Passage Eight(The Development of Cities)
Mass transportation revised the social and economic fabric of the American city in three fundamental ways. It catalyzed physical expansion, it sorted out people and land uses, and it accelerated the inherent instability of urban life. By opening vast areas of unoccupied land for residential expansion, the omnibuses, horse railways, commuter trains, and electric trolleys pulled settled regions outward two to four times more distant form city centers than they were in the premodern era. In 1850, for example, the borders of Boston lay scarcely two miles from the old business district; by the turn of the century the radius extended ten miles. Now those who could afford it could live far removed from the old city center and still commute there for work, shopping, and entertainment. The new accessibility of land around the periphery of almost every major city sparked an explosion of real estate development and fueled what we now know as urban sprawl. Between 1890 and 1920, for example, some 250,000 new residential lots were recorded within the borders of Chicago, most of them located in outlying areas. Over the same period, another 550,000 were plotted outside the city limits but within the metropolitan area. Anxious to take advantage of the possibilities of commuting, real estate developers added 800,000 potential building sites to the Chicago region in just thirty years – lots that could have housed five to six million people.
Of course, many were never occupied; there was always a huge surplus of subdivided, but vacant, land around Chicago and other cities. These excesses underscore a feature of residential expansion related to the growth of mass transportation: urban sprawl was essentially unplanned. It was carried out by thousands of small investors who paid little heed to coordinated land use or to future land users. Those who purchased and prepared land for residential purposes, particularly land near or outside city borders where transit lines and middle-class inhabitants were anticipated, did so to create demand as much as to respond to it. Chicago is a prime example of this process. Real estate subdivision there proceeded much faster than population growth.
1.With which of the following subjects is the passage mainly concerned?
A.Types of mass transportation.
B.Instability of urban life.
C.How supply and demand determine land use.
D.The effect of mass transportation on urban expansion.
2.Why does the author mention both Boston and Chicago?
A.To demonstrate positive and negative effects of growth.
B.To exemplify cities with and without mass transportation.
C.To show mass transportation changed many cities.
D.To contrast their rate of growth.
3.According to the passage, what was one disadvantage of residential expansion?
A.It was expensive.
B.It happened too slowly.
C.It was unplanned.
D.It created a demand for public transportation.
4.The author mentions Chicago in the second paragraph as an example of a city,
A.that is large.
B.that is used as a model for land development.
C.where the development of land exceeded population growth.
D.with an excellent mass transportation system.

Hurry! Time to “steal vegetables”
Don't be afraid! We are not encouraging the stealing behavior, but to tell you maybe the most popular topic from white-collars' mouth in cities. Together with "How many vegetables do you steal today," "it's harvest time for your ripe peach," "I bought you a new car today."
Are there so many people in the city really have their own farms, or are they really so rich to buy someone else cars casually?
The answer is obviously negative. They just play some games on Social Network Sites (SNS) like kaixin001.com.
Can you imagine that more than millions of people in Chinese mainland will spend lots of time on SNS to play game and talk to friends, especially white-collars who work in the cities? Take kaixin001.com as an example, the current member of it has already hit 38 million.
However, the great number of people who would like to use such SNS indicates another social problem. That is lots of people choose to escape from the reality. And SNS just offer them a Virtual space to forget the reality.
Kinds of games and various of friends do give netizens lots of fun. Though indulging, dreaming, chatting and playing , it seems like people could really escape from all the upsets in reality. But virtual world is not real and no one can live in it forever, and reality is not that simple like noodling around on the internet.
Since this kind of social phenomenon is so popular on the internet, people start thinking to remove it in the reality.After playing the "happy farm" game on kaixin001.com, would you like to put yourself among the real corps while smelling the fragrance of the countryside? Recently, a farm land service called "happy farm in reality" was opened in the suburbs of Shanghai where white-collar workers from around that region can experience the real farmer's life by themselves
【小题1】What is the topic of the passage?

A．Because they like playing computer games.

B．Because it offers them a virtual space to escape from reality.

C．because they can talk and play with their friends at the same time.

D．because they can harvest peaches.

"I've changed my mind．I wanted to have a telescope, but now I want my daddy back．" Lucien Lawrence's letter to Father Christmas, written after his schoolteacher father had been knifed to death outside his school gale, must have touched every heart．Lucien went on to say that without his father he couldn't see the stars in the sky．When those whom we love depart from us, we cannot see the stare for a while．

But Lucien, the stars are still there, and one day, when you are older and your tears have gone, you will see them again．And, in a strange way, I expect that you will find your father is there too, in your mind and in your heart．I find that my parents, long dead now, still figure in many of my dreams and that I think of them perhaps more than 1 ever did when they were alive．I still live to please them and I'm still surprised by their reactions．I remember that when I became a professor,! was so proud, or rather so pleased with myself, that I couldn't wait to call my parents．The reply was a long time in coming, but when it did, all Mother said was "I hope this means that now you will have more time for the children!" I haven't forgotten．The values of my parents still live on．

It makes me pause and think about how I will live on in the hearts and minds of my children and of those for whom I care．Would I have been as ready as Philip Lawrence have been to face the aggressors （挑衅者）, and to lay down my life for those in my care? How many people would want me back for Christmas'' It's a serious thought, one to give me pause．

I pray silently, sometimes, in the dead of night, that ancient cry of a poet " Deliver my soul from the sword（剑）, and my darling from the power of the dog．" Yet I know the death comes to us all,

and sometimes comes suddenly．We must therefore plan to live forever, but live as if we will die

tomorrow．We live on, I'm sure, in the lives of those we loved．and therefore we ought to have a care

for what they will remember and what they will treasure．If more parents knew this in their hearts to

be true, there might be fewer knives on our streets today．

1.According to the whole text we can see that the first paragraph ______．

    A．puts forward the subject of the text

    B．shows the author's pity on the kid

    C．acts as an introduction to the discussion

    D．makes a clear statement of the author's views

2.In the second paragraph the author mainly wants to explain to us ______．

    A．how much he misses his parents now

    B．why his parents often appear in his dream

    C．when Lucien will get over all his sadness

    D．how proud he was when he succeeded in life

3.What feeling did the author's mother express in her reply?

    A．Proud．          B．Happy．          C．Disappointed．  D．Worried

4.In the author's opinion, the value of a person's life is ______．

    A．to leave behind a precious memory to the people related

    B．to have a high sense of duty to the whole society

    C．to care what others will remember and treasure

    D．to share happiness and sadness with his family

5.What does the writer mean by the sentence taken from an old poem?

    A．Call on criminals and murderers to lay down their guns．

    B．Advise parents stay with their children safely at home．

    C．Spend every day meaningfully in memory of the death．

   D．Try to keep violence and murder far away from society．

“I've changed my mind. I wanted to have a telescope, but now I want my daddy back." Lucien Lawrence’s letter to Father Christmas written after his schoolteacher father had been knifed to death outside his school gate, must have touched every heart. Lucien went on to say that without his father he couldn't see the stars in the sky. When those whom we love depart from us, we cannot see the stars for a while.
But Lucien, the stars are still there, and one day, when you are older and your tears have gone, you will see them again. And, in a strange way, I expect that you will find your father is there too, in your mind and in your heart. I find that my parents, long dead now, still figure in many of my dreams and that I think of them perhaps more than I ever did when they were alive. I still live to please them and I' m still surprised by their reactions. I remember that when I became a professor, I was so proud, or rather so pleased with myself, that I couldn't wait to cable my parents. The reply was a long time in coming, but when it did, all Mother said was “I hope this means that now you will have more time for the children!” I haven' t forgotten. The values of my parents still live on.
It makes me pause and think about how I will live on in the hearts and minds of my children and of those for whom I care. Would I have been as ready as Philip Lawrence have been to face the aggressors (挑衅者)，and to lay down my life for those in my care? How many people would want me back for Christmas? It's a serious thought, one to give me pause.
I pray silently, sometimes, in the dead of night, that ancient cry of a poet “Deliver my soul from the sword (剑), and my darling from the power of the dog.” Yet I know the death comes to us all, and sometimes comes suddenly. We must therefore plan to live forever, but live as if we will die tomorrow. We live on, I'm sure, in the lives of those we loved, and therefore we ought to have a care for what they will remember and what they will treasure. If more parents knew this in their hearts to be true, there might be fewer knives on our streets today.
【小题1】According to the whole text we can see that the first paragraph ________.

The evidence for harmony may not be obvious in some families. But it seems that four out of five young people now get on with their parents, which is the opposite of the popularly-held image （形象）of unhappy teenagers locked in their room after endless family quarrels.

An important new study into teenage attitudes surprisingly shows that their family life is more harmonious than it has ever been in the past. “We were surprised by just how positive today’s young people seem to be about their families,” said one member of the research team. “They’re expected to be rebellious（叛逆的）and selfish .but actually they have other things on their minds: they want a car and material goods, and they worry about whether school is serving them well. There’s more negotiation（商议）and discussion between parents and children, and children expect to take part in the family decision-making process. They don’t want to rock the boat.”

So it seems that this generation of parents is much more likely than parents of 30 years ago to treat their children as friends. “My parents are happy to discuss things with me and willing to listen to me," says 17-year-old Daniel Lazall. “I always tell them when I’m going out clubbing. As long as they know what I’m doing, they’re fine with it.” Susan Crome, who is now 21, agrees. “Looking back on the last 10 years, there was a lot of what you could call negotiation. For example, as long as I’d done all my homework, I could go out on a Saturday night. But I think my grandparents were a lot stricter with my parents than that.”

Maybe this positive view of family life should not be unexpected. It is possible that the idea of teenage rebellion is not rooted in real facts. A researcher comments, “Our surprise that teenagers say they get along well with their parents comes because of a brief period in our social history when teenagers were regarded as different beings. But that idea of rebelling and breaking away from their parents really only happened during that one time in the 1960s when everyone rebelled. The normal situation throughout history has been a smooth change from helping out with the family business to taking it over.”

41. What is the popular image of teenagers today?

A. They worry about school.                        B. They dislike living with their parents.

C, They have to be locked in to avoid troubles.  D. They quarrel a lot with other family members.

42. The study shows that teenagers don’t want to__________ .

A. share family responsibility                                B. cause trouble in their families

C. go boating with their family                          D. make family decisions

43. Compared with parents of 30 years ago, today’s parents__________ .

A. go to clubs more often with their children          B. are much stricter with their children

C. care less about their children’s life                 D. give their children more freedom

44. According to the author, teenage rebellion__________ .

A. may be a false belief                                    B. is common nowadays

C. existed only in the 1960s                               D. resulted from changes in families

45. What is the passage mainly about?

A. Negotiation in family.                                         B. Education in family.

C. Harmony in family.                          D.Teenage trouble in family.