If you see a group of people dancing and singing on the street or in the railway station, you don't need to feel surprised. They are a flash mob(暴民). Who are they? Are they mobs? Don't be confused by their name. Actually, a flash mob is a group of people who gather suddenly in a public place, do something unusual for a brief period of time, and then quickly disappear.
They are usually organized with the help of the Internet or other digital communications networks. The messages may be sent to friends, who send to more people. At a predetermined time, they gather and perform some activities such as exchanging books, coming together to look at the sky, waving their hands and yelling something at the top of their voice for 30 seconds. Then, they quickly disappear before the police can arrive. Using mobile phones, the flash mob can change its place if the first one has been cancelled for any reason.
Bill Wasik, senior editor of Harper's Magazine, organized the first flash mob in Manhattan in May 2003 and the first successful flash mob gathered on June 3, 2003. Wasik claimed that he created the flash mob as a social experiment designed to laugh at fashion seekers and stress the cultural atmosphere of wanting to be an insider or part of “the next big thing”.
Flash mob gatherings can sometimes shock people. Such an activity might seem amusing and magical, but it also might frighten people who are not aware of what is taking place. Undoubtedly, flash mob can serve as good political tools and have great potential, such as using flash mob to advertise a product.
The flash mob is now becoming more and more popular. People use it to do many things. For example, in 2009, Michael Jackson’s fans took part in a flash mob to remember him. Hundreds of his fans gathered singing and dancing Michael’s famous song “Beat It” together. Flash mobs give people from all walks of life an opportunity to come together to create a memory.What is NOT the feature of the flash mob?
| A．It can get together quickly. |
| B．It can change its place freely. |
| C．It can do activities suddenly. |
| D．It can injure people seriously. |
How do flash mobs inform one another?
①By using the Internet.
②By writing letters.
③By yelling.
④By waving hands.
⑤By using mobile phones.
⑥By holding a meeting.
| A．③④ | B．①⑤ | C．②⑥ | D．⑤⑥ |
Why did Bill Wasik create the flash mob?
| A．To advertise some products. | B．To help people make friends. |
| C．To laugh at fashion seekers. | D．To create some memories. |
What can we learn about the flash mob from the passage?
| A．Bill Wasik organized the first successful flash mob in May, 2003. |
| B．People are encouraged to take a more active part in an activity. |
| C．Flash mobs tend to do something illegal for a short time. |
| D．Flash mob gathering can frighten all the people present. |
I had made up my mind a long time ago that I would not give a homeless person money, because I could never be sure what that money would be used for. Instead, I decided, I would buy them a sandwich, a cold drink on a hot day, a cup of coffee, whatever I could manage.
I was out recently and saw a homeless man outside of a Starbucks. I decided I would buy this man lunch. I bought a sandwich and soda.
Just as I was leaving the store, two policemen were approaching the man. Obviously the shop owners had complained of his wandering and the police were there to draw him away from the storefronts. Just as they were about to wake him, I asked one of the officers if it was all right if I just gave the man something before he went. I was not sure why I asked the permission but the policeman said sure and I just left the bag in the man’s cart, got in my car and drove off.
As I was driving off I remember thinking “I hope people saw that”. Then I had to seriously ask myself why I hoped people had seen me give the man a sandwich from Starbucks. Was it because I wanted people to think, “She’s such a nice person!”? Why did I hope others had seen me do it? I continued to wonder this all evening.
The next morning, it came to me that I wanted people to have witnessed that small act of kindness not so that I would receive credit and praise but so that they might be inspired to do the same and in so doing that others still would witness their acts of kindness. Thus the whole spirit of pity and giving would be lasting.The underlined word “Starbucks” in the second paragraph is the name of a _________.
| A．shop | B．bookstore | C．bank | D．man |
When the author saw the homeless man, he was __________.
| A．begging outside | B．buying goods |
| C．staying awake | D．falling asleep |
What’s the purpose of the passage?
| A．To show the author is great. |
| B．To encourage people to help others. |
| C．To introduce an experience that changed the author. |
| D．To call on people not to give money to a homeless man. |
The author can be best described as __________.
| A．bad-tempered | B．hard-working |
| C．kind-hearted | D．self-confident |
Extract 1（摘录一）
A computer
A computer is an "information processor". It is given information, called "data", instructed to do certain things and then show us the results. The data put into the computer is called the" input" and the results which come out are the "output". Some people say the circle of large standing stones at Stonehenge is a kind of computer. Prehistory people worked out their calendar from the position of the shadows made by the sun shining on the stones.
Extract 2
Teach yourself new subjects and skills at your own pace with a home computer. Use it to help with schoolwork, for self-improvement, even to improve your career skills. Learn touchtyping.
Foreign languages or computer programming. A home computer can help children of all ages learn classroom subjects such as spelling, geography and others. In fact it makes learning fun. So if you want to teach yourself, or help your children teach themselves---get a home computer. It can also help you manage your personal finances(经济）or help you to work taxes and plan household budgets(预算）.You can make business a pleasure with a home computer.The writer introduces the words such as "input" and "output" in order to_____.
| A．introduce people to computer language |
| B．show computer language is the same as English |
| C．help people some scientific language |
| D．give people some scientific language |
Why does the writer talk about Stonehenge in Extract 1?
| A．To give an example of the very first computer. |
| B．To show that computers are older than mankind. |
| C．To tell the difference between the past and the present. |
| D．To give another way of explaining computers. |
If you think of the circle of large standing stones as a computer,_____.
| A．the shadow is the input and the position is the output |
| B．the sunlight is the input and the calendar is the output |
| C．the position is the input and the sunlight is the output |
| D．the calendar is the input and the shadow is the output |
Extract 2 is probably taken from_____.
| A．a computer textbook | B．a company's advertisement |
| C．a teach-yourself computer book | D．a children's guide to computers |
A rat looked through a crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife opening a package. What food might it contain? But he discovered that it was a rattrap (捕鼠夹）.
Going back to the farmyard, the rat started to give a warning.
The rat turned to the pig and told him：“There is a rattrap in the house, a rattrap in the house!”
‘Tm sorry，Mr. Rat，” said the pig，“I can only say this is something terrible to you, but it is of no influence to me. I cannot be bothered with it.”
The rat turned to the cow. But the cow said，“Like wow，Mr. Rat? A rattrap? I am in danger, Huh?”
The rat returned to the house, head down and dejected. So the rat had to face the farmer's rattrap alone.
That very night, a sound was heard throughout the house，like the sound of a rattrap catching its prey (猎物）The farmer's wife rushed to see what was caught. In the darkness，she did not notice that it was a poisonous snake whose tail had been caught by the trap. The snake bit her.
The farmer rushed her to hospital. She returned home with a fever. Everyone knows that a fever could be treated with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his knife to the farmyard for the soup. However, his wife's sickness continued.
The farmer's friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. To feed them, the farmer killed the pig. But she didn't get well. Finally, she diedand so many people came for the last sight that the farmer had the cow killed to provide meat for all of them.
So the next time you hear that someone is facing a problem and think that it does not concern you, remember that the whole farmyard is at risk when there is a rattrap in the house.From the passage we know that______.
| A．the pig helped the rat get rid of the trap |
| B．the cow strongly believed in what the rat said |
| C．no animals showed concern over the rat's warning |
| D．the snake was killed immediately after being caught |
The underlined word ‘‘dejected” is the closest in meaning to______.
| A．disappointed | B．surprised | C．determined | D．excited |
We can learn from the article that_____.
| A．the farmer had planned to kill the rat |
| B．the rat was very wise in avoiding the trap |
| C．the farmer's wife got good treatment in hospital |
| D．the rat had expected what would happen to the pig and cow |
What message does the story intend to pass?
| A．We should mind our own business. |
| B．Everything is related to something else. |
| C．We'd better treat animals in a friendly way. |
| D．The farmer couple and their friends are all foolish. |
My son Jack, a fourth grader, was having a hard time in getting interested in story books recently, so I offered to read the first few chapters to him. In the early pages of ‘Incident at Halk Hill’, a quiet little boy has a special meeting with a female badger (獾).Soon after, another badger is caught in a steel leg trap(陷阱), and the author describes in detail the pain and scare of an animal struggling to its death. We meet the cruel hunter and his ill treatment of a dog; we see the badger being skinned by the boy's father；and we experience the child's confusion when beaten by his father in anger. Pretty heavy going for ten-year-olds, I thought.
Last night , I returned from a weekend away to find that Jack had finished the whole book on his own. “It was really, really good and sad, and violent，” he reported. “There was a lot of killing.”
“Were there any happy parts?" I asked,
"The boy's life was saved by the badger, and that was good. But then that badger got caught in a trap again and at the end it's dying, too. ” Jack said, "It was so sad that I almost cried. ”
I told him that many books have made me cry, beginning with Heidi, when I was just his age, right on up to the novel I finished last week.
“Well，” he admitted then, “I actually did cry. Reading that book just reminded me of all the sadness in the world, and it made me feel sad ,too. ”
So, I think, now he has been through the sad tone of the passage , the discovery that words on a printed page can give rise to such strong emotion ，that a book can move you right out of your own comfortable little self and into someone else's pain. Thus we come to realize that if we are to remain fully engaged in life, open to its mysteries and feel sorry towards its suffering, we indeed need stories to grab（抓住） us by the neck and remind us of the sadness in the world that is not our own.‘Incident at Halk Hill’ is a _______story.
| A．sad | B．happy | C．funny | D．boring |
The underlined sentence “Pretty heavy going for ten-year-olds" means____
| A．the book is too long for a ten year old child |
| B．the book is too difficult for a ten year old child |
| C．the book is too violent(暴力) for a ten year old child |
| D．the book is too pretty for a ten year old child |
According to the passage , stories can be something to help you_____
| A．enjoy your spare time | B．develop your care for animals |
| C．realize the truth of life | D．think about your own life |
By writing the passage, the writer mainly wants to____.
| A．tell a story that interested his son |
| B．show the importance of reading stories |
| C．share an experience between himself and his son |
| D．show how to make children interested in books |
On July 4，1986，Americans celebrated the Statue of Liberty’s（自由女神） 100th birthday．Parades，speeches，fireworks，and other activities contributed to the great joy of the event．The celebration caused reporters and the 1ocal people to 1ook back a century to the similar great joy that marked the official opening of the statue．The Statue of Liberty was completed in 1886，but the story began earlier．The idea for a statue was first suggested at a dinner party by Edouard de Laboulaye， a French historian ．A guest at the party was Frederic Bartholdi，a young sculptor．
Most people who attended the dinner party soon forgot the idea，but Laboulaye and Bartholdi remembered it．In 187l， Bartholdi came to the United States to interest Americans in a statue that would link France and the United States in friendship．Many people in France had already been persuaded and contributed money to the project．Americans were also persuaded to build a fund （基金）for the statue．Much of the money came from school children．
After the idea had been accepted，Bartholdi set to work． He worked hard for many years．His friend Laboulaye died before the statue was completed．At last，in 1885，the statue was sent to the United States．It had to be shipped in sections and then put together for its weight and size．
Ever since then， 1886，the Statue of Liberty has stood as a symbol of freedom to millions of immigrants entering New York Harbor．Bartholdi made his first trip to the United States to talk about the Statue of Liberty in________．
| A．1986 | B．187l | C．1885 | D．1886 |
The Statue of Liberty was shipped in sections because_______．
| A．it was too 1arge and heavy to move to USA as a whole |
| B．USA had better means of putting it together than France |
| C．the completed statue was a symbol of friendship for Americans |
| D．putting it together cost less money and labour in USA |
From the content，we may feel that the writer is _______when he is writing the passage．
| A．calm | B．curious | C．worried | D．Modest(谦虚) |
Which of the following titles best summarizes(归纳) the content of the passage？
| A．Labou1aye and Bartholdi：Makers of the Statue of the Liberty |
| B．How People Made the Statue of Liberty Possible |
| C．The l00th Birthday of the Statue of Liberty |
| D．The True Story of the Statue of Liberty |
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