“Homestay is a form of study abroad program. It allows the visitor to rent a room from a local family to better understand the local lifestyle. It also helps to improve the visitor’s language ability,” said a teacher during a school meeting last term, “Students who wish to learn more about foreign cultures or to get foreign experience should join this kind of holiday. I am sure you won’t be disappointed(失望的).”
After this special meeting, I always thought about this kind of holiday. Last month, I had a chance at last to go on such a holiday with some of my schoolmates and we went to London, a place where I had wanted to go since years ago.
As we were still young, we had a group leader who planned things for us and looked after us. After we got to London, we went to stay with different families. I was lucky that my host family(寄宿家庭) was a white couple who had a daughter about my age. They treated me as a daughter of their family during my stay there. They were interested in me and I learnt a lot of things from them, too. 
The holiday was filled with activities every day. After breakfast, a local teacher would come to take us in his car. Then we would have classes or go on a sight-seeing trip to different places of interest like the Big Ben, the London Bridge, and the Buckingham Palace. We would go back to our own homes after the activities.
The holiday was a valuable experience for me. I enjoyed every minute of it. Yet, time really flew fast. Three weeks later, we had to leave “home” for Hong Kong.In the “homestay” program, a visitor can .
| A．learn more about holidays | B．understand his culture better |
| C．improve the language ability | D．take part in foreign meetings |
The writer had wanted to visit London since .
| A．the last month | B．years ago | C．the special meeting | D．her stay abroad |
The group leader should .
| A．make plans for the family | B．take care of the students |
| C．stay with different families | D．rent rooms to the students |
The writer’s host family .
| A．was very kind to her | B．went sight-seeing with her |
| C．had two white daughters | D．was interested in her activities |
From the passage, we know that the writer in London.
| A．wished to stay a little longer |
| B．spent three weeks in her “home” |
| C．had classes in many interesting places |
| D．helped the teacher take the students in a car |
It was my first day at school in London and I was half-excited and half-frightened. On my way to school I wondered what sort of questions the other boys would ask me and practiced all the answers: “I am nine years old. I was born here but I haven’t lived here since I was two. I was living in Farley. It’s about thirty miles away. I came back to London two months ago.” I also wondered if it was the custom（习惯）for boys to fight strangers like me, but I was tall for my age. I hoped they would decide not to risk（冒险）it.
No one took any notice of me before school. I stood in the center of the playground, expecting someone to say “hello”, but no one spoke to me. When a teacher called my name and told me where my classroom was, one or two boys looked at me but that was all the curiosity my arrival aroused（唤醒）.
My teacher was called Mr. Jones. There were 42 boys in the class, so I didn’t stand out there, either, until the first lesson of the afternoon. Mr. Jones was very fond of Charles Dickens and he had decided to read aloud to us from David Copperfield, but first he asked several boys if they knew Dickens’ birthplace, but no one guessed right. A boy called Brian, the biggest in the class, said: “Timbuktu”, and Mr. Jones went red in the face. Then he asked me. I said: “Portsmouth”, and everyone stared at me because Mr. Jones said I was right. This didn’t make me very popular, of course.
“He thinks he’s clever,” I heard Brian say.
After that, we went out to the playground to play football. I was in Brian’s team, and he obviously had Dickens in mind because he told me to go in goal. No one ever wanted to be the goalkeeper.
“He’s big enough and useless enough,” Brian said when someone asked him why he had chosen me.
I suppose Mr. Jones remembered Dickens, too, because when the game was nearly over, Brian pushed one of the players on the other team, and he gave them a penalty（罚球）. As the boy kicked the ball hard along the ground to my right, I threw myself down instinctively（本能地）and saved it. All my team crowded round me. My bare knees were grazed（擦伤）and bleeding. Brian took out a handkerchief and offered it to me.
“Do you want to join my team?” he said.
At the end of the day, I was no longer a stranger.
The writer prepared to answer all of the following questions EXCEPT “_________”.
| A．How old are you? |
| B．Where are you from? |
| C．Do you want to join my team? |
| D．When did you come back to London? |
We can learn from the passage that _________.
| A．boys were usually unfriendly to new students |
| B．the writer was not greeted as he expected |
| C．Brian praised the writer for his cleverness |
| D．the writer was glad to be a goalkeeper |
The underlined part “I didn’t stand out” in paragraph 3 means that the writer was not _______.
| A．noticeable（值得注意的） | B．welcome |
| C．important | D．popular |
What can we infer from the fact that the writer was offered a handkerchief?
| A．He threw himself down and saved the goal. |
| B．He pushed a player on the other team. |
| C．He was beginning to be accepted. |
| D．He was no longer a new comer. |
Everybody makes decisions in daily life. They can be as important as what you will do in the future or as simple as what you will eat for breakfast. Any decision could be the turning point of your life.
I made an important decision when I was in Junior 3.
Before I made that decision I was one of the boys who tried too hard to act as an adult. I didn’t know that only kids want to show themselves as adults.
I didn’t listen to my parents and teachers, and my grades became poor. Then came the high school entrance exam.
At the turning point of my life, my mom wanted to have a conversation with me. I wanted to turn it down but when I looked at her eyes, I felt I couldn’t refuse. Instead of asking me to study hard, to my surprise, Mom just asked what I wanted to do in the future. Without thinking too much, I just said I would like to study hard.
Mom smiled and asked again: “I asked: what do you WANT to do?”
I never seriously thought about the question. So, I kept silent.
“Whether you want to go on studying or enter the society,” she went on, “it is your own decision. Your life ought to be decided by you, not by anyone else, including me. ” After saying that, she had tears in her eyes.
For the first time in my life I was asked to make my own decision. I sat in my chair and thought about myself, my life and what kind of person I wanted to become.
It took me what seemed to be ages to make the biggest decision so far in my life—I wanted to be a man who makes a difference in the world. To achieve that, I needed to study hard.
The path to my future became clear to me. I didn’t act rebelliously(叛逆地) any more. With passion (激情) in my heart, I studied hard.
Now, I’m 17 and I’m in one of the best schools in my city, in one of the best classes at the school and I am one of the best students in the class.
Thanks to that decision, I have become what I am today.When did the writer make the important decision?
| A．After he was 17 years old. |
| B．After he was in one of the best classes. |
| C．When he was a pupil. |
| D．When he was studying in Junior 3. |
What was the writer like before the decision?
| A．His grades became poor. |
| B．He tried too hard not to act as an adult. |
| C．He was one of the top students in his class. |
| D．He did what his teachers and his parents asked him to do. |
Why did the writer make the decision?
| A．Because his teacher talked with him patiently. |
| B．Because he didn’t want to act rebelliously any more. |
| C．Because his mother asked him to study hard as usual. |
| D．Because his father asked him to think about his future by himself. |
Which of the following is TRUE?
| A．The writer made the decision that he should work hard. |
| B．It took the writer several years to make the decision. |
| C．After hearing his mother’s words, the writer had tears in his eyes. |
| D．At the turning point of his life, the writer wanted to have a conversation with his mother |
Is there intelligent (有智力的) life on other planets? For years, scientists said “no.” or “we don’t know.” But today this is changing. Seth Shostak and Alexandra Barnett are astronomers(天文学家). They believe intelligent life exists (存在) somewhere in the universe. They also think we sill soon contact these beings(人；生物).
Why do Shostak and Barnett think intelligent life exists on other planets? The first reason is time. Scientists believe the universe is about 12 billion years old. “This is long enough for other planets to have intelligent life,” say Shostak and Barnett. The second reason is size—the universe is huge. “Tools like the Hubble Telescope(哈勃望远镜) have shown that there are at least 100 billion galaxies,” says Shostak. “And our galaxy, the Milky Way, has at least 100 billion stars. Some planets going around these stars might be similar to Earth.”
In the past, it was hard to look for signs of intelligent life in the universe. But now, powerful telescopes(高倍望远镜) allow scientists to discover smaller planets—the size of Mars or Earth—in other solar systems. These planets might have intelligent life.
Have beings from space already visited Earth? “Probably not,” says Shostak. “It’s a long way away. However, intelligent beings may contact us in other way, such as radio signals(信号). In fact, they may be trying to communicate with us now, but we don’t have the right tools to receive their messages. However, this is changing. By 2025, we could make contact with other life forms in our universe and we might help each other.”
Seth Shostak and Alexandra Barnett are _____.
| A．astronomers | B．farmers |
| C．singers | D．drivers |
What is the best title for Paragraph 2?
| A．The Age and Size of Earth |
| B．Our Galaxy: The Milky Way |
| C．Why Intelligent Life Might Exist |
| D．Earth: The Only Planet with Intelligent Life |
Why was it hard to look for signs of intelligent life in the universe in the past?
| A．There were not any smaller planets. |
| B．There were not any powerful telescopes. |
| C．The astronomers were not interested in them. |
| D．The Milky Way didn’t exist at that time, |
Why haven’t beings from space visited us yet according to Shostak?
| A．They’re afraid of us. |
| B．It’s a long way away. |
| C．They don’t want to see us. |
| D．They don’t know how to use radio signals. |
A man had a little dog, and he was very fond of it. He would pat its head, and take it on his knee, and talk to it. Then he would give it little bits of food from his own plate. A donkey looked in at the window and saw the man and the dog. "Why does he not make a pet of me?" said the donkey. "It is not fair. I work hard, and the dog only wags its tail, and barks, and jumps on its master's knee. It is not fair."
Then the donkey said to himself, "If I do what the dog does, he may make a pet of me." So the donkey ran into the room. It brayed as loudly as it could. It wagged its tail so hard that it knocked over a jar on the table. Then it tried to jump on to its master's knee. The master thought the donkey was mad, and he shouted, "Help! Help!" Men came running in with sticks, and they beat the donkey till it ran out of the house, and they drove it back to the field.
"I only did what the dog does," said the donkey," and yet they make a pet of the dog, and they beat me with sticks. It is not fair."
The man liked the dog. He did a lot except __________.
| A．patting the dog’s head | B．sleeping with the dog |
| C．talking to the dog | D．taking the dog on his knee |
Which is not the reason why the man treated the dog well?
| A．It barked |
| B．It worked hard. |
| C．It jumped on the master’s knee |
| D．It wagged its tail |
What happened to the donkey at last?
| A．The donkey jumped onto the man’s knees. |
| B．The man liked it as the dog. |
| C．The donkey was driven back to the field. |
| D．The men beat it to death. |
任务型阅读 根据短文内容完成表格中所缺信息，在答题卷上相应的横线上填写答案，每空限填一个单词。
Whenever we meet with difficulty or failure, teachers, parents or others often say to us or perhaps we say to ourselves, ―Never give up.
These can be encouraging words and words of determination. A person who believes in himself will keep trying to reach his goal no matter how many times he fails. In my opinion, the quality of determination to succeed is an important one to have. Therefore, I believe that we should never give up.
One reason is that if we give up too easily, we will rarely achieve anything. It is not unusual for us to fail in our first attempt at something new, so we should not feel disappointed and should try again. Besides, if we always give up when we fail, we will not be able to develop new skills and grow.
Another reason we should never give up is that we can learn from our mistakes so that we can not make the same ones. If we do not try again, the lesson we have learned is wasted. Finally, we should never give up because as we work to reach our goals, we develop confidence, and this confidence can help us succeed in other areas of our lives. If we never challenge ourselves, we will begin to doubt our abilities.
In short, it is important that we do not give up when working for our goals. Whether we succeed in the end or not, we will learn something, and what we learn will help us to become better and more confident. Furthermore, if we give up, we have no chance of attaining our goals any more, but if we keep making great efforts, there is always a chance that we will succeed one day.
| Possible meanings and the author’s opinions |
●The words——Never give up can ●A person who wants to succeed should have the quality. So we should never give up. |
| The |
●If we give up too easily, maybe we will achieve ●Always giving up means that we will not be able to make any progress. ●Never giving up will make us learn from the mistakes we’ve made before and learn the lesson so as not to make the same mistakes. ●To reach our goals and develop the confidence which can help us |
| Conclusion |
If you give up, you will have no |
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