Most musicians agree that the best violins were made in Cremona, Italy, about 200 years ago. They even sound better than violins made today. Violin makers and scientists try to make instruments like the old Italian violins. But they aren’t the same. Why are these old Italian violins so special? Many people think they have an answer.

Some people think it is the age of the violins. But there is a problem here. Not all old violins sound wonderful. Only those from Cremona are special. So age cannot be the answer.

Other people think the secret to those violins is the wood. The wood of the violin is very important. It must be from certain kinds of trees. It must not be too young or too old. Perhaps the violin makers of Cremona knew something special about wood for violins.

But the kind of wood may not be so important. It may be more important to cut the wood in a special way. Wood for a violin must be cut very carefully. It has to be the right size and shape. The smallest difference will change the sound of the violin. Musicians sometimes think that this is the secret of the Italians.

Size and shape may not be the answer either. Scientists make new violins that are exactly the same size and shape. But the new violins still do not sound as good as the old one. Some scientists think the secret may be the varnish（清漆）, which covers the wood of the violin and makes it look shiny. It also helps the sound of the instrument. Since no one knows what the Italian violin makers used in their varnish, no one can make the same varnish today.

There may never be other violins like the violins of Cremona. And there are not many of the old violins left. So these old violins are becoming more and more precious.

1.What would be the best title for the passage?

A．The Secrets of Cremona Violins

B．The History of Italian Violins

C．Special Musical Instruments

D．How to Make the Best Violins

2.The main purpose of the first paragraph is to_______________

A．list some facts                                  B．raise a question

C．give an opinion                                   D．offer an answer

3.What is still unclear about Cremona violins according to the writer?

A．The shape．    B．The size．    C．The wood．  D．The varnish．

4.Which of the following words can best describe Cremona violins?

A．Light．       B．Shining．    C．Valuable．D．Modern

5.What can we learn from this passage?

A．Modem things are always better than ancient ones

B．Ancient things are always better than modem ones

C．Once a cultural relic is lost．it Can never be recovered

D．Varnish for violins will become more and more precious

There is no doubt about it. The best way to learn new words is to do it unconsciously. I don’t mean while you’re unconscious. I mean while you are unconscious of the fact that it is sinking in.
That is how I learnt the 30,000 words in my vocabulary by living in an English-speaking world, mother tongue. I just pick them up. But some of them may be misunderstood. Now, to misunderstand does not mean not to understand. To misunderstand is to understand but incorrectly.
The 5% mislearnt of all the words we “know” will be the least frequently used words, as the more frequently used words are less likely to be mislearnt. Some of the misunderstanding may live with all our lives, without knowing that we got them wrong.
Many English teachers think that this natural method of learning words in one’s own mother tongue can be used for a second language learning. They teach their students how to play the Guessing Game. “There is no time to look up in your dictionaries all the new words you come across,” they will say. “You have to practice guessing what the word means from the context.”
This method of guessing in a second language learning does not work. It may succeed in many cases, but results in hundreds or thousands of wrongly-guessed meanings of words.
And what’s more, there are more separate meanings than there are words themselves. Our learners’ dictionaries usually have many meanings. A good dictionary is what makes self-learning possible.
Don’t guess! Look it up!
【小题1】 It is certain that the best way to learn new words is ______.

Perhaps the most astonishing theory to come out of kinetics, the study of body movement, was suggested by Professor Ray Birdwhistell. He believes that physical appearance is often culturally programmed．In other words, we learn our looks; we are not born with them.

A baby has generally unformed facial features. A baby, according to Birdwhistell, learns where to set the eyebrows by looking at those around family and friends. This helps explain why the people of some regions of the United States look so much alike. New Englanders or Southerners have certain common facial characteristics that cannot be explained by genetics (遗传学) “The exact shape of the mouth is not set at birth, it is learned after. In fact, the final mouth shape is not formed until well after permanent (永久的) teeth are set. For many, this can be well into adolescence (青春期). A husband and wife together for a long time often come to look somewhat alike. We learn our looks from those around us. This is perhaps why in a single country there are areas where people smile more than those in other areas. In the United States, for example, the South is the part of the country where the people smile most frequently. In New England they smile less, and in the western part of New York State still less. Many Southerners find cities such as New York cold and unfriendly, Partly because people on Madison Avenue smile less than people on Peach Tree Street in Atlanta, Georgia．People in densely (稠密地) populated urban areas also tend to smile and greet each other in public less than people in rural areas and small towns.

Ray Birdwhistell believes that physical appearance ______.

       A．has little to do with culture     B．can be influenced by culture

       C．is decided by culture       D．varies from place to place

Ray Birdwhistell can tell what region of the United States a person is from by ______.

       A．how much he or she laughs     B．how he or she raises his or her eyebrows

       C．what he or she likes best  D．the way he or she talks

People who live _____ are more friendly according to the passage.

       A．in densely populated areas      B．in the country

       C．in New York City           D．in the North

This passage might have been taken out of a book dealing with ______.

       A．physics     B．health       C．chemistry  D．none of the above

At the heart of the debate over illegal immigration lies one key question: are immigrants good or bad for the economy? The American public overwhelmingly thinks they’re bad. Yet the agreement among most economists is that immigration, both legal and illegal, provides a small net boost to the economy. Immigrants provide cheap labor, lower the prices of everything from farm produce to new homes, and leave consumers with a little more money in their pockets. So why is there such a discrepancy between the perception of immigrants’ impact on the economy and the reality?
There are a number of familiar theories. Some argue that people are anxious and feel threatened by an inflow of new workers. Others highlight the stress that undocumented immigrants place on public services, like schools, hospitals, and jails. Still others emphasize the role of race, arguing that foreigners add to the nation's fears and insecurities. There’s some truth to all these explanations, but they aren’t quite sufficient.
To get a better understanding of what’s going on, consider the way immigration’s impact is felt. Though its overall effect may be positive, its costs and benefits are distributed unevenly. David Card, an economist at UC Berkeley, notes that the ones who profit most directly from immigrants’ low-cost labor are businesses and employers —meatpacking plants in Nebraska, for instance, these producers’ savings probably translate into lower prices at the grocery store, but how many consumers make that mental connection at the checkout counter? As for the drawbacks of illegal immigration, these, too, are concentrated. Native low-skilled workers suffer most from the competition of foreign labor. According to a study by George Borjas, a Harvard economist, immigration has reduced the wages of American high-school dropouts by 9%. 
Among high-skilled, better-educated employees, however, opposition was strongest in states with both high numbers of immigrants and relatively generous social services. What worried them most, in other words, was the financial burden of immigration. That conclusion was reinforced by another finding: that their opposition appeared to soften when that financial burden decreased, as occurred with welfare reform in the 1990s, which curbed immigrants’ access to certain benefits.
The irony is that for all the overexcited debate, the net effect of immigration is minimal. Even for those most acutely affected — say, low-skilled workers, or California residents — the impact isn’t all that dramatic. “The unpleasant voices have tended to dominate our perceptions,” says Daniel Tichenor, a professor at the University of Oregon. “But when all those factors are put together and the economists calculate the numbers, it ends up being a net positive, but a small one.” Too bad most people don’t realize it. 
【小题1】What can we learn from the first paragraph?

At the heart of the debate over illegal immigration lies one key question: are immigrants good or bad for the economy? The American public overwhelmingly thinks they’re bad. Yet the agreement among most economists is that immigration, both legal and illegal, provides a small net boost to the economy. Immigrants provide cheap labor, lower the prices of everything from farm produce to new homes, and leave consumers with a little more money in their pockets. So why is there such a discrepancy between the perception of immigrants’ impact on the economy and the reality?

There are a number of familiar theories. Some argue that people are anxious and feel threatened by an inflow of new workers. Others highlight the stress that undocumented immigrants place on public services, like schools, hospitals, and jails. Still others emphasize the role of race, arguing that foreigners add to the nation's fears and insecurities. There’s some truth to all these explanations, but they aren’t quite sufficient.

To get a better understanding of what’s going on, consider the way immigration’s impact is felt. Though its overall effect may be positive, its costs and benefits are distributed unevenly. David Card, an economist at UC Berkeley, notes that the ones who profit most directly from immigrants’ low-cost labor are businesses and employers —meatpacking plants in Nebraska, for instance, these producers’ savings probably translate into lower prices at the grocery store, but how many consumers make that mental connection at the checkout counter? As for the drawbacks of illegal immigration, these, too, are concentrated. Native low-skilled workers suffer most from the competition of foreign labor. According to a study by George Borjas, a Harvard economist, immigration has reduced the wages of American high-school dropouts by 9%. 

Among high-skilled, better-educated employees, however, opposition was strongest in states with both high numbers of immigrants and relatively generous social services. What worried them most, in other words, was the financial burden of immigration. That conclusion was reinforced by another finding: that their opposition appeared to soften when that financial burden decreased, as occurred with welfare reform in the 1990s, which curbed immigrants’ access to certain benefits.

The irony is that for all the overexcited debate, the net effect of immigration is minimal. Even for those most acutely affected — say, low-skilled workers, or California residents — the impact isn’t all that dramatic. “The unpleasant voices have tended to dominate our perceptions,” says Daniel Tichenor, a professor at the University of Oregon. “But when all those factors are put together and the economists calculate the numbers, it ends up being a net positive, but a small one.” Too bad most people don’t realize it. 

1.What can we learn from the first paragraph?

A．Whether immigrants are good or bad for the economy has been puzzling economists.

B．The American economy used to thrive on immigration but now it’s a different story.

C．The agreement among economists is that immigration should not be encouraged.

D．The general public thinks differently from most economists on the impact of immigration.

2.What is the chief concern of native high-skilled, better-educated employees about the inflow of immigrants?

A．It may change the existing social structure.

B．It may pose a threat to their economic status.

C．It may decrease .their financial burden.

D．It may place a great pressure on the state budget.

3.What is the irony about the debate over immigration?

A．Even economists can’t reach an agreement about its impact.

B．Those who are opposed to it turn out to benefit most from it.

C．People are making too big a fuss about something of small impact.

D．There is no essential difference between seemingly opposite opinions.

4.Which of the following might be the best title of the passage?

A．A debate about whether to immigrate.

B．A debate about the impact of illegal immigrants.

C．The great impact of immigrants on the economy.

D．Opposition to illegal immigration.