Americans with small families own a small car or a large one. If both parents are working, they usually have two cars. When the family is large, one of the cars is sold and they will buy a van(住房汽车).

A small car can hold(容纳)four persons and a large car can hold six persons, but it is very crowded(拥挤). A van hold seven persons easily, so a family with three children could ask their grandparents to go on a holiday travel. They could all travel together.

Mr.Hagen and his wife had a third child last year. This made them sell a second car and buy a van. Their children sixth and seventh seats are used to put other things, for a family of five must carry many suitcases(衣箱)when they travel. When they arrive at their grandparents’ home , the suitcases are brought into the two seats, the van can then carry the grandparents.

Americans call vans motor homes. A motor home is always used for holidays. When a family are traveling to the mountains or to the seaside, they can live in their motor home for a few days or weeks. All the members of a big family can enjoy a happier life when they are traveling together. That is why motor homes have become very popular. In America there are many parks for motor homes.

1.From the passage, a van is also called ____________.

2.Before Mr. Hagen and his wife bought a van, they__________.

3.A motor home is usually owned by a family with__________.

4.Americans usually use motor homes____________.

5.Motor homes have become popular because___________.

A young man from a village called Nawalapitiya married a young woman from Maiyuwa, a small village. They lived with the man’s big family－his parents, his brothers, their wives and husbands and children. The family kept an elephant, in which the woman soon took a great interest. Every day she fed it with fruit and sugar.

Three months later, having quarreled with her husband, the woman went back to her parents’ home. Soon the elephant refused to eat and work. It appeared to be ill and heartbroken. One morning after several weeks the animal disappeared from the house.

It went to the woman’s home. On seeing her, the elephant waved its trunk and touched her with it. The young woman was so moved by the act of the animal .So she went back to her husband’s home.

1.The woman left her new home ______.

A. to visit her own parents in Maiyuwa

B. to see if the elephant would follow her

C. because she was angry with her husband

D. because she was tired of the large family

2.The word “disappeared” in the reading means “______”.

A. ran away                          B. lost                           C. hid                           D. remained

3.After the young woman left her husband’s home, the elephant______.

A. returned to the forest                                        B. was sad because it missed her

C. went to look for a new home                            D. was sick because nobody fed it

4.How did the elephant express its feeling when it saw the young woman?

A. It waved its trunk and smiled.                           B. It touched her with its trunk.

C. It touched her and cried.                                   D. It waved its trunk and ran around her.

5.The writer wrote the story in order to______.

A. show that elephants are very clever

B. tell how a woman trained a wild animal

C. show that women care more for animals than men do

D. tell how an animal got a husband and a wife together again