What is language for? Some people seem to think it's for practising grammar rules and learning lists of words—the longer the lists，the better. That's wrong. Language is for the exchange（交流）of ideas and information. It's meaningless knowing all about a language if you can't use it freely. Many students I have met know hundreds of grammar rules, but they can't speak correctly or fluently（流利地）. They are afraid of making mistakes. One shouldn't be afraid of making mistakes when speaking a foreign language. Native speakers make mistakes and break rules, too. Bernard Shaw once wrote, "Foreigners often speak English too correctly. "But the mistakes that native speakers make are different from those that Chinese students make. They're English mistakes in the English language. And if enough native speakers break a rule, it is no longer a rule. What used to be wrong becomes right. People not only make history, they make language. But a people can only make its own language. It can't make another people's language. So Chinese students of English should pay attention to grammar, but they shouldn't overdo（做过头）it. They should put communication（交际）first.　
1．Language is used to ________.
A. express oneself　　     　       B. practice grammar rules
C. talk with foreigners only            D. learn lists of words
2．Generally, when an American or an Englishman speaks English, he ________.
A. never makes mistakes　　          B. often makes mistakes
C. can't avoid making mistakes         D. always makes mistakes
3．"Foreigners often speak English too correctly. "This sentence means that ________.
A. foreigners speak correct English   
B. foreigners speak incorrect English
C. foreigners speak English according to the grammar rules
D. foreigners never make mistakes when they speak English
4．If too many native speakers break a rule,  ________.
A. what they use will become right       B. they are against the law
C. they should say sorry to others        D. they will become heroes

第三部分：阅读理解（共20小题，每题2分）
Bamboo (竹子) is one of nature’s (自然) most surprising plants． Many people call this plant a tree, but it is a kind of grass．
Like other kinds of grass, a bamboo plant may be cut very low to the ground, but it will grow back very quickly． A Japanese scientist reported one bamboo plant which grew 1.5 meters (4 feet) in 24 hours! Bamboo grows almost everywhere in the world except Europe． There are more than 1, 000 kinds of bamboo．
Not all bamboo looks the same． Some bamboo plants are very thin． They may only grow to be a few centimeters wide while others may grow to more than 30 centimeters (1 foot) across． This plant also comes in different colors, from yellow to black to green．
Bamboo has been used to make many things such as hats and kitchen tools(厨房用具)． Because it is strong, bamboo is also used to build buildings．
Many Asian countries have used bamboo for hundreds of years． They often use bamboo for buildings and supporting (支撑) new buildings and bridges while they are being built．
In Africa, poor farmers are taught how to find water using bamboo． These African countries need cheap way to find water because they have no money, and their fields often die from no rain and no water．Bamboo pipes (管子) help poor farmers bring water to their thirsty fields without spending a lot of money．
1．How is bamboo like grass?
A．It grows quickly． B．It’s wood．    C．it is easy to cut．  D．It is very thin．
2．Though you can see bamboo everywhere, it doesn’t grow      ．
A．in China      B．in Europe C．on mountains   D．in Africa
2．Why is bamboo used by African poor farmers? Because       ．
A．it is cheap B．it has different colors  C．it is strong   D．it has been used by Asians
3．In Asia, bamboo has been used for     ．
A．a short time                    B．many thousands of years
C．many hundreds of years          D．about 100 years

Primary teachers are responsible for guiding children through the formation of many important life skills, and also watching over their students’ social development. Primary teachers come into contact with about 30 students every day, and teach them a variety of subjects. Many hours are spent before and after class on planning, preparation and correction. One should be a very patient, caring, yet firm person to be able to deal with the demands of children in the four to twelve-year-old age group.
Secondary teachers teach specific subjects to various groups of students. Just like primary teachers, they spend an amount of time planning and preparing lessons and correcting homework—their duties are not restricted to face-to-face teaching. Dealing with twelve to eighteen-year-olds requires a wide range of skills.
If you become a primary teacher, you will need to decided whether to be a “generalist (多面手)”, teaching a wide range of subjects, or a "specialist", teaching only one or two. Most primary teachers are specialists. Generalist teachers spend the greatest part of their day with one class, which means that they spend more time with the same children. Specialist teachers have more time away from their students. It is therefore very important for generalist teachers to develop a strong working relationship with their students.
The unique rapport (和谐) you can develop with a particular set of students is one of teaching’s greatest pleasures. However, the disadvantage of primary teaching is that if you have a difficult student, you will be forced to deal with him or her, all day, every day, throughout the school year. Teachers need to work out strategies to get themselves and their students through such difficulties.
Primary teachers today are generally four-year trained. They usually do a three or four-year undergraduate degree, and if this degree does not include teacher training, they will have to undertake postgraduate study in education as well.
1. After class primary teachers usually_____________
A. come into contact with students          
B. teach students a variety of subjects
C. deal with the demands of children      
D. make planning, preparation and correction
2. What does the third paragraph mainly discuss?
A. What a primary teacher needs to do in the classroom.
B. The differences between generalist and specialist teaching.
C. How a primary teacher should try his best in the school.
D. The relationship between the primary teachers and students.
3. We can learn from this passage that___________
A. a primary teacher needs a wide range of skills
B. the disadvantage of primary teaching is having difficult students
C. teacher training is not important for a primary teacher
D. secondary teachers mainly teach children two subjects
4. The author writes the article in order to_________
A. tell teachers how primary teachers guide students
B. tell teachers what you should do as a primary teacher
C. let readers know more about primary teachers
D. let readers know how to be a primary teacher

Cellphone feels like a part of your body? A global survey has found that most people can’t live without their mobiles, never leave home without them and, if given a choice, would rather lose their wallet.
Calling mobile phones the “remote control” for life, market research firm Synovate’s poll said cell phones are so ubiquitous that by last year more humans owned one than did not.
Three-quarters of the more than 8,000 respondents polled online in 11 countries said they take their phone with them everywhere, which Russians and Singaporeans the most attached.
More than a third also said they couldn’t live without their phone, topped by Taiwanese and again Singaporeans, while one in four would find it harder to replace the mobile than their purse.
Some two thirds of respondents go to bed with their phones nearby and can’t switch them off, even though they want to, because they’re afraid they’ll miss something.
Mobiles have changed the nature of relationships, with the survey finding a fifth of all respondents set up first dates via text and almost the same number use the same method to end a love affair.
Apart from the obvious calling and SMS-ing, the top three features people use regularly on their mobile phones globally are the alarm clock, the camera and the games.
As for email and Internet access, 17 percent of respondents said they checked their inboxes or surfed the Web on their phones, led by those in the United States and Britain.
One in 10 respondents log onto(注册) social networking websites such as Facebook and MySpace regularly via mobile, again led by Britain and the United States.
Not everyone is tech savvy(科技通), however,37 percent of respondents said they don’t know how to use all the functions on their phone.
1. How many people of all respondents end a love affair via text?
A. About 4,800.                          B. About 3,600.
C. About 2,400.                          D. About 1,600.
2. According to the survey,       like surfing the Internet with a cellphone most.
A. Singaporeans    B. Russians            C. Americans            D. Chinese
3. Which of the following functions of cellphones is the least used?
A. Calling.                                  B. Playing games.
C. Taking photos.                            D. Surfing the Internet.
4. Which would be the best title of the passage?
A. People can live better without the cellphone.
B. People would rather lose their wallet than their cellphone.
C. Different uses of the cellphone.
D. New functions of the cellphone.

Why should I teach my children history? That sounds like a stupid question to even ask. But, as I hear different home schooling teachers discuss history, I get the idea that there may be different reasons for teaching history. Let me briefly explain the three good reasons for studying history and two bad reasons for studying history.
The major reason I see for studying history is that we can learn from the past. I am convinced that the world would be a much better place if more people understood the successes and failures of the past and the things that made these successes and failures. However, as the unfortunately true statement goes “the one thing we seem to learn from history is that we don’t seem to learn from history. ”Perhaps at least in teaching history, to my children I can do a small part in changing this.
A second major reason for studying history is that it is hard to understand the current political climate in the absence of an understanding of its historical context. We can not even understand who we are and where we are without history, much less try to figure out where we are going or how we should get where we want to be.
I teach my children history, for one more reason. I purchased a set of historical audio tapes for our children. My seven-year-old son listened to them over and over. It was my hope that he would become inspired by the accomplishments of people like the Wright brothers to accomplish things by himself. I think that it is good that we celebrate the accomplishments of people like Martin Luther King Jr. In doing so, young people are called on to stand for the principles that he stood for and accomplish what he accomplished. I also think that by studying people like Adolph Hitler, people can learn to stand against the things that he stood for.
1. What message can we get from the underlined sentence in Paragraph 2?
A. Many people aren’t clever enough to learn well from the past.
B. Many people fail to make good use of history and make the same mistakes.
C. Many people feel it hard to understand history.
D. Many people have no interest in studying history.
2. In Paragraph 3, the author shows that history is useful because
A. it makes the current political situation go smoothly
B. it helps us realize the importance of historical events
C. it helps us understand why things are the way they are
D. it helps people accept the present situation where they live
3. Some historical figures are mentioned in the last paragraph to show
A. people can be inspired to do good, while also learning to fight against evil
B. people may also learn from bad historical figures
C. more celebrations should be held to honor their achievements
D. today’s people can also achieve what they achieved
4. What would be talked about in the following paragraph?
A. How to teach history effectively.         
B. Some negative reasons for studying history.
C. How to get more people to study history.  
D. Some bad historical figures.

It was reported today that in China, 56% of people who write blogs(博客) do so as a personal diary and 83% use their blogs for sending messages to friends. It was also found that there is a strong East- West difference. In places like the US, blogs that offer information on news attract more readers but in China, blogs are more likely to be about sharing personal feelings.
It seems that bloggers can be divided into three types: IT(信息技术) bloggers, bloggers who record their ordinary feelings and media（媒体） bloggers.
When blogging first started, the IT people had the technological advantage and they took the chance to put their thoughts on the web. Some of these IT people now have had over a million people read their blogs.
The next wave of bloggers did not have any training as writers or in IT and wrote about normal daily life. Media bloggers, however, are trained writers, such as journalists and editors. When the many media bloggers showed up, the everyday bloggers lost most of their readers. Media bloggers have the advantage of knowing how to communicate well through the written words.
However, the normal bloggers are still out there and increasing in number. It seems that blogging is the new way to express your feelings. People feel like the world is listening to, or rather reading, their problems, even if they are not.
1. From the passage we know that________.
A.56% of the Chinese write blogs
B. people in US like to read blogs for news
C. the Chinese share feelings with each other mainly through blogs
D. the way that Chinese use blogs is not different from the West
2. ________wrote more blogs at the very beginning and now have more readers than others.
A.IT bloggers    B. Media bloggers    C. Normal bloggers   D. US bloggers
3. Which of the following is true according to the passage?
A. There will be more and more normal bloggers.
B. Only bloggers express their feelings through the Internet.
C. All people in the world are listening to the bloggers’ voice.
D. Media bloggers have more readers because of their popularity.
4.The underlined expression in the passage can be best replaced by “________”.
A. increased.      B. appeared .        C. arrived.          D. grew.

The best way to improve your reading ability is, of course, to read. The student must make a real effort to improve his speed, and if necessary his comprehension, with each exercise. Too many students read passages passively（被动的） and without judgment: they simply start at the first word and read through to the end. You should read a passage actively, selectively（选择地） and purposely. You must believe that you indeed have the ability to read faster and understand, and that you will.
Reading, like everything else in life, is best done when you’re relaxed. The key to improve it is concentration. You must be willing to break some old habits and form new ones. Extra body movement, such as turning the head from side to side, pointing at the line with a finger or pencil, or moving the lips, should be stopped immediately. Reading is mostly a mental process(大脑活动过程) and body movement helps neither speed nor comprehension. Then you should see words as part of a whole sentence or paragraph, not just in isolation(孤立), This is why a slow, word-by-word student often understands far less, or misses much of the joy and excitement of reading.
The student must learn to improve reading skills on their own, and not just when a teacher is looking over his shoulder. Reading improvement takes discipline（纪律） and effort. Don’t give up.
1. According to the author, how should we not read a passage?
A. actively        B passively.   C. purposely        D. selectively
2. You may conclude that whether you can improve your reading depends on________.
A. your attitude                      B. your good habits of reading
C. discipline                         D. all of the above
3. Which of the following is true according to the passage?        
A. When reading, you’d better point at the line with a pencil. 　　
B. When reading, you should turn your head from side to side.
C. When reading, you should pay attention to basic unit of meaning, that is a phrase or sentence that contains an idea.    
D. Body movement will help you to improve reading.
4. The best title for this passage is___________.
A. Reading Faster                         B. Understanding Better
C. How to Improve Your Reading             D. Don’t Give Up

第二部分：阅读理解（共20小题;每小题2.5分，满分50分）
阅读下列短文，从每题所给的A、B、C、D四个选项中，选出最佳选项。
Proper arrangement of classroom space is important to encouraging interaction. Most of us have noticed how important physical setting is to efficiency and comfort in our work. College classroom space should be designed to encourage the activity of critical thinking.
We have entered the 21st century, but step into almost any college classroom and you step back in time at least a hundred years. Desks are normally in straight rows, so students can clearly see the teacher but not all their classmates. The message behind such an arrangement is obvious. Everything of importance comes from the teacher.
With a little imagination and effort, unless desks are fixed to the floor, the teacher can correct this situation and create space that encourage interchange among students. In small or standard-size classes, chairs, desks, and tables can be arranged in a variety of ways. The primary goal should be for everyone to be able to see everyone else. Large classes, particularly those held in lecture halls, unfortunately, allow much less flexibility.
Arrangement of the classroom should also make it easy to divide students into small groups for discussion or problem-solving exercises. Small classes with movable desks and tables present no problem. Even in large lecture halls, it is possible for students to turn around and form groups of four to six. Breaking a class into small groups provides more opportunities for students to interact with each other, think out loud, and see how other students’ thinking processes operate all essential elements in developing new modes of critical thinking.
In courses that regularly use a small group format, students might be asked to stay in the same small groups throughout the course. A colleague of mine, John, allows students to move around during the first two weeks, until they find a group they are comfortable with. John then asks them to stay in the same seat, with the same group, from that time on. This not only creates a comfortable setting for interaction but helps him learn students’ names and faces.
1. The primary purpose of desk rearrangement is _______.
A. for the teacher to divide students into small groups.
B. to make it possible for students to interact with each other.
C. for the teacher to find out how students think.
D. to give students more opportunities to practice speaking.
2. The expression “step back in time at least a hundred years” in Paragraph 2 is intended to convey the idea that _______.
A. there is not much change in educational idea over the past hundred years
B. critical thinking was encouraged even a century ago
C. college classrooms often remind people of their college life
D. a hundred years ago, desk arrangement in a classroom was quite different
3. The greatest advantage in allowing each student to find his own group might be that________
A. learning is made comfortable in this way
B. the teacher can easily remember students’ names and faces
C. the teacher saves the trouble in doing that
D. brighter students can help slower ones.
4. It is implied in the passage that ______.
A. students are allowed to changed groups throughout the course in John’s class
B. classroom interaction between students is essential to the teachers
C. a comfortable environment leads to higher working efficiency
D. new kinds of desks and chairs should be made
5. The author mentioned John in the last paragraph in order to ________
A. create a comfortable setting for interaction
B. introduce an approach of learning students’ names and faces easily
C. give an example that students stay in the same seat throughout the course.
D. describe a good seat-arrangement mode in courses with small group format.

第二部分：阅读理解（共20小题;每小题2.5分，满分50分）
阅读下列短文，从每题所给的A、B、C、D四个选项中，选出最佳选项。
Do you know about a series of books that say they are "for dummies"? These American self-help books have been translated into more than thirty-nine languages, including Chinese, Arabic, Russian, French, German, Greek and Spanish.
"Dummy" is a word for a stupid person. The dummies books are not really for stupid people. They are designed to show people how to do something they may never have tried before, like painting a house or learning a language. The books all say in a funny way that they are for dummies, such as World History for Dummies, Rabbits for Dummies, Chinese Cooking for Dummies, and Wedding Planning for Dummies. The first such book, DOS for Dummies, was published in 1991. it helped people learn how to use the DOS operating system for computers. Since then, more than one hundred fifty million dummies books have been sold.
The dummies.com website explains the idea behind the books. It says that they show that people can be taught to do anything. First they can make fun of ideas that are difficult to understand. Then they show how the information can be interesting and easy. The publishers say that the books do not provide more information than necessary. They give readers just enough information to do what they want. They say that the dummies books give the best and easiest way to do something. And the books use simple and easy language.
There are more than one thousand different dummies books. A report in New York Times says that the top-selling dummies books are those that explain technology and personal finance.
The publishers say that the best-selling dummies books are those providing information many people need —like information about diseases, education and cooking. People interested in opera, car repair and wine can also find dummies books to help them. And there are even more dummies books to come. The publishers say that they publish about two hundred new dummies books every year.
1. Which of the following can be the best title of the passage?
A. Books for “Dummies”   
B. The Easiest, the Best
C. Self-Help Books            
D. New Ideas behind the Books
2. According to the dummies.com website, people can ______ with the help of dummies books.
A. simplify some personal things         
B. do anything they want
C. become expert in any field            
D. learn any foreign language
3. The dummies books have been popular because ______.
A. they provide just what is needed and are easy to understand
B. they provide abundant information on the concerning subject
C. people can learn to do anything with just one copy
D. people can save lots of money through self-teaching
4. According to New York Times, we know that books on ______ sell best.
A. technology and personal finance       
B. opera and car repairing
C. diseases and education               
D. cooking and world history
5. What can we learn from the passage?
A. The first dummies book was on Chinese cooking.
B. The dummies books will continue to be popular.
C. Fifty million different dummies books have been published.
D. The simple language was intended for child readers.

第三部分阅读理解（共15小题，每小题2分，共30分。）
阅读下列短文，从每题中的A、B、C、D四个选项中，选出最佳答案。
A NATIONWIDE BESTSELLER
It’s likely that everything you learned about America’s ancient history is wrong.
The new book, 1491, completely changes our understanding of the Americas before the arrival of Columbus in 1492.
DID YOU KNOW?
When Columbus landed there were probably more people in the Americas than there were in Europe.
The peoples of North America had such healthy life-styles that as late as the 19th century they continued to be the tallest people on earth.
Facts have shown that the Americas were populated as long as 33,000 years ago.
4,000 years ago Mesoamerican farmers developed corn in a feat (技艺) of genetic engineering that still isn’t completely understood.
COMMENTS ON 1491
“In the tradition of Jared Diamond & John McPhee, a totally new view of pie-Columbian America”                                                    --Richard Rhodes
“Attractively written and really absorbing ... Charles C. Mann has produced a book that’s part detective story, part epic (史诗) and part tragedy. He has taken on a vast topic: thousands of years, two huge continents, and cultures.”
-- Charles Matthews, San Jose Mercury News
“Powerful and challenging”
--Alan Taylor, Washington Post
“A pleasure to read as well as a wonderful education”              -- Howard Zinn
56. On the whole, 1491 is a book mainly about America’s_______ .
A. life-styles       B. population       C. history         D. agriculture
57. Which of the following is NOT TRUE about the comments on the book 1491 ?
A. It is interesting and instructive.        B. It is attractive and culturally related
C. It is challenging and revolutionary.     D. It is humorous and persuasive.
58. From this passage, we can learn______ .
A. people settled in the Americas a little earlier than 1492
B. North Americans were the tallest in the 18th century in the world
C. Mesoamerican farmers knew genetic engineering 5,000 years ago
D. the population in the Americas was smaller than that in Europe in 1492