1 . The world was mysterious (神秘的) when I was a child, so miracles (奇迹) were welcome wonders. Now, there doesn’t seem to be space for them in this world I so intelligently understand. Perhaps it’s from years of working around sick and often dying children, watching time and time again as a child slips away from the arms of a begging mother. I have stopped hoping as the parents around me hope.
I recently cared for a patient near the end of his life. Medically speaking, his situation was hopeless, which made me feel helpless and defeated.
His mother came in to see him. I had prepared myself to support her, imagining she would crumble (崩溃) into a pile of tears.
“Our God is faithful,” she said, with a smile on her face and the sunshine of hope in her eyes.
“Cancer is faithful,” I muttered (嘀咕) in my mind.
“We still believe he can heal him,” she continued, as if she had heard what I was thinking. I provided updates on his body. In a laundry list of updates, perhaps two things were positive. She thanked me for the information, repeating back the minor positive notes I had given. I became kind of angry. And I wanted to sak, “Do you really not understand the gravity (严重性) of this illness?”
And then, yet again, as if she had heard me, she replied with this: A positive attitude gives us power over our circumstances, rather than allowing our circumstances to have power over us. I was shocked. Here I was, judging her positive attitude as a fault. I completely disregarded the choice to believe in something more powerful than me, more healing than the doctors on our team. It wasn’t blind faith. It was strength and devotion.
When I came out of the room, tears welling in my eyes, I sat at my computer and looked down at a small plate of candies she must have left for me on her way into the room. A hand written note was laid above them: Kate, your devotion is so appreciated, So, it is your devotion that I am appreciating today. Because of you, I am begging again to believe in miracles.
1. The author is probably a ________.

A．nurse

B．patient

C．teacher

D．mother

2. Before seeing the patient’s mother, the author thought that the patient ________.

A．would recover soon

B．had got much better

C．was going to die of cancer

D．might make a miraculous recovery

3. Why was the author angry with the patient’s mother?

A．Because of her optimism.

B．Because of her impoliteness.

C．Because she couldn’t stop crying.

D．Because she was always complaining.

4. Finally, the patient’s mother made the author become ________.

A．more patient	B．more positive
C．more aggressive	D．more sympathetic

2 . A few weeks ago, while I was reading the morning paper, I turned the radio up to listen to a Saturday morning talk show and I heard an old sounding gentleman, with a golden voice. He was telling whoever he was talking with something about “a thousand marbles”.
I was intrigued and stopped to listen to what he had to say …
“Let me tell you something, Tom, something that has helped me keep a good perspective on my own priorities (优先考虑的事).”
He continued, “You see, I sat down one day and did a little math. The average person lives for about seventy-five years. Now then, I multiplied 75 by 52 and I came up with 3,900 which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has in their entire lifetime. Now stick with (继续倾听……的话) me, Tom. I’m getting to the important part.”
“It wasn’t until I had lived through over twenty-eight hundred Saturdays that I started thinking about all this in any detail,” he went on. “I got to thinking that if I lived to be seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them left to enjoy. So I went to a toy store and bought 1,000 marbles. I took them home and put them inside a large, clear plastic container. Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out and thrown it away.
“I found that by watching the marbles diminish (变少), I focused more on the really important things in life. There is nothing like watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight.
“It was nice to meet you, Tom. I hope you spend time with your family, and I hope to meet you again.”
You could have heard a pin drop on the radio when the old man signed off. I guess he gave us all a lot to think about. I had panned to work that morning. Instead, I went upstairs and woke my wife up with a kiss. “Come on, honey, I’m taking you and the kids to breakfast. And can we stop at a toy store while we’re out? I need to buy some marbles.”
1. The underlines word “intrigued” in Paragraph 2 probably means “ ________”.

A．encouraged

B．moved

C．worried

D．attracted

2. The old man started practicing the theory of “a thousand marbles” ________.

A．in his twenties	B．in his fifties
C．in his seventies	D．in his eighties

3. What life lesson does this text teach us?

A．Spending more time with our family.

B．Enriching our life with marble games.

C．It’s never too late to love our family.

D．Learning to live life to the fullest.

3 . 完形填空。

The family had just moved to Rhode Island, and the young woman was feeling a little depressed on that Sunday in May. After all, it was Mother's Day — and 800 miles________her from her parents in Ohio.

She had called them that morning, to wish her a happy Mother's Day and her mother had________how colorful their backyard was________spring had arrived. Later, she told her husband how she________those lilacs in her parents' yard. "I know where we can find some," he said. "Get the________and come on." So off they went.

Some time later, they stopped at a hill and there were lilacs all round. The young woman rushed up to the nearest____and buried her face in the flowers. Carefully, she________some.

Finally, they returned to their car for the________home. The woman sat smiling, surrounded by her________.

When they were near home, she shouted "stop," got off quickly and________to a nearby nursing home. She went to the end of the porch(门廊), where a(n)________patient was sitting in her wheelchair, and put the flowers into her lap. The two________, bursting into laughter now and then. Later the young woman turned and ran back to her________. As the car pulled away, the woman in the wheelchair________with a smile, and held the lilacs________.

"Mom," the kids asked, "___did you give her our flowers?" "It is Mother's Day, and she seems so________while I have all of you. And anyone would be____________by flowers."

This satisfied the kids, but not the husband. The next day he________some young lilacs around their yard.

I was the husband. Now, every May, our yard is full of lilacs. Every Mother's Day our kids________purple lilacs. And every year I remember that smile of the lonely old woman.

1.

A．moved

B．kept

C．separated

D．made

2.

A．learned

B．mentioned

C．imagined

D．realized

3.

A．as if

B．so that

C．now that

D．even if

4.

A．grew

B．missed

C．watered

D．showed

5.

A．cars

B．kids

C．clothes

D．lilacs

6.

A．yard

B．hill

C．bush

D．door

7.

A．bought

B．picked

C．set

D．raised

8.

A．break

B．holiday

C．trip

D．dinner

9.

A．friends

B．memory

C．honor

D．flowers

10.

A．responded

B．pointed

C．drove

D．hurried

11.

A．elderly

B．loving

C．serious

D．sensitive

12.

A．hesitated

B．waited

C．chatted

D．sat

13.

A．family

B．mot her

C．path

D．home

14.

A．nodded

B．left

C．waved

D．continued

15.

A．sadly

B．politely

C．quickly

D．tightly

16.

A．why

B．when

C．how

D．where

17.

A．lonely

B．confused

C．alone

D．patient

18.

A．calmed

B．persuaded

C．disappointed

D．cheered

19.

A．arranged

B．planted

C．dried

D．hid

20.

A．find

B．gather

C．receive

D．sell

4 . Michelle Obama, Kate Moss and Samantha Cameron are three of the most stylish﹙时髦的﹚ women on the planet because they have their daughters rather than their style. A new research has shown that women with daughters tend to be more stylish than mothers of sons; a fact partly because of the style advice their daughters offer as they get older.
78 percent of women over the age of 50 say they would be more than happy to let their daughters choose a complete outfit﹙全套衣装﹚ for them. However, just five percent of women say they would turn to their sons for style advice, while 28 percent believe that mothers of boys are less fashionable than women with girls.
“Women who don’t have daughters become less interested in style as they grow older but having a daughter may keep alive her interest in looking great,” comments psychologist Honey Langcaster-James. “And, because of their close relationship, they also have a source of support and encouragement when it comes to their style decisions.”
More than a quarter of women believe that Mums who have sons are less fashion-conscious than Mums with daughters. The most common reasons for this are that daughters are more critical, offer good advice and inspiration, and add an element of competition to look the best while sons don’t seem to care and aren’t as strict as daughters.
Interestingly, although mothers tend to rely on their daughters’ style tips, their confidence isn’t reciprocated﹙互换﹚, with 40 percent of women between the age of 19 and 34 saying they wouldn’t allow their mothers to shop for them as what their mothers would choose for them would not be as good as they expected.
And although they might not appreciate the fashion advice, the research, which was conducted by online retailer Gray & Osbourn, showed that daughters do still need their mothers with 71 percent saying they chat to their female parent every day.
“In short, the research shows just how important relationships are between mothers and daughters,” added Langcaster-James, “and just how much women appreciate an honest and trustworthy opinion.”
1. The opening paragraph is mainly to show        .

A．girls influence their mothers’ style decision

B．women with children are often less stylish

C．mothers like to follow their children’s advice

D．boys are actually better advisors than girls

2. Which of the following may Langcaster-James agree with?

A．Daughters usually love their mothers more than sons do.

B．It’s hard for boys to get along well with their mothers.

C．Mothers without daughters show less interest in style.

D．Girls are more independent than boys in some ways.

3. It can be inferred from the passage that girls        .

A．show more interest in science than boys.

B．care more about what their mothers wear

C．can help a lot to solve family problems

D．are good at encouraging other people

4. By saying “their confidence isn’t reciprocated” in Paragraph 5, the author means that      .

A．some women don’t like to choose clothes for their mothers

B．some women aren’t sure what to wear when attending a party

C．some women often show no confidence in themselves

D．some women would not like to follow their mothers’ style advice

5. What does the author mainly tell us in the passage?

A．It confuses many parents how to talk with their kids.

B．Daughters prefer to talk with their mums instead of dads.

C．It is important for parents to respect their children’s choice.

D．Mothers of girls are more fashionable than those of boys

5 . Linda Evans was my best friend like the sister I never had. We did everything together; piano lessons, movies, swimming, horseback riding.
When I was 13, my family moved away. Linda and I kept in touch through letters, and we saw each other on special times—like my wedding and Linda’s. Soon we were busy with children and moving to new houses, and we wrote less often. One day a card that I sent came back, stamped “Address Unknown”. I had no idea how to find Linda.
Over the years, I missed Linda very much. I wanted to share happiness of my children and then grandchildren. And I need to share my sadness when my brother and then mother died. There was an empty place in my heart that only a friend like Linda could fill.
One day I was reading a newspaper when I noticed a photo of a young woman who looked very much like Linda and whose last name was Wagmans—Linda’s married name. “There must be thousands of Wagmans.” I thought, but I still wrote to her.
She called as soon as she got my letter. “Ms Tobin!” she said excitedly, “Linda Evans Wagmans is my mother.” Minutes later I heard a voice that I knew very much, even after 40 years, laughed and cried and caught up on each other’s lives. Now the empty place in my heart is filled. And there’s one thing that Linda and I know for sure: We won’t lose each other again!
1. What happened to me when I was 13?

A．My father died of an illness.

B．I got married and had a son.

C．My family removed to a new place.

D．Linda moved away with her family.

2. Why was the card I sent returned to me?

A．I forgot to write the address.

B．The address couldn’t be found.

C．Something was wrong with the card.

D．Linda was sent to a foreign country.

3. Over the years, I missed Linda very much because________.

A．Linda could fill my dream

B．Linda made a promise that she would visit me

C．Linda had a deep effect on my choice of life

D．I wanted to share happiness and sorrow with Linda

4. What did I notice in the newspaper one day?

A．A photo of a young woman who looked very much like Linda.

B．Linda was still looking for me in the newspaper.

C．Linda fell in love with a man called Wagmans.

D．Linda was still living in the nearby city.

6 .

When I was younger, I thought that boys and grown men should not cry. The tears were signs of being weak and a sissy(胆小鬼), which a man is not supposed to be. This was even strengthened in my young mind when the song, Boys Don't Cry, came out in the early 1980s.

But just this June, I discovered that courage is not all about trying to keep all the pain inside in check. Courage is not all about trying to hide the tears. It is the opposite — the tears strengthen the heart's courage. And I saw this in my father. That day my father cried.

My 18-year-old sister eloped (私奔) and from it I saw how weak my father's heart was. My sister and I were used to seeing him as an iron-willed figure and authoritarian father.

For three days after my sister eloped, he would not talk. He would just sit quietly outside our house in the dark. On the fourth night, I sat beside him and asked him to tell me what he felt about everything.

It has been years since I have laid my hand on my father's shoulder as we have drifted apart (疏远) farther and farther while I was growing up. That night，though, I sensed my father trying to control his pain and I wanted him to be able to let it out. We have all cried over what happened except him. All of us except him.

The simple touch and my words, “Dad, it is not your fault.”, broke my father's dam. In the darkness, he began to cry. I felt his shoulders shaking as he whispered, "Where did I go wrong? All I ever wanted was for my children to grow up right. Why couldn't your sister wait?"

I understood then why he preferred to be in the dark. By being there, he hoped to spare his family of a father's pain. His tears, though we did not see them before that night, were there all the same. I saw his courage, that night when my father cried with my hand on his shoulder, and understood his pain.

1. Why did the author think men shouldn’t cry when he was younger?
(No more than 12 words)
__________________
2. According to the author and his sister, what kind of person was their father?
(No more than 6 words)
__________________
3. How did the author make his father let out his pain?
(No more than 9 words)   
__________________
4. When did the author see his father’s courage?
(No more than 7 words)   
__________________

7 . Many teenagers(青少年) feel that important people in their lives are their friends. They believe that their family members, especially their parents, don't know them as well as their friends do. In large families, it is often for brothers and sisters to fight with each other and then they can only go to their friends for advice.
It is very important for teenagers to have one good friend or many friends. Even when they are not with their friends, they usually spend a lot of time talking among themselves on the phone. This communication is very important in children's growing up, because friends can discuss something difficult to say to their family members.
However, parents often try to choose their children's friends for them. _____________________________________ The question of “choice” is an interesting one. Have you ever thought of the following questions?
Who chooses your friends?
Do you choose your friends or your friends choose you?
Have you got a good friend your parents don't like?
1. Why do many teenagers think their friends are the most important?

A．They often fight with their brothers and sisters.

B．They can't get help from their parents.

C．They believe their friends understand them better.

D．They are often the only child of their family.

2. When teenagers stay alone, the usual way of communication is to ______.

A．go to their friends

B．talk with their parents

C．have a discussion with their family

D．talk with their friends on the phone

3. The underlined sentence in Paragraph 3 is different from ______ in meaning.

A．Some parents may even not allow their children to meet their good friends.

B．Some parents may even ask their children to stay away from their good friends.

C．Some parents may even not let their children meet their good friends.

D．Some parents may want their children to stop to meet their good friends.

4. Which of the following sentences is true?

A．Parents should like everything their children enjoy.

B．In all families, children can choose everything they like.

C．Parents should try their best to understand their children better.

D．Teenagers can only go to their friends for help.

5. The main idea of this passage is that “______”.

A．Teenagers need friends.

B．Friends can give good advice.

C．Parents often choose their children’s friends for them.

D．Good friends can communicate with each other.

8 . A friend is better than fortune. A friend is worse than poison in some cases.
          The two sentences above have opposite meanings and seem to be unreasonable, but they can be explained as follows: the first refers to all good friends who drive us towards good while the second all bad ones who lead us into bad ways.
　　My ideal friend is of course a good friend whose goodness is shown below — he has no bad habits, such as smoking and drinking. He lives in frugality (节俭). He studies hard so as not to waste his golden time. At home he honors his parents and loves his brothers; at school he respects his teachers and shares the feelings of his classmates. He treats those truly who are true to him. In a word, he has all the good characteristics that I don’t have. I can follow him as a model. With his help I can be free from all difficulties.
Indeed, if I have such a person as my friend, I shall never fear difficulty and I shall never know the existence of the word “failure”.
1. This passage tells us ____.

A．how to make friends with others.

B．how to help friends.

C．what kind of person the writer’s friend is.

D．what kind of person we should make friends with.

2. According to the writer, an ideal friend refers to _______.

A．a friend without bad habits.

B．a famous man.

C．a perfect man.

D．a respectable man.

3. From the passage we can learn that ________.

A．the writer and his ideal friend have a lot to learn from each other.

B．the writer has a lot to learn from his ideal friend.

C．the writer’s ideal friend has a lot to learn from him.

D．the writer has only a little to learn from his ideal friend.

4. From the second paragraph, we can infer the writer is sure that _______.

A．friendship means a great deal to him.

B．nothing can be done without friends.

C．he who does not smoke or drink must be a good friend..

D．good friends should always help each other.

9 . 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。
Very mobile ears help many animals direct their attention to the rustle of a possible attacker. Researchers say these mobile ears have become a useful communication tool. Their studies of animal behaviour build up a picture of how communication and social skills developed.
“We're interested in how they communicate,” said lead researcher Jennifer Wathan.“And being sensitive to what another individual is thinking is a fundamental skill from which other more complex skills develop.”
Ms Wathan and her colleague Prof Karen McComb set up a behavioural experiment where 72 individual horses had to use visual clues from another horse in order to choose where to feed. They led each horse to a point where it had to select one of two buckets. On a wall behind this decision-making spot was a life-sized photograph of a horse's head facing either to left or right. In some of the trials, the horses’ ears or eyes were covered.
If the ears and eyes of the horse in the picture were visible, the horses being tested would choose the bucket towards which its gaze and its ears were directed. If the horse in the picture had either its eyes or its ears covered, the horse being tested would just choose a feed bucket at random.
Like many mammals that are hunted by predators（捕食者）, horses can rotate（旋转）their ears through almost 180 degrees - but Ms Wathan said that in our "human-centric" view of the world, we had overlooked the importance of these very mobile ears in animal communication.
"It seems there's something in the visual clues----from both the eyes and the ears-----that are really important," she told BBC News. "Horses have quite rich social lives and relationships with other horses, so they're a good species to look at this in." And the more we look at communication across different species, the more we can consider what might have promoted the evolution of sophisticated communication and social skills."
1. Why does a horse rotate its ears?

A．To tell each other where they can go for the buckets.

B．To be curious about what the other horse is thinking.

C．To warn the other horse when an attacker is coming closer.

D．To express its hope to build up social relations with others.

2. Why did the researchers use the life-sized photograph of a horse in the experiment?

A．To help develop horses’ complex skills.

B．To lead other horses to feed themselves.

C．To make the horses in the experiment excited.

D．To provide clues for the horses in the experiment.

3. Why are ears and eyes important to horses?

A．They can find the feeding buckets more easily with ears and eyes.

B．With ears and eyes they can escape from dangers more easily.

C．With ears and eyes they can communicate with other horses.

D．Horses have quite rich social lives with ears and eyes.

4. What can be the best title of the passage?Z,X,X,K]

A．Rotary Ears Serve as Communication Tools.

B．Horses Have More Social Skills than Other Species.

C．Experiments with Horses’ Ears.

D．Fundamental Skills of Horses.

10 . When I began planning to move to Auckland to study, my mother was a little worried about the uncertainty of living in a place that was so different from India, where we lived. She worried particularly about the lack of jobs and cultural differences and the chance that I would face racism(种族主义).
Despite these concerns, I came to New Zealand in July 2009.I found the place and the people very nice and supportive. Soon after I arrived, I realized the importance of getting a job to supply my living expenses.
Determined to do this on my own, I spent a whole day going from door to door for a job. However, I received little or no response.
One afternoon, I walked into a building to ask if there were any job opportunities. The people there were very surprised and advised me not to continue my job search in that manner. As I was about to leave, a clerk in the building, who had been listening to what others had said, approached me and asked me to wait outside. Fifteen minutes later, he returned, and asked me what my plans were and encouraged me to stay confident. Then he offered to take me to his friend’s company, Royal Oak, to search for a job. The following day, I received a call from a store in Royal Oak offering me a job.
It seems that the world always gives back to you when you need it. And this time, it was a complete stranger who turned out to be a real blessing.
1. What wasn’t the author’s mother worried about?

A．There might be cultural differences.

B．People might look down on the author.

C．The author couldn’t speak the local language.

D．It might be difficult for the author to find a job.

2. After staying in New Zealand for a short time, the author         .

A．decided to go back to his own country.

B．felt the local people were not very friendly.

C．wanted to get a job that needed practical skills.

D．had to find a job to cover his living expenses.

3. When the author went into a building to look for a job,       .

A．a clerk gave him encouragement and advice.

B．he was confident that he would find a good one.

C．he found many college students like him already there.

D．a clerk recommended him to the company he worked for.