How Super Are Supermarkets?

Buying e week’s groceries is tiring. You want to get it over and done with quickly, so you head for the nearest supermarket, you find everything you need under one roof, and you feel glad that those days of going in and out of different shops in the high street are over. Supermarkets seem to be a big plus. There is a downside, though.

In the UK 90% of all the food people consume is bought at 5 different supermarket chains. This makes these companies extremely powerful, which lets them use their huge buying power to squeeze small suppliers to get the best deal. Milk is a good example. Supermarkets like to use things like milk, which is the top of almost everyone’s shopping list to attract customers. To offer the lowest price possible to the consumer, the supermarkets force dairy farmers to sell milk at less than the cost of production. Supermarkets guarantee their good profits while farmers are left struggling to make ends meet, and the taxpayer pays to support the system without even knowing it.

It would be nice if local grocers supported local agriculture. But for the big supermarkets this just doesn’t make sense. Supermarkets don’t want little farmers thinking they can decide prices. So supermarkets have started a global search for the cheapest possible agricultural produce. In many supermarkets it is difficult to find anything which is produced locally.

UK farmers used to grow a lot of apples. Not anymore. In 1999 36% of apples were imported. By 2015 the figure had risen to 80% and the domestic production of apples had fallen by two thirds. The consumer might just be happy to get a reasonably priced meal made up of foods from Thailand, Spain, Italy and Zambia, but we should also bear in mind the Influence on local producers.

Then there’s packaging. Supermarkets like everything to be packed and wrapped so it can be piled neatly on shelves. Supermarkets produce nearly 10 million tons of waste packaging in the UK every year, of which less 5%is recycled. Some supermarkets make sure that large recycling bins are obvious in their car parks, showing that they are environment-friendly. But that is just an image.

When a new supermarket is planned there are claims about the number of new jobs that will be created. Unfortunately, the number of jobs lost in the area is larger than the number of new positions in the supermarket. On average each new supermarket leads to the loss of 276 jobs.

However, the modern world is all about shopping, and the freedom to buy whatever you what, so it would be impossible to stop people shopping at some particular kind of shop. But some measures do need to be taken when small suppliers lose profits, local producers suffer, sea levels rise and jobs are lost, anyway, we can’t just care about a free car park and special offers.

1.The author mentions “milk” in paragraph 2 to explain how supermarkets ____________.

A. cheat the taxpayers

B. support local dairy farmer

C. harm small suppliers ‘benefits

D .provide customers with the cheapest product

2.According to the passage, supermarkets keep price advantage by_______________.

A. competing against each other

B. importing foreign products

C. purchasing local products

D. reducing product tax

3.Which of the following shows the structure of the passage?

CP: Central Point P:Point SP: Sub-point C:Conclusion

4.What is the author’s attitude towards supermarkets?

A. Critical B. Sympathetic C. Doubtful D. Cautious

根据短文内容，从短文后的选项中选出能填入空白处的最佳选项。选项中有两项为多余选项。

Most teens look forward to learning how to drive. 1. . Fortunately, there are things that you can do to help your teen become more comfortable behind the wheel. Below are some tips for helping your teen become a more confident driver.

2.

Before your teen gets behind the wheel of a car, he or she should be familiar with the rules of the road. You should have your teen review the driver’s handbook and the vehicle’s instruction. If your teen understands the basic rules and how the car works, then he or she will feel a little better about getting on the road.

Model good driving

Actions speak louder than words. Many people will tell you that they learned how to drive by watching one of their close family members drive. 3. .

Practice

Practice makes perfect. The more your teen practices, the more confident he or she will become. Your teen should start off by driving in a place that is free of barriers. 4. . After your teen has gotten comfortable about this, he or she can start practicing on the road.

Drive in a variety of conditions

In order for your teen to become a good driver, he or she has to practice driving in a variety of conditions. 5. .

Get car insurance

Many teens are worried about how much money their parents would have to pay if an accident occurred. You should explain to your teen that car insurance can help one save a lot of money.

A. Teach your teen the rules of the road

B. Everyone should be considerate of others on the road

C. You should show good driving techniques with examples

D. Let your teen finish school before he or she gets on the road

E. An empty parking lo is a good place for a new driver to practice

F. This includes things such as heavy traffic, bad weather and freeways

G. However, some of them are nervous about actually getting out on the road

完形填空

阅读下面短文，从短文后各题所给的四个选项（A、B、C、D）中，选出可以填入空白处的最佳选项，并在答题卡上将该项涂黑。

What a busy day! The three boys were fed, bathed and changed into their nightclothes. Mary had ___________ them a story and finally they were asleep. “Babysitting（照看）the three boys aged eight, six and four is extremely___________ ,”she thought.

“Sleep,” she considered, “if only I could!” But she had difficult homework to complete. Leaning back, she ___________ her feet onto the sofa to get comfortable. Whoever said babysitting was a(n) ___________ way to make money obviously hadn't met the three boys, she thought. The television was on, the room was warm, and the lights were dim. Mary's ___________ felt heavier and heavier. I mustn't sleep, she thought— which was ___________ what she did, of course.

Strangely enough, she soon ___________ that she was a world-famous chef（主厨）. She made a _________ and wore diamonds and designer clothes. Most days she relaxed by the pool, meeting the rich and famous or ___________ —her favorite hobby. She ___________ took the leading role in her own TV show.

That is, until she became too ___________ . “I am definitely the best in the world,” she thought, as she prepared a tasty chicken dish. But ___________seemed to go right. She spilt the flour, she dropped an egg and she cut her finger. Despite all the troubles, she ___________ to get the chicken into the stove. Soon, smoke blanketed the room. The chicken was on fire. ___________ set in, but Mary could not run—she was___________ to the spot. She tried hard to move, but could not, ____________ a sharp sound awoke her.

She got shocked and confused —___________ was pouring from the kitchen. Rushing to investigate, she was met by three ___________ little faces and some very burnt bread. “Sorry, we were hungry and you were ___________ , so we tried to make some bread,” explained a boy. Relieved, Mary made them a snack and sent them back to bed. She ___________ them never to fall asleep on the job again!

1.A．writtenB．toldC．taughtD．given

2.A．helpfulB．tiringC．surprisingD．successful

3.A．putB．bentC．keptD．shook

4.A．boringB．importantC．easyD．difficult

5.A．mindB．heartC. legsD．eyes

6.A．curiouslyB．carelesslyC. exactl yD．nicely

7.A．reminded B．learntC．dreamtD．realized

8.A．fortuneB．businessC．planD．decision

9.A．readingB．runningC．babysittingD．cooking

10.A．everB．evenC．onlyD．just

11.A．proudB．stubbornC．sensitiveD．selfish

12.A．somethingB．anythingC．nothingD．everything

13.A．arranged B．managedC．preparedD．tried

14.A．PainB．NoiseC．PanicD．Stress

15.A．draggedB．pushedC．broughtD．frozen

16.A．untilB．asC．unlessD．because

17.A．lightB．waterC．fireD．smoke

18.A．strangeB．guiltyC．confidentD．cheerful

19.A．hungryB．worriedC．asleepD．busy

20.A．allowedB．expectedC．persuadedD．promised

阅读下面材料，在空白处填入适当的内容（1个单词）或括号内单词的正确形式。

Some years ago ,I was at a subway station in Los Angeles waiting in line to buy a ticket. As I stood there I saw a young man asking people for money so that he could buy his breakfast. Most of the travelers simply 1. (ignore) the young man or gave 2. (he) a dirty look, yet a well-dressed middle-aged man reacted differently. When 3. (approach) by the young man, the gentleman looked 4. at him and quietly asked, “How much will you need?” I couldn’t hear 5. the young man said but watched as the gentleman pulled several 6. (note) from his wallet and 7. (calm) placed them in the young man’s hands.

I don’t know whether the young man actually used the money for his breakfast or for 8. purposes. What I do know is that I witnessed two different reactions to the same situation. I saw people who 9. (be) either afraid or annoyed. And then I saw the gentleman who was not afraid and treated the homeless young man as though he were a brother. I decided then and there that, even though we have to be10. (care) in this world, I would rather be like the gentleman.

短文改错

假定英语课上老师要求同桌之间交换修改作文，请你修改你同桌写的一下作文。文中共有10处语言错误，每句中最多有两处。没出错误仅涉及一个单词的增加、删除或修改。

增加：在缺词处加一个漏字符号（∧），并在其下面写出该加的词。

删除：把多余的词用斜线（\）划掉。

修改：在错的词下划一横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。

注意： 1. 没出错误及其修改均仅限一词；

2. 只允许修改10处，多者（从第11处起）不计分。

Last Sunday, it was my father’s funny day. After supper, my father went to see the film. But in our surprise, he came back just about half an hour later. I asked him what was the matter. He smiled and told us about the funny thing what had happened in the cinema. He was sitting in his seat while a woman came to her and said the seat was hers. Surprising, they looked at their ticket carefully, only to find the seats shown in their tickets were the same while the colors were different. So they looked at the tickets carefully. After a while, my father apologized to the woman, saying, “Sorry, I make a mistake. Take this seat, please.” The fact was that his ticket found out under the glass on his desk was for the film a month ago.

1.If you happen to be the 200th customer to buy Cholesterolblock, you will .

A. be able to buy it at a low price

B. be the luckiest one online

C. try it free of charge

D. change your diet

2.Liptor?，Zocor?，Crestor? are ．

A. diseases B. side effects C. medicines D. cholesterol

3.Where can you most probably read this passage?

A. In a travel guide book．

B. On a university bulletin board（布告牌）．

C. In a health magazine.

D. In a doctor's prescription.

Whatever our differences as human beings are, we all think we’re more like the rest of the animal world than we realize. It is said that we share 40 per cent of our genetic（遗传的）structure with the simple worm.

But that fact has helped Sir John Sulston win the 2002 Nobel Prize for Medicine. Sir John is the founder of the Sanger Institute in Cambridge, which was set up in 1992 to get further understanding of the human genome（染色体组）.

To help them do this, they turned to the worm. The nematode（线虫类的）worm is one of the earliest creatures on planet earth. It is less than one millimeter long, completely transparent and spends its entire life digging holes through sand. But it still has lots to say about human life, and what can be done to make it better.

What the worm told Sir John and his colleagues was that each of cells in the human body is programmed like a computer. They grow, develop and die according to a set of instructions that are coded in our genetic make-up.

Many of the diseases that humans suffer from happen when these instructions go wrong or are not obeyed. When the cell refuses to die but carries on growing instead, this leads to cancer. Heart attacks and diseases like AIDS cause more cell deaths than normal, increasing the damage they do to the body. Sir John was the first scientist to prove the existence of programmed cell death.

1.Sir John Sulston got a Nobel Prize for Medicine because he has .

A．found that human beings are similar to the worm

B．got the fact we share 40 per cent of our genetic structure with the simple worm

C．found the computer which controls each of the cells in the human body

D．proved that cell death is programmed

2.People might be seriously ill if the cells in their body .

A．grow without being instructed

B．die regularly

C．fail to follow people’s instructions

D．develop in the human body

3.The underlined word “they” (paragraph 5) refers to .

A．cell deaths B．diseases C．instructions D．cells

4.What is the subject discussed in the text?

A．The theory of programmed cell deaths.

B．A great scientist—Sir John Sulston.

C．The programmed human life.

D．Dangerous diseases.

Several days ago, a Beijing - based IT company fired about 400 people overnight. No one had expected the job cuts, which broke with traditional ways of letting go of workers in China. Moreover, what was special about this case was that the day before the 400 were fired, they all received from their boss a gift - the book “Who Moved My Cheese?”.

The book - a bestseller in the US - is being used by men and women to deal with changes in their lives and work. Some large organizations, including Coca- Cola, Kodak and General Motors, ask their employees to read it in order to encourage them to be active towards changes.

Cheese is something related to everyone’s livelihood - our jobs, the industries we work in, relationships and love as well.

With China’s official entry into WTO, the whole nation will face up to more changes and challenges. So what should we do once this “cheese” on which we are so dependent is moved?

“Whatever challenges and changes we meet, we should face up to them bravely” Jiang Hengwei, a civil servant said after reading the book.

Professor Yang in Renmin University of China agrees. “We should change our way of thinking. The coming competitive foreign companies and products provide us with great chances to learn from them and improve our own products to meet international standards and be more competitive.”

“With hard work and wisdom, we will create a much larger and better piece of cheese. ”Zhang smiled confidently.

1.The whole passage is about________.

A. a bestseller in the US

B. what people think about China’s entry into the WTO

C. people’s attitude toward changes and challenges

D. how a book influences the Chinese workers

2.The company in Beijing gave each of the 400 fired workers a copy of “Who Moved My Cheese” in order to________.

A. be more competitive with foreign firms

B. find an excuse for their job cuts

C. let the workers make a living on their own

D. encourage the fired workers

3.The word “cheese”in the passage can refer to________.

A. something we depend on for a living

B. a most important kind of food

C. change or challenge

D. way of life

4.From what Hengwei and Professor Zhang Yang said, we can know that________.

A. they have different opinions on changes and challenges

B. people are not afraid of competition from foreign companies

C. the Chinese people are ready to face any changes and challenges

D. they are both greatly encouraged by the book

Babies are not just passing idle time when they stare goggle-eyed at the television—they are actually learning about the world, U.S. researchers said. Parents may want to limit what their babies see on television , based on the study, said Donna Mumme, assistant professor of psychology at Tufts University in Boston, who led the research. “Children as young as 12 months are making decisions based on the emotional(情感的)reactions of adults around them,” Mumme said in a statement. “It turns out they can also use emotional information they pick up from television. This means that adults might want to think twice before they speak in a loud and harsh voice or let a baby see television programs meant for information about the world. A mother urging her baby to eat some “yummy” soup or a brother crying in fear when a dog approaches can influence a baby’s reaction. Mumme’s team tested babies to determine. If television has the same influence, showing actors reacting on a videotape to objects such as red spiral letter holder, a blue bumpy ball, and a yellow garden hose attachment. Babies aged 10 months or 12 months were later given the same objects to play with. Ten-month-olds did not seem to be influenced by the video but the 1-year-olds were. When the actors acted neutrally or positively to an object, the babies happily played with them. But if the actor had seemed afraid or disgusted, the babies would avoid the object.

1.Psychology is the study of .

A．human’s society and its growth

B．human’s hopes had dreams

C．human’s mind and behaviors

D．human’s languages and cultures

2.Which of the following is Mumme’s conclusion?

A．Small babies should not be allowed to watch television programs.

B．Adults need to think twice before they act in front of small babies.

C．TV programs provide small babies with all the information they need.

D．One-year-olds can be emotionally influenced by TV programs.

3.Mumme reached his conclusion by .

A．measuring the time babies spent in front of TV.

B．making TV programs and advertisements for kids.

C．showing actors how to react to blue bumpy balls

D．observing small babies’ reactions to TV programs

4.Which of the following may the study lead to according to the researchers?

A．Parents may want to limit what their babies see on television.

B．Actors may try to behave themselves well in front of babies.

C．Babies may be allowed to choose what they see on TV.

D．Scientists may stop ignoring babies’ emotional world.

根据短文内容，从短文后的选项中选出能填入空白处的最佳选项。选项中有两项为多余选项。

1.__You probably think you will never be a top student. This is not necessarily so, however. Anyone can become a better student if he or she wants to. Here’s how:

Plan your time carefully. When planning your work, you should make a list of things that you have to do. After making this list, you should make a schedule of your time. First your time for eating, sleeping, dressing, etc. Then decide a good, regular time for studying. 2.__ A weekly schedule may not solve all your problems, but it will force you realize what is happening to your time.

Find a good place to study. Look around the house for a good study area. Keep this space, which may be a desk or simply a corner of your room, free of everything but study materials. No games, radios, or television. When you sit down to study, concentrate on the subject.

Make good use of your time in class. 3._ Listening carefully in class means less work later. Taking notes will help you remember what the teacher says.

Study regularly. When you get home from school, go over your notes, review the important points that your teacher is going to discuss the next day, read that material. 4._ If you do these things regularly, the material will become more meaningful, and you’ll remember it longer.

Develop a good attitude towards tests. The purpose of a test is to show what you have learned about a subject. They help you remember your new knowledge. The world won’t end if you don’t pass a test, so don’t be over worried.

5._ You will probably discover them after you have tried these.

A. There are other methods that might help you with your studying.

B. Don’t forget to set aside enough time for entertainment.

C. Take advantage of class time to listen to everything the teacher says.

D. No one can become a top student unless he or she works hard.

E. Maybe you are an average student.

F. Make full use of class time to take notes of what the teacher says in class.

G. This will help you understand the next class.