One night I was sitting in my room half-listening as my 15-year-old brother Tommy fought with my 12-year-old brother Kevin. I didn’t pay attention when Kevin rushed up the stairs with the hurt on his face.

About 20 minutes later, as I was walking upstairs I heard Kevin crying inside the bathroom. I knocked on the door and asked, “Hey Kevin, do you want to talk?”

No answer.

I tried again, “Why don’t you come out of there?”

Again, no answer.

So, joking around, I grabbed a stack of （一摞）cards and a pencil and wrote, “If you don’t want to talk, we can write notes to each other.”

An hour later I was still sitting on the floor outside the bathroom with two stacks of cards in front of me. One was blank and one was cards from Kevin on which he had translated all his yucky feelings into words for me. As I read one of Kevin’s notes, tears came to my eyes. It said, “Nobody in this family cares about me. I’m not the youngest, and I’m not the oldest. Tommy thinks I’m silly and Dad wishes he had the other Kevin as a kid because he’s better at basketball. And you’re never around to even notice me.”

Tears came to my eyes as I wrote back to him. “You know Kevin, I really do love you and I’m sorry I don’t always show it. I am here for you and you are loved in this family.”

There was no answer for a while, but then I heard a tearing sound coming from inside the bathroom. Kevin, who had run out of cards wrote on a torn paper cup. “Thanks.”

I wrote back “For what?” it returned to me with “Loving me” on it.

Since then, I try my best to never only half-notice my family members any more. Kevin and I have a closer relationship now. And sometimes when one of us notices that the other is upset, we’ll smile and say “Write it on a paper cup.”

1.The underlined word “yucky” most probably means ____.

     A. upset     B. exciting     C. terrible     D. amazing

2.What could be the reason that Kevin’s Dad doesn’t like him?

A.Kevin is not as clever as his brother.

B.He is neither the youngest nor the oldest.

C.Kevin doesn’t like to make friends with others.

D.Kevin is not good at playing basketball.

3.What do we know about the writer?

A.She has two children in her family.

B.She didn’t pay enough attention to Kevin before.

C.She used to show her love to Kevin.

D.She has a closer relationship with Tommy after that.

4.What does the writer want to tell us?

A.Everyone should show how they love their family members.

B.It’s hard to get on well with family members.

C.It’s important to keep peace in the family.

D.We should try our best to stop our children from fighting.

 

Long long ago, a king had a big rock placed in the middle of a very busy road. Then he hid nearby to see if anyone would move the rock out of the way to make it convenient for others. Some of the king’s supporters came past and simply walked around it. Many others complained(抱怨) about the rock. To the king’s surprise, no one tried to move it out of the way.

    Finally, a poor farmer came along, carrying a load of old vegetables. When he saw the rock, he put down his load, and tried to move the heavy rock to the side of the road. No one stopped to help him. At last, after much pushing and straining, and with no help, the farmer got the rock to the side of the road. As he bent down to pick up his vegetables, he found a small bag lying in the road. There was a lot of money and a note in the bag. The note was from the king. It said that the money was for the person who moved the rock out of the way.

    Taking responsibility（责任）is about solving hard problems. The farmer takes responsibility when no one else is prepared to. It does not always mean that you will get a reward(报酬), but it is a value that builds up a community, and makes life better for all of us.

1.Why did the king put a big rock in the middle of the road?

A. To see if anyone would move the rock away.

B. To see who was the most powerful.

C. To find out who was the most poorest.

D. To see how people walked around it.

2. Who moved the rock away?

A. The king.  B. The king’s supporters.  C. The wealthy.  D. A poor farmer.

3. The story mainly tells us that _________.

A. everyone should learn to take responsibility

B. nobody likes to solve hard problems

C. taking responsibility always means getting a reward

D. the poor always take more responsibility than the rich

 

    If you want to become a fluent(流利的)English speaker you should take some advice: There are four skills in learning English. They are reading, listening, speaking, and writing. The most important thing you must remember is that if you want to improve your speaking and writing skills you should first master the skills of reading and listening.

    Read as much as you can. But your reading must be active. It means that you must think about the meaning of the sentence, the meanings of the unfamiliar words, etc. There is no need for you to pay much attention to grammars or try to understand all the unfamiliar words you come across, but the fact that you see them for the first time and recognize them whenever you see them, for example in other passages or books, is enough. It would be better to prepare yourself a notebook so you can write down the important words or sentences in it_

    As for listening, there are two choices: besides reading, you can listen every day for about 30 minutes. You can only pay attention to your reading and become skillful at your reading, then you can catch up on your listening. Since you have lots of inputs in your mind, you can easily guess what the speaker is going to say. This never means that you should not practice listening.

    For listening you can listen to cartoons or some movies that are specially made for children.  Their languages are easy. Or if you are good at listening you can listen to VOA or BBC programs every day. Again the thing to remember is being active in listening and preferably taking some notes.

    If you follow these pieces of advice, your speaking and writing will improve automatically, and you can be sure that with a little effort they will become perfect.

46. According to the author, which should you improve first among the four skills?

    A. Reading and writing.                    B. Reading and listening.

    C. Writing and speaking.                         D. Speaking and listening.

47. The underlined phrase "come across" in Paragraph 2 can probably be replaced by "_______".

    A. meet by accident                                B. discover

    C. find on purpose                           D. look for

48. The author seems to agree with the view that_______.

    A. everyone should listen to VOA or BBC programs every day

    B. you needn't practice listening if you keep on reading every day

    C. being good at reading is helpful in improving your listening

    D. you should take notes of whatever you are hearing

49. The passage is mainly about how to_______.

    A. choose suitable listening materials

    B. deal with new words in reading

    C. read as many English books as possible

    D. become fluent in speaking and writing English

    If you want to become a fluent(流利的)English speaker you should take some advice: There are four skills in learning English. They are reading, listening, speaking, and writing. The most important thing you must remember is that if you want to improve your speaking and writing skills you should first master the skills of reading and listening.

    Read as much as you can. But your reading must be active. It means that you must think about the meaning of the sentence, the meanings of the unfamiliar words, etc. There is no need for you to pay much attention to grammars or try to understand all the unfamiliar words you come across, but the fact that you see them for the first time and recognize them whenever you see them, for example in other passages or books, is enough. It would be better to prepare yourself a notebook so you can write down the important words or sentences in it_

    As for listening, there are two choices: besides reading, you can listen every day for about 30 minutes. You can only pay attention to your reading and become skillful at your reading, then you can catch up on your listening. Since you have lots of inputs in your mind, you can easily guess what the speaker is going to say. This never means that you should not practice listening.

    For listening you can listen to cartoons or some movies that are specially made for children.  Their languages are easy. Or if you are good at listening you can listen to VOA or BBC programs every day. Again the thing to remember is being active in listening and preferably taking some notes.

    If you follow these pieces of advice, your speaking and writing will improve automatically, and you can be sure that with a little effort they will become perfect.

46. According to the author, which should you improve first among the four skills?

    A. Reading and writing.                    B. Reading and listening.

    C. Writing and speaking.                         D. Speaking and listening.

47. The underlined phrase "come across" in Paragraph 2 can probably be replaced by "_______".

    A. meet by accident                                B. discover

    C. find on purpose                           D. look for

48. The author seems to agree with the view that_______.

    A. everyone should listen to VOA or BBC programs every day

    B. you needn't practice listening if you keep on reading every day

    C. being good at reading is helpful in improving your listening

    D. you should take notes of whatever you are hearing

49. The passage is mainly about how to_______.

    A. choose suitable listening materials

    B. deal with new words in reading

    C. read as many English books as possible

    D. become fluent in speaking and writing English