explanations would help soften the blow if you do choose not to add them to your friends list.The underlined sentence in paragraph 1 means that _______________.
| A．students begin to communicate on some websites |
| B．students may log in micro-blog on school hallways |
| C．students can find pictures of hallways on micro-blog |
| D．schools begin to build their hallways on the Internet |
According to paragraph 2, parents nowadays __________________.
| A．are not content with their life any more |
| B．are all very good at new technology |
| C．go to school to learn new technology |
| D．begin to know their children through network |
What can we infer from paragraph 3, 4 and 5？
| A．People like network because they can choose friends as they like. |
| B．People cannot keep all their privacy on social networking sites. |
| C．Children refuse their parents’ “friend” request to hide something |
| D．Refusing parents “friend” request on the internet will hurt their feelings. |
According to the passage, if Jack, a 17-year-old high school student refuses a “friend” request from his mother on micro-blog, ____________.
| A．it means he will feel being watched and unsafe then |
| B．it is because Jack wants to own his independence |
| C．his mother will know that Jack wants to keep privacy |
| D．a quarrel will break out between Jack and his mother |
What is the passage mainly taking about?
| A．Children are more likely to turn to parents when they need help. |
| B．Children should be “friends” with their parents in order not to hurt parents. |
| C．It is a question to children whether to be “friends” with their parents. |
| D．There are some ways preventing children from hurting parents’ feelings. |