Modcm inventions have speeded up people’s lives amazingly. Motor-cars cover a bundred miles in little more than an hour. Aireraft cross the world a day, while computers operate at lightning speed. Indeed, this love of speed seems never-ending. Every ycar motor-cars are produced which go even faster each new computer boasts（吹嘘）of saving preeious seconds in handling tasks.

         All this saves timc, but at a prick.When we lose or gain half a day in speeding aeross the world in an airplane, our bodies tell us so. We get the uncomfoerable feeling known as jet-lag; our bodies feel tlru they have been left bebind in anot ar nine zoors Again pending too long at compulers resul’s in painti ninrts and fingers. Mobile phones also to dange according to some seientists; too much uss may thesmit h bul radiation into our brains, a we do not like to think about.

         Howave, what do we do with the time we have saved?Certainly not or so it seems. We are so accustomed to constant activity that we find it difficult to sit and do nothing, or even just one thing at a time. Pcrhaps the days are long gone when we might listen quietly to a story on the radio, letting imavination take us into another world.

         There was a time when some people’s lives were devotcd simply to the cultivation of the land or the eare of eattle. No multi-tasking there; their lives wenl on at a much gentler pace, and in a familiar pattern. There is much that we might envy about a way of life like this. Yet before we do so ,we must think of the hard tasks our ancestors faeed;:they farmed with bare hands, often lived close to hunger, and had to fashion tools from wood and stone. Modem machinery has freed peope fre that primitive existcnee.

1.The new rooucts opcome more and more time-saving beeause_________.

         A.our love of speed secure never-ending

         B.time is limited

         C.theprices are increasingly high

         D.the manufacturers boast a lot

2.What does“the days”in Paragraph 3 refer to?

         A.I maginary life               B.Simple life in the past

         C.Times of inventions           D.Time for constant activity

3.What is the author’s attitude towards the modem teehnology?

         A.Critical            B.Objective        C.Optimistic            D.Negative

4.What does the pa mge mainly diseuss?

         A.The present and past times             B.Machinary and human beings

         C.Imaginations and inventions            D.Modem technology and its influenec

 

 

An earthquake is caused by a sudden slip on a fault, or fracture, in the earth's surface. The tectonic plates on the surface are always slowly moving, but they get stuck at their edges because of friction. When the stress on the edge overcomes the friction, there is an earthquake that releases energy in waves that travel through the earth's crust and create the shaking we feel.

An earthquake's degree is a measured value of its size and is the same no matter where you are, or how strong or weak the shaking was in different locations. An earthquake's intensity is a measure of the shaking it creates, and varies with location.

A degree of 8 or higher defines a “great” earthquake; 7 to 7.9 is considered “major”; 6 to 6.9 is “strong”;5 to 5.9 is “moderate”; 4 to 4.9 is “light”; 3 to 3.9 is "minor"; and less than 3 is “micro.”

Experts have said that a million people died in earthquakes in the 20th century ­and that this century might see 10 times as many deaths, with as many as a million killed in a single quake. That is, unless major efforts are made to fortify the world’s growing cities, which are expected to be homes to billions of added residents.

Even though the rate of earthquakes over time seems to be more or less unchanging, the world's population explosion means that more people are moving into quake zones, which are often near coasts. The result, the experts say, is the prospect of continuing trauma.

“It is inevitable,” Klaus H. Jacob, an earthquake expert at Lamont-Doherty, the earth sciences research center of Columbia University, said at the end of the last century. “More and more people, and more and more buildings, are  at stake  . As the world gets more populous and richer, allowing a more built-up environment, higher buildings and all the infrastructure that supports our civilization, communications and the like, the risk goes up.”

  63. We can feel the earthquake because               

    A. the plates are always moving.     

    B. the stress overcomes the friction.

    C. the plates get stuck.  

    D. the waves in which energy is released travel through the earth’s crust.

   64. a degree of 8.2 is thought              

   A. a  “moderate” earthquake.         B. a “major” earthquake .

   C. a “strong” earthquake.             D. a “great” earthquake.

  65.  Experts have said that                

   A. a billion people died in earthquakes in the 20th century.

   B. ten times as many deaths will be seen by this century.

   C. a million people will be killed in a single earthquake this century.

   D. if we don’t take measures, something worse may happen.

   66. The underlined expression probably means           .

    A. endangered       B. strong         C. safe        D. weak

 

We don’t plan to cry, but it just happens. In fact when we feel sad or angry, a good cry is almost impossible to resist. But if you didn’t know what crying was, you’d have to wonder why some strong feelings started water streaming from people’s eyes and why they seemed to feel better afterwards.

Now a US researcher had found there may be more in crying than we think. William H. Frey II, author of “Crying: The Mystery of Tears,” believes it may really be one of the body’s clever self-repair mechanisms. Crying may be a way of getting rid of the by-products of stress, he says.

He has found that tears contain some chemicals which can cause stress. One of these is the hormone prolactin (激素), which is set free when one is feeling stressed. Since women have more of this than men, that might explain why they usually cry more, he suggests.

Unsurprisingly, Dr Frey’s study seemed to prove that most people feel better after a good cry. And sex has nothing to do with it ––– the result was true for women and men. So, next time you feel like bursting into tears, go ahead. If Dr Frey is right, you’ll be doing yourself a favour.

1.The best title of this passage would be ________.

A．Why Do We Cry                        B．Crying and Tears.

C．Dr Frey and Crying.                      D．Tears and Chemicals

2.According to the author, we feel like crying because________.

A．crying is one of our habits

B．we can’t control it

C．crying is one of the body’s self-repair mechanisms

D．we can get the by-products of stress by crying

3.According to the passage, men seem less likely to cry than women because_______.

A．their bodies contain less hormone prolactin

B．their tears contain more chemicals

C．they are not so full of feelings as women

D．the chemicals in their tears can’t cause stress

4.The author advised us________.

A．to plan to cry very often

B．not to cry any more

C．to go outdoors without hesitation

D．to cry as we want to

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

A．Good cries can make most people feel better

B．Only women can feel better after crying.

C．It is easy to understand that people feel better after a good cry.

D．Crying is sometimes impossible to resist.

 

    A middle-aged stranger visited us late on a dark rainy night when my father was working the night shift (a job for a period during the night). The stranger asked if he could wait under the eaves of our roof for the rain to stop. Then he disappeared, and we started hearing footsteps and creaking boards in the attic(the space or room at the top of a building, under the roof, often used for storing things). Was the stranger inside our house? My whole body couldn’t help but stiffen. In my mind’s eye, I could imagine the stranger pushing through the attic door and approaching us.

    We immediately called Jerry, our neighbor, for help. He searched everywhere, but the visitor was nowhere to be found. As Jerry looked in the garage, he found the stranger lying underneath the car. Jerry exclaimed with fright, “You are not allowed to enter the house. Get off the property right now.”

    We were determined to leave the house immediately. As we drove away, we saw the man blocking our way on the road and staring at us. We had to swerve to miss him. After that, I never saw the stranger again.

1.The text is mainly about                 .

    A．the neighbor Jerry                                       B．a strange dream

    C．a strange visitor                                        D．footsteps in the attic

2.Based on the text, which of the following statements is true?

    A．The family h it the stranger with their car.

    B．The stranger pushed through the family’s door.

    C．Jerry was hurrying back from the night shift.

    D．The author’s father wasn’t at home that night.

3.Why did the family leave their house on a late, dark night?

    A．It was raining hard and the eaves of their roof were broken.

    B．There was a ghost wandering around the house.

    C．They did not feel safe in their house.

    D．The stranger was still somewhere inside the house.

4.The text was written in order of             .

    A．time             B．space            C．importance       D．age of the family

 

 

 

第二卷（共35分）

V．短文填词(共10空；每空1分，满分10分)

    阅读下面短文，根据以下提示：1)汉语提示；2)首字母提示；3)语境提示，在每个空格内填入一个适当的英语单词，并将该词完整地写在右边相对应的横线上。所填单词要求意义准确，拼写正确。

    Many school students have difficulty in English listening．Here are

some t          for you．We hope they can help you in one way or other．       76．              

       Before you start to listen to something，you need to       (放松)．              77．       

Don’t get n       or excited．The first sentence tells a lot about the whole            78．       

passage，so you’d       listen carefully．When you’re listening，try to do          79．       

some    (思考)．For example，you call think of the following questions：                80．       

What h        ，when，where and how? What was the result and what                81．       

does the speaker want to tell us? This      ，you may understand the            82．       

passage better．It’s n      for you to remember some important facts．                 83．       

You may hear words you don’t know, but don’t spend too much time           84．       

them．Very often，you’ll find out        they mean later when you goon               85．       

with the listening．