完形填空，阅读下面短文，从短文后各题所给的四个选项（A, B, C和D）中，选出可以填入空白处的最佳选项。

A young businessman was traveling down a narrow street, driving a bit too fast in his new Benz. He was watching for kids darting out from between parked cars and _______ when he thought he saw something.

As his car passed, one child appeared, and a brick smashed into the Benz’s side door. He slammed on the brakes and _______ the Benz back to the spot from _______ the brick had been thrown.

He jumped out of the car, _______ some kid and pushed him up against a parked car, shouting “What was that all about and who are you? Just what on earth are you doing?” _______ a head of steam, he went on “That’s a new car and that brick you threw is gonna cost a lot of money. Why did you do it?” “Please, mister, please, I’m sorry. I didn’t know what else to do!” pleaded the youngster.

“It’s my brother,” he said. “He rolled _______ the stairs and fell out of his wheelchair and I can’t _______ him up.”

_______, the boy asked the businessman, “Would you please help me get him back into his wheelchair? He’s hurt and he’s too heavy for me.”

Moved beyond words, the driver tried to swallow the _______ swelling lump in his ________ He lifted the young man back into the wheelchair and took out his handkerchief and wiped the ________, checking ________ that everything was going to be okay.

“Thank you, sir. And God bless you,” the ________ child said to him. The man then watched the little boy push his brother to the sidewalk toward their home.

It was a long walk back to his Benz...a long, ________ walk. He never did ________ the side door. He kept the damage to remind him not to ________life so fast that someone has to ________ a brick at you to get your attention.

Life whispers in your soul and ________ to your heart. Sometimes, when you don’t have the time to listen...Life throws a brick at your head.

It’s your choice: Listen to the whispers of your soul ________ wait for the brick!

Do you sometimes ignore loved ones because your life is too fast and busy ________ them to wonder whether you really love them?

1.

A.sped up B.went out C.slowed down D.pulled back

2.

A.spun B.drag C.push D.stretch

3.

A.where B.which C.that D.there

4.

A.grasped B.got C.arrested D.grabbed

5.

A.Rising up B.Opening up C.Building up D.Giving up

6.

A.away B.out C.over D.off

7.

A.catch B.lift C.seize D.carry

8.

A.talking B.shouting C.sobbing D.crying

9.

A.abruptly B.roughly C.absolutely D.rapidly

10.

A.throat B.heart C.spirit D.tongue

11.

A.blood and sweat B.scrapes and cuts C.black and white D.neck and neck

12.

A.to see B.to be seen C.to have seen D.to be seeing

13.

A.graceful B.grated C.grateful D.gratitude

14.

A.slipped B.slow C.steep D.slim

15.

A.require B.request C.repair D.recommend

16.

A.go after B.go about C.go over D.go through

17.

A.kick B.throw C.strike D.beat

18.

A.tells B.speaks C.conveys D.says

19.

A.or B.but C.and D.for

20.

A.ensuring B.letting C.making D.Leaving

Work Smarter Not Harder

In Dan Pink’s Free Agent Nation: The Future of Working for Yourself, he closes the book with a long, excellent list of “Work Smarter Not Harder” type advice for people who want to start working for themselves.

1.Below are my favorites.

●Make a “not to” list. Prepare a list that contains all the things you shouldn’t waste your time on useless tasks, unnecessary meetings, worthless phone calls, and so on. 2. 

●Carry a notebook and pen. Thomas Edison did it. Virginia Woolf did it. And so did Charles Darwin. They carried a notebook with them everywhere and wrote down ideas that popped into their heads. 3.Trust me: This is a fantastic way to explore ideas and to weave creativity into the fabric of your life.

● 4. Ask questions. Take smart people to lunch. Read. Read some more. Listen to audiobooks. Take classes. Added benefit: This makes life more interesting. Yet another benefit: Studies have shown that people who make constant learning part of their lives end up living longer.

●Guard your calendar. Make sure your time is focused on your one or two top priorities (优先). Ask yourself: “Is this how I want to be spending my time right now?” Remember: You are your calendar. 5.  

●Respond to calls and e-mails quickly. Even if your response is,“I’ll get back to you,” try to get back to people within 24 hours. They’ll appreciate the politeness.

A.Be quick, but don’t hurry.

B.So treat your calendar with respect.

C.Become a learning machine.

D.Page through the notebook occasionally.

E.Try to begin your day the same way.

F.Then place it next to your “to do” list and stick to it.

G.Frankly, the list is so good I think everyone would benefit from it.

In modern society there is a great deal of argument about competition. Some value it highly , believing that it is responsible for social progress and prosperity . Others say that competition is bad ; that it sets one person against another ; that it leads to unfriendly relationship between people .

I have taught many children who held the belief that their self-worth relied (依赖)on how well they performed at tennis and other skills . For them, playing well and winning are often life-and-death affairs. In their single-minded pursuit ( 追求)of success , the development of many other human qualities is sadly forgotten .

However ，while some seem to be lost in the desire to succeed , others take an opposite attitude .In a culture which values only the winner and pays no attention to the ordinary players , they strongly blame competition . Among the most vocal are youngsters who have suffered under competitive pressures from their parents or society. Teaching these young people . I often observe in them a desire to fail . They seem to seek failure by not trying to win or achieve success . By not trying , they always have an excuse : “I may have lost . but it doesn’t matter because I really didn’t try . “What is not usually admitted by themselves is the belief that if they had really tried and lost, that would mean a lot . Such a loss would be a measure of their worth . Clearly, this belief is the same as that of the true competitors who try to prove themselves . Both are based on the mistaken belief that one’s self-respect relies on how well one performs in comparison with others . Both are afraid of not being valued . Only as this basic and often troublesome fear begins to dissolve (缓解) can we discover a new meaning in competition .

1.What does this passage mainly talk about?

A.Competition helps to set up self-respect.

B.Opinions about competition are different among people

C.Competition is harmful to personal quality development.

D.Failures are necessary experiences in competition

2.Why do some people favor competition according to the passage?

A.It pushes society forward. B.It builds up a sense of duty.

C.It improves personal abilities. D.It encourages individual efforts

3.The underlined phrase “the most vocal” in Paragraph 3 means       .

A.those who try their best to win

B.those who value competition most highly

C.those who are against competition most strongly

D.those who rely on others most for success

4.Which point of view may the author agree to?

A.Every effort should be paid back.

B.Competition should be encouraged.

C.Winning should be a life-and-death matter.

D.Fear of failure should be removed in competition.

    One evening in February 2007, a student named Paula Ceely brought her car to a stop on a remote road in Wales. She got out to open a metal gate that blocked her path .That’s when she heard the whistle sounded by the driver of a train. Her Renault Clio was parked across a railway line. Seconds later, she watched the train drag her car almost a kilometre down the railway tracks.

Ceely’s near miss made the news because she blamed it on her GPS (导航仪). She had never driven the route before. It was dark and raining heavily. Ceely was relying on her GPS, but it made no mention of the crossing. “I put my complete trust in the device and it led me right into the path of a speeding train,” she told the BBC.

Who is to blame here? Rick Stevenson, who tells Ceely’s story in his book When Machines Fail Us, points the finger at the limitations of technology. We put our faith in digital devices, he says, but our digital helpers are too often not up to the job. They are filled with small problems. And it’s not just GPS devices: Stevenson takes us on a tour of digital disasters involving everything from mobile phones to wireless keyboards.

The problem with his argument in the book is that it’s not clear why he only focuses on digital technology, while there may be a number of other possible causes. A map-maker might have left the crossing off a paper map. Maybe we should blame Ceely for not paying attention. Perhaps the railway authorities are at fault for poor singalling system. Or maybe someone has studied the relative dangers and worked out that there really is something specific wrong with the GPS equipment. But Stevenson doesn’t say.

It’s a problem that runs through the book. In a section on cars, Stevenson gives an account of the advanced techniques that criminals use to defeat computer-based locking systems for cars. He offers two independent sets of figures on car theft; both show a small rise in some parts of the country. He says that once again not all new locks have proved reliable. Perhaps, but maybe it’s also due to the shortage of policemen on the streets. Or changing social circumstances. Or some combination of these factors.

The game between humans and their smart devices is amusing and complex. It is shaped by economics and psychology and the cultures we live in. Somewhere in the mix of those forces there may be a way for a wiser use of technology.

If there is such a way, it should involve more than just an awareness of the shortcomings of our machines. After all, we have lived with them for thousands of years. They have probably been fooling us for just as long.

1.What did Paula Ceely think was the cause of her accident？

A.She was not familiar with the road.

B.It was dark and raining heavily then.

C.The railway workers failed to give the signal.

D.Her GPS device didn’t tell her about the crossing.

2.The phrase “near miss” (Paragraph 2) can best be replaced by______.

A.close hit B.heavy loss C.narrow escape D.big mistake

3.Which of the following would Rick Stevenson most probably agree with?

A.Modern technology is what we can’t live without.

B.Digital technology often falls short of our expectation.

C.Digital devices are more reliable than they used to be.

D.GPS error is not the only cause for Ceely’s accident.

4.In the writer’s opinion, Stevenson’s argument is _______.

A.one-sided B.reasonable C.puzzling D.well-based

    Why elephants rarely get cancer is a mystery that has confused scientists for decades. A study was led by researchers at Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) at the University of Utah and Arizona State University, including researchers from the Ringling Bros. Center for Elephant Conservation may have found the answer. According to the results, elephants have 38 additional modified copies of a gene (基因) that encodes p53, a well-defined tumor (肿瘤) suppressor, as compared to humans, who have only two. Further, elephants may have a more powerful mechanism for killing damaged cells that are at risk for becoming cancerous. In isolated elephant cells, this activity is doubled compared to healthy human cells, and five times that of cells from patients with Li-Fraumeni Syndrome, who have only one working copy of p53 and more than a 90 percent lifetime cancer risk in children and adults. The results suggest extra p53 could explain elephants’ increased resistance to cancer.

“Nature has already figured out how to prevent cancer. It’s up to us to learn how different animals overcome the problem so we can adapt those strategies to prevent cancer in people,” says co-senior author Joshua Schiffman, M.D., pediatric oncologist (肿瘤学家) at Huntsman Cancer Institute, University of Utah School of Medicine, and Primary Children’s Hospital.

According to Schiffman, elephants have long been considered a walking problem. Because they have 100 times as many cells as people, they should be 100 times more likely to have a cell slip into a cancerous state and cause the disease over their long life span of 50 to 70 years. And yet it’s believed that elephants get cancer less often, a theory confirmed in this study. Analysis of a large database of elephant deaths estimates a cancer death rate of less than 5 percent compared to 11 to 25 percent in people.

1.Why do humans often get cancer compared to elephants according to the passage?

A.Elephants are bigger than humans.

B.Elephants have more p53 than humans.

C.Elephants are not as clever as humans.

D.Elephants eat more than humans.

2.Which of the following is right according to the passage?

A.Some damaged cells may be dangerous.

B.Some damaged cells are not dangerous.

C.Some damaged cells can’t be cancerous.

D.Some damaged cells in elephants’ bodies are more dangerous than those in humans’ bodies.

3.What can we know from the last paragraph?

A.Elephants have more cells than people. B.Elephants can get cancer easily.

C.Elephants seldom die from cancer. D.Elephants often die from cancer.

4.Which of the following can be the best title for the passage?

A.Elephants help us B.Learn from Nature

C.How to deal with cancer D.Nature helps us prevent cancer

Evening Workshops

1.One of the purposes of a networking mixer held each year is to ________.

A.provide students with greater control over the media

B.link cultural information to recognizable plants

C.help the students to deal with most of the environment issues

D.help the students to be familiar with educational programs

2.Which of the following is true according to the poster?

A.Evening workshops will be held at small restaurants with meals included.

B.Participants have more than one option on Feb.5ththan another night.

C.Workshops have nothing to do with the discussions held at SEB meetings.

D.Faculty advisers can join the mixer without training experience.

3.You are a college student, interested in plants and good at taking TV pictures. Which of the Evening Workshops is most suitable for you?

A.Botanical Film Making. B.Collections for Botany.

C.Student Network. D.Society for Economic Botany.

听下面一段独白。回答以下小题。

1.Why did the waiter refuse to serve the man any drink?

A.The man was a taxi driver.

B.The man had had plenty of drink.

C.The man had never paid for the drink.

2.How did the man feel when he saw the waiter the second time?

A.Unexpected. B.Angry. C.Afraid.

3.From where did the man enter the bar the last time?

A.The front door. B.The side door.    C .The back door.

4.What can we learn from the story?

A.The waiter called a policeman in the end.

B.The man asked the waiter to call a taxi for him.

C.The man thought he went to three different bars.

听下面一段较长对话。回答以下小题。

1.What are the speakers mainly discussing?

A.Old-fashioned televisions. B.The man’ s childhood. C.Difficult times of the past.

2.When did the TV programs start when the man was a child?

A.In the evening. B.In the afternoon. C.In the morning.

3.What did the man do on holiday when he was a boy?

A.He stayed at home.

B.He went to the seaside.

C.He took the train to England.

4.What does the woman think of the old days?

A.Hard. B.Funny. C.Boring.

听下面一段较长对话。回答以下小题。

1.Why is the woman bringing a suit?

A.To give it to her father. B.To wear it for a meeting. C.To use it against the cold.

2.What does the man suggest the woman get for Maria?

A.A book. B.A sweater. C.A video game.

3.Where did the woman's father buy the mask?

A.In New York. B.In Mexico City. C.In Tokyo.

听下面一段较长对话。回答以下小题。

1.What are the speakers talking about?

A.A new designer. B.New products. C.Newly-designed posters.

2.What is Lisa?

A.An artist. B.team leader. C.A product manager.