Today, in many high schools, teaching is now a technical miracle of computer labs, digital cameras.  DVD players and laptops. Teachers can e-mail parents, post messages for students on online bulletin(公告，告示) boards, and take attendance with a quick movement of a mouse.

Even though we are now living in the digital age, the basic and most important element of education has not changed. Most students still need that one-on-one, teacher-student relationship to learn and to succeed. Teenagers need instruction in English, math or history, but they also want personal advice and encouragement. Kids talk with me about their families, their weekend plans, their favorite TV shows and their relationship problems. In my English and journalism class, we talk about Shakespeare and persuasive(富有哲理的) essays, but we also discuss college basketball, the war in Iraq and career choices. Students show me pictures of their rebuilt cars, their family vacations, and their newborn baby brothers. This personal connection is the necessary link between teachers and students that no amount of technology can improve upon or replace.

A few years ago I had a student in sophomore English who was struggling with my class and with school in general. Although he was a humorous young man who liked to joke around, I knew his family life was far from ideal. Whenever I approached him about missing homework or low test grades, he always had the same reply: “It doesn’t matter because I’m quitting school anyway.” Even though he always said this in a half-teasing way, I knew he needed to hear my different opinion and my “value of a high school education” lecture. He needed to hear this speech from me. After he left my class, he struggled through the next two years of school. But, he did finally graduate because we kept telling him to hang in there. We’d cared about him finishing school.

Recently, I saw this former student working at a local Italian restaurant. I told him again how proud I was of him. He said that he was hoping to go back to school to become a certified electrician. I encouraged him to get that training.

Students rely on compassionate teachers to guide, to tutor, to listen, to laugh and to cry with them. Teachers provide the most important link in the educational process — the human one.

The first paragraph mainly discusses _______.

    A．the variety of modern teaching methods

    B．the wide use of modern technology in education

    C．the importance of teacher-parent relationship

    D．the importance of using modern technology

The underlined word “compassionate” in Para 5 means          .

    A．ambitious    B．knowledgeable    C．sympathetic  D．generous

According to the text, the most important element in education is         .

    A．teacher’s good instruction  B．advanced technology

    C．teachers’ encouragement D．personal connection

The author states his view of education by         .

    A．example  B．description  C．figure   D．comparison

Here I must put in a few words about my experience here in China. If I have ___36__ with a Chinese host, he always presses(硬塞给)___37__ food onto my plate as soon as I have emptied the previous helping(份额). That often makes me ___38___awkward(尴尬). I have to eat the food even if I don’t ___39___ it, because it is ___40___ manners in the  West to _41__ one’s food on the plate. I have also ___42__ that when a Chinese sits at an American’s dinner party, he  often ___43___ the offer of food or drink though he is in fact still hungry or  ___44___.  This might be good manners in China,  but it is
certainly__45___ in the West. In the United States,  it is___46___ to keep asking someone again and again or press something on him. Americans are very ___47___.  If they want something, they will ask for it. If not, they will say, “__48__” Here’s an example:  When an American is offered ___49_ by the host, and he doesn’t feel like beer, he will probably say, “No, thanks. I just don’t feel like it. I’ll  ___50___  some Pepsi-Cola （百事可乐）if you have it.” That is ___51__ an American will do. ___52___are taught that  “Honesty is the best policy”. But in some countries, courtesy(谦虚) might be more important than ___53___. So when I am here in China, I have to observe（遵循） the __54__ here. But when you go to ___55___, you had better “Do as the Romans do.”

Recently I spoke to some of my students about what they wanted to do after they graduated, and what kind of job prospects they thought they had.

Given that I teach students who are training to be doctors, I was surprised to find that most thought that they would not be able to get the jobs they wanted without “outside help”. “What kind of help is that?” I asked, expecting them to tell me that they would need a relative or family friend to help them out.

“Surgery(外科手术)”, one replied.

I was pretty alarmed by that response. It seems that the graduates of today are increasingly willing to go under the knife to get ahead of others when it comes to getting a job.

One girl told me that she was considering surgery to increase her height. “They break your legs, put in special extending screws, and slowly expand the gap between the two ends of the bone as it regrows, you can get at least 5cm taller!”

At that point, I was shocked. I am short, I can’t deny that, but I don’t think I would put myself through months of agony(痛苦) just to be a few centimeters taller. I don’t even bother to wear shoes with thick soles, as I’m not trying to hide the fact that I am just not tall!

It seems to me that there is a trend toward wanting “perfection”, and that is an ideal that just does not exist in reality.

No one is born perfect, yet magazines, TV shows and movies present images of thin, tall, beautiful people as being the norm. Advertisements for slimming aids, beauty treatments and cosmetic surgery clinics fill the pages of newspapers, further creating an idea that “perfection” is a requirement, and that it must be purchased, no matter what the cost.

In my opinion, skills, rather than appearance, should determine how successful a person is in his chosen career.

1.We can know from the passage that the author works as ________.

  A. a doctor         B. a model       C. a teacher        D. a reporter

2.Many graduates today turn to cosmetic surgery to ________.

A. marry a better man\woman            B. become a model

C. get an advantage over others in job-hunt  D. attract more admirers

3.According to the passage, the author believes that ________.

A. everyone should purchase perfection, whatever the cost

B. it’s right for graduates to ask for others to help them out in hunting for jobs

C. it is one’s appearance instead of skills that really matters in one’s career

D. media are to blame for misleading young people in their seeking for surgery

4.What does the author think of his height?

A. He hates to be called a short man.

B. He tries to increase his height through surgery.

C. He just accepts it as it is.

D. He always wears shoes with thick soles to hide the fact.

5.The best title for the passage should be “________”.

A. Young Graduates Have Higher Expectation

B. Young Graduates Look to Surgery for Better Jobs

C. Young Graduates’ Opinion About Cosmetic Surgery

D. Young Graduates Face a Different Situation in Job-hunt

How often one hears children wishing they were grown-ups and old people wishing they were young again. Each age has its pleasures and its pains, and the happiest person is the one who enjoys what each age gives him without wasting his time in useless regrets.

Childhood is a time when there are few responsibilities to make life difficult. If a child has good parents, he is fed, looked after and loved, whatever he may do. It is impossible that he will ever again in his life be given so much without having to do anything in return. In addition, life is always presenting new things to the child — things that have lost their interest for older people because they are too well-known. But a child has his parents. He is not so free to do what he wishes to do; he is continually being told not to do things or being punished for what he has done wrong.

When the young man starts to earn his own living, he can no longer expect others to pay for his food, his clothes, and his room, but has to work if he wants to live comfortably. If he spends most of his time playing about in the way that he used to as a child, he will go hungry. And if he breaks the laws of society as he used to break the laws of his parents, he may go to prison. If, however, he works hard, keeps out of trouble and has good health, he can have the great happiness of building up for himself his own position in society.

1. According to the second paragraph, the writer thinks that __________.

2. After a child grows up, he __________.

3. Which of the following statements is NOT true according to the passage?

4.The underlined word "responsibilities" in the second paragraph means __________.

5. The main idea of the passage is __________.

Tim Becker and his neighbors are doing something to make their neighborhood a trouble free area.

When Tim Becker gets in his car to go shopping, he doesn't __36__drive to a store and back home. He always looks__37__ 37 up and down the streets of his neighborhood. He looks for anything___38  such as strange cars, loud noises, __39  windows, or people gathering on street corners.

Tim__40 to a neighborhood watch group in Stoneville, Indiana, USA. The neighborhood watch group__41 on the third Wednesday of every month. That's__42  Tim gets together with about ten of his neighbors to discuss community__43. Members of the neighborhood watch group want to help the police__44_their homes, streets, and families safe.

Tina Stedman, president of__45   neighborhood watch group, agrees with Tim. “People seem to think that crime(犯罪) happens to other people but not__46  them. Well, it's never happened to me,” she said,“but I don't think anyone has the__47  to steal from other people or to make them feel__48  sitting in their own homes.”

Alex, a member of the group, said that all the neighbors__49_our for one another.“We__50 each other's homes. We keep watch on the neighborhood at night and on weekends. Usually a __51 _ of four or five of us goes out together. If something doesn't look right, then we call the__52 . For example, if we notice a group of teenagers who seem to be looking for__53 , or someone destroying property(财产), we report to the police.”

Alex feels the neighborhood watch groups__54  a lot in keeping crime down. Her husband Jim agrees, “Police are good people, but they can't do __55  .”

36.  A. yet           B. still        C. just           D. rather 

37.  A. carefully     B. clearly      C. nervously      D. coldly 

38.  A. familiar      B. unusual      C. expensive      D. interesting 

39.  A. curtained     B. open         C. old            D. broken 

40.  A. attends       B. belongs      C. goes           D .turns 

41.  A. meets         B. quarrels     C. sings          D. searches 

42.  A. where         B. why          C. when           D. how 

43.  A. politics      B. wealth       C. health         D. safety 

44.  A. keep          B. hold         C. let            D. protect  

45.  A. its           B. his          C. their          D. your 

46.  A. round         B. on           C. about          D. to 

47.  A. right         B. chance       C. courage        D. mind 

48.  A. unlucky       B. unsafe       C. disappointed   D. discouraged 

49.  A. set           B. let          C. hold           D. look 

50.  A. care          B. enter        C. watch          D. manage 

51.  A. group         B. set          C. number         D. crowd 

52.  A. judges        B. police       C. firemen        D. doctors 

53.  A. work          B. burden       C. service        D. trouble 

54.  A. produce       B. find         C. get            D. help 

55.  A. anything      B. everything   C. harm           D. wrong