One day at a park, a woman sat down next to a man on a bench (长椅) near a playground. “That’s my son over there,” she said, pointing to (指着) a little boy in a red sweater.

   “He’s a lovely boy,” the man said. “That’s my daughter on the bike in the white dress.” Then, looking at his watch, he called to his daughter, “We have to leave for home now, Rosa.”

“Just five minutes, Dad,” Rosa said, “Please, just five more minutes.”

The man agreed and Rosa went to ride his bike happily. Five minutes later, the father stood and called again to his daughter, “Time to go now?”

“Five more minutes, Dad,” Rosa said again, “Just five more minutes.”

The man smiled and said, “OK.”

“Oh, you are really a patient father,” said the woman.

The man smiled and then said, “Her elder brother Tommy died (死) in a traffic accident (事故)last year when he was riding his bike near here,” the man said,  “I never spent much time with Tommy and now I’d like to give anything for just five more minutes with him. I vowed (发誓) not to make the same mistake(错误) with Rosa. She thinks she has five more minutes to ride her bike. In fact, I get five more minutes to watch her play.”

1.The woman’s son was wearing _______________.

A. a red T-shirt                                B. a red sweater           

C. a white sweater                          D. a white dress

2.From the article, we know that Tommy was ____________.

A. the man’s son                            B. the woman’s son

C. Rosa’s younger brother                       C. the man’s elder brother

3.The underlined word “patient” means_____________.

A. 严格的           B. 勤劳的          C. 有耐心的         D.积极的

4.Which of the following sentences is TRUE?

A. The man’s daughter and her brother played at the park.

B. Rosa agreed to go home when her father called her the first time.

C. The woman felt sorry that she didn’t spend any time with her son.

D. The man learned a lot from Tommy’s death(死亡).

Starting a stamp collection is easy and not very expensive. Before you start, you need to decide what kind of stamps you want to collect. Most people collect stamps that they are interested in: a certain country or an animal, a famous person or even a sport. Whatever you choose, you will find that there is a world of knowledge in stamps: you will learn about people, geography, building, history and culture.
You can collect stamps from letters, ask your friends to let you have their old stamps, or you can buy used stamps. When you get a letter with a stamp on it, carefully cut out the stamp. Leave lots of space around the stamp so that you will not damage it. Put the stamp in water and wait until you can safely remove the stamp. Carefully remove the stamp off the letter. Place the wet stamp between two clean pieces of paper. A stamp can get wrinkled(褶皱的) when it dries, so put some books on top.
【小题1】What does the writer think of collecting stamps?

短文填空 根据短文内容及首字母提示，补全空格内单词，使短文完整、通顺（10分）

Dear Editor,

I’m a middle school student. I’m writing to tell you about children who are left-behind(留守儿童) in towns around the country. Now, our city is b  1.    more and more modern. That makes a lot of p  2.  leave their hometowns to work on building the cities. But when they work in the cities, their children are waiting for them at home. One of the most s  3.   problems is the loneliness. These left-behind children feel always l 4.   and stressed out because they have no parents’ love. At the same time, nobody can teach them the differences b 5.  right and wrong. So , it’s easier for these children to make m 6.    even break laws. It’s very important for us to pay more a  7.  to these children if we want to build a harmonious society.

So how do we s  8.   this problem? Most of the left-behind children say they miss their parents a lot,  e  9.   during holidays. Maybe the government can set up special group activities for these children during holidays. Of course, the best thing for these families is to be together. As the song says, “If e  10.    gives their love, the world will be better.”

Best wishes to you!

Sincerely,

Mary

Bobby was sitting out in his back yard in the snow. There were a few holes in his shoes. He thought hard, but he could not come up with an idea for his mother’s Christmas gift.

Ever since his father had died three years ago, his mother worked nights at the hospital, but the small money she made could hardly be enough for their needs.

Although the family lacked in money and material things, they got more love in the family. The children ran the family when their mother was absent. All three of Bobby’s sisters had already made beautiful gifts for their mother.

It was Christmas Eve already, and he had nothing. Bobby started to walk down to the street. He walked from shop to shop. Everything seemed so beautiful and so far away. It was getting dark. Suddenly he found a shiny dime (一角硬币) on the ground. Never has anyone felt so wealthy as Bobby did at the moment. It was enough to buy a rose with one dime.

He went inside a flower shop. When the owner asked if he could help him, Bobby took out the dime and asked if he could buy one flower. The shop owner looked at Bobby, then said, “You just wait here and I’ll see what I can do for you.”

The shop owner returned holding a dozen of red roses in his hand. Bobby’s heart sank (下沉) as the owner put them gently into a long white box. “That will be a dime, young man,” said the shop owner, reaching out his hand for the dime. Slowly, Bobby moved his hand to give the man his dime.

Then the shopkeeper’s wife appeared. “Where are the red roses?”

The shop owner said, “A strange thing happened to me this morning. I thought I heard a voice telling me to leave a dozen of my best roses for a special gift. When I saw that little boy tonight, I knew who that voice was.”

1.The underlined phrase “lacked in” means _____.

     A. had less            B. gave up      C. had more     D. looked down upon

2.Bobby slowly gave the dime to the shop owner because _____.

    A. he wanted to buy other things

    B. he needed to give the dime to his mum

    C. the roses were too expensive

        D. he could hardly believe what had happened

3.From the last two paragraphs we can infer that the shop owner _____.

    A. was moved by the boy’s voice

    B. was ready to help others

    C. knew the boy before

   D. was good at telling stories