More and more American parents, students, educators, political and business leaders have come to see the importance of Chinese on the world stage. As a result, Americans hoping to learn Chinese are growing in number though they face a lot of difficulties.

Liu Chuansheng, chairperson of the University Council at Beijing Normal University, talked about this situation. “There have been 300 million Chinese learning English, and I know that there are more and more Americans beginning to learn Chinese. I remember when I came to the U. S. there were only 250 schools offering Chinese classes; when I left in 2005, there were already 2,400 schools hoping to offer Chinese classes. Today more than 700 schools are offering Chinese classes, and 4,500 are planning to do so.”

“This is an important time in America. We have suffered from an economic crisis; there is swine flu(猪流感) ---- all part of our lives. We need to be competitive to deal with the world and make an effort to understand each other,” said Shuhan Wang, head of Chinese Language Initiatives at Asia Society. “The number of Chinese language teachers remains the key bottleneck,” she said. “And the need for specialized teachers becomes greater, as there is increasing popularity of early language learning ---- kindergarten through 8th grades.”

Jon M. Huntsman Jr., governor(州长) of Utah, has led his state to the front in teaching Chinese. “While math and science remain main studies,” he said, “language is going to be an important drive in education. Next year 82 schools will offer Chinese to 6,000 students.”

64. It is implied in the passage that the number of Americans learning Chinese is growing mainly because _______.

A. more and more Americans face a lot of difficulties

B. the number of Chinese learning English is growing

C. Chinese is widely used by actors all over the world

D. China is playing a more important role in the world

65. Liu Chuansheng’s talk mainly shows us _______.

A. how Americans are learning Chinese      B. why Americans are learning Chinese

C. that Chinese becomes popular in America  D. that China offers more Chinese classes there

66. The biggest problem with Americans learning Chinese is that _____.

A. the Chinese language is too difficult for them to learn

B. they don’t have enough teachers of Chinese in the USA

C. American children are not good at learning languages

D. teachers won’t work in kindergartens or primary schools

67. The proper title for the passage is _______.

A. Americans show great interest in learning Chinese

B. Americans show less interest in math and science

C. Chinese teachers get new chance to work in America

D. Chinese is widely used in some states of America

 

 

The film “Avatar” has received great popularity around the world. It turned out to be a great success. The film got $1 billion in ticket sales in a very short time. The story in the film happens on an alien planet called Pandora where many strange species live. Among the planet’s inhabitants(居民,栖息动物),the one that has the most similarities with humans is the Na’vi, and it is the struggle between the Ma’vi and human invaders(入侵者) that forms the story of the film.

As to the factors(因素) leading to the film’s success, many think that the entertaining feast(盛宴) for the eyes and the wonderful story shouldn’t be forgotten, but the new language invented especially for the film which provides audiences with a new experience also plays an important part.

In order to increase the truthfulness of an alien race(外星人), the film’s director James Cameron asked an expert in languages from the University of Southern California to invent a language for the Na’vi. Professor Paul Frommer combined the languages spoken among Indians, Africans and mid-Asians and worked with James Caneron for four years to create the Na’vi language based on the original 30 words that the director had already come up with.

According to Professor Frommer, the most important characteristic of the Na’vi language is that it could be pronounced. “This is an alien language but obviously it has to be spoken by human actors and actresses,” Professor Frommer told the BBC, “it has to sound natural and it should make human beings comfortable when using it.”

The language has a vocabulary of around 1000 words but Progessor Formmer hopes to enlarge the vocabulary in possible follow-ups to the film and in video games. The professor hopes that one day his creation will be as successful as the Klingon alien language from the “Star Trek”films. “There’s a translation of Hamlet into Klingon and it has received great popularity among the audiences,” says Professor Frommer,“if anything like this happens to the Na’vi language, I’d be very happy.”

1. What do we know about“Avatar” from this passage?

A. The story in it is a moving love story.    

 B. It brings the producer $1 billion in total.

C. The story in it happens on an alien planet.

 D. It talks about humans and aliens’ friendship.

2. The director of “Avatar” James Cameron had a language invented for the Na’vi to     

A. make the film a whole mystery          B. make the Na’vi more believable

C. make the Na’vi different from humans    D. make the film have specific characteristics

3. Who first created the basic words of the Na’vi language?

A. Paul Frommer.        B. An Indian.    C. James Cameron     D. Hamlet.

4. The important feature of the Na’vi language is that      

A. it can be spoken by humans         B. it has just 30 original words

C. it has a vocabulary of 1000 words.    D. it is like the Klingon alien language

5. We can infer from the passage that       

A. James Cameron will produce follow-ups to “Avatar”

B. the Na’vi language is another kind of the Klingon language

C. the director believes the Na’vi language will be popular

D. Paul Frommer hopes to add new words to the Na’vi language

 

People who are outdoors in cold weather should avoid actions like suddenly lifting a heavy basket full of snow. Even walking through heavy, wet snow can strain a person’s heart.

Many people aren’t conditioned to the physical stress of outdoor activities and don’t know the dangers of being outdoors in cold weather. Those who like winter sports can suffer accidental hypothermia if they don’t make certain preparations.

Hypothermia means the body temperature has fallen below normal. It occurs when your body can’t produce enough energy to keep the internal (内部的) body temperature warm enough. It can kill you. Heart failure causes most deaths in hypothermia.

Children, the elderly and those with heart disease are at special risk. As people age, their ability to keep a normal internal body temperature often decreases. Elderly people can suffer hypothermia without knowing they’re in danger because they can’t notice the cold conditions as quickly as the young.

Besides cold temperatures, high winds, snow and rain can also steal body heat. Wind is especially dangerous because it removes the layer of heated air from around your body. At 30 degrees Fahrenheit in a 20-mile-per-hour wind, the cooling effect is equal to calm air at four degrees. Similarly dampness (湿气) causes the body to lose heat faster than it would at the same temperature in drier conditions.

To keep warm, wear more clothes. This traps air between layers. Also, wear a hat or head scarf. Much of your body’s heat can be lost through your head. Keep your hands and feet warm, too, as they tend to lose heat rapidly.

Don’t drink alcohol before going outdoors or when outside. Alcohol makes you feel warm at first because blood vessels in the skin expand. But heat is then drawn away from the body’s important organs.

1. The underlined word “strain” in Paragraph 1 means ________.

A. injure     B. warm      C. control    D. burn

2. What is implied in the passage about hypothermia?

A.

It means the body temperature falls rapidly.

B.

Most heart attacks are caused by it.

C.

It is not as scary as people think.

D.

It can threaten a person’s life.

3. Based on the passage, one of the reasons why the elderly are at special risk of suffering from hypothermia is that _______.

A.

they like exercising outside in cold mornings

B.

they can’t notice cold conditions if they are not told

C.

their body temperature is generally lower than young people’s

D.

their ability to keep a normal internal body temperature is not so good

4.What is Paragraph 5 mainly about?

A.

What causes the body to lose heat faster.

B.

The advantages of drier conditions.

C.

What else can steal body heat.

D.

Dangers of high winds.

5. Which of the following is NOT a result of drinking alcohol before going outdoors?

A.

Feeling warm at first

B.

The body’s heat is taken away

C.

Blood vessels in the skin expand

D.

The risk of hypothermia is reduced

 

 

  B

People tend to become more personal and hide less of themselves when using email. Researchers from Open University in Britain have found in a recent study that there are good reasons for this.

The team of researchers asked 83 pairs of students, all strangers to each other, to solve a problem. They had to discuss this question: If only five people in the world could be saved from a world disaster, who should they be? The pairs of students had to talk over the problem either face to face or by computers. Dr. Johnson said, “They told their partners four times as much about themselves when they talked over the Internet as when they talked face to face. When the computers were fitted with cameras so that students could see each other, this limited the personal side of the conversation.”

Generally the information was not extremely personal. It was mainly about things such as where they went to school, or where they used to live. But some students discussed their love stories, and personal childhood experiences.

Dr Johnson believes that emailing encourages people to focus on themselves. And when they do this, they become more open, especially if there are no cameras. “If you cannot see the other person, it becomes easier to talk about yourself. This is because you are not thinking what the other person is thinking of you. So emailing has become the modern way of talking,” said Dr. Johnson. However, this style of talking is not entirely new. “In the 19th century people started to use the ‘telegraph’ to communicate. Now the same kind of thing has happened and people ended up speaking more freely.”

Dr. Johnson thinks that emailers need to know about these effects of emailing, especially when they start work in a company. “ If you don’t know about it, you could find yourself saying more about yourself than you wanted to.”

60. The subject discussed in this passage is _______.

A. how people open up when emailing               B. how people do research studies

C. how to communicate at work                         D. how to discuss and solve a problem

61. The reason that some couples talked freely about themselves is that _______.

A. they didn’t talk about very personal things       B. they couldn’t see each other

C. the cameras on the computers were turned on   D. they had to discuss a question

62. What does the underlined sentence refer to?

A. The telegraph.          B. The computer.          C. Emailing.          D. Face-to-face talk.

63. In the writer’s opinion, one should ______.

A. focus on oneself when emailing                            B. talk more freely in emails than usual

C. discuss any subject that one wants to                     D. consider how one uses email at work

 

I’ve been writing for most of my life. The book Writing Without Teachers introduced me to one distinction(区别)and one practice that has helped my writing processes tremendously. The distinction is between the creative mind and the critical mind. While you need to employ both to get to a finished result, they cannot work in parallel no matter how much we might like to think so.

Trying to criticize writing on the fly is possibly the single greatest barrier to writing that most of us encounter. If you are listening to that 5th grade English teacher correct your grammar while you are trying to capture a fleeting (稍纵即逝的) thought, the thought will die. If you capture the fleeting thought and simply share it with the world in raw form, no one is likely to understand. You must learn to create first and then criticize if you want to make writing the tool for thinking that it is.

The practice that can help you past your learned bad habits of trying to edit as you write is what Elbow calls “free writing.” In free writing, the objective is to get words down on paper non-stop, usually for 15-20 minutes. No stopping, no going back, no criticizing. The goal is to get the words flowing. As the words begin to flow, the ideas will come from the shadows and let themselves be captured on your notepad or your screen.

Now you have raw materials that you can begin to work with using the critical mind that you’ve persuaded to sit on the side and watch quietly. Most likely, you will believe that this will take more time than you actually have and you will end up staring blankly at the pages as the deadline draws near.

Instead of staring at a blank start filling it with words no matter how bad. Halfway through your available time, stop and rework your raw writing into something closer to finished product. Move back and forth until you run out of time and the final result will most likely be far better than your current practices.

1.When the author says the creative mind and the critical mind “cannot work in parallel” in the writing process, he means                .

A. one cannot use them at the same time             B. they cannot be regarded as equally important

C. they are in constant conflict with each other        D. no one can be both creative and critical

2.What prevents people from writing on is                .

A. putting their ideas in raw form                  B. ignoring grammatical soundness

C. attempting to edit as they write                     D. trying to capture fleeting thoughts

3.What is the chief objective of the first stage of writing?

A. To organize one’s thoughts logically.            B. To get one’s ideas down.

C. To choose an appropriate topic.                  D. To collect raw materials.

4.One common concern of writers about “free writing” is that                .

A. it overstresses the role of the creative mind        B. it does not help them to think clearly

C. it may bring about too much criticism                D. it takes too much time to edit afterwards

5.In what way does the critical mind help the writer in the writing process?

A. It allows him to sit on the side and observe.        B. It helps him to come up with new ideas.

C. It saves the writing time available to him.          D. It improves his writing into better shape.

 

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