1 . I bought several packs of seeds, 24 small plastic seed pots, plant fertilizer and potting soil. I made sure the soil didn't contain added fertilizer. I wanted something that I could grow quickly, that wouldn't take up a lot of space and that wouldn't get too big. I ran this experiment in early fall in Maryland. So I knew I needed a plant that could grow when it's cool. I picked radishes (小萝卜), which grow well in the early fall or spring. Some varieties can grow a full radish in only 21 days.
I kept 12 of the pots and one pack of seeds for myself. I gave the other 12 pots and the other packet of seeds — along with some fertilizer and soil — to my editor, Sarah. This was to provide an additional control for location. After all, what if my yard just happens to be much better for growing plants? What if it's worse? By dividing the plants up between my yard and Sarah's, I hoped to make sure that any difference with the plants came from the fertilizer.
Sarah and I planted our seeds. Sometimes, seeds don’t sprout (发芽). So we carefully planted four evenly (相等地) spaced seeds in each pot. Six of my pots (and six of Sarah’s) served as controls — pots that would not get fertilizer. Our other six were treated with fertilizer. For each of us, this added up to 24 control seeds, and 24 seeds that would get fertilizer.
We watered all the plants equally with clean water every other day (unless it rained). Once a week, we applied fertilizer to half the pots. We also took pictures every day, so we could see the plants change over time. As I expected, many of our seeds didn't sprout. In fact, only about a fourth of mine sprouted. Sarah has a greener thumb. She successfully grew half of hers.
1. Why does the author want to grow such a plant?| A．To enjoy it. | B．To make it very cool. |
| C．To take up more space, | D．To make an experiment. |
| A．From the fertilizer used. | B．From the different way. |
| C．From the different soil. | D．From the seeds used. |
| A．The experiment is successful. | B．The author is respectful to her editor. |
| C．The author is considerate. | D．The process of the experiment is complex. |
| A．She's fond of growing plants. | B．She's smarter than the author. |
| C．She has a gifted for growing plants. | D．She's a devoted and friendly woman. |
2 . If you were to throw, say, a banana peel out of your car while driving along the motorway, that would be a completely harmless action, due to the fact that it’s part of a fruit — right? Actually, no. A banana peel can take up to two years to be naturally processed, and with a third of motorists admitting to littering while driving, that’s a whole lot of discarded banana peels. An orange peel and a cigarette butt has a similar biodegrading (生物降解) term to that of a banana peel, but tin cans last up to 100 years; and plastic bottles last forever, as do glass bottles.
Despite the fact that longer-lasting materials will serve to damage the environment and its animals for longer, we can’t merely measure the severity of a certain type of rubbish by its lifetime. For example, despite having a fairly short length of biodegrading time, more than 120 tons of cigarette-related litter is discarded in the UK every day.
It’s not a cheap habit either: to keep our streets clean annually costs UK taxpayers £500 million, and when you include our green spaces, that goes up to £1 billion. So, it’s not surprising that if caught fly-tipping you could face a £20,000 fine or even jail time and, if you disposed of something dangerous, the court could give you five years to serve. Regardless of how severe these punishments might seem, however, among the reported cases only 2,000 were found guilty out of 825,000, so we still have some way to go in making sure people obey the rules.
1. What does the underlined word “discarded” in para1 mean?| A．Harmless. | B．Processed. | C．Thrown. | D．Long-lasting. |
| A．Glass bottles. | B．Tin cans. | C．Cigarette butts. | D．Banana peels. |
| A．The severity of rubbish can be measured by its lifetime. |
| B．Quite a few people were found guilty of illegally littering. |
| C．Every year UK taxpayers spend £500 million keeping streets free of dirt. |
| D．Cigarette-related litter and peels can be ignored for their fairly short lifetime. |
| A．To inform readers of different biodegrading terms. |
| B．To call for people not to litter illegally. |
| C．To encourage people to use fewer plastic bags. |
| D．To stress the importance of good behavior. |
3 . I have always found the Chinese to be a very polite people. In particular, Chinese frequently compliment (称赞) foreign friends on their language skills, knowledge of Chinese culture, professional accomplishments, and personal health. Curiously, however, Chinese are as loath to accept a compliment as they are eager to give one. As many of my Chinese friends have explained, this is a sign of the Chinese virtue of modesty.
I have noticed a difference, though, in the degree to which modesty is emphasized in the United States and China. In the US, we tend to place more emphasis on “seeking the truth from fact”, thus, Americans tend to accept a compliment with gratitude.
Chinese, on the other hand, tend to reject the compliment, even when they know they deserve the credit or recognition which has been awarded them. I can imagine a Chinese basketball fan meeting Michael Jordan of the Chicago Bulls. He might say, “Mr. Jordan, I am so happy to meet you. I just want to tell you, you are the best basketball player in the world; you’re the greatest!” to which Jordan would probably respond, “Thank you very much. I really appreciate it! I just to try to do my best every time I step on the court.” If an American met Deng Yaping, China’s premier pingpong player, he might say much the same thing: “Ms. Deng, you’re the best!” but as a Chinese, Deng would probably say, “No, I really don’t play all that well. You’re too much kind.”
Plainly, Americans and Chinese have different ways of responding to praise. Ironically, many Americans might consider Ms. Deng’s response the less modest, because it is less truthful—and therefore less sincere. Americans generally place sincerity above manners; genuine gratitude for the praise serves as a substitute for protestations of modesty. After all, in the words of one of my closest Chinese friends, modesty taken to the extreme is pride.
1. What does the underlined word “loath” in paragraph 1 refer to?| A．Polite. | B．Uncertain. | C．Curious. | D．Unwilling. |
| A．To note they do as much as they can each time they play against others. |
| B．To remind readers they are the best players in basketball and table tennis. |
| C．To explain they deserve the credit or recognition for their great contributions. |
| D．To show they as Chinese and Americans are different in accepting praise. |
| A．They think sincerity matters the most. | B．They think her reply is against the fact. |
| C．They think she is too modest to believe. | D．They think manners is more important. |
| A．Education. | B．Sports. | C．Culture. | D．People. |
A new review based on a research shows that acute stress affects the way the brain considers the advantages and disadvantages, causing it to focus on pleasure and ignore the possible negative (负面的) consequences of a decision.
The research suggests that stress may change the way people make choices in predictable ways.
“Stress affects how people learn,” says Professor Mara Mather. “People learn better about positive than negative outcomes under stress.”
For example, two recent studies looked at how people learned to connect images(影像) with either rewards or punishments. In one experiment, some of the participants were first stressed by having to give a speech and do difficult math problems in front of an audience; in the other, some were stressed by having to keep their hands in ice water. In both cases, the stressed participants remembered the rewarded material more accurately and the punished material less accurately than those who hadn’t gone through the stress.
This phenomenon is likely not surprising to anyone who has tried to resist eating cookies or smoking a cigarette while under stress –at those moments, only the pleasure associated with such activities comes to mind. But the findings further suggest that stress may bring about a double effect. Not only are rewarding experiences remembered better, but negative consequences are also easily recalled.
The research also found that stress appears to affect decision-making differently in men and women. While both men and women tend to focus on rewards and less on consequences under stress, their responses to risk turn out to be different.
Men who had been stressed by the cold-water task tended to take more risks in the experiment while women responded in the opposite way. In stressful situations in which risk-taking can pay off big, men may tend to do better, when caution weighs more, however, women will win.
This tendency to slow down and become more cautious when decisions are risky might also help explain why women are less likely to become addicted than men: they may more often avoid making the risky choices that eventually harden into addiction.
1. We can learn from the passage that people under pressure tend to ______.
| A．keep rewards better in their memory |
| B．recall consequences more effortlessly |
| C．make risky decisions more frequently |
| D．learn a subject more effectively |
| A．ways of making choices | B．preference for pleasure |
| C．tolerance of punishments | D．responses to suggestions |
| A．women find it easier to fall into certain habits |
| B．men have a greater tendency to slow down |
| C．women focus more on outcomes |
| D．men are more likely to take risks |
5 . Cassandra Warren, a baby-sitter, was in a rush and feeling a little overcome with work and planning her 200-person wedding. As she was getting invitations for her weddings in the mail one day last year, she hurriedly addressed one to her aunt and uncle in Oregon.
A week later, the invitation came back, with a handwritten note on the return envelope: “I wish I knew you. Congratulations! I’ve been married for 40 years—it gets better with age.” A $ 20 bill was inside.
Cassandra was at a professional crossroads and had been having a tough day. In fact, she nearly broke down, telling her husband-to-be, Jesse Jones, about her depression just as she opened the misdirected envelope. And the magic envelope wasn’t finished with its surprises. Cassandra looked closer and saw that on the envelope were “Live long and prosper”, a nod to space-based film Star Trek (《星际迷航》).
Casandra and Jesse have no idea who the anonymous note writer is. But they figure the Star Trek reference was because the person noticed the “fandom” corner of their invitation, which had both a Star Wars light-saber (光剑) and a Harry Potter wand (魔杖). “She assumed we’d understand her message,” Cassandra says. “Which we did.”
The following night Casandra and Jesse went out o dinner with a friend who was going overseas with the military. They happily put the $20 toward their bill. Then Casandra stopped by a store and bought another card—a thank-you card. She wrote her aunt and uncle’s incorrect address on the envelope again to “Kind Stranger.” Inside, she wrote, “Thank you for the note and taking the time to send it. Not many people would have done that. It was a big blessing after the day I was having. I am thankful for people like you still being in the world.”
1. What is the best title for the text?| A．Welcome to Cassandra’s wedding. | B．What if you invite a kind stranger. |
| C．Take your time to write a right letter. | D．Wedding invitation to the wrong address |
| A．She suffered a disease. | B．She was in bad mood. |
| C．She quarreled with Jesse. | D．She lost her job as a baby-sitter. |
| A．Nameless. | B．Warm-hearted. | C．Peace-loving. | D．Doubtful. |
| A．Cassandra made the same mistake the second time. |
| B．The return letter might be from the military friend. |
| C．The second letter was wrongly addressed on purpose. |
| D．Cassandra doesn’t know her uncle and aunt’s address. |
