Almost every day we come across situations in which we have to make decisions one way or another. Choice, we are given to believe, is a right. But for a good many people in the world in rich and poor countries, choice is a luxury, something wonderful but hard to get, not a right. And for those who think they are exercising their right to make choices, the whole system is merely an illusion, a false idea created by companies and advertiser, hoping to sell their products.
The endless choice gives birth to anxiety in people’s lives. Buying something as basic as a coffee pot is not exactly simple. Easy access to a wide range of everyday goods leads to a sense of powerlessness in many people, ending in the shopper giving up and walking away, or just buying an unsuitable item(商品) that is not really wanted. Recent studies in England have shown that many electrical goods bought in almost every family are not really needed. More difficult decision-making is then either avoided or trusted into the hands of the professionals, lifestyle instructors, or advisors.
It is not just the availability of the goods that is the problem, but the speed with which new types of products come on the market. Advances in design and production help quicken the process. Products also need to have a short lifespan so that the public can be persuaded to replace them within a short time. The typical example is computers, which are almost out-of-date once they are bought. This indeed makes selection a problem. Gone are the days when one could just walk with ease into a shop and buy one thing; no choice, no anxiety.What does the author try to argue in Paragraph 1?
| A．The exercise of rights is a luxury. |
| B．The practice of choice is difficult. |
| C．The right of choice is given but at a price. |
| D．Choice and right exist at the same time. |
Why do more choices of goods give rise to anxiety?
| A．Professionals find it hard to decide on a suitable product. |
| B．People are likely to find themselves overcome by business persuasion. |
| C．Shoppers may find themselves lost in the broad range of items. |
| D．Companies and advertisers are often misleading about the rage of choice. |
By using computers as an example, the author wants to prove that _______.
| A．advanced products meet the needs of people |
| B．products of the latest design flood the market |
| C．competitions are fierce in high-tech industry |
| D．everyday goods need to be replaced often |
What is this passage mainly about?
| A．The variety of choices in modern society. |
| B．The opinions on people’s right in different countries |
| C．The Problems about the availability of everyday goods. |
| D．The helplessness in purchasing decisions |
It was one of those terribly hot days in Baltimore. Needless to say, it was too hot to do anything outside. But it was also scorching in our apartment. This was 1962, and I would not live in a place with an air conditioner for another ten years. So my brother and I decided to leave the apartment to find someplace indoors. He suggested we could see a movie. It was a brilliant plan.
Movie theaters were one of the few places you could sit all day and—most important —sit in air conditioning. In those days, you could buy one ticket and sit through two movies. Then, the theater would show the same two movies again. If you wanted to, you could sit through them twice. Most people did not do that, but the manager at our theater. Mr. Bellow did not mind if you did.
That particular day, my brother and I sat through both movies twice, trying to escape the heat. We bought three bags of popcorn and three sodas each. Then, we sat and watched The Music Man followed by The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. We’d already seen the second movie once before. It had been at the theater since January, because Mr. Bellow loved anything with John Wayne in it.
We left the theater around 8, just before the evening shows began. But we returned the next day and saw the same two movies again, twice more. And we did it the next day too. Finally, on the fourth day, the heat wave broke.
Still, to this day I can sing half the songs in The Music Man and recite half of John Wayne and Jimmy Stewart’s dialogue from The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance! Those memories are some of the few I have of the heat wave of 1962. They’re really memories of the screen, not memories of my life. In which year did the author first live in a place with an air conditioner?
| A．1952 | B．1962 | C．1972 | D．1982 |
What does the underlined word”It” in Paragraph 3 refer to?
| A．The heat |
| B．The theater. |
| C．The Music Man |
| D．The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance |
What do we know about Mr. Bellow?
| A．He loved children very much. |
| B．He was a fan of John Wayne. |
| C．He sold air conditioners. |
| D．He was a movie star. |
Why did the author and his/her brother see the same movies several times?
| A．The two movies were really wonderful. |
| B．They wanted to avoid the heat outside. |
| C．The manager of the theater was friendly. |
| D．They liked the popcorn and the soda at the theater. |
What can we learn from the last paragraph?
| A．The author turned out to be a great singer. |
| B．The author enjoyed the heat wave of 1962. |
| C．The author’s life has been changed by the two movies. |
| D．The author considers the experience at the theater unforgettable. |
One morning, Ann's neighbor Tracy found a lost dog wandering around the local elementary school. She asked Ann if she could keep an eye on the dog. Ann said that she could watch it only for the day.
Tracy took photos of the dog and printed off 400 FOUND fliers（传单）, and put them in mailboxes. Meanwhile, Ann went to the dollar store and bought some pet supplies, warning her two sons not to fall in love with the dog. At the time, Ann's son Thomas was 10 years old, and Jack, who was recovering from a heart operation, was 21 years old.
Four days later Ann was still looking after the dog, whom they had started to call Riley. When she arrived home from work, the dog threw itself against the screen door and barked madly at her. As soon as she opened the door, Riley dashed into the boys' room where Ann found Jack suffering from a heart attack. Riley ran over to Jack, but as soon as Ann bent over to help him the dog went silent.
"If it hadn't come to get me, the doctor said Jack would have died," Ann reported to a local newspaper. At this point, no one had called to claim the dog, so Ann decided to keep it.
The next morning Tracy got a call. A man named Peter recognized his lost dog and called the number on the flier. Tracy started crying, and told him, "That dog saved my friend's son."
Peter drove to Ann's house to pick up his dog, and saw Thomas and Jack crying in the window. After a few moments Peter said, "Maybe Odie was supposed to find you, maybe you should keep it."
| 1． |
What did Tracy do after finding the dog?
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| 2． |
How did the dog help save Jack?
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| 3． |
What was Ann's attitude to the dog according to Paragraph 4?
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| 4． |
For what purpose did Peter call Tracy?
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| 5． |
What can we infer about the dog from the last paragraph?
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Travis is the manager of G&G where he is responsible for forty employees (雇员)and profits (利润) of over $2 million per year. He's never late to work. He does not get upset on the job. When one of his employees started crying after a customer screamed at her, Travis took her away. "Your working uniform is your shelter," he told her. "Nothing anyone says will ever hurt you. You will always be as strong as you want to be."
Travis picked up that lecture in one of his G&G training courses, an education program that began on his first day and continues throughout an employee's occupation. The training has, Travis says, changed his life. G&G has taught him how to live, how to focus, how to get to work on time, and how to master his emotions (情绪). Most importantly, it taught him willpower.
At the center of that education is an extreme focus on an all-important habit; willpower. Dozens of cases show that willpower is the single most important habit for a person's success.
And the best way to strengthen willpower is to make it into a habit. "Sometimes it looks like people with great self-control aren't working hard—but that's because they've made it automatic," Angela Duckworth, one of the University of Pennsylvania researchers said. "Their willpower occurs without them having to think about it."
The company spent millions of dollars developing programs of study to train employees on self-control. Managers wrote workbooks that serve as guides to how to make willpower a habit in workers' lives. Those courses arc, in part, why G&G has grown from a sleepy company into a large one with more than seventeen thousand stores and profits of more than $10 billion a year.We loam from Paragraph 2 that employees in G&G must .
| A．learn to give lectures |
| B．attend education programs |
| C．design a working uniform |
| D．develop a common hobby |
Willpower will become a habit when employees can .
| A．focus on the profits |
| B．benefit from the job |
| C．protect themselves well |
| D．control their feeling well |
What can we infer from the passage?
| A．G&G has grown into a large company. |
| B．G&G will spend half its profits training employees. |
| C．G&G may become more successful in the future. |
| D．G&G has to produce more workbooks for managers. |
Would it surprise you to learn that, like animals, trees communicate with each other and pass on their wealth to the next generation?
UBC Professor Simard explains how trees are much more complex than most of us ever imagined. Although Charles Darwin thought that trees are competing for survival of the fittest, Simard shows just how wrong he was. In fact, the opposite is true: trees survive through their co-operation and support, passing around necessary nutrition "depending on who needs it".
Nitrogen (氮) and carbon are shared through miles of underground fungi (真菌) networks, making sure that all trees in the forest ecological system give and receive just the right amount to keep them all healthy. This hidden system works in a very similar way to the networks of neurons (神经元) in our brains, and when one tree is destroyed, it affects all.
Simard talks about "mother trees", usually the largest and oldest plants on which all other trees depend. She explains how dying trees pass on the wealth to the next generation, transporting important minerals to young trees so they may continue to grow. When humans cut down "mother trees" with no awareness of these highly complex "tree societies" or the networks on which they feed, we are reducing the chances of survival for the entire forest.
"We didn't take any notice of it" Simard says sadly. "Dying trees move nutrition into the young trees before dying, but we never give them chance." If we could put across the message to the forestry industry, we could make a huge difference towards our environmental protection efforts for the future.
| 1． |
The underlined sentence "the opposite is true" in Paragraph 2 probably means that trees.
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| 2． |
"Mother trees" are extremely important because they.
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| 3． |
The underlined word "it" in the last paragraph refers to.
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| 4． |
What would be the best title for the passage?
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(Q =" Question;" A = Answer)
Situation I
Q: If someone sits right next to me in an empty movie theater, is it rude to move?
A: Maybe, but nobody will fault you for it. Chances are that close sitter doesn't realize he disturbs you, so he may miss your annoyance. You undoubtedly aren't the first person he's met who needs enough room. Forgive his bad judgment, move quietly and enjoy the show.
Situation II
Q: If I use the bathroom at a store, do I need to buy something?
A: Consider frequency and urgency. Is this a one-time or an emergency? If so, you don't have to buy anything, but it would be kind if you did. However, if you regularly use the bathroom at this place, then you are a customer, and you should act like one.
Situation III
Q: If someone is talking loudly on the bus, is there a nice way to ask him to keep it down?
A: No. Try other means.1) Stare at him until he gets aware of it and quiets down. 2) Lift your finger in a silence motion(动作)and smile. 3) Put on earphones and ignore him.
Situation IV
Q: If I remember my friend's birthday a day late, should I apologize or just wish her a happy birthday like nothing happened?
A: This is the reason why the word belated was invented. "Happy belated birthday!" is short for: "Well, I know I forgot, but then I remembered. Forgive me and happy birthday."
Situation V
Q: Can I lie about seeing a text because I was too busy or lazy to respond(回复) to it?
A: Don't lie. Receiving a text does not mean you need to respond to it. Why waste a perfectly good lie when the truth will serve? "Yes," you can say if ever asked, "I saw it." No explanation is needed as to why you don't respond.You will get annoyed in a theater when .
| A．a person is too active |
| B．a person is too rude to you |
| C．a person talks too loudly |
| D．a person sits too close to you |
How will you quiet someone down in a public place?
| A．By making fun of him continuously. |
| B．By looking purposefully at him. |
| C．By talking to him directly. |
| D．By pointing angrily at him. |
The underlined word "belated" in Situation IV probably means .
| A．predicted | B．returned | C．cancelled | D．delayed |
What is the passage mainly about?
| A．Modern ways to mind your manners. |
| B．Different ways to change others' manners. |
| C．Proper manners to offer help to others. |
| D．Good manners to talk to people. |
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