There was a woman in Nanjing , who had two sons. She was worried about them, especially(尤其) the younger one, Ben,       he was not doing well in school. Boys in his class made jokes about him because he seemed(看似) so      .

    The mother       that she herself would have to get her sons to do better in school. She told them to go to the library to read a     a week and do a report about it for her.

One day, in Ben’s      , the teacher held up a rock（石头） and asked if anyone knew it. Ben put up his hand and the teacher let him      . Why did Ben raise his hand? They wondered（想知道）. He    said anything, what could he possibly want to say?

    Well, Ben not only       the rock; he said a lot about it. He named other rocks in its group and even knew       the teacher had found it. The teacher and the students were   . Ben had learned all this from doing one of his book      .

Ben later went to the       of his class. When he finished high school, he went to University （大学）and at last became one of the best doctors in the United States.

After Ben grew up, he       something about his mother that he did not know as a    .

She, herself, had never learned how to      .

1.A. because       B. so                  C. but            D. though

2.A. clever         B. had                C. slow           D. quick

3.A. asked         B. decided             C. forgot          D. heard

4.A. notice         B. message            C. book           D. question

5.A. class         B. room               C. office          D. lab

6.A. think          B. leave               C. speak          D. answer

7.A. always        B. even               C. quickly        D. never

8.A. found        B. played              C. knew          D. threw

9.A. whether      B. when               C. where          D. why

10.A. afraid        B. surprised            C. worried        D. unhappy

11.A. pictures      B. exercises            C. shops           D. reports

12.A. top          B. end                C. back           D. side

13.A. learned       B. remembered         C. understood      D. guessed

14.A. doctor        B. child                C. student         D. teacher

15.A. read         B. work               C. teach           D. show

Li Ping is a Grade Eight student in Nanjing Sunshine Secondary School. The table below is his mid-term self-assessment(自我评价).He draws faces to show his progress：

1.Li Ping thinks he did best in ______ in Unit 1.

A. opposites        B. using a dictionary

C. a report         D. present perfect tense

2.What does Li Ping need to improve（提高） in Unit 1?

A. Present perfect tense.       B. Using a dictionary

C. A report.                    D. Opposites.

3.Which do you think Li Ping does well in?

A. Present perfect tense.       B. Passive voice.

C. Organizing information.      D. Favorite educational computer game.

4.What is Li Ping NOT very good at in Unit 2?

A. Suffixes ‘full’and ‘less’.   B. Past continuous tense

C. Linking words.                   D. My best holiday.

5.From the table we know Li Ping is weak in ________

A. Vocabulary                       B. Main task  

C. Study skills／Pronunciation      D. Grammar 

 I  will do an ____with Jim, a popular singer ,at the TV station tomorrow morning .

A. report   B. research   C. interview   D. description

B

Sun Liping, 6 , lives in a small village in Yunnan. Her biggest wish is to have running water in her home. All 35 families in Sun’s village have a serious problem--- they don’t have enough water. Every day, the villagers have to walk 20 minutes to get water.

Last year, the worst drought since the 1950s hit Yunnan, making more than 2 million people short of drinking water. This year, the drought is even worse.

Not only Yunnan, but many other provinces in China are short of water as well, such as Gansu and Qinghai.

According to a report on February 17, each Chinese person has about 28% of the world’s average（平均的） person’s amount of available(可用的) water. Two thirds of China’s cities are short of water and nearly 300 million people in rural areas don’t have safe water for drinking.

Every drop of water is important. Waste a drop of water a day and you lose a bucket(桶) a year. How can we use water in a smart way? Here are some tips for you to save water in your daily life:

1. Put plastic bottles of water in your toilet to cut down the water waste when you flush (冲洗) your toilet.

2. Don’t keep the water running while you’re brushing your teeth or washing your face and hands.

3. Use low-flow(低流量) shower heads .

4. Use a bucket to collect shower water while you wait for it to warm up.

5. Make your shower time shorter.

6. Set up a rain bucket to collect rainwater for watering plants or flowers.

1. What is the problem in Sun’s village?

2. What does the underlined word drought mean in the second paragraph?

3. According to the report, __________________________________.

A. China has just 28 percent of the world’s available water.

Each Chinese person can use more water than the world’s average person.

There is not enough water in two thirds of China’s cities.

D. There are about 300 million people in China’s cities who don’t have enough water.

4.Which of the following would lead to a waste of water?

阅读短文，根据短文内容填写表格，将信息补充完整。每空不超过三个单词。

Co-operation(合作) is always needed when you make a project that the teacher gives you.

First, discuss all you would like to do with your classmates. Choose one of the members to write down what you’re talking about. Then, with the ideas you get, list all you want. Everyone shares the duty for the project. You can collect information not only from books but also on the Internet. Making a survey and doing a research are also good ways. After that, all the members put what has been found together. Try to make the project more well-organized. In the end, you can give a report in front of your class to show the results of your hard work.