Most of the 20th century has been a development on the Industrial Revolution taken to an extreme: people now own more products than ever before; there are enough unclear weapons to destroy the earth several times over; there is hardly any forest left and pollution has got to the point where we buy water. Within a few years I predict you will be able to buy air. (There once was a time when you didn’t need to buy food or shelter either.)

Important developments in the last century are the breading down of the class structures left over from the Industrial Revolution stage, bringing with it the empowerment of the “common man ”: the working day is set by law to only 8 hours a day, everyone has the vote, the media has less obvious government control, people have landed on the moon, sent spacecrafts to Mars and so on. Families have also shrunk drastically（强烈地）; the nuclear family came about, and especially in the last half of the 20th century, one-parent families are becoming more common. This shrinking in the size of the family shows the increased independence of people—once upon a time people had to live in large groups to survive.

As humans have “become the gods”, they have realized their individuality and independence and taken their control of the world to an extreme. In many countries the land is almost completely used in the land is almost completely used in the production of food and as living space and they live in small cities which are entirely human constructed, made from materials which are also entirely human constructed(concrete, bricks) with hardly any remains of nature. Weeds are poisoned because they are messy; even parks have trees grown in tidy lines; grass is mowed to keep it short and so on. I think the massive drug “problem” troubling people is a result of too much of this influence, humans needing to escape the stark world they have created by entering fantasy worlds.

Over the last 100 years, the 20th century consciousness has spread throughout the world; most of Asia has been thoroughly “Westernized”, and most of the Third World is being overrun by western ways of doing things and living.

What’s the author most concerned about?

A．The influence of pollution.    

B．Strong effects of development.

       C．Changed positions of humans as gods.   

       D．The process of the Industrial Revolution.

What is the author’s attitude towards the changes of the 20th century?   

A．Objective. B．Tolerant.   C．Vague.     D．Negative.

What does the underlined word “stark” in Paragraph 3 mean?

A．Unfair.     B．Illegal.     C．Dull. D．Violent.

What can be inferred from the passage?

A．Men’s individuality is over controlled.

B．People have damaged nature too much.

C．Men’s independence is partially limited.

D．People show concern for nuclear families.

你校学生会办的《英语月报》举行“为建设节约型社会献一计”活动，你提出一个建议：鼓励毕业学生把参考书以及课本留给下一届学生使用。

你的理由是：

1．可以节约资源，减少浪费；

2．书上的笔记很有用；

3．国外（如澳大利亚）已有成功的做法；

4．其他。

注意：

1．词数100左右；

2．可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯；

3．标题 On Saving

4．参考词汇：节约型社会 energy – saving society

On Saving

As we know, when senior students graduate from school,                                                                  

Hard work and lack of sleep has ______ her beauty and youth in recent years．

A. made out           B. worn out           C. wiped out          D. sent out

—You see, I’m poor in maths, you are not good at English, and...

— That’s ____ we should help each other.

A．when               B．where                     C．how                D．what

As a teacher rich in experience, he knows how to         his ideas to these new students in a limited period of time.

A．convey     B．educate     C．pass   D．convince

We didn’t know you were in trouble at that time.       ,we would have given you a hand.

       A．However  B．Besides     C．Otherwise D．Anyway

They were ahead during the first half of the match, but they ________ in the last five minutes．

       A．were beating               B．beat            

       C．were beaten              D．had been beaten

The result of the study indicated that it was the type of fat ______ made the difference．  

       A．that   B．what  C．who  D．as

Do you remember the game “Telephone”? A message gets passed from person to person, and everyone laughs at how distorted(曲解) it becomes. As a game, telephone can be fun. In real life, sending messages through third parties fouls things up. It is important for family members who have “business” with other family members to take it up directly.

       When tension arises in a relationship between two people, a frequent way of dealing with this is to send messages through a third person. Family doctors refer to the process as ‘triangulation”. Following a quarrel, a mother may say to her son, “Tell your father to pass the salt”, which may be answered by, “Tell your mother to get her own salt.” In many long cases of triangulation, the middleman becomes severely disturbed.

       Two years ago, Ruth and Ralph Gordon brought their 17-year-old daughter for treatment. Lucille was not doing well in school, using drugs heavily. When I began to work with her, she was uncommunicative and aggressive. After some time, however, she opened up and told me her parents rarely talked to each other, but both used her as a middleman. Mrs. Gordon was sexually unsatisfied and suggested to Lucille that she ask her father to go for marriage advice. Mr. Gordon told Lucille that he was seeing another woman, and he urged Lucille to speak to her mother about improving her behaviour. Caught in this confusing situation, Lucille became more and more troubled. It wasn’t until she refused to play middleman that she began to improve. When either parent began to send a message through her, she learned to say, “Tell him/her yourself!”

You’ll find that when family members learn to dial each other directly, there’s rarely a busy signal or wrong number. With direct dialing, a sense of freshness is created.

The underlined words “foul things up” in the 1st paragraph means ________.

A. create things  B. improve things  C. remove things  D. ruin things

“Triangulation” in the 2nd paragraph refers to _________.

A. the process of sending messages through a 3rd person

B. the middleman who becomes severely disturbed

C. the tension in a relationship between 2 people

D. the argument between a mother and a father

Through the example of Lucille and her parents, the writer hopes to tell the readers that _______.

A. family members should learn to get their messages across directly

B. parents should send their children taking drugs for treatment

C. children can hardly get used to their parents’ troubles

D. children should refuse the requests of their parents

—Can I help you with your heavy box.

   — ____________.

A. That's very kind of you

B. With pleasure

C. You can, please 

D. Ok