Some Chinese new-rich like eating shark fin soup because they think it shows their class. However, for the Chinese NBA idol Yao Ming, doing so is unacceptable as the practice has led to the overfishing of sharks.

When Yao and his wife Ye Li got married in 2007, they publicly announced that they would not allow shark fin soup to be served at their wedding banquet.

Actually, Yao had been saying no to shark fins since 2006, when he was appointed as the Goodwill Ambassador for wild life protection.

Now, the 226-cm big guy is resorting to his personal influence to encourage more to say no to eating the soup and to raise awareness of animal protection. "Sharks are friends of human beings. They are not our food," Yao said.

Other celebrity athletes like Olympic champions Li Ning and Kong Linghui are following on the heels of Yao, throwing themselves into serving the public as Goodwill Ambassadors for wild animal rescue. Recent reports about Yao's retirement have saddened tens of thousands of basketball fans both at home and abroad. Yet Yao's influence goes far beyond the basketball courts.

Yao has engaged himself in charity and public welfare services for quite a while. When the devastating 8.0-magnitude earthquake hit Wenchuan in southwest China in 2008, Yao donated 2 million yuan . "When I was a little boy, my parents and teachers told me to help others and to be a good man," Yao recalled.  "But I could not donate then because I had not much pocket money. After I moved to Houston, I got involved in quite a number of community service activities and I felt a strong sense of achievement when I got people together," Yao said.

Like Yao, newly crowned French Open champion Li Na has showed her willingness to donate. Li gave 480,000 yuan of her prize money from the open, plus 20,000 yuan from her own pocket, to a local nursing home in her hometown. Another Chinese sports icon, hurdler Liu Xiang, has also been actively involved in charity for years.

1.The reason why some Chinese new-rich like eating shark fin soup is that they think _______ .

2.Yao Ming is against eating shark fin soup because ________ .

3. Which of the following statements is NOT TRUE?

4.What words can be used to describe Yao Ming according to the passage?

5.From the passage , we can learn that________.

American researchers found females are the more talkative sex because of a special “language protein(蛋白质)” in the brain.

The study, conducted by neuroscientists （神经学家）and psychologist from the University of Maryland, concluded that women talked more because they had more of the Foxp2 protein. The research, published in the Journal of Neuroscience, found that higher levels were found among humans that were women but in rats that were males. Their findings came after it was previously claimed that ladies speak about 20,000 words a day – over 13,000 more than men. "This study is one of the first to report a sex difference in the expression of a language-associated protein in humans or animals,” said Prof Margaret McCarthy, who led the study. In their study, the researchers attempted to determine what might make male rats more vocal than their female friends.

They separated four-day-old rats from their mothers and then counted the number of times they cried out in the “ultrasonic range”, the frequencies higher than humans can hear, over five minutes. While both sexes called out hundreds of cries, the males called out twice as often, they found. But when the pups were returned to their mother’s cage, she fussed over her sons first. Tests conducted on the parts of the brain known to be associated with vocalcalls showed the male pups have up to twice as much Foxp2 protein as the females. The researchers then increased the production in the brains of female pups and reduced it in males. This led to the female rats crying out more often and their mothers showing more interest to them. In contrast, males became less “talkative”.

The researchers then tested samples from ten children, aged between three and five, which showed that females had up to 30 per cent more of the Foxp2 protein than males, in a brain area key to language in humans.

“Based on our observations, we assume higher levels of Foxp2 in girls and higher levels of Foxp2 in male rats is an indication that Foxp2 protein levels are associated with the more communicative sex,” said Prof McCarthy.

"Our results imply Foxp2 as a component of the neurobiological basis of sex differences in vocal communication in mammals."

1.From the second paragraph, we can learn that ________.

A．women always speak more words than men

B．men and male rats have low levels of language protein

C．women and male rats have similar levels of Foxp2

D．McCarthy isn’t the first to find females more talkative

2.The underlined phrase “fussed over” in the third paragraph probably means______.

A．paid attention to    B．related to         C．put pressure on     D．counted on

3.The researchers carried out the experiments on rats in order to _______.

A．test which part of the brain is key to language in rats and humans

B．prove the levels of Foxp2 protein in humans and rats are different

C．determine the reason why female rats are more talkative than male rats

D．discover the association between Foxp2protein and vocal communication

4.Which of the following can be the best title for the passage ?

A．Tests on humans and rats                 B．Why women are the talkative sex

C．Sex differences in Foxp2 protein            D．Foxp2 protein determines oral ability

We were driving on the right road when, all of a sudden, a black car pulled out of a parking space right in front of us. My taxi driver stepped on his brake, skidded(打滑), and missed the black car’s back end by just inches! The driver of the black car, who almost caused a major accident, turned his head angrily and started shouting bad words at us.

My taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy. I mean, my taxi driver was friendly. So, I said, “Why did you just do that? This guy almost ruined your car and sent us to hospital!” And the following is what my taxi driver told me, which I now call “the law of the Garbage Truck”.

“Many people are like garbage(垃圾) trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they need a place to dump(倾卸)it. And if you let them, they dump it on you. When someone wants to dump on you, don’t take it personally. Just smile, wave, wish him well, and move on. Believe me. You’ll be happier.”

So this is “The Law of the Garbage Truck”. I started thinking: How often do I let “Garbage Trucks” run right over me? And how often do I take their garbage and spread it to other people at work, at home, or on the streets? It was then that I said, “I’m not going to do it any more.”

I began to see “Garbage Trucks”. I see the load they’re carrying. I see them coming to drop it off. And like my taxi driver, I don’t make it a personal thing; I just smile, wave, and move on.

Good leaders know they have to be ready for their next meeting. Good parents know that they have to welcome their children home from school with hugs and kisses. What about you? The mark of a successful person is how quickly he can get back his focus on what’s important.

1.Who acted like a garbage truck in the accident described in the first two paragraphs?

2.The reason why the taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy is that ______.

3.The underlined part “the load” in Paragraph 5 refers to _____.

4.What is the main idea of the last paragraph?

For many parents, raising a teenager is like fighting a long war, but years go by without any clear winner. Like a border conflict between neighboring countries, the parent-teen war is about boundaries: Where is the line between what I control and what you do?

Both sides want peace, but neither feels it has any power to stop the conflict. In part, this is because neither is willing to admit any responsibility for starting it. From the parents’ point of view, the only cause of their fight is their adolescents’ complete unreasonableness. And of course, the teens see it in exactly the same way, except oppositely. Both feel trapped.

In this article. I’ll describe three no-win situations that commonly arise between teens and parents and then suggest some ways out of the trap. The first no-win situation is quarrels over unimportant things. Examples include the color of the teen’s hair, the cleanliness of the bedroom, the preferred style of clothing, the child’s failure to eat a good breakfast before school, or his tendency to sleep until noon on the weekends. Second,  blaming. The goal of a blaming battle is to make the other admit that his bad attitude is the reason why everything goes wrong. Third, needing to be right, It doesn’t matter what the topic is –politics. The taws of physics, or the proper way to break an egg –the point of these arguments is to prove that you are right and the other person is wrong. for both wish to be considered an authority—someone who actually knows something — and therefore to command respect. Unfortunately, as long as long as parents and teens continue to assume that they know more than the other, they’ll continue to fight these battles forever and never make any real progress.

1.Why does the author compare the parent-teen war to a border conflict?

A. Both can continue for generations.     

B. Both are about where to draw the line

C. Neither has any clear winner          

D. Neither can be put to an end

2.What does the underlined part in Paragraph 2 mean?

A. The teens blame their parents for starting the conflict.

B. The teens agree with their parents on the cause of the conflict

C. The teens cause their parents of misleading them

D. The teens tend to have a full understanding of their parents

3.Parents and teens want to be right because they want to ________.

A. give orders to the other           

B. know more than the other

C. gain respect from the other        

D. get the other to behave properly

4.What will the author most probably discuss in the paragraph that follows?

A. Causes for the parent –teen conflicts     

B. Examples of the parent –teen war.

C. Solutions for the parent –teen problems   

D. Future of the parent-teen relationship

Virginia is set to begin enforcing the toughest drunken-driving punishment, one that will require thousands of first-time offenders—whether they were highly drunk or slightly over the limit—to install in their cars blood- alcohol testing devices that can lock the ignition. The devices work like this—A driver must blow into a blood alcohol device linked to the car’s ignition. If the result is higher than the legal limit, the car will not start. The device also requires random “rolling retests” once the driver is on the road.

Virginia’s current law requires only repeated offenders or those with a blood alcohol level of 0.15 or higher to have an ignition interlock device in their cars.

The new law, which takes effect in July, will roughly increase the number of people required to use ignition interlock devices four times, and offenders will have to pay about $ 480 for a typical six-month installation.

The measure has caused a debate between groups battling drunken driving and those representing offenders. Such groups as Mother Against Drunken Driving and The Washington Regional Alcohol Program say that Virginia’s 274 alcohol-related road deaths and more than 5,500 injuries in 2010 remained unacceptably high despite years of cracking down on drunken driving. Ignition interlock devices, they say, reduce repeat offenses. But some public defenders and lawyers argue that the devices are too severe a punishment for offenders at the legal blood alcohol limit 0.08, and that the court system will be burdened by more cases going to trial and lower-income drivers will be affected by the fees.

Del. Sal R. Iaquinto, who sponsored the bill, had a simple reply for concerns about the costs of the interlock devises: “How much does a life cost?” “Blowing into a tube for six months, you will remember that,” Iaquinto said, “And you’re not likely to offend again.”

1.The underlined word “ignition” in Paragraph 1probably refers to the part in a car where ___________.

A．the alarm goes off   B．the engine starts    C．the door opens     D．the car is fueled

2.Who are required to install the blood alcohol devices according to the current law?

A．The first time drunken-driving offenders.

B．The drivers who are not able to pay offence fees.

C．The repeat drunken-driving offenders.

D．Drivers whose blood alcohol level is below 0.15.

3.The reason why some defenders and lawyers oppose the new law is that ____________.

A．fewer cases go to trial

B．lower-income drivers will not afford to drink again

C．interlock devices increase repeat offenses

D．the devices are too severe a punishment for offenders

4.The debate aroused by the measure implies that ___________.

A．prevention is better than cure             B．no law is absolutely perfect

C．punishment is the key to all                D．justice has long arms

5.What is Del. Sal R. Iaquinto’s attitude towards the new law?

A．Negative.          B．Indifferent.        C．flexible.           D．workable.