Good readers know that reading isn’t just about knowing words — it’s a way of thinking. Smart readers think before, during and after reading. Here are some tips that may be of some help.

Think before you read. Before you read the text, ask yourself the questions why you are reading it and what you want to get from it. Answering the questions will help you choose what words you need to know and what words you can skip or scan.

Think while you are reading. Can you get the meaning of the text without looking up new words in a dictionary? Are there any clues in the text? A text will often give examples that may help you understand what some of the words mean. Let’s take the following sentence for example: Many large Russian cities, such as Chelyabinsk and Irkutsk, have taken steps to protect their culture. The words “Chelyabinsk” and “Irkutsk” may be new to us, but the sentence tells us that they are examples of ______.

Think after you read. Do you understand the text? What is the main idea of the text? Can you guess the meaning of the new words? Which words do you need to look up? Is the text too easy or too hard for you?

If you practice reading and thinking in this way you will become a smarter reader and you will learn faster and better.

1.This passage is probably taken from _______.

A. a newspaper for general readers

B. a magazine for language teachers

C. a book for language learners

D. an advertisement for a new book

2.Which of the following can best be put in the blank in the passage?

A. countries B. mountains

C. rivers D. cities

3.The author of the passage advises us to do all the following EXCEPT_______.

A. we should think before, while and after we read a passage

B. we’d better look up every new word in a dictionary

C. we should learn to guess the meanings of new words

D. the clues in a passage should be made use of

Watching some children trying to catch butterflies one hot August afternoon, I was reminded of an incident in my own childhood. When I was a boy of 12, something happened to me that cured me forever of wanting to put any wild creature in a cage.

We lived on the edge of a wood, and every evening at dusk the mockingbirds would come and rest in the trees and sing. It’s the most beautiful sound in the world.

I decided that I would catch a young bird and keep it in a cage and in that way would have my own private musician.

I finally succeeded in catching one and put it in a cage. I felt very pleased with myself and looked forward to some beautiful singing from my tiny musician.

I had left the cage out on our back porch, and on the second day, my new pet’s mother

flew to the cage with food in her mouth. The baby bird ate everything she brought to it. I was pleased to see this. Certainly the mother knew better than I how to feed her baby.

The following morning when I went to see how my pet bird was doing, I discovered it on the floor of the cage, dead. I was shocked! What had happened! I had taken excellent care of my little bird, or so I thought.

Arthur Wayne, the famous ornithologist, happened to be visiting my father at the time, hearing me crying over the death of my bird, explained what had occurred. “A mother mockingbird, finding her young in a cage, will sometimes bring it poison berries(浆果). She thinks it better for her young to die than to live in captivity.”

Never since then have I caught any living creature and put it in a cage. All living creatures have a right to live free.

1.Why did the writer catch a mockingbird when he was a boy of 12?

A. He had just got a new cage.

B. He liked its beautiful feather.

C. He wanted a pet for a companion.

D. He wanted it to sing for him.

2.The mockingbird died because it ______.

A. ate the poisonous food its mother gave it

B. was frightened to death

C. refused to eat anything

D. drank the poisonous water by mistake

3.An ornithologist probably means ______.

A. a religious person B. a kind person

C. an expert in birds D. a headmaster

4.What is the most important lesson the writer learned from the incident?

A. Freedom is very valuable to all creatures.

B. All birds put in a cage won’t live long.

C. You should keep the birds from their mother.

D. Be careful about food you give to baby birds.

Mountaineers have noted that as they climb, for example, up to the 12,633?foot Humphreys Peak in Arizona, plant life changes greatly. In the Sonoran Desert, one climbs into a pine forest at 7,000 feet and a treeless tundra(冻土带) on the top of the mountain. It may seem that plants at a given altitude are associated in what can be called “communities” -groupings of species. The idea is that over time, plants that require particular climate and soil conditions come to live in the same places, and are frequently to be found together. Scientists study the history of plant life and build up a picture of how groups of plants have responded to climate changes and how ecosystems develop. But are these associations, which are real in the present, permanent?

A great natural experiment took place on this planet between 25,000 and 10,000 years ago, when small changes in the earth’s orbit caused great sheets of ice to spread from poles. These glaciers(冰川) covered much of North America and Europe to depths of up to two miles, and then, as the climate warmed, they retreated. During this retreat, they left behind newly uncovered land for living things to occupy, and as those living things moved in they laid down a record we can read now. As the ice retreated and plants started to grow near a lake, they release pollen(花粉). Some would fall into the lake, sink to the bottom and mix with the sand. By drilling into the lake bottom it is possible to read the record of the plant life around the lake. The fossil record seems clear; there is little or no evidence that entire groups of plants moved north together. Things that lived together in the past don’t live together now, and things that live together now didn’t live together in the past. Each individual living things moved at its own pace. The fossil record seems to be telling us that we should be thinking about preserving species by giving them room to move about-to respond to environmental changes.

1.According to the passage, the movement of individual species of plants ________.

A. occurs in groups

B. often depends upon the formation of lakes

C. does not occur in groups

D. depends upon climate and soil conditions

2. All of the following are true EXCEPT ________.

A. The ice age occurred when there were small changes in the orbit of the earth

B. fossil records seem to indicate that plants will be preserved if they have enough room to move

C. fossil records clearly show that entire groups of plants are unlikely to have moved together

D. in the ice age glaciers covered the world to depths of up to two miles

3.The underlined word “which” refers to ________.

A. the responses of plants to climate changes

B. the current theories of ecosystems

C. the development of ecosystems

D. plant life changes

4.The second paragraph is intended to ________.

A. support the main idea of the first paragraph

B. answer the question raised in first paragraph

C. make suggestions about responding to environmental changes

D. stress the importance of preserving species

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