When we see well, we do not think about our eyes very often. It is only when we cannot see perfectly that we realize how important our eyes are.
People who are near-sighted can only see things that are very close to their eyes, and everything else seems blurry (="unclear)." Many people who do a lot of work, such as writing, reading and sewing become near-sighted.
People who are far-sighted suffer from just the opposite problem. They can see things that are far away, but they have difficulty in reading a book unless they hold it at arm’s length. If they want to do much reading, they must get glasses, too.
Other people do not see clearly because their eyes are not exactly the right shape. They have what is called astigmatism (散光). This, too, can be corrected by glasses. Some people’s eyes become cloudy because of cataracts (白内障). Long ago these people often became blind. Now, however, it is possible to operate on the cataracts and remove them.
Having two good eyes is important for judging distances. Each eye sees things from a slightly different angle. To prove this to yourself, look at an object out of one eye; then look at the same object out of your other eye. You will find the object’s relation to the background and other things around it has changed. The difference between these two different eye views helps us to judge how far away an object is. People who have only one eye cannot judge distance as people with two eyes.When things far away seem indistinct(模糊不清) , one is probably____.
| A．near-sighted | B．far-sighted |
| C．astigmatic | D．suffering from cataracts |
The underlined word suffer in the third paragraph probably means_____.
| A．experience | B．imagine |
| C．feel pain | D．are affected with |
Having two eyes instead of one is particularly useful for______.
| A．seeing at night | B．seeing objects far away |
| C．looking over a wide area | D．judging distances |
People who suffer from astigmatism have______.
| A．one eye bigger than the other |
| B．eyes that are not exactly the right shape |
| C．a difficulty that can be corrected by an operation |
| D．an eye difficulty that cannot be corrected by glasses |
One morning, Ann’s neighbor Tracy found a lost dog wandering around the local elementary school. She asked Ann if she could keep an eye on the dog. Ann said that she could watch it only for the day.
Tracy took photos of the dog and printed off 400 FOUND fliers（传单）, and put them in mailboxes. Meanwhile, Ann went to the dollar store and bought some pet supplies, warning her two sons not to fall in love with the dog. At the time, Ann’s son Thomas was 10 years old, and Jack, who was recovering from a heart operation, was 21 years old.
Four days later Ann was still looking after the dog, whom they had started to call Riley. When she arrived home from work, the dog threw itself against the screen door and barked madly at her. As soon as she opened the door, Riley dashed into the boys’ room where Ann found Jack suffering from a heart attack. Riley ran over to Jack, but as soon as Ann bent over to help him the dog went silent.
“If it hadn’t come to get me, the doctor said Jack would have died,” Ann reported to a local newspaper. At this point, no one had called to claim the dog, so Ann decided to keep it.
The next morning Tracy got a call. A man named Peter recognized his lost dog and called the number on the flier. Tracy started crying, and told him, “That dog saved my friend’s son.”
Peter drove to Ann’s house to pick up his dog, and saw Thomas and Jack crying in the window. After a few moments Peter said, “Maybe Odie was supposed to find you, maybe you should keep it.”What did Tracy do after finding the dog?
| A．She looked for its owner |
| B．She gave it to Ann as a gift. |
| C．She sold it to the dollar store. |
| D．She bought some food for it. |
How did the dog help save Jack?
| A．By breaking the door for Ann. |
| B．By leading Ann to Jack’s room. |
| C．By dragging Jack out of the room. |
| D．By attending Jack when Ann was out. |
What was Ann’s attitude to the dog according to Paragraph 4?
| A．Sympathetic | B．Doubtful |
| C．Tolerant | D．Grateful |
For what purpose did Peter call Tracy?
| A．To help her friend’s son. |
| B．To interview Tracy |
| C．To take back his dog. |
| D．To return the flier to her. |
Well I decided to cut my front lawn （草坪）today, especially since I live on a main street downtown with lots of traffic. Anyway, I finished mine and decided to cut my neighbor—Jean’s grass while I was at it. She is a sweet person who has gone through some trying times in the last year. Her brother passed away of cancer last year; her sister (who lives with her) is mentally challenged—yet so sweet!
It was a difficult time with physical and mental challenges that led her employer in our local hospital to let her go after 25 years of service! Lastly, my neighbor Jean, who is a nurse in our local hospital, was diagnosed with esophageal （食道） cancer in December. She went through radiation and a long recovery—but thankful she is in remission（缓解）.
Anyway, in short I was leaving my house this afternoon and she stopped me to thank me for cutting her grass. She told me her dad passed away on Friday and she just arrived home from the funeral service, so she didn’t know when I would have time to cut her grass. So, when she arrived home and saw it cut she was more than happy and grateful! I said to her “You are welcome, just a small act of kindness for a neighbor.”
I did it for exercise and shared pleasure not knowing it meant more to her than just doing a neighbor a favor!Although a lot of unfortunate matters happened to Jean, she is still _____.
| A．pessimistic | B．optimistic |
| C．depressed | D．disappointed |
What’s the meaning of the underlined word “trying” in the first paragraph?
| A．Happy. | B．Exciting. | C．Simple. | D．Hard. |
What can we learn from the first three paragraphs?
| A．Jean is unlucky. |
| B．Jean lives happily. |
| C．Jean has retired. |
| D．Jean’s employer doesn’t like her. |
How does Jean feel about the author helping her cutting grass?
| A．She feels sad. |
| B．She feels only happy. |
| C．She feels very happy and thankful. |
| D．She feels easy. |
Half of the world’s population is affected by Asian monsoons（季风）, but monsoons are difficult to predict. American researchers have put together a 700-year record of the rainy seasons, which is expected to provide guidance for experts making weather predictions.
Every year, moist （潮湿的）air masses，known as monsoon，produce large amounts of rainfall in India, East Asia, Northern Australia and East Africa. All this wet air is pulled in by a high pressure area over the Indian Ocean and a low pressure area to the south.
According to Edward Cook , a weather expert at Columbia University in New York., the complex nature of the climate systems across Asia makes monsoons hard to predict. In addition, climate records for the area are too recent and not detailed enough to be of much use. Therefore, he and a team of researchers spent more than fifteen years traveling across Asia, looking for trees old enough to provide long-term records. They measured the rings, or circles, inside thousands of ancient trees in more than 300 places.
Rainfall has a direct link to the growth and width of rings on some kinds of trees. The researchers developed a document they are calling a Monsoon Asia Drought Atlas. It shows the effect of monsoons over seven centuries, beginning in the 1300s.
Professor Cook says the tree-ring records show periods of wet and dry weather. “If the monsoon basically fails or is a very weak one, the trees affected by monsoons at that location might put on a very narrow ring. But if the monsoon is very strong, the trees affected by that monsoon might put on a wide ring for that year. So, the wide and narrow ring widths of the chronology that we developed in Asia provide us with a measure of monsoon variability.” With all this information, researchers say they can begin to improve computer climate models for predicting the behavior of monsoons.
“There has been widespread famine and starvation and human dying in the past in large droughts. And on the other hand, if the monsoon is particularly heavy, it can cause extensive flooding.” said Eugene Wahl, a scientist with America’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “So, to get a sense of what the regional moisture patterns have been, dryness and wetness over such a long period of time in great detail, I would call it a kind of victory for climate science.”What’sthe passage mainly about？
| A．The effects of Asian monsoons. |
| B．A breakthrough in monsoon prediction. |
| C．The achievements of Edward cook. |
| D．The necessity of weather forecast. |
It is difficult for experts to predict Asian monsoons because_________
| A．it is hard to keep long-term climate records. |
| B．they are formed under complex climate systems. |
| C．they influence many nations. |
| D．there is heavy rainfall in Asia. |
What can be inferred from the passage?
| A．Long and details climate records can offer useful information for monsoon research. |
| B．The Monsoon Asia Drought Atlas has a monsoon record for about 1,300 years. |
| C．The trees affected by monsoon grow fast if the monsoon is weak. |
| D．The rainfall might be low although the monsoon is strong in monsoon-affected areas. |
What do we know about the research according to Eugene Wahl?
| A．It will help people prevent droughts and floods. |
| B．It should include information about human life in the past. |
| C．It has analyzed moisture models world wide, |
| D．It is a great achievement in climate science. |
Which of the following best describes the tone of this passage?
| A．Humorous | B．Pessimistic |
| C．Matter-of –fact | D．Friendly. |
2011 Top Education News
| "Tiger Mother" became well known both in the US and China after the publication of the Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua, a professor of Yale University and a Chinese immigrant mother. In the book, Chua describes how she educates her two daughters in a strict "typical Chinese" way. |
The South University of Science and Technology of China (SUSTC), became "China's first independent university"-the only university to recruit students through its independent exam rather than the National College Entrance Exam adopted by almost all public universities in China. |
| Wuhan schoolboy Huang Yibo, 13,known as the deputy chief of all Wuhan's young pioneers, became an overnight sensation after blogging about watching prime time news on China's Central Television since he was two years old and reading People's Daily since the age of seven because his father asked him to do so. |
The First Experimental Elementary School of Weiyang district in Xi'an, Shaanxi province, hit the headlines for requiring students with a poor performance to wear a green scarf, distinguishing them from the good performance of the red scarf, a symbol for the Young Pioneer organization. |
| Dong Fan, a professor from Beijing Normal University, the director of the university’s real estate research center, refused to see any of his students who do not possess 40 million yuan by the time they are 40. Dong said people who had received high-level education should be ashamed if they do not live a wealthy life. |
The No 4 classroom building on the campus of Tsinghua University, one of China's elite colleges, took on the name of a popular clothing company, the Hong Kong-based Jeanswest Clothing in May. A golden-colored plate bearing the name of the company was affixed on to the wall of the teaching building. |
How many pieces of the news above have something to do with family education?
| A．4 | B．3 | C．2 | D．5 |
Which of the following statements is True according to the news above?
| A．Tsinghua University became "China's first independent university". |
| B．Students caring about environmental protection will wear a green scarf. |
| C．“Tiger Mother” is famous for her book about how she educates her two daughters. |
| D．Huang Yibo began to read People's Daily at the age of two. |
We can infer from the news about Dong Fan that _______.
| A．he tends to measure success by money |
| B．he spares no efforts to help his students |
| C．he works hard |
| D．he is a professor of Yale University |
All the six pieces of news above deal with the subject of ______.
| A．education | B．parents | C．students | D．Schools |
One kind of female butterfly mates only once in its life -- and then closes its wings to avoid "harassment" when pursued by persistent and unwanted males, a Japanese researcher said.
Observations of the Small Copper Butterfly, a colourful orange and black butterfly, showed that some females closed their wings when males flew by, but only when they were males of their own species, said Jun-Ya Ide, an associate professor at Kurume Institute of Technology in Fukuoka, western Japan.
"When we looked into why, the males were courting the females. They do this very stubbornly, so the females sometimes try to get away -- or prefer to stay unobserved," he added.
Ide and his colleagues brought a model of a male butterfly near the females to test their reactions and found that young females that had yet to mate kept their wings open, but those that had already mated closed them.
Not only can the persistent attentions of unwanted suitors harm the delicate females, fleeing from them -- with the male often in pursuit -- uses up strength and can even shorten their lives, he added.
"Closing their wings makes them less visible, helping them avoid communication with their own species. We figured they were trying to avoid harassment by males," Ide said.What does the word “harassment”mean in the paragraph？
| A．attack | B．embarrassment |
| C．sexual invasion | D．threat |
Why some some females closed their wings when males flew by？
| A．because they close their wings to avoid "harassment" when pursued by persistent and unwanted males. |
| B．because the female butterfly mates only once in its life. |
| C．because they don’t like the male butterfly at all. |
| D．because they are afraid of the male butterfly. |
According the the passage, which is correct?
| A．The females closed their wings when males flew by. |
| B．Only the model of a male butterfly can make the young female butterflies to keep their wings open. |
| C．The female butterfly mates only once in its life |
| D．Not only can the persistent attentions of wanted suitors harm the delicate females, fleeing from them with the male often in pursuit -- uses up strength and can even shorten their lives. |