The bar-tailed godwit (斑尾鷸)has just broken its own record for the world’s longest non-stop flight, including humans in planes, according to a report made by Lund University Press. The bird can fly non-stop for eight days, while the most impressive man-made airplane can only remain in the sky for 82 hours without a stop.

  The bar-tailed godwit’s journey, from Alaska to New Zealand, covers over 6,835 miles. It completes this trip twice a year, in autumn going to New Zealand, and in spring back to Alaska. The tireless bird ends the trip without stopping once for food or rest. All other birds can only finish trips that are twice as short as what the bar-tailed godwit travels.

  One reason for the bar-tailed godwit’s success is that it has made the best use of its fuel, which is only 0.41 percent of its body weight over each hour of any given long flight. Hedenstrom, a professor from Lund University, says, “This figure is extremely low compared with other birds.” The bird also has a special body shape that helps it fly easily. It stores body fat and protein to manage its trips. It also travels fast, compared to other birds and animals.

  Many questions remain about this bird record holder that never gets lost in the air. Researchers wonder whether it has an inside compass (指南针) that helps it to know the direction. Please watch how beautiful bar-tailed godwits look as they come in for a landing, along with other birds.

For the flight from Alaska to New Zealand, the bar-tailed godwit__________

A. doesn’t need to stop to eat        

B. is afraid of hot weather

C. seems very tired at last   

D. should fly less than 7,000 meters

The main reason why the bar-tailed godwit can break the record is that it ______.

A. eats little food every hour

B. has a special body shape  

C. stores much water in its body    

D. has very light body weight

The last paragraph tells us that _________.

A. researchers have understood the bird very well

B. the bird has a very good sense of direction

C. there are still many who doubt the bird’s ability

D. the bird has an inner compass

(2011·山东卷)C

  Diana Jacobs thought her family had a workable plan to pay for college for her 21-year-old twin sons: a combination of savings, income, scholarships, and a modest amount of borrowing. Then her husband lost his job, and the plan fell apart.

  “I have two kids in college, and I want to say ‘come home,’ but at the same time I want to provide them with a good education,” says Jacobs.

The Jacobs family did work out a solution: They asked and received more aid from the schools, and each son increased his borrowing to the maximum amount through the federal loan (贷款) program. They will each graduate with $20,000 of debt, but at least they will be able to finish school.

    With unemployment rising, financial aid administrators expect to hear more families like the Jacobs. More students are applying for aid, and more families expect to need student loans. College administrators are concerned that they will not have enough aid money to go around.

    At the same time, tuition(学费)continues to rise. A report from the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education found that college tuition and fees increased 439% from 1982 to 2007, while average family income rose just 147%. Student borrowing has more than doubled in the last decade,

    “If we go on this way for another 25years, we won’t have an affordable system of higher education,” says Patrick M. Callan, president of the center. “The middle class families have been financing it through debt. They will send kids to college whatever it takes, even if that means a huge amount of debt.”

    Financial aid administrators have been having a hard time as many companies decide that student loans are not profitable enough and have stopped making them. The good news, however, is that federal loans account for about three quarters of student borrowing, and the government says that money will flow uninterrupted.

67. How did the Jacobs manage to solve their problem?

    A. They asked their kids to come home.

    B. They borrowed $20,000 from the school.

    C. They encouraged their twin sons to do part-time jobs.

    D. They got help from the school and the federal government.

68. Financial aid administrators believe that _______.

    A. more families will face the same problem as the Jacobses

    B. the government will receive more letters of complaint

    C. college tuition fees will double soon

    D. America’s unemployment will fall

69.What can we learn about the middle class families from the text?

A. They blamed the government for the tuition increase.

B. Their income remained steady in the last decade.

C. They will try their best to send kids to college.

D. Their debts will be paid off within 25 years.

70.According to the last paragraph, the government will       .

A. provide most students will scholarships

B. dismiss some financial aid administrators

C. stop the companies from making student loans

D. go on providing financial support for college students

We have all experienced days when everything goes wrong.A day may begin well enough,but suddenly everything seems to get out of control.It seems as if a single unimportant event may cause a number of things to happen.Let us suppose that you are preparing a meal and keeping an eye on the baby at the same time.The telephone rings and this means your troubles are beginning.While you are on the phone,the baby pulls the table-cloth off the table,destroying your half-prepared meal.You hang up hurriedly and attend to your baby.Meanwhile,the meal gets burnt.As if this were not enough to bring you to tears,your husband arrives,unexpectedly bringing three guests to dinner.
Things can go wrong on a number of people on the road. During the rush hour one evening two cars hit each other and both drivers began to argue.The woman driver behind the two cars happened to be a learner.She suddenly got into a panic(恐慌)and stopped her car.This made the driver following her stop suddenly.His wife was sitting beside him holding a large cake.As she was thrown forward,the cake went right through the window and landed on the road.Seeing a cake flying through the air,a truck-driver had to stop his truck all of a sudden.The truck was carrying empty beer bottles and hundreds of them slid off the back of the truck on the road.This led to yet another angry argument.Meanwhile,the traffic piled up behind.It took the police nearly an hour to get the traffic on the move again.In the meanwhile,the truck-driver had to sweep up hundreds of broken bottles.Only two dogs were enjoying themselves from the accident,for they were happily having what was left of the cake.It was just one of those days!
【小题1】In the writer’s opinion         .

A.accidents may happen anytime
B.troubles always come in groups
C.a small matter may cause great trouble
D.anyone may have trouble any day
【小题2】What did the police do after the accident?
A.They helped the driver clean up the road.
B.They helped the drivers to go on with their journey.
C.They tried to stop the people from arguing.
D.They would find out who should be responsible for(有责任的)the accident.
【小题3】When the telephone rings        .
A.you’d better have your baby a little distant from your table before going to answer the phone
B.you’d better just let it ring all the way
C.you should never go to answer it in a hurry
D.you should answer it right away
【小题4】From the story we can see_________.
A.some drivers are too careless
B.such accidents are rather strange
C.such accidents are very common
D.we don’t know why such accidents happen

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Now let us look at how we read. When we read a printed text, our eyes move across a page in short, jerky (急动的)movement. We recognize words usually when our eyes are still when they fixate. Each time they fixate, we see a group of words. This is known as the recognition span(范围)or the visual span. The length of time of which the eyes stop ---the duration of the fixation (定位)----varies considerably from person to person. It also varies within any one person according to his purpose in reading and his familiarity with the text. Furthermore, it can be affected by such factors as lighting and tiredness.

  Unfortunately, in the past, many reading improvement courses have concentrated too much on how our eyes move across the printed page. As a result of this misleading emphasis on the purely visual aspects of reading, numerous exercises have been devised to train the eyes to see more words at one fixation. For instance, in some exercises, words are flashed on to a screen for, say, a tenth or a twentieth of a second. One of the exercises has required students to fix their eyes on some central point, taking in the words on either side. Such word patterns are often constructed in the shape of rather steep pyramids so the reader takes in more and more words at each successive (连续的) fixation. All these exercises are very clever, but it’s one thing to improve a person’s ability to see words and quite another thing to improve his ability to read a text efficiently. Reading requires the ability to understand the relationship between words. Consequently (因此), for these reasons, many experts have now begun to question the usefulness of eye training, especially since any approach which trains a person to read isolated (孤立的) words and phrases would seem unlikely to help him in reading a continuous text.

1.The time of the recognition span can be affected by the following facts except ________ .

A.one’s familiarity with the text

B.one’s purpose in reading

C.the length of a group of words

D.lighting and tiredness

2.The author may believe that reading ______.

A.requires a reader to take in more words at each fixation

B.requires a reader to see words more quickly

C.demands an deeply-participating mind

D.demands more mind than eyes

3.What does the author mean by saying “but it’s one thing to improve a person’s ability to see words and quite another thing to improve his ability to read a text efficiently.” in the second paragraph?

A.The ability to see words is not needed when an efficient reading is conducted.

B.The reading exercises mentioned can’t help to improve both the ability to see and to comprehend words.

C.The reading exercises mentioned can’t help to improve an efficient reading.

D.The reading exercises mentioned has done a great job to improve one’s ability to see words.

4.Which of the following is NOT true?

A.The visual span is a word or a group of words we see each time.

B.Many experts began to question the efficiency of eye training.

C.The emphasis on the purely visual aspects is misleading.

D.The eye training will help readers in reading a continuous text.

5.The tune of the author in writing this article is ________

A.critical (批评的)

B.neutral (中立的)

C. pessimistic (悲观的 )

D.optimistic

 

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