The speaker, a teacher from a community college, addressed a sympathetic(赞同的) audience. Heads nodded in agreement when he said, “High school English teachers are not doing their jobs.” He described the inadequacies of his students, all high school graduates who can use language only at a grade 9 level. I was unable to determine from his answers to my questions how this grade 9 level had been established.

My topic is not standards nor its decline(降低). What the speaker was really saying is that he is no longer young; he has been teaching for sixteen years, and is able to think and speak like a mature adult.

　　My point is that the frequent complaint of one generation about the one immediately following it is inevitable. It is also human nature to look for the reasons for our dissatisfaction. Before English became a school subject in the late nineteenth century, it was difficult to find the target of the blame for language deficiencies (缺陷). But since then, English teachers have been under constant attack.

　　The complainers think they have hit upon an original idea. As their own command of the language improves, they notice that young people do not have this same ability. Unaware that their own ability has developed through the years, they assume the new generation of young people must be hopeless in this respect. To the eyes and ears of sensitive adults the language of the young always seems inadequate.

Since this concern about the decline and fall of the English language is not perceived(察觉) as a generational phenomenon but rather as something new and peculiar(特有的) to today’s          young people, it naturally follows that today’s English teachers cannot be doing their jobs. Otherwise, young people would not commit offenses against the language.

The speaker the author mentioned in the passage believed that _____.

A. the language of the younger generation is usually inferior(差的) to that of the older     

generation

B. the students had a poor command of English because they didn’t work hard enough

C. he was an excellent language teacher because he had been teaching English for sixteen  

years

D. English teachers should be held responsible for the students’ poor command of English

In the author’s opinion, the speaker ______.

A. gave a correct judgment of the English level of the students

B. had exaggerated(夸大) the language problems of the students

C. was right in saying that English teachers were not doing their jobs

D. could think and speak intelligently

The author’s attitude towards the speaker’s remarks is ______.

A. neutral                    B. positive                   C. critical             D. compromising

It can be concluded from the passage that ______.

A. it is justifiable(有理由的) to include English as a school subject

B. the author disagrees with the speaker over the standard of English at Grade 9 level

C. English language teaching is by no means an easy job

D. language improvement needs time and effort

In the passage the author argues that ______.

A. it is unfair to blame the English teachers for the language deficiencies of the students

B. young people would not commit offences against the language if the teachers did their 

jobs properly

C. to eliminate(消除) language deficiencies one must have sensitive eyes and ears

D. to improve the standard of English requires the effort of several generations

Television has changed our lives in many ways. Many people now spend more time watching TV than doing anything else. Researchers in the USA has estimated(估计)that when most students leave school they have spent 11,000 hours in the classroom and 22,000 hours watching television. But what effect does this have?
Benefits(好处) of television:
1. Television helps us to learn more about the world and to know and see many mew things. Television can offer present information to us in a more effective way than books. It can also make things more memorable.
2. It entertains (使欢乐) us. It is an enjoyable way to relax. For millions of people around the world, television is a source of companionship and helps them to cope with everyday life.
3. It has increased the popularity of sports and arts.
4. It has made us aware of our global responsibilities. In 2000, for example, 1.5billion people in 147 countries watched a TV pop concert and helped to collect more than $100million for people in Africa.
Dangers:
1. Television can make us passive (消极的). We don't have to think and our brains become lazy.
2. It encourages us to buy things that we don’t need, and can make us unhappy with our own life.
3. It takes time away from activities such as reading, conversation, and games.
4. It gives a false picture of society. A study in 2003 showed that people who watch a lot of TV are more afraid of crime. They also think that there is a lot more crime than there really is .
5. Some critics(批评家) say that television make people violent. A ten-year study in the United States showed that children who watch violent television programmes are more likely to be violent themselves.
【小题1】 What’s the proper description of the time American students spend on TV and study?

A．They spend twice as much time on TV as in the classroom.

B．They spend twice as much time in the classroom as on TV.

C．They spend as much time on TV as in the classroom.

D．They spend less time on TV than in the classroom/

【小题2】 The underlined word “memorable” is closed in meaning to    .

A．easy to be remembered	B．remembered forever
C．interesting	D．knowledgeable

【小题3】Which of the following number is NOT true of the pop concert mentioned in the passage?

A．People in more than 140 countries watched it on TV

B．It helped to collect more than $100 million

C．It was held in 2000.

D．1.5million people watched it on TV.

【小题4】 According to the passage, the dangers of watching TV too much included all the following except that    .

A．television can make us active

B．television encourages us to buy things that we don’t need

C．television gives us a worse picture of society

D．television takes time away from a lot of activities

George Spilich at Washington College in Chestertown, Maryland, decided to find out whether, as many smokers say, smoking helps them to “think and fix their attention on (集中精力于)their work”. Spilich put young non－smokers, active smokers and smokers deprived(被剥夺)of cigarettes through a series of tests.

In the first test, each subject sat before a computer screen and pressed a key as soon as he or she recognized a certain letter among a grouping of 96. In this simple test, smokers, deprived smokers and non－smokers performed equally well. The next test was more difficult, requiring all to scan(扫描) groups of 20 letters and find the one of the letters changed into a different one. Non－smokers were faster, but under the stimulation(刺激)of nicotine, active smokers were faster than deprived smokers. In the third test of short－term memory, non－smokers made the fewest mistakes, but deprived smokers made fewer mistakes than active smokers. The fourth test required people to read a passage, then answer questions about it. Non－smokers remembered 19 percent more of the most important information than active smokers, and deprived smokers did better than those who had smoked a cigarette just before testing. Active smokers were likely not only to have poorer memories but also had trouble separating important information from unimportant details.

“As our tests became more difficult，” says Spilich, “non－smokers performed better than smokers by far.” he says, “Smokers might perform adequately(准确)at many jobs until they got very difficult. A smoking airline pilot could fly adequately if no problems arose, but if something went wrong, smoking might damage his mental capacity(思维能力)．”

1. Smokers usually think that smoking ________.

A. helps them to be less nervous

B. helps them to do better work

C. helps them to think and act quickly

D. does some good to their health

2. George Spilich's experiment was organized in such a way as to ________.

A. force the subjects to separate major information from minor details

B. check the effectiveness of nicotine on smokers

C. put the subjects through increasing difficult test

D. make a written and formal record of the answers of the subjects

3. Which fact does this passage lead us to believe?

A. Active smokers generally performed better than deprived smokers.

B. Active smokers answered more quickly than the other subjects.

C. Deprived smokers gave the slowest answers to the various tasks.

D. Non－smokers were not better than other subjects in performing simple tasks.

4. We can infer from the last paragraph that ________.

A. smokers should not expect to become airline pilots

B. smokers may prove unequal to dealing with emergency (紧急) cases

C. no airline pilots smoke during flights

D. smoking in emergency cases causes mental illness

A few days ago I got a call from my old college friend whom I haven’t seen for a very long time. The topic, which was about all the good old times that we had changed to a touching story when he started talking about his father.　　
His father’s declining health made him stay at the hospital. Because of his illness, his father suffered from insomnia (失眠) and often talked to himself. My friend, who had not been able to sleep for a few days as he had to keep watching his father’s condition, became irritated and told his father to keep silent and try to get some sleep. His father said that he really wanted to sleep well because he was very tired and told my friend to leave him alone in the hospital if he did not want to keep him company.　　
After his father finished talking, he fell unconscious (失去知觉). My friend was very sorry for speaking the ill words towards his father. My friend, whom I knew as a tough person, cried as a baby on the other end of the telephone. He said that from that moment on, he prayed every day, asking God to let his father wake up from his coma. He promised himself that whatever words came out from his father’s mouth after he regained his consciousness, he would gladly take them. His only hope for God was to give him a chance to rectify his past mistake.　　
Often, we complain when we have to accompany or watch over our parents for years, months, days, hours or even minutes. But do we realize that our parents keep us company and watch over us for as long as we (or they) live? From the day we were born to our adulthood, and even when deaths come to us, they are always at our side.
Imagine how sad our parents will be when they hear a seemingly innocent word of “no” come out from our mouths. We can make promises to ourselves that from now on there will be no more complaints that come out from our mouths when we have to watch over or accompany our parents. No more complaints come out from our mouths when we feel that our parents have treated us like little children. There are so many unlucky ones who have neither fathers nor mothers. They long to have the things that we most complain about, but never have them.
Actually, it takes only a second to think and light the lamp that will bring us to a place where peace is dwelling.
【小题1】Which of the following word can be used to describe the writer’s friend?

A．Sad

B．Sorry

C．Regretful

D．Pitiful

【小题2】What does the underlined word “rectify” mean in Para. 3?

A．put…right

B．recite…by heart

C．realize

D．recognize

【小题3】What does the writer want to tell us in the passage?

A．Your parents will keep talking to themselves when they are old.

B．Be good to your parents when you still have the chance.

C．You will regret in your life if you don’t show your kindness to your parents.

D．It is not easy to take good care of sick old parents.

When I was twelve years old, my family were the first black people to move into an all white part of Grand Rapids, Michigan. Many of our new neighbors weren’t very welcoming. Some of them said angrily that we should return to where we came from. The children sometimes threw stones at me .

Most of my teachers simply took no notice of me, but not Dorothy Bean, my history teacher. Miss Bean was angry at how badly I was being treated, but she didn’t say this to me. Miss Bean showed her respect for me by teaching me just like anyone else. Instead of being unnoticed, I was given a chance to show that I was clever. Miss Bean was the first teacher who ever made me think for myself. She always wanted to know what I thought about different questions. She expected me to have my own idea. Miss Bean was teaching me that thinking for oneself was the real key to education.

One day, when I was not paying attention in class, Miss Bean suddenly threw an eraser(黑板擦) at me. The eraser hit me right on the hand and sent my pencil flying. The whole class were very surprised at first, then started laughing. This event became famous in the school and, because it happened to me, the students wanted to get to know me. So that’s the story of how Dorothy Bean made me her target(靶子). However, what I want to do is express my thanks to her.

56. The author and his family were not welcomed by the local people because ____________.

A. they returned from another country     B. they have different skin color

C. they spoke a different language         D. they moved to a wrong place

57. From the end of the first paragraph we know that _____________.

A. children were more friendly to strangers

B. American schools were not safe for kids

C. children often follow their parents’ behavior

D. fighting each other is part of children’s nature

58. Miss Bean respected the author by ____________.

A. giving him special attention.

B. hitting him with an eraser.

C. giving him extra lessons.

D. treating him as one of her students.

59. To Miss Bean the most important thing for a student is to _________.

A. pay close attention to what the teacher says.

B. learn to think and have one’s own idea.

C. keep silent and unnoticed in class.

D. get special attention from the teacher.

60. Which is the writer’s attitude to Miss Bean?

A. Grateful.      B. Hateful.      C. Negative.       D. Supportive.