Which tablet computer should YOU be buying: They are this year's must have... and there's a style to suit everyone？
| Best for young children LeapPad Explorer 2, ￡68 Aimed at children between three and nine (though a nine-year-old might find it a little simple), it comes in pink or blue and with five built-in education games (you can buy more). Besides, the LeapPad does not allow access to the internet — so it is impossible for your child to meet with anything inappropriate. Pros: The education games are well-designed, the built-in video camera is a fun way to play at being a film director. Cons: Some of the games are shockingly expensive. And the power adaptor is not included. |
Best for teenagers iPad 4th generation, ￡399-￡659 The iPad is still the market leader, and for good reason. If the teenager in your house enjoys playing computer games, the latest offering from Apple is the one to choose. Pros: No other tablet can compete with the near one million ‘apps’ (the name Apple created for specially-designed downloadable programs) available for the iPad. Simple to use, even for those who usually struggle with technology. Cons: Considerably more expensive than most competitors. |
| Best for working parents Microsoft Surface, ￡399-￡559 Tablets are brilliant for leisure — but what if you want to do a bit of work? No tablet can yet compete with a full-size laptop computer, but this is the only tablet that allows you to use Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint (they are all pre-installed and included in the price) and you can buy a pretty lovely mini- keyboard for typing letters and emails, which also doubles up as the cover. Pros: The Surface is good for watching movies — a bonus when stuck in the airport on a business trip — and surfing the internet. Con: The keyboard is an expensive add-on — costing up to ￡109. It might be cheaper to buy a laptop (though a tablet is much smaller and lighter). |
Best for bookworms Amazon Kindle Paperwhite, ￡109 Nearly all tablets let you download books. It's a great way to take a mountainous pile of hardbacks on holiday without stuffing your suitcase. But most tablets have a shiny screen — which can be very distracting (分心) when you're trying to read. The Paperwhite is different: its matt screen and crisp black lettering imitate the look of words on paper brilliantly. And yet you can still read the words in the dark. Pros: Easy on the eye, excellent battery life, 180,000 free books (if you subscribe to the Amazon Prime customer loyalty service) plus hundreds of thousands more to buy. Cons: No TV, films, games, internet or camera. |
60.With iPad 4th generation, you can ____.
| A．become a film director and have fun |
| B．download more “apps” than any other tablet |
| C．compete with a full-size laptop computer |
| D．read the words clearly in the dark |
Which of the following about LeapPad Explorer 2 is TRUE?
| A．It is designed only for children in the kindergarten. |
| B．The power adaptor I not free of charge. |
| C．You have to pay extra to install Microsoft Word. |
| D．You can surf the internet to find anything interesting. |
You enjoy reading and want to protect your eyesight. You would like to buy_____.
| A．Amazon Kindle Paperwhite |
| B．iPad 4th generation |
| C．Microsoft Surface |
| D．LeapPad Explorer 2 |
If you want to ____, the tablet Microsoft Surface is your best choice.
| A．choose a tablet for your young child |
| B．operate a tablet without any difficulty |
| C．concentrate on what you read without distraction |
| D．add something to your prepared PPT for a presentation |
Most students hate their endless homework. The students from Class 2, Senior 2 of the High School Affiliated to Peking University certainly did before they published their own collection of English novels at home.
Their small book contains stories about a holy (神圣的) war, the happy life of a self-taught artist and the story of a laid-off worker who devoted his last breath to playing his beloved accordion (手风琴). The book becomes an instant hit on campus. About 3,000 copies have been sold and the class is already working on the second volume.
"We’re up to our ears in homework. Exercises and exams make us out of breath. But to do something creative and full of imagination is such a great achievement," said Yu Xiaoxiao, 16.
"I took the writing as an ordinary homework at the beginning, but after I finished the first part of my story, I could not help but let it flow," said Wang An, who wrote "Accordion".
Inspired by "Lord of the Rings", Jiang Lu wrote his story about magic wars between angels from the light and the dark side. "The main message of the story was to look at the balance of the world. Both dark and light angels fight with love as their weapons. I want to tell people that selfish love might bring hate," Jiang said.
"I was shocked by their work and felt so proud to be the editor of my students’ book," said Nathaniel Timmermann, the oral English teacher at the school. Liu Xiuqin, an English teacher, started the project by asking students to write whatever was in their mind every week. "They have performed beyond expectation," Liu said. "They wrote interesting stories and their English has improved after they started to express their real minds."
"We never imagined that our homework would be so popular and profitable (盈利的). We sell the novels at five yuan, but many teachers pay more to encourage us," said Yuan Mengyao. After Wang An finished the first part of his story, he _________.
| A．couldn’t go on | B．had to put it aside |
| C．just wanted to express it freely | D．lost it |
What was not the outcome of the students’ homework of writing whatever was in their mind?
| A．Being popular. | B．Being profitable. |
| C．Improving their English. | D．Winning prize. |
What is the reason for the students’ liking to write interesting stories?
| A．It is creative and imaginative. |
| B．It is profitable. |
| C．Interesting stories are sure to be popular. |
| D．Interesting stories can be well sold. |
What is the best title of this passage?
| A．Creative homework leads to a popular book |
| B．Writing interesting stories |
| C．Students’ new book |
| D．A popular book |
Without proper planning，tourism can cause problems．For example，too many tourists can crowd public places that are also enjoyed by the inhabitants of the country．If tourists create too much traffic，the inhabitants become annoyed and unhappy．They begin to dislike tourists and to treat them impolitely．They forget how much tourism can help the country’s economy．It is important to think about the people of a destination (旅行目的地) country and how tourism affects them．Tourism should help a country keep the customs and beauty that attract tourists．Tourism should also advance the wealth and happiness of local inhabitants．
Too much tourism can be a problem．If tourism grows too quickly，people must leave other jobs to work in the tourism industry．This means that other parts of the country’s economy can suffer．
On the other hand，if there is not enough tourism，people can lose jobs．Businesses can also lose money．It costs a great deal of money to build large hotels．Airports，first-class roads，and other support facilities (配套设施) needed by tourist attractions．For example，a major international class tourism hotel can cost as much as 50 thousand dollars per room to build．If this room is not used most of the time，the owners of the hotel will lose money．
Building a hotel is just a beginning．There must be many other support facilities as well，including roads to get to the hotel，electricity，sewers (下水道) to handle waste，and water．All of these support facilities cost money．If they are not used because there are not enough tourists，jobs and money are lost．Which of the following do you think has been discussed in the part before this selection?
| A．It is extremely important to develop tourism． |
| B．Building roads and hotels is important． |
| C．Support facilities are highly necessary． |
| D．Planning is of great importance to tourism． |
The underlined word “inhabitants” (in Paragraph 1) probably means ______．
| A．citizens | B．passengers | C．population | D．tourists |
Too much tourism can cause all these problems EXCEPT _______．
| A．a bad effect on other industries | B．a change of tourists’ customs |
| C．over-crowdedness of places of interest | D．pressure on traffic |
It can be inferred from the text that _______．
| A．the author doesn’t like tourism developing so fast. |
| B．local people will benefit from tourist attraction. |
| C．people will lose jobs because of the development of tourism. |
| D．we shouldn’t build support facilities needed by tourist attractions . |
The author thinks it is good for local people to know that tourism will _____．
| A．waste a lot of money | B．weaken their economy |
| C．help establish (确立) their customs | D．help improve their life |
“Life is speeding up. Everyone is getting unwell.”
This may sound like something someone would say today. But in fact, an unknown citizen who lived in Rome in AD 52 wrote it.
We all love new inventions. They are exciting, amazing and can even change our lives. But have all these developments really improve the quality of our lives?
Picture this: You’re rushing to finish your homework on the computer. Your mobile phone rings, a QQ message from your friend appears on the screen, the noise from the television is getting louder and louder. Suddenly the computer goes blank and you lose all your work. Now you have to stay up all night to get it done. How calm and happy do you feel?
Inventions have speeded up our lives so much that they often leave us feeling stressed and tired. Why do you think people who live far away from noisy cities, who have no telephones, no cars, not even any electricity often seem to be happier? Perhaps because they lead simpler lives.
One family in the UK went “back in time” to see what life was like without all the inventions we have today. The grandparents, with their daughter, and grandsons Benjamin, 10, and Tomas, 7, spent nine weeks in a 1940s house. They had no washing machine, microwave, computer or mobile phones.
The grandmother, Lyn, said, “It was hard physically, but not mentally.” She believed life was less materialistic. “The more things you have, the more difficult life becomes,” She said. The boys said they fought less to fight over, such as their computer. Benjamin also noticed that his grandmother had changed from being a “trendy（时髦的）, beer-drinking granny, to one who cooked things.”
Here are some simple ways to beat the stress often caused by our inventions!
Don’t be available all the time. Turn off your mobile phone at certain times of the day. Don’t check your e-mail every day.
Don’t reply to somebody as soon as they leave a text message just because you can. It may be fun at first, but it soon gets annoying.The passage is mainly about _______.
| A．problem with technology |
| B．improvements of our life with technology |
| C．the important roles technology plays in our everyday life |
| D．major changes which will be likely to happen to technology |
The writer quoted (引用) what a citizen in ancient Rome said at the beginning of the story in order to ______________.
| A．share a truth about life |
| B．tell us what life was like long time ago |
| C．make us wonder what causes such a thing to happen |
| D．point out that you experience some big problems and they may be the same |
Why did the family choose to spend some time in a 1940’s house? Because ______________.
| A．they liked to live simple lives |
| B．they were curious about how people lived without modern inventions |
| C．they were troubled by modern inventions |
| D．living in a different time would be a lot of fun for them |
What do you think the underlined word “available” in the first suggestion offered by the writer mean?
| A．Busy on line | B．Free | C．Be able to | D．Be found by others. |
Some people are lucky enough to be born with a good sense of direction and even if they have only visited a place once, they will be able to find it again years later.
I am one of those unfortunate people who have poor sense of direction and I may have visited a place time after time but I still get lost on my way there. When I was young I was so shy that I never dared ask complete strangers the way and so I used to wander round in circles and hope that by some chance I would get to the spot I was heading for.
I am no longer too shy to ask people for direction, but I often receive replies that puzzle me. Often people do not like to admit that they didn’t know their hometown and will insist on telling you the way, even if they do not know it; others, who are anxious to prove that they know their hometown very well, will give you a long list of directions which you can not possibly hope to remember, and still others do not seem to be able to tell between their left and their right and you find in the end that you are going in the opposite direction to that in which you should be going.
If anyone ever asks me the way to somewhere, I always tell them I am a stranger to the town in order to avoid giving them wrong direction but even this can have embarrassing results.
Once I was on my way to work when I was stopped by a man who asked me if I would direct him the way to the Sunlight Building. I gave my usual reply, but I had not walked on a few steps when I realized that he had asked for directions to my office building. However, at this point, I decide it was too late to turn back and search for him out of the crowd behind me as I was going to meet with someone at the office and I did not want to keep him waiting.
Imagine my embarrassment when my secretary showed in the very man who had asked for directions of my office and his astonishment when he recognized me as the person he had asked.What is the writer going to do when someone asks him for direction?
| A．He will direct the right way to the person willingly. |
| B．He will reply to it by the means of being a stranger to the town. |
| C．He will give the very person long list of direction. |
| D．He is going to show the man an opposite direction. |
Why did the writer consider himself to be an unlucky dog?
| A．Because of his poor sense of direction. |
| B．Because he always forget the way to home. |
| C．Because he did not have any friend. |
| D．Because he used to be shy and dared not ask others the way. |
How did the visitor feel when he was showed into the very room?
| A．He felt strange. | B．He felt embarrassed. |
| C．He felt very sad. | D．He felt astonished. |
Who showed the right way to the interviewee according to the passage?
| A．Someone we don’t know. | B．The writer did it for himself. |
| C．The secretary did so. | D．A warm-hearted old lady did such a thing. |
Almost two-thirds of children want their parents to spend more time reading to them before bed, and most prefer Mum’s storytelling to Dad’s, researchers said.
They conducted a study that showed younger children aged 3-4 were most hungry for more stories, with over three-quarters saying they wished their parents read to them more often.
More than half of all children aged 3-8 said story time was their favourite pastime with their parents.
"The results of our research confirm the traditional activity of storytelling continues to be a powerful learning and emotional resource in children’s lives," said child psychologist Richard Woolfson.
Storytelling ranked higher than television or video games among pastimes for kids, and 82 percent said reading a story with their parents helped them sleep better, according the survey of 500 children aged 3-8 in Britain.
The best storytellers were mothers who used funny voices to illustrate different characters or made their own special sound effects to keep the story moving, researchers said.
When mum and dad are not at hand, celebrities will do: over 30 percent of children said they would like to hear a bedtime story from Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe, with teen idols Zac Efron, Miley Cyrus and Emma Watson.
"It can be very difficult for parents to find the time to read with their children, but these moments can help build strong bonds and play a vital part in their child’s development," said Woolfson.The underlined word “pastime” in the passage mot probably means .
| A．old time | B．entertainment | C．emotion | D．character |
The author develops the passage mainly by .
| A．pointing out similarities and differences | B．following the natural time order |
| C．comparing opinions from different fields | D．providing examples and statistics |
Reading a story with their parents helped most kids aged 3-8 .
| A．grow stronger | B．become more emotional |
| C．sleep better | D．become more powerful |
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