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Although most people believe that laughter is one of the nature’s great treatments for a whole range of mental and physical diseases, it is still a serious scientific subject that researchers are trying to figure out.
“Laughter above all else is a social thing,” says Baltimore neuroscientist(神经科学家), Robert Provine, who has studied laughter for many years. “All laughter groups laugh ‘ha-ha-ha’ basically the same way. Whether you speak Mandarin, French or English, everyone will understand laughter. There is a pattern generator(发生器) in our brain that produces this sound.”
Laughing is our first way of communicating. Babies laugh long before they speak. No one teaches them how to laugh. They just do. People may laugh at a prank(恶作剧) on April Fools’ Day. But surprisingly, only 10 to 15 percent of laughter is the result of someone making a joke. Laughter is mostly about social responses rather to a joke. Deaf people laugh without hearing and people on cell phones laugh without seeing, showing that laughter isn’t dependent on single sense but on social interactions.
And laughter is not just a people thing. Chimps tickle(挠痒) each other and even laugh when another chimp pretends to tickle them.
Jaak Panksepp, a Bowling Green University Psychology professor, studies rats that laugh when he tickles them. It turns out rats love to be tickled — they return again and again to the hands of researchers tickling them.
By studying rats, scientists can figure out what’s going on in the brain during laughter. Northwestern University biomedical engineering professor, Jeffrey Burgdorf has found that laughter in rats produces a chemical that acts as an antidepressant(抗抑郁药). He thinks the same thing probably happens in humans, too. This would give doctors a new chemical target to develop drugs that can fight depression.
Even so, laughter itself has not been proved to be the best medicine, experts said. Margaret Stuber, a professor at University of California, studied whether laugher helped patients. She found that distraction(分心) and mood improvement helped, but she could not find a benefit of laughter alone.
“No study has shown that laughter produces a direct health benefit,” Provine said, mainly because it’s hard to separate laughter from just feeling good. But he thinks it doesn’t really matter: “Isn’t the fact that laughter feels good when you do it enough?”The underlined word “figure out” in Paragraph 6 means “________”.
| A．deal with | B．work out |
| C．look out of | D．come up with |
According to the passage, scientists studied rats in order to find ______.
| A．how they laugh |
| B．if they like laughing |
| C．what laughter in rats produces |
| D．how rats react while being tickled |
What can we know from Robert Provine’s research?
| A．Laughter makes a person feel good. |
| B．Laughter produces a direct health benefit. |
| C．Laughter depends on all kinds of senses. |
| D．Laughter is a way of communicating. |
What is probably the best title for this passage?
| A．Why Rats Laugh |
| B．When Laughter Happens |
| C．How Laughter Works |
| D．Why Laughter Matters |
I wonder whether there is any girl or boy who does not like to see a rainbow in the sky. It is so beautiful.
There is a story, saying that whenever you see a rainbow you should run at once to the place where it touches the ground, and there you would find a pot of gold. Of course it is not true. You could not find the pot of gold or its end. No matter how far you run, it always seems far away.
A rainbow is not a thing which we can feel with our hands as we can feel a flower. It is only the effect of light shining on raindrops. The raindrops catch the sunlight and break it up into all the wonderful colours which we see. It is called a rainbow perhaps because it is made up of raindrops and looks like a bow（弓).
That is why we can never see a rainbow in a clear sky. We see a rainbow only when there is rain in the air and the sun is shining brightly through the clouds.
Every rainbow has many colours in the same order. The first or the top colour is always red, and the next comes orange, then yellow, and last of all, blue. A rainbow is indeed one of the wonders of nature.Children like rainbows because .
| A．they are beautiful |
| B．they are like bows |
| C．they can find a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow |
| D．they are good to crops |
We cannot feelwith our hands.
| A．a pot of gold | B．a flower | C．a rainbow | D．a raindrop |
We can see a rainbow.
| A．when it is raining heavily |
| B．when it is snowing |
| C．when it is cloudy |
| D．when it is becomes fine shortly after raining |
Which of the following statements is NOT true?
| A．A rainbow is like bow. |
| B．A rainbow is the effect of light shining on raindrops. |
| C．Every rainbow has different colours in different orders. |
| D．A rainbow is one of the wonders of nature. |
The first colour of a rainbow is always .
| A．yellow | B．red | C．green | D．blue |
When I was about 13, I had an enemy, a girl who liked to point out my shortcomings (缺点). Sometimes she said I was lazy. Sometimes she said I wasn’t a good student. . I tried to put up with (忍受) her as long as I could. At last, I became very angry.
.
My father listened to me quietly, and then he asked, “Are the things she said true or not? Go and make a list of everything she said and mark the points that are true. Pay no attention to the other things she said.”
I returned to my room and I did as my father told me. To my surprise, I found that about half the things were true. . He refused to take the list. “That’s just for you,” he said. “When something said about you is true, you’ll find it will be helpful to you. Listen to them all, but hear the truth and do what you think is right.”
Many years have passed. . In our life we often meet with some trouble and we often go to someone and ask for advice. For some advice you will treasure (珍惜) all your life!
| A. I brought the list back to my father B. The situation often appears in my mind C. My mum didn’t like me D. I ran to my father E. Sometimes she said I talked too much |
The high school diploma (文凭) is losing its value quickly, as a growing number of students graduate (毕业) from school without the math and reading skills that colleges and companies require, according to a new report.
The high school graduation exams that most states (州) require students to pass before they graduate remain far too easy. Most of the exams generally test eighth-or ninth-grade level work.
Today, even high school graduates who are going to have blue-collar (蓝领) jobs need to study the math, research and writing courses. But in high school, only students who are going to college are now required to take these courses.
“If you want a good job with a good pay, it’s a high-skill job,” said Michael Cohen, a leading member of the America Diploma Project.
The project suggests that all graduates master a wide range (范围) of skills. “A high school diploma should mean something to a company and university,” said Ohio Gov. Bob Taft, who is Achieve’s co-chairman.
In Taft’s state, about 30% students who go directly to college from high school have to take remedial classes of English or math, he said. It’s easy to see that the present high-school graduating standards are not preparing students for college education.
And with high-skilled jobs increasingly headed overseas to places like India and Ireland, states need to act, he said.
To prove why math and reading skills matter, the report includes real-life examples of problems students meet in college and that workers must solve each day on the job.
Some states are taking actions to upgrade the high school diploma. In Texas, all high school students, starting with the 2008 graduating class, will have to take the college-prep curriculum (大学预备课程) - unless a parent agrees to an easier course load. Other states are planning similar moves.
The report includes examples of reading and math skills that high-school students should have. Project leaders say they hope parents will use those examples to judge (评定) the coursework at their kids’ high schools.Why is the high school diploma losing its value quickly?
| A．Because the number of high school students is growing fast. |
| B．Because high school students fail to reach the standards. |
| C．Because the graduation tests are easier than it should be. |
| D．Because difficult courses are not required in high schools. |
Remedial classes in Paragraph 6 mean classes____.
| A．for good learners to study quickly and better |
| B．for slower learners weak in the subject |
| C．for learners to be taught one by one |
| D．for learners to reach a higher standard |
What can we learn from the passage?
| A．Colleges require higher math and reading skills than companies. |
| B．It is easier for companies to find high-skilled workers in India. |
| C．Math and reading skills help little for workers to solve daily problems. |
| D．Parents ask high schools to offer college-prep curriculum in Texas. |
What can be the best title for the passage?
| A．High School Diploma Means Little |
| B．Give Students More High-skill Jobs |
| C．Math and Reading Skills Really Matter |
| D．Judge Coursework at High Schools |
Dolores Huerta has worked hard most of her life to help other people. She has helped change things so that farm workers can have a better life.
Dolores grew up in California. She was a good student and liked school. After she finished high school, she went to college and studied to be a teacher. After she became a teacher, Dolores noticed that many of her students were not getting enough food to eat. Some of them wore very old clothes. Dolores wondered how she could help them.
Dolores decided to stop teaching so that she could spend more time helping the farm workers and their families. One thing she wanted to do was to get more pay for farm workers so they could buy their children the things they needed.
Dolores knew that many farm workers moved often from one place to another to help pick different kinds of fruits and vegetables. She began talking and writing about these workers. Even people who lived far from California read what Dolores wrote.
Getting higher pay for the farm workers was not easy. Dolores worked hard to make sure that farm workers got good pay for their work. She knew that nothing would change unless people made new laws to help the workers. Through all her hard work, new laws were made that gave farm workers good pay.
Dolores Huerta has worked for more than 30 years in many different ways to make life better for working people. She has shown how much one person can change things.Dolores became a ____ after she left college.
| A．farmer | B．teacher | C．worker | D．lawyer |
Dolores gave up her first job because ____.
| A．she found it was too boring for her | B．the work condition was too bad |
| C．she wanted to do more for others | D．she got little pay for her work |
How did Dolores help farm workers?
| A．She gave them food and clothes. | B．She helped them teach their children. |
| C．She helped them got more pay. | D．She made new laws for them. |
This is part of a book’s table of contents.
Chapter One: North America The Fox and the Raccoon ..... 1 Song of the Mountains ......... 4 Little Feather Meets Bear ..... 7 Chapter Two: South America Kuma and the Big River......... 10 The Smallest Monkey ............ 12 Three Tree Frogs ................... 15 Chapter Three: Africa Marumbi Saves the Day....... 18 The Jumping Fish ................ 22 Father Lion and His Son ...... 25 |
Chapter One is about ____.
| A．North America | B．South America | C．Africa | D．Asia |
If you want to read The Smallest Monkey, you can turn to page ____.
| A．4 | B．7 | C．12 | D．25 |
If you are reading page 22, which story are you reading?
| A．Song of the Mountains. | B．Kuma and the Big River. |
| C．Three Tree Frogs. | D．The Jumping Fish. |