The clock struck eleven at night. The whole house was quiet. Everyone was in bed except me. Under the strong light, I looked sadly before me at a huge pile of that troublesome stuff they call “books”.
I was going to have my examination the next day. “When can I go to bed?” I asked myself. I didn’t answer. In fact I dared not.
The clock struck twelve. “Oh, dear!” I cried. “Ten more books to read before I can go to bed!” We pupils are the most wretched creatures in the world. Dad does not agree with me on this. He did not have to work so hard when he was a boy.
The clock struck one. I was quite desperate now. I forgot all I had learned. I was too tired to go on. I did the only thing I could. I prayed, “Oh God, please help me pass the exam tomorrow. I do promise to work hard afterwards, Amen.” My eyes were so heavy that I could hardly open them. A few minutes later, with my head on the desk, I fell asleep.
【小题1】 The underlined word “wretched” in Paragraph 3 probably means ____________.

In our discussion with people on how education can help them succeed in life, a woman remembered the first meeting of an introductory____course about 20 years ago.

The professor ____the lecture hall, placed upon his desk a large jar filled with dried beans（豆）, and invited the students to _  _how many beans the jar contained. After ____shouts of wildly wrong guesses the professor smiled a thin, dry smile, announced the ____ answer, and went on saying,” You have just ___an important lesson about science. That is Never____ your own senses.”

Twenty years later, the ___could guess what the professor had in mind. He ____himself, perhaps, as inviting his students to start an exciting____into an unknown world

Invisible（无形的）to the     ,which can be discovered only through scientific         .But the seventeen-year-old girl could not accept or even         the invitation. She was just        to understand the world. And she        that her firsthand experience could be the        .The professor, however, said that it was      .he was taking away her only      for knowing and was providing her with no substitute. “I remember feeling small and         ,”the women says, “and I did the only thing I could do.  I           the course that afternoon, and I haven’t gone near science since.”

1.A .art      B. history    C. science      D. math

2.A. searched for  B. looked at         C. got through   D. marched  into

3.A. count          B. guess    C. report   D. watch

4.A. warning      B. giving    C. turning away D. listening to

5.A. ready          B. possible         C. correct D. difficult

6.A. learned      B. prepared       C. taught   D. taken

7.A. lose      B. trust         C. sharpen         D. show

8.A. lecturer       B. scientist     C. speaker         D. woman

9.A. described    B. respected C. saw        D. served

10.A. voyage       B. movement          C. change D. rush

11.A. professor     B. eye          C. knowledge       D. light

12.A. model       B. senses         C. spirit          D. methods

13.A. hear         B. make         C. present        D. refuse

14.A. suggesting    B. beginning      C. pretending      D. waiting

15.A. believed      B. doubted       C. proved         D. explained

16.A. growth        B. strength      C. faith            D. truth

17.A .firm          B. interesting      C. wrong           D. acceptable

18.A. task          B. tool         C. success          D. connection

19.A. cruel         B. proud       C. frightened       D. brave

20.A. dropped       B. started      C. passed           D .missed

阅读理解 （共20小题; 每小题2分,满分40分）

阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项（A、B、C和D）中，选出最佳选项。

I felt encouraged by his words and began to swim more calmly.But my clothes stuck to me like a heavy weight.I could hardly stay above the surface.

Counsel saw this.“Shall I cut them?”he asked.

With a knife he cut my clothes from top to bottom and took them of quickly while I swam for both of us.

Then I did the same for Counsel,and we continued to swim near each other.

 But we were in serious trouble.The crew（船员）might not have noticed our disappearance.

And if they had,they could not return because the rudder（舵）had broken.Counsel thought of all this,and calmly made his plans.We decided to wait for the ship as long as possible,because we had no other hope of safety.I suggested that we save our strength so that both of us would not be tired out at the same time.This was how we did it:While one of us lay on his back,quite still,with arms crossed and legs stretched out（伸直）,the other would swim and push him along.We changed every ten minutes or so.In this way we could swim for hours,perhaps till daylight.The crash（破裂声）of the ship and the whale（鲸）had appeared at about eleven o’clock.We had about eight hours to swim before daylight.This seemed possible,if the sea remained calm.

What happened to the man who told the story?

A.He and his companion got into the water to test their strength.

B.He jumped into the water to save the broken rudder.

C.He was knocked into the water by his enemy.

D.He was thrown into the sea when the ship struck a whale.

Why did the two men cut their clothes?

A.Because no people helped them to take off their clothes.

B.Because they couldn’t take off their clothes on the sea.

C.Because they wanted to get rid of their clothes quickly.

D.Because they wanted to lifebuoys（救生圈）with their clothes.

What does the word “still” in the last paragraph mean?

A.not moving                    B.even                        C.yet                          D.however

n order to save their strength,______.

A.one of them pushed the other while swimming and then they changed

B.they both swam calmly

C.they crossed their arms and stretched their legs on the water

D.they lay on their backs instead of swimming

Which one of the following is true?

A.Neither of the two men was good swimmers.

B.The sea was calm before eleven o’clock that night.

C.The story took place at night.

D.The two men had to swim eight hours to catch up with the ship.

There was a time when I thought my dad didn’t know a thing about being a good father. I couldn’t   36  him ever saying the words “I love you.” It seems to me his only purpose in life was to say “  37  ” to anywhere I wanted to go and anything I wanted to do, including getting a   38 . Some parents bought their kids cars when they got their driver’s licenses. Not my dad ---- he said that I’d have to get a job and buy my own.
So that is what I did. I got a job at a very nice restaurant and   39  every penny I could and   40  I had enough to buy my car, I did! The day I brought that car home, my dad was the first one I wanted to   41  to. “Look, dad, a car of my own. If you ever want a ride, I’ll only   42 you five dollars.” I offered with a smile.
“I see,” was all he said.
One day, there was something wrong with my father’s truck. So he needed a   43  to work. The sun wasn’t even up when we left the house ,   44  it was already getting warm out. It was going to be a(n)   45  day. As I dropped my dad off, I   46  him, dressed in his work clothes, getting his   47  from the truck (车尾箱) of my car. Watching his sun-weathered face, and even from a distance I could tell there were   48  lines than I ever remembered being there before. I realized how hard my dad works for the family. My father is a cement finisher(水泥修整工).
In that instant, it  49  to me that he actually got down on his hands and knees to sweat over hot concrete to make a living for his family. And he did this day in and day out,   50  hot it got. Never, not once, had I hear him   51  about it. To him we were “worth” it. And never once did he “charge” us for it.
When he closed the trunk, his tools set off to the side, he walked over to my window to   52  me five dollars. I rolled down the window and said “Good-bye, dad. Keep your five dollars. It’s my   53 . Don’t work too hard. I love you.”
His   54  met mine, then glanced away in the direction of his waiting tools, he   55  his throat and said, “Oh, and… me, too.”

The clock struck eleven at night. The whole house was quiet. Everyone was in bed except me. Under the strong light, I looked sadly before me at a huge pile of that troublesome stuff(东西) they call “books”.

I was going to have my examination the next day.  “When can I go to bed?” I asked myself. I didn’t answer, In fact I dared not.

The clock struck twelve. “Oh, dear!” I cried. “Ten more books to read before I can go to bed!” We pupils are the most wretched creatures in the world. Dad does not agree with me on this. He did not have to work so hard when he was a boy.

The clock struck one. I was quite desperate(绝望的) now. I forgot all I had learned. I was too tired to go on. I did the only thing I could. I prayed, “Oh, God, please help me pass the exam tomorrow. I do promise to work hard afterwards, Amen.” My eyes were so heavy that I could hardly open them. A few minutes later, with my head on the desk, I fell asleep.

When the author was going over his lessons, all the others in the house were______ .

A. asleep    B. outside    C. working in bed    D. quietly laughing at him

The underlined word “wretched” in Paragraph 3 probably means _______.

A. very happy    B. disappointed    C. very unhappy    D. hopeful

What do you suppose happened to the author?

A. He went to a church to pray again.          B. He passed the exam by sheer luck.

C. He failed in the exam.                                  D. He was punished by his teacher.

The best title for the passage would be __________ .

A. The Night Before the Examination          B. Working Far into the Night

C. A Slow Student                                     D. Going Over My Lessons