The resounding film Avatar has been very popular in the UK and around the world， becoming the fastest film ever to earn 1 billion dollars(7 billion yuan) in ticket sales.
But as well as being an entertaining feast for the eyes, the sci-fi epic (叙事诗)also introduces the audience to a brand new language invented especially for the film.
The movie is set in an alien planet called Pandora which is inhabited by many strange species. The most humanoid of the planet's inhabitants are the Na'vi, and it is the struggle between the Na'vi and human invader that forms the main story of the film.
The film has been released in 2D and 3D versions.
In order to add a sense of reality to his vision of an alien race the film's director James Cameron asked a professor of language from the University of Southern California to invent a language for the Na'vi.
Professor Paul Frommer worked with James Cameron for four years to build upon the original 30 words or so that the director had already come up with for the language.
According to Professor Frommer, the most important aspect of the Na'Vi language was that it could be pronounced.
"This is an alien language but obviously it has to be spoken by human actors," Professor Frommer told the BBC, "it has to be sounds that human beings are comfortable producing."
The language currently has around 1，000 words but Professor Frommer hopes to expand it in possible sequels (续集)to the film and in video games.
The professor hopes that one day his creation will have a high level of the Klingon alien language from the Star Trek films.
"There's a translation of Hamlet into Klingon," says Professor Frommer.
"If anything happened like this with Na'Vi, I'd be delighted." The underlined word "resounding" in Paragraph 1 means ______ .
| A．later | B．scientific | C．hit | D．surprising |
Which of the following is RIGHT according to the passage?
| A．A kind of new language was invented especially for the film. |
| B．The film Avatar is as good a film as the Star Trek. |
| C．The creation in Alien Language is different from that in human beings. |
| D．Avatar is one of the excellent films invented by Pandora. |
The most challenging part in the creation of the language is ______ .
| A．that Professor Frommer needs to create 1 ,000 words for the film Avatar by himself |
| B．that the language is based on that of the Alien planet called Pandora |
| C．that James Cameron introduces a new style of language to the audience |
| D．that an Alien language is created to be spoken by human beings |
We can infer from the passage that ______ .
| A．the film Avatar has been released in 2D and 3D versions |
| B．the most important aspect of the Na'vi language was that it could be pronounced |
| C．Professor Paul Frommer believes his language creation in the film Avatar is very successful |
| D．Professor Paul Frommer worked with James Cameron for four years for a sense of reality of the film |
My boss’s daughter was studying in the Philippines. He asked me if my husband and I could take care of her. He thought his daughter would be able to improve her English communication skills in this way.
After days of thinking, we agreed. He then brought her here and left after 3 days. I thought that my boss’s daughter was well-mannered, but that was wrong.
After a month of staying in the Philippines, she started to show her true colors. When my husband asked her what she wanted for breakfast, she answered him in a rude way. From then on, we experienced fights at home. There was a time when we didn’t talk to her for a week as a punishment of not being good to us. What I hated most was that she didn’t care about other people’s feelings. She ate ahead of us when we were still working and didn’t leave anything for us. So we had to separate her food from ours to avoid such a problem.
The worst thing about her was that she shouted at us. I was wondering if she did this to her parents. We told this to her parents, but unfortunately I didn’t think that solved the problem. This situation lasted for almost 8 months. Our patience was tested during that time.
We tried to teach her everything we could to make her a better person, but I guess 8 months may not to be enough. We even tried to understand her and adjust for her, but it didn’t work. I just hope that she learned something from us and from other Filipinos. This passage is mainly about the writer’s experience of .
| A．trying to please her boss |
| B．changing a girl’s bad behavior |
| C．improving her communication skills |
| D．dealing with a teenage girl staying in her house |
Why did the boss want his daughter to stay with the writer ?
| A．Because he was too busy to take care of his daughter |
| B．Because he wanted his daughter to take a holiday there |
| C．Because he wanted his daughter to improve her English in this way |
| D．Because he wanted the writer to teach his daughter good manners . |
What do the examples in paragraph 3 tell us ?
| A．The daughter wasn’t behaving well. |
| B．The writer and her husband were careless. |
| C．The writer and her husband hated children. |
| D．The daughter tried her best to make others happy. |
The underlined word “that” in paragraph 4 refers to .
| A．being patient with her |
| B．her parents punishing her |
| C．asking her parents about her |
| D．telling her parents about her behavior |
After reading the passage , we learn that .
| A．the writer had known the daughter was hard to deal with |
| B．the daughter learnt to behave well in the end |
| C．the writer didn’t enjoy the daughter’s stay |
| D．the daughter hated dealing with others |
When Emily Beardmore first heard that a trip was being planned by the biology class at Windsor High School, she thought about how much fun it would be.
“I thought it would be a really good experience to go with other friends and teachers to another country in an environment other than a vacation environment,” the 17-year-old girl said.
A few months later, Emily got her chance when she and 14 of her classmates, along with biology teacher Tamara Pennington went to Costa Rica for eight days in late May.
“It was not just a tour,” said Pennington, who organized the trip. “You can go any place in the world on just a tour. This one was really working with the sea turtles (海龟) and practicing conservation(保护). It just seemed like the perfect science field trip for kids who think they want to get into science to see what it's really like to be out in the field and enjoy themselves.”
Emily said her time on the turtle program, which was the focus of the trip, was “crazy.” “We were walking on the beach at night and you can’t see anything—just see a big black dot.” She said with a laugh. “I was not expecting the turtles to be that big.” The turtles are leatherback turtles, which are becoming extinct (灭绝) because their eggs are used as food.
“When they would move their legs while laying their eggs they were really hard to control because they were a lot more powerful than you would imagine,” Emily said.
Once the eggs were collected, the students took them back to a hatchery(孵化场) and dug holes to copy the hole the mother turtle had made and then buried the eggs for the 60 days needed to hatch.
“The experience was so cool,” Emily said. “You go to another country to see what their culture is like and learn what their everyday lives are like. It made me really want to help out my mom a lot more than I do, and value what I have.”What did Pennington consider the trip to be?
| A．It was a common tour to a foreign country. |
| B．It was a journey to practice what students learned. |
| C．It was to attract students’ interest in science. |
| D．It was a trip to do practical science activities. |
From what Emily said on her turtle program, we know that .
| A．she was afraid of walking on the beach at night |
| B．she didn’t dare to catch the powerful turtles |
| C．she had thought turtles were small animals |
| D．she got crazy at the sight of turtles at night |
What did Emily learn from her experience?
| A．She learned to be grateful to her teachers. |
| B．She understood the importance of what she had. |
| C．She realized the beauty of foreign culture. |
| D．She knew the importance of everyday life |
What would be the best title for the passage?
| A．Teens Help Fight Turtle Extinction. |
| B．Teens Take a tour to Costa Rica. |
| C．Teens Have a Research on Turtles. |
| D．Teens Learn to be Independent. |
I have been using the Internet since I was five years old, when my dad first sat me down in front of a computer and connected me the World Wide Web.
I’ve always felt like a master of the Internet world. AOL Instant Messaging, MSN, Gmail, Facebook, Myspace -- I’ve got it all under control. I thought there was nothing more to it besides checking my e-mail and wasting my time, until I was introduced to electronic commerce(e-commerce): business on the Internet.
Some online businesses are run from one-room home offices. Others have hundreds of employees (雇员) across the world. Have you ever heard of Amazon.com, Yahoo.com?
My friends often said they got cheap textbooks off Amazon.com, or had a good deal (交易) on Steve Madden shoes that were on sale at SteveMaden.com. Unfortunately for me, I continued my “e-commerceless” Web-surfing, not knowing about all the deals I was missing out on.
That is, of course, until my sister finally sold the idea to me.
“Why are all these packages arriving in the mail for you, Katy?” I asked her one day. Strange envelopes (信封) had been put on our doorstep for weeks now, each one always addressed to my sister; and we all know little sisters should never be getting more mail than their elders!
“Oh, it’s the things I ordered online!” she answered. I watched speechlessly as she opened them. There was no way our parents were letting her spend that much money- online or off!
“How much did all of this coat?”
“Oh, only about $15 in all!” She said excitedly. “Everything on eBay is on sale! It’s a way better than going to the mall.”
I felt as if there had been a store right in my backyard that I had never walked into! That week, I ordered a used Spanish textbook for my summer course online for 10 percent of the publishing price. A few days later, I bought an iPod protector and a book or two via the wonderful eBay.com.From the first two paragraph we can conclude that the author
| A．had no experience using computers |
| B．had no idea of what e-commerce is |
| C．only used the Internet to check e-mail |
| D．thought surfing the Internet was a waste of time |
The writer didn’t find out about e-commerce until
| A．he stopped web-surfing |
| B．he visited a store in his backyard |
| C．his sister explained the packages she got by mail |
| D．his friends told him about the online deals they made |
We can infer from the last paragraph that the author .
| A．never enjoyed shopping that much |
| B．loves the big store in her backyard |
| C．feels she is a true master of the Internet |
| D．has begun to enjoy online shopping |
What’s the purpose of the article?
| A．To tell the readers how he begins online shopping. |
| B．To do business on the Internet. |
| C．To make an online shopping ad. |
| D．To advise people not to do online shopping |
John H. Johnson was born in a black family in Arkansas City in 1918. His father died in an accident when John was six. He was reaching the high school age, but his hometown offered no high school for blacks.
Luckily he had a strong-willed caring mother. John remembered that his mother told him many times, “Son，you can be anything you want really to be if you just believe.” She told him not to depend on others，including his mother. “You have to earn success,” she said. “All the people who work hard don’t succeed, but the only people who do succeed are those who work hard.”
These words came from a woman with less than a third grade education. She also knew that believing and hard work don’t mean everything. So she worked hard as a cook for two years to save enough to take her son, who was then 15，to Chicago.
Chicago in 1933 was not the promised land that black southerners were looking for. John’s mother and stepfather could not find work. But here John could go to school, and here he learned the power of words — as an editor of the newspaper and yearbook at Du Sable High School. His wish was to publish a magazine for blacks.
While others discouraged (使气馁) him, John’s mother offered him more words to live by: “Nothing beats a failure but a try.” She also let him pawn（典当）her furniture to get the ＄500 he needed to start the Negro magazine.
It is natural that difficulties and failures followed John closely until he became very successful. He always keeps his mother’s words in mind: “Son, failure is not in your vocabulary!”
Now John H. Johnson is one of the 400 richest people in America — worth $150 million. John’s father died in ________.
| A．1922 | B．1933 | C．1924 | D．1923 |
John’s mother decided to move to Chicago because _______.
| A．his father died when John was very young |
| B．life was too hard for them to stay on in their hometown |
| C．there were no schools for black people in their hometown |
| D．John needed more education badly |
John’s mother ________．
| A．didn’t believe in or depend on others |
| B．thought no one could succeed without working hard |
| C．believed one would succeed without working hard |
| D．thought one could be whatever one wanted to be |
The story mainly tells us ________ .
| A．about the spiritual support John’s mother gave him |
| B．how John H. Johnson became successful |
| C．about the importance of a good education |
| D．about the key to success for blacks |
America is a mobile society. Friendships between Americans can be close and real, yet disappear soon if situations change. Neither side feels hurt by this. Both may exchange Christmas greetings for a year or two, perhaps a few letters for a while — then no more. If the same two people meet again by chance, even years later, they pick up the friendship. This can be quite difficult for us Chinese to understand, because friendships between us flower more slowly but then may become lifelong feelings, extending (延伸) sometimes deeply into both families.
Americans are ready to receive us foreigners at their homes, share their holidays, and their home life. They will enjoy welcoming us and be pleased if we accept their hospitality (好客) easily.
Another difficult point for us Chinese to understand Americans is that although they include us warmly in their personal everyday lives, they don’t show their politeness (礼貌) to us if it requires a great deal of time. This is usually the opposite (相反) of the practice in our country where we may be generous with our time. Sometimes, we, as hosts, will appear at airports even in the middle of the night to meet a friend. We may take days off to act as guides to our foreign friends. The Americans, however, express their welcome usually at homes, but truly can not manage the time to do a great deal with a visitor outside their daily activities. They will probably expect us to get ourselves from the airport to our own hotel by bus. And they expect that we will phone them from there. Once we arrive at their homes, the welcome will be full, warm and real. We will find ourselves treated hospitably.
For the Americans, it is often considered more friendly to invite a friend to their homes than to go to restaurants, except for purely business matters. So accept their hospitality at home!Which of the following statements is TRUE according to the passage?
| A．Friendships between Americans usually extend deeply into their families. |
| B．Americans will continue their friendships again even after a long break. |
| C．Americans always show their warmth even if they are very busy. |
| D．Friendships between Americans usually last for all their lives. |
From the last two paragraphs we can learn that when we arrive in America to visit an American friend, we will probably be ______.
| A．treated hospitably at his home |
| B．offered a ride to his home |
| C．warmly welcomed at the airport |
| D．treated to dinner in a restaurant |
The underlined words “generous with our time” in Paragraph 3 probably mean ______.
| A．strict with time | B．serious with time |
| C．willing to spend time | D．careful with time |
A suitable title for this passage would probably be “______”.
| A．Friendships between Chinese |
| B．Friendships between Americans |
| C．Americans’ hospitality |
| D．Americans’ and Chinese’s opinions of friendships |
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