I've refused to allow my step son Jim to go to university because it will be too expensive and a waste
of time. People think I'm selfish or not kind-hearted. But I don't feel sorry for that, and I think more parents
will be coming around to my way of thinking. Britain's universities are failing to serve either the country or
our children. It's about time we voted (投票) with our feet.
        I can't remember when I began to change my mind on education. Like a lot of middle-class parents,
we had believed that going to university was what your children did. It's one of the reasons (理由) we offered
more than $ 100,000 in fees (学费) for Jim to go to a private (私立) school rather than a free public one.
Education is more important than nice cars, new kitchens or skiing holidays.
        Jim is a young boy of whom any parent would be proud. He's clever and helpful; he's good at things like
hanging pictures and mending doors; he can get on well with other kids. But he's shown little interest in study.
        It's not Jim's intellect (智力) that's the problem-after he entered the school he was asked to sit an exam
but an in-built reluctance (勉强) to do any more work than necessary to get by. We've tried everything to make
him work harder. None of it has worked. For his final exams, Jim got a D and two Es. Even allowing for our
low expectations (期望), this came as a surprise to his mother and me.
         "Surely," I said to one of Jim's teachers, "the only subject Jim would get on with such poor grades would
be the kind of subject that wouldn't be worth doing anyway."
         "Not at all," the teacher answered, as if speaking to a dinosaur. He read out the names of a lot of univer-
sities I'd never heard of, saying they'd all be fit for Jim. 
         It was at this point I realized how far away I was from today's education. I knew that, since I was at
school in the early 1980s-when a student with such poor grades as Jim's would not have been allowed to go to
any university-the population in the UK going on to higher education has gone up from 14% to a surprising 44%.

1. The reason the writer won't let Jim go to university is that _________.

A. the family is too poor to send Jim there
B. there are few universities in the UK
C. Jim won't be allowed to go to university
D. it's a waste of time and money to do so

2. What's Jim's main problem?

3. What is the teacher's idea in the passage?

A. He thinks the writer should encourage Jim to go to university.
B. He is sure most universities will certainly refuse to take Jim.
C. He is sure Jim's father is too old to understand today's education.
D. He thinks education in the UK has changed a lot in the past years.

4. From the passage we can infer（推论）_________.

A. some people can't follow the steps of the country
B. many young people don't go to university in the UK
C. parents are usually strongly against higher education
D. education in the UK is becoming worse and worse

     Afel was only a small boy when he first saw snow in a picture book. In the pictures he saw a lot of
children (1) ______ (play) in the snow.
    Afel didn't understand what snow was. But he dreamed about snow all the time. He dreamed of being
able (2) ______ (fly) across the snow.
    One day when he was twelve, Afel (3) ______ (watch) TV at his uncle's house. The program was
full of snow. Not only snow there were people flying across the snow.
      "Look! They (4) ______ (fly)!" he shouted excitedly.
     The snow, and the people… It was just like one of his dreams.
     "They're skiing. It needs snow," said his uncle, "it's the Winter Olympics. It (5) ______ (hold) every
four years."
     Afel (6)______ (find)out that the next Winter Olympics would be in Sochi, Russia in 2014.
     "Perfect," he thought. "Enough time for me to become a good skier. I (7)______(go) to the
Winter Olympics, and win the gold medal for skiing."
     "But there's no snow here!" people told him. "Where are you going to ski?"
     Afel made himself a pair of skis and skied across the sand. At first he couldn't move, but he practised
and practised until he could move quite quickly.
     "How will you go to the Winter Olympics?" people asked him. "Our country (8) ______ (not, have)
a team at all. Why (9) ______ (not, do) athletics (田径) instead? We have lots of good runners. And
we (10) ______ (win) lots of medals at the Olympics."
      Now Afel is practising skiing down sand dunes (沙丘). He dreams that the yellow sand and brown
earth of the desert (沙漠) is the white snow.