Tourism probably started in Roman times. Rich Romans visited friends and family who were working in another part of the Roman Empire. But when the empire broke down, this kind of tourism stopped.

In the early 17th century, the idea of the “Grand Tour” was born. Rich young English people sailed across the English Channel. They visited the most beautiful and important European cities of the time, including Paris in France, and Rome and Venice（威尼斯）in Italy. Their tours lasted for two to four years, and the tourists stayed a few weeks or months in each city. The “Grand Tour” was an important part of young people’s education-but only for the rich.

In the 18th century, tourism began to change. For example, people in the UK started to visit some towns, such as Bath to “take the waters”. They believed that the water there was good for their health. So large and expensive hotels were built in these towns.

In the 19th century, travel became much more popular and faster. When the first railways were built in the 1820s, it was easier for people to travel between towns, so they started to go for holidays by the sea. And some started to have holidays in the countryside as cities became larger, noisier and dirtier.

Traveling by sea also became faster and safer when the first steamships were built. People began to travel more to faraway countries.

The 20th century saw cars become more and more popular among ordinary people. Planes were made larger, so ticket prices dropped and more people used them.

Thus tourism grew, in 1949, Russian journalist Vladimir Raitz started a company called Horizon Holidays. The company organizes everything-plane tickets, hotel rooms, even food-and tourists pay for it all before they leave home. The package tour and modern tourist industry was born and began to take off.

1.When tourism first started in Roman times, people ______.

2.. In the early times, the travelers ______.

3. ______ played the most important role in the tourism development.

4. Package tour was born ______.

5. The underlined phrase “take off” means ______.

As many as one in five US teenagers have some degree of hearing loss, according to researchers. They say the problem is growing.

“Teenagers really don’t pay attention to how much noise they are exposed to(接触),” Josef Shargorodsky of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston told Reuters. “Often people won’t notice it, but even very little hearing loss may influence language development,” said Shargorodsky, one of the researchers.

The study compared surveys from the early 1990s and the mid-2000s. Each included a few thousand teenagers. In the first survey, about 15 percent of teenagers had some degree of hearing loss. Some 15 years later, that number had risen by a third, to nearly 20 percent.

“This certainly is big news,” said Alison Grimes, an ear doctor. “Hearing loss is very common in old people,” Grimes said, but she added that it was worrying to see it happen in the younger age group.

In babies and young children, hearing problems are known to slow language development. The science is less clear for teenagers, but it is easy to imagine how being hard of hearing could influence learning, said Grimes.

The reasons for the rise are still unclear. When researchers asked teenagers about noise exposure – on the job, at school or from activities, for example – the teenagers didn’t report any change. But Shargorodsky said that might not be true. “We know from before that it is difficult to ask this age group about noise exposure – they underestimate it.” Few people would call it noise when they listen to music on their MP3 player, for example. “There is a difference between what we think is loud and what is harmful to the ear,” said Grimes.

Although it’s not clear that the MP3 players cause teenagers’ hearing loss, Grimes said it was still a good idea to turn down the sound and take short breaks from listening.

1.The writer advises teenagers __________.

2.The underlined sentence “they underestimate it” means __________.

3.Which of the following is true according to the passage?

4.What is the best title for the passage?

In the computer age, most of us take a broadband（宽带）Internet connection for granted. Whether cable or mobile broadband, today’s connections are many times faster than those in the early days. Videos play smoothly, complex websites load quickly, and files（档案文件）download much faster than ten years ago. And the files are much bigger too.

There’s a catch, of course: You have to live near enough to a major city to get broadband Internet. If you don’t, it’s slow dial-up access for you. And for those living really far out, there may be no Internet access at all.

Technology experts often talk about the “last mile” problem, which refers to the difficulty of bringing Internet access to remote locations. In cities and suburbs（郊区）, it’s relatively easy to provide access for everyone. It is much more difficult to deliver access to those living far from cities, especially in developing countries. Internet service providers, for their part, have been reluctant to provide access to sparsely (稀疏地) populated areas. The handful of Internet users they would reach wouldn’t cover the expense.

But every year, technological advancements allow of more and more Internet users. Most broadband connections today run over existing cable TV and telephone lines although these technologies aren’t available everywhere.

Some companies have delivered the Internet over standard power lines. Advancements in cheaper, more efficient fiber optics cables (光纤电缆) promise to bring extremely fast Internet connections to more users.

Still, the “last mile” problem remains hard to deal with. There will always be somewhere that doesn’t have an affordable broadband connection. But someday that might not matter. If the rapid progress in cell phone technology is any indication (迹象), it may not be too long before an Internet connection simply follows you wherever you go.

1.The underlined part “a catch” (in Paragraph 2) probably means “_____”.

A．a rare challenge                        B．a desirable plan

C．an efficient device                      D．a hidden problem

2.What can we know from the third paragraph?

A．Internet connection has not been popular in most cities.

B．Internet service providers care about rural（农村的）customers.

C．Computer is popular in developing countries.

D．It is hard to bring Internet access to users in remote areas.

3.Paragraph 4 mainly tells us that technological advancements _____.

A．make TV and telephone available everywhere

B．bring great change to people’s everyday life

C．make it possible for more people to use the Internet

D．bring faster Internet connections to users

4.What may eventually settle the “last mile” problem?

A．The broadband connection’s getting faster.

B．More and more Internet users.

C．more and more Internet connections.

D．The rapid progress in cell phone technology.

阅读下面短文，按照句子结构的语法性和上下文连贯的要求，在空格处填入一个适当的词或使用括号中词语的正确形式填空。

An 8.8­magnitude earthquake struck Chile on 27 Feb,2010.More than 300 people are reported __36__(kill) in Chile after a magnitude 8.8 earthquake hit the South American nation early Saturday，__37__(cause)considerable destruction as well，and creating tsunami warnings across the Pacific Ocean.

Rescuers worked frantically for hours to help survivors of the quake __38__centered 100 kilometers from the city of Concepcion but caused damage and deaths in several parts of Chile.

Homes，buildings and bridges collapsed or caught fire，cars __39__(overturn)，and the main international airport had to be shut down because of damage. One survivor said it was terrible. She said she thought she was not __40__(scare)of earthquakes but then，she says，it looked as if everything was going to collapse. There were at least eight aftershocks and tidal waves of up __41__ two meters that hit Chile’s coast. Residents in lowlying areas and living on islands off the mainland tried to flee __42__higher ground. Chile experiences many earthquakes but the early Saturday natural disaster was __43__of its most severe (剧烈的). Thorne Lay，a geophysicist at the University of California，Santa Cruz，said it was much stronger than __44__one that caused devastation(废墟)in Haiti last month，but probably less __45__(destroy)，because of where it was centered.

I began working in journalism when I was eight. It was my mother’s idea. She wanted me to “make something” of myself, and decided I had better start young if I was to have any chance of keeping up with the competition.

With my load of magazines I headed toward Belleville Avenue. The crowds were there. There were two gas stations on the corner of Belleville and Union. For several hours I made myself highly visible, making sure everyone could see me and the heavy black letters on the bag that said THE SATURDAY EVENING POST. When it was suppertime, I walked back home.

“ How many did you sell, my boy?” my mother asked.

“ None.”

“ Where did you go?”

“ The corner of Belleville and Union Avenues.”

“ What did you do?”

“ Stood on the corner waiting for somebody to buy a Saturday Evening Post.”

“ You just stood there?”

“ Didn’t sell a single one.”

“ My God, Russell!”

Uncle Allen put in, “ Well, I’ve decided to take the Post.” I handed him a copy and he paid me a nickel. It was the first nickel I earned.

Afterwards my mother taught me how to be a salesman. I would have to ring doorbells, address adults with self-confidence, and persuade them by saying that no one, no matter how poor, could afford to be without the Saturday Evening Post in the home.

One day, I told my mother I’d changed my mind. I didn’t want to make a success in the magazine business.

“ If you think you can change your mind like this,” she replied, “ you’ll become a good-for-nothing.” She insisted that, as soon as school was over, I should start ringing doorbells, selling magazines. Whenever I said no, she would scold me.

My mother and I had fought this battle almost as long as I could remember. My mother, dissatisfied with my father’s plain workman’s life, determined that I would not grow up like him and his people. But never did she expect that, forty years later, such a successful journalist as me would go back to her husband’s people for true life and love.

1.Why did the boy start his job young?

2.From the dialogue between the boy and his mother, we learn that the mother was _______.

3.What did the mother do when the boy wanted to give up?

4.What is the text mainly about?