When you are little, the whole world feels like a big playground. I was living in Conyers, Georgia the summer it all happened. I was a second grader, but my best friend Stephanie was only in the first grade. Both of our parents were at work and most of the time they let us go our own way.

It was a hot afternoon and we decided to have an adventure in Stephanie’s basement. As I opened the basement door, before us lay the biggest room, full of amazing things like guns, dolls, and old clothes. I ran downstairs, and spotted red steel can. It was paint. I looked beyond it and there lay even more paint in bright colors like purple, orange, blue and green.

“Stephanie, I just found us a project for the day. Get some paintbrushes. We are fixing to paint.” She screamed with excitement as I told her of my secret plans and immediately we got to work. We gathered all the brushes we could find and moved all of our materials to my yard. There on the road in front of my house, we painted bit stripes (条纹) of colors across the pavement (人行道). Stripe by stripe, our colors turned into a beautiful rainbow. It was fantastic!

The sun was starting to sink. I saw a car in the distance and jumped up as I recognized the car. It was my mother. I couldn’t wait to show her my masterpiece. The car pulled slowly into the driveway and from the look on my mother’s face, I could tell that I was in deep trouble.

My mother shut the car door and walked towards me. Her eyes glaring, she shouted, “What in the world were you thinking? I understood when you made castles out of leaves, and climbed the neighbors’ trees, but this! Come inside right now!” I stood there glaring hack at her for a minute, angry because she had insulted (侮辱) my art. 

“Now go clean it up!” Mother and I began cleaning the road. Tears ran down my cheeks as I saw my beautiful rainbow turn into black cement.  

Though years have now passed, I still wonder where my rainbow has gone. I wonder if, maybe when I get older, I can find my rainbow and never have to brush it away. I guess we all need sort of rainbow to brighten our lives from time to time and to keep our hopes and dreams colorful.

What did the writer want to do when his mother came home?

    A. To introduce Stephanie to her. 

    B. To prevent her from seeing his painting. 

    C. To put the materials back in the yard.      

    D. To show his artwork to her.

In his mother’s eyes, the writer_______.

    A. was a born artist        B. always caused trouble

    C. was a problem solver     D. worked very hard

The underlined word “rainbow” in the last paragraph refers to ______.

    A. the rainbow in the sky      

    B. the stripes on the pavement

    C. something imaginative and fun   

    D. important lessons learned in childhood

It can be learned from the passage that parents should ________.

    A. encourage children to paint     

    B. value friendship among children

    C. discover the hidden talent in children  

    D. protect rather than destroy children’s dreams

When you watch a movie in the cinema, you may wonder how “the moving pictures” is made and where the voices, and noises and music come from. Now here is the answer.

In modern times, the middle part of a cinema film has lots of small photographs, each one of which is different from the one before it. Each photograph is brought in front of a strong light, and there it stops for a very small part of a second. This photograph, therefore, appears on the screen, and we see it. Then the light is covered and the next photograph is moved to the position in the front of the strong light. Meanwhile, the metal cover turns away from the light. Thus, the second photograph is shown on the screen. This is done again and again, twenty-four times a second, and we think we are watching a moving picture on the screen. But nothing on the screen actually moves. ”The moving picture” is in fact made up of a lot of bits. We see about 86,000 different pictures every hour, but none of them moves.

The voices, noises and music are recorded on the side of the cinema film. The record looks like marks of strange shapes. The side of the film passes in front of another light, and the rays of light which pass through change as the marks change. These marks have been made from the voices and other sounds of the people and events in front of the cinema when the film is being made. The marks may be considered as “printed sounds”.

1. When a cinema film is shown, how long does each photograph appear on the screen?

A. One twenty-third of a second.

B. One twenty-fourth of a second

C. A few seconds

D. One thirty-fifth of a second.

2. Why can we see pictures moving on the screen?

A. We see about 86,000 different pictures every hour.

B. Each picture is a little different from the former.

C. Photographs change quickly.

D. Both B and C.

3. What is a cinema film made up of?

A. Small photographs and a strong light.

B. Small photographs and the sounds.

C. A lot of bits.

D. Voices and photographs.

4. Which is the true about the sound record?

A. It sounds strange.

B. It looks as irregular marks.

C. It is printed in the middle of a film.

D. It is made while the film is being shown on the screen.

 

July 21st, 2007 was a typical English summer’s day — it rained for 24 hours! As usual, I rushed home from work at midday to check on the house. Nothing was amiss. By the time I lift work at 5 pm, however, the road into our village was flooded. Our house bad never been flooded but, as I opened the front door, a wave of water greeted me. Thank God the kids weren’t with me, because the house was 5 feet deep in water. We lost everything downstairs. And the plaster had to be torn off the walls, ceilings pulled down.

 At first we tried to push on through. We didn’t want to move the children out of home, so we camped upstairs. we put a sheet of plastic across the floor to protect us from the damp. But after three months, we felt very sick, so we moved to a wooden house in a park. The house was small, but at first we were all just delighted to be in a new place. Unfortunately, things took longer than expected and we were there for 10 months. The life there was inconvenient. What surprised me most was how much I missed being part of a community（社区）.We had lived in a friendly village with good neighbours, and I’d never thought how much I’d miss that.

 Although-our situation was very bad, it’s difficult to feel too sorry for yourself when you look at what’s happening elsewhere. I watched a news report about floods in Northern India and thought , “We didn’t have a straw hut（茅草房）that was swept away , and our house is still sanding . We’re lucky .”

 We moved back home in August. With December coming, there’s reconstruction work to be done, so it’s difficult to prepare for Christmas. But I can’t wait — I’m going to throw a party for our friends in the village to say thanks for their support. This year , I won’t need any gifts — living away from home for months has made me realize how little we actually need or miss all our possessions . Although we are replacing things, there’s really no rush — we have our home back, and that’s the main thing.

What does the underlined word “amiss” in the first paragraph mean?

A. Wrong.   B. Missing.   C. Right.    D. Found.

It can be inferred from the text that the author                    .

A. was sick of staying upstairs

B. cared much about her children

C. could not stand living a wooden house

D. did not deal well with her family affairs during the flood

Why does author say that they were lucky in the third paragraph?

A. Because her situation was not serious.

B. Because many other places were flooded.

C. Because she had been to Northern India.

D. Because some others suffered even more.

What does the author mainly want to express by telling her story?

A. She valued human feelings more than before.

B. She realized she almost didn’t need possessions.

C. She found Christmas gifts no longer badly needed.

D. She thought her own home was the most important.

 

第二节 完形填空（共20小题；每小题1.5分，满分30分）

阅读下面短文，掌握其大意，然后从各题所给的四个选项中，选出最佳选项。

We’ve heard it before － we’ve heard it on the news, from teachers, from parents －children and teenagers today are growing up too fast. There are not too many people that will   _31  with that statement. Teenagers are faced with serious problems and decisions at an early   _32 . In fact most teenagers’ daily schedules（日程表）are as  33  as those of an adult’s.

    I have been working since I was thirteen, and always in  34  in which I was working with adults. I have had to learn to think and  35  like an adult to be taken seriously. So, I count myself as one who has grown up too fast. I just graduated from high school, and have recently spent some time reflecting（反思）on the  36  eighteen years － thinking about myself, what I have gained, and what  37  I have yet to achieve.

    We are expected to work hard, get excellent  38 , be in a good relationship, and know what we want to do  39 . The list goes on and on. But the  40  is clear: We live in a society today that is  41  our childhood. We no longer have many years to be careless and fancy-free. We are expected to  42  the strict school rules and to excel（擅长）in everything we do.

    I’ve known these things for a long time, and knew that they  43  me. But, I never really admitted it until last night, when I learned a  44  lesson, taught to me by my boss where I work. We had finished a job at a remote site. It was about 11:30 at night, and we had  45  to his house. We were talking about the  46  he had been making to his home. One of the things he said was “I  47  my basketball hoop（篮圈）. ”Then he threw a basketball to me.

    I hadn’t  48  a basketball in five years.

    We proceeded to shoot hoops for about 5 minutes. Both of us were terribly bad at it, but we spent the whole time  49  like children. Then I realized something: I am still a child. Oh, the law says I’m an adult. But, we are still really and truly children. We all need to have  50_   once in a while.

31. A. argue                        B. disagree                    C. satisfy                        D. discuss

32. A. age                                B. stage                          C. year                            D. grade

33. A. certain                B. busy                            C. careful                       D. perfect

34. A. companies              B. factories                         C. positions                   D. offices

35. A. study                        B. speak                         C. work                           D. act

36. A. last                                B. other                          C. rest                             D. coming

37. A. purposes                 B. success                      C. goals                          D. jobs

38. A. textbooks                B. grades                       C. teachers                    D. schools

39. A. in life                   B. in time                       C. for ages                     D. for ever

40. A. information       B. message                   C. notice                         D. idea

41. A. ruining                B. correcting                 C. envying                      D. shortening

42. A. respect               B. accept                        C. learn                           D. follow

43. A. inspired              B. disappointed            C. affected                     D. frightened

44. A. valuable                       B. serious                           C. important                 D. useful

45. A. walked                B. flown back                C. gone back                 D. driven

46. A. furniture                  B. improvements         C. equipment                D. arrangements

47. A. moved                 B. fixed                           C. sold                             D. broke

48. A. played                 B. caught                       C. seen                      D. held

49. A. laughing                   B. shouting                    C. running                      D. shooting

50. A. a rest                        B. a talk                          C. fun                              D. sports

 

Minimalism (简约主义) is a term that describes movements in various forms of art and design, especially visual art and music, where the work is reduced to its most basic features.

As for me, minimalism functions well not in art or design, but in my daily life.

When I was packing for university, I found it extremely difficult to let go of some of the things I owned. I knew I couldn’t take everything with me, but I kept asking myself “how could I possibly throw this away?”, “what if I need it one day?”, and “what about all of the memories?” Now that I’ve moved, and left that stuff behind, I don’t even miss it. Whether or not I got rid of it, it barely makes a bit of difference to me now.

I’ve learned that over time people forget, or their need for a particular object eventually disappears. Either they store it away or they get rid of it.

You might think nostalgically（怀旧的） about the toys you cared about when you were a child, but what is making you smile now is not the thing itself but the memory of it. 1’ve heard it a hundred times, “you don’t need things to make you happy.” It takes something life-changing like moving across the country to realize how true this is.

Speaking of which, for a lot of people, minimalism is about able to move. It’s about being able to go almost anywhere at any time because you don’t have many possessions to carry. When you keep things you don’t need they become a burden that ties you to a place. Moving to university was a good time to let go of a lot of stuff. And when I visit for the holidays, I’ll probably get rid of even more, to lighten the burden.

Of course there are exceptions. There are some things that are irreplaceable, very rare or expensive or we simply love and cherish for some reason or another, since we are humans. But after we keep those, how much is left that we don’t really need?

Hence, minimalism. And why does minimalism bring happiness? That was a bit of a roundabout way of saying that, it’s because what really makes me happy is freedom. And the key to freedom is minimalism because minimalism reduces our attachment to things.

Attachment to too many objects creates a great mess and can severely hold back our freedom to do whatever we want, while minimalism helps us start new projects, move, travel, learn new things, work, expand, be debt-free, be healthy – really living life to our full potential.

I left the nest to fly onwards and upwards, I can’t do it with old things weighing me down. And that is why I have adopted minimalism with open arms.

1.In paragraph l, the writer gives the definition of minimalism to      .

A．introduce a topic                       B．present his own idea

C．describe a scene                        D．offer an argument

2.Many people don’t want to let go of some of their belongings because       .

A．they haven’t had any life-changing experiences

B．they fear their memories will be gone with the thrown-away stuff

C．they hope to live life to their full potential by storing things away

D．they may have to change their lifestyle because of the loss of them

3.Which of the following is NOT the reason why the writer favors “minimalism” in life?                          

A．It takes the burden off her while she is moving.

B．It reduces her attachment to her personal things.

C．It enables her to gain the freedom that she desires.

D．It helps her to realize how true life is.

4.By saying “there are exceptions”, the writer means       

A．little is left if we keep what we cherish most in our life

B．minimalism should be practised accordingly in different situations

C．minimalism is a method difficult to employ in reality

D．life is full of exceptions so it’s difficult to preserve what we value

5.What’s the main idea of the passage?

A．Minimalism brings happiness.

B．Minimalism is applied in many fields.

C．Minimalism makes people think nostalgically.

D．Minimalism is about able to move.