阅读下面短文, 掌握其大意，然后从36~55各题所给的四个选项（A、B、C和D）中，选出最佳选项。

        One day before Christmas, all of us children from the Children's Home Society Orphanage(孤儿院) were taken to the Mayflower Hotel in downtown to attend a Christmas party.

After the man on the stage said a prayer        （祈祷）, we were told to  　36　 . Within minutes we were   37    a meal which was fit for a king. I ate   38  I could eat no more. As we ate, Santa Clause came walking out onto the  39  . The kids cheered with  40  . Everyone began clapping their hands and yelling as   41  as they could.

I too was excited   42   but I knew better than to yell（叫喊）out loud or to jump up and scream. Mrs. Winters, the head matron, sat only three seats from me. She had   43   it very clear to everyone that we were to behave ourselves in "a proper manner" and that there was to be "no yelling or shouting".

One orphan   44  was led up onto the stage and each kid was handed a   45   by Santa Claus himself.

As the line became shorter and shorter my   46   finally came. He smiled at me. Then he reached over and handed me a   47   box which had two gold ribbons(丝带) on it. As I leaned(向前倾) to take the box I tripped and I   48  to my knees. Santa reached over and helped me to my feet.

"Move  49   Kiser." called out Mrs. Winters.

I was now leaning against Santa Claus' leg and I was looking   50   into his eyes. His face was less than an inch from mine.

"Can I   51   you Santa?" I asked him.

The next thing I knew Mrs. Winters had caught me up by my shirt collar and was  52   me away from the line of children.

I sat down in my chair just crying. Once in a while I would  53   at the stage to see if my gift was still sitting by Santa Claus.

When we all lined up waiting, I  54  "HO HO HO" coming from behind me.

As I   55  , there stood Santa Claus holding my large box. Then he knelt down and he hugged my neck as hard as he could.

36. A. stand up                B. go out                    C. sit down                D. keep silent

37. A. taken                     B. served                    C. brought                 D. supplied

38. A. until                         B. unless                    C. before                    D. after

39. A. table                         B. hotel                       C. seat                        D. stage

40. A. encouragement           B. excitement          C. disappointment           D. astonishment

41. A. loud                         B. big                           C. high                        D. low

42. A. outside                   B. beside                   C. aside                      D. inside

43. A. took                         B. made               C. demanded           D. warned

44. A. at a time               B. at one time           C. at time’s                D. at time

45. A. favor                      B. box                       C. gift                         D. medal

46. A. turn                         B. way                       C. chance                  D. gift

47. A. golden                     B. yellow                   C. small                     D. large

48. A. sat                           B. fell                         C. dropped               D. turned

49. A. by                             B. on                        C. in                            D. out

50. A. quickly                  B. directly                 C. immediately        D. finally

51. A. tell                             B. call                         C. hug                        D. leave

52. A. pushing                   B. keeping                  C. stopping                D. pulling

53. A. look                        B. jump                    C. put                       D. stand

54. A. watched                B. found           C. heard                             D. observed

55. A. turned around        B. turned up              C. turned away         D. turned down

Green is an important color in nature. It is the color of grass and the leaves on trees. It is also the color of most growing plants.

Sometimes, the word green means young, fresh and growing. Sometimes, it describes something that is not yet ripe or finished. For example, a greenhorn is someone who has no experience, who is new to a situation. In the fifteenth century, a greenhorn was a young cow or ox whose horns(角) had not yet developed. A century or so later, a greenhorn was a soldier who had not yet had any experience in battle. By the eighteenth century, a greenhorn had the meaning it has today—a person who is new in a job.

Someone who has the ability to grow plants well is said to have a green thumb. The expression comes from the early nineteen hundreds. A person with a green thumb seems to have a magic touch that makes plants grow quickly and well. You might say that the woman next door has a green thumb if her garden continues to grow long after your plants have died.

The Green Revolution is the name given some years ago to the development of new kinds of rice and other grains. The new plants produced much larger crops. The Green Revolution was the result of hard work by agricultural scientists who had green thumbs.

Green is also the color used to describe the powerful feeling, jealousy(嫉妒). The green-eyed monster is not a frightening creature from outer space. It is an expression used about four hundred years ago by British writer William Shakespeare in his play “Othello”. It describes the unpleasant feeling a person has when someone has something he wants. A young man may suffer from the green-eyed monster if his girlfriend begins going out with someone else. Or, that green-eyed monster may affect your friend if you get a pay rise and she does not.

1.Greenhorn now refers to ____.

A. a person who is new in a job                          B. a new solider

C. a young horse                                                   D. None of above

2.A person who has a green thumb is a person ____.

A. who is good at growing plants                     B. whose thumbs are in green color

C. whose garden is greener than others’                 D. who is younger than his neighbors

3.The author is actually talking about ____.

A. colors                     B. language        C. politics                            D. agriculture 

Natural ways of keeping time

In ancient times, people had to use the sun and the moon to tell time. They got up when the sun came up and worked in the fields until the sun went down.

Man-made things

The sand clock is made of two glass balls joined by a narrow neck. The top ball was filled with sand. The sand slowly moved through the neck into the bottom ball. People knew how much time had passed when all the sand had fallen to the bottom ball.

People also made the water clock. They made a small hole near the bottom of a pot. Then they filled the pot with water. Markings inside the pot showed how much time passed as the water dripped (滴) out of the hole.

Nature’s Clocks in Living Things

◆Animals’ Body Clock

Animals do not need clocks to know time. They have a way of telling time by their bodies. Birds know when to fly to warmer places before winter. Some animals know when to keep more food for the cold winter months. Some fish know when it is time to move up the river and lay eggs.

◆Plants have their own clocks

Plants also have their own clocks to keep time. Plants know when to open flow­ers or when to drop their leaves.

◆The Body Clock in Human Beings

People also have their own body clocks. When we get used to our lives, our body clocks can be very accurate (准确的). It can tell us when it is time to wake up. It can also tell us when to eat or to go to sleep.

1.How could an ancient farmer know when to go back home in the daytime?

A. By looking at the moon.              B. By looking at the stars.

C. By looking at the sun.                D. By feeling whether tired or not.

2. How many kinds of living things with nature’s clocks are mentioned here?

A. 2.           B. 3.             C. 5          D. 6.

3.From the passage, we know what man-made things have in common is that_______.

A. both of them have a hole.                               B. both of them are designed with glass balls.

C. both of them can be used only once.           D. both of them tell time in the same way

Millions of youngsters across Europe could suffer permanent hearing loss after five years if they listen to MP3 players at too high a volume for more than five hours a week, EU scientists warned.

The scientists’ study, requested by the European Commission, attacked the concept of “leisure noise,” saying children and teenagers should be protected from increasingly high sound levels---with loud mobile phones also coming in for criticism（批评）.

“There has been increasing concern about exposure from the new generation of personal music players which can reproduce sounds at very high volumes without loss of quality,” the Commission, the EU’s executive arm, said in a statement.

“Risk for hearing damage depends on sound level and exposure time,” it said. More and more young people were exposed to the great threat(威胁)that leisure noise posed to hearing, it said.

Commission experts said that between 50 and 100 million people listen to portable music players on a daily basis.

If they listened for only five hours a week at more than 89 decibels(分贝), they would already be beyond   EU limits for noise allowed in the workplace, they said. But if they listened for longer periods, they risked permanent hearing loss after five years.

The scientists calculated the number of people in that risk category at between five and 10 percent of listeners, meaning up to 10 million people in the European Union.

Sales of personal music players have soared in EU countries in recent years, particularly of MP3 players.

"I am worried that so many young people ... who are frequent users of personal music players and mobile phones at high acoustic levels, may be unknowingly damaging their hearing ," she said in the statement.

1.Which of the following can be the best title of the article?

A. Youngsters across Europe: suffer permanent hearing loss.

B. MP3 players: sell best but do harm to youngsters

C. The scientists’ study: requested by the EU

D. EU warns youth: turn your MP3 players down!

2. This passage is most likely to be taken from a _________.

A. textbook                                  B. medical report

C. teen magazine                            D. governmental newspaper

3.The underlined part in the forth paragraph most probably means________.

A. were uncovered                     B. felt                   C. realized           D. were faced with

4.From the passage we know that________.

A. besides the high sound levels, scientists also criticized loud mobile phones.

B. if one listened for 5 hours more a week at 100 decibels, he would risk permanent hearing loss.

C. it is only the level of the sound that can do damage to hearing.

D. the scientists said there were 5-10 percent of MP3 listeners risking hearing loss around the world.

单词拼写（5分）

The sights of the city never fail to make a strong  i­­­­­­­­­­_______________ on foreign tourists.

She graduated from college just last year, so she was an  i_________________ teacher.

It is a great  h_______________ for a journalist to be sent to Beijing to cover the Olympic Games.

The scientist made great ___________________ (贡献) to the film industry.

Although I am quite busy this month, I don't want to miss my cousin’s wedding __________(典礼).

According to the spokesman, he is not ________________ (牵涉) in the event.

I want to be one of the _______________（志愿者）to work for the 2012 London Olympic Games.

In our school, all teachers and students have free  a_____________ to the library.

_______________(不幸)，we didn't succeed in preventing the river from being polluted by these factories.

His progress is far away from his parents’  s__________________, so he will go on working hard.

选择适当的词或短语并用其正确形式填空（5分）

任务型阅读（共10小题;每小题1分，满分10分）

请认真阅读下列短文，并根据所读内容在文章后表格中的空格里填入最恰当的单词。

注意：每空一词。

It is an all too familiar story. A natural disaster strikes in a remote part of the world, causing destruction and suffering. Villages are flattened and people are forced into camps. It is now happening in China, after the earthquake of magnitude（里氏）8 that was centered on Wenchuan but shook the entire country.

Actually, in the past centuries, there were hundreds of thousands of earthquakes in different parts of the world. In Sept. 1923, Tokyo and Yokohama were both destroyed by an earthquake and the fires that followed it. They had to be completely rebuilt. One of the most serious earthquakes was in China’s Shanxi Province in 1556. It claimed almost one million people.

We measure an earthquake’s strength on the Richter scale. The Richter scale was introduced in 1935 in Southern California in the USA. It measures earthquakes on a scale of one to ten. Any earthquake measuring five or more is usually serious.

The earth’s crust (地壳) is made up of layers of rock called plates. As these plates move, they sometimes crash against each other, causing the crust to quake. In cities such as Tokyo, where small quakes happen quite often, many modern buildings are designed to be flexible so when the earth moves, they move with it.

Earthquakes can also break up gas or oil pipes. This can cause fires to break out, which can do as much damage as the earthquake itself.

Another effect of the earthquakes is tsunamis (海啸). These are huge waves created by earthquakes beneath the sea. They can be many meters high and cause great damage to costal towns and cities.

China, Japan, Russia and the USA have the highest occurrence of earthquakes in the world.

书面表达: （满分25分）

假如你的网友John即将外出旅行，请你根据以下提示，用英语给他写封电子邮件，向他介绍你对旅游的看法并提醒他旅行注意事项。

1. 旅游是一种非常好的活动。当你累了或有空的时候，到外地走走。欣赏美景，呼吸

新鲜空气，交朋友，放松身心，忘记疲劳，有益健康。

2. 旅行前的准备。了解天气，带好衣服、相机、常用药品等。

3. 旅行时注意饮食卫生和安全，防止小偷。

要求：1、行文连贯，不得逐句翻译；

         2、词数：120词左右

Dear John,

    I am glad to hear that you are going to travel. Now I’d like to share my view on traveling with you.

   __________________________________________________________________________

__________________________________________________________________________

Yours,

Ren Jin

He ________ the multinational corporation(跨国公司) _______ the position yesterday, because he thinks that he is good at it.

A. applied for; to        B. adapted to, for

C. applied to ; for        D applies to ; for

 I am_____ to learn that Picasso produced more than 20,000 pieces of art ___ he wasn’t just a painter.