Child labor — the employment of children in industry, often against their will — has been a problem for many years. Over a hundred years ago, Charles Dickens shocked many of his readers when he described the conditions under which young children worked in British factories. The conditions Dickens described continue almost unchanged today in many parts of the world. The only difference is that today employment of children is confined（limited）to small industries and family businesses, such as hotels, restaurants and particularly farms, rather than to large factories.
Girls suffer more from child labor practices than boys. Many of them are forced to start work when they are only ten years old. Although the work they are given to do is often light, it is often harmful to the health. Recently, children as young as six years were found to be working in Asian factories, and the children were working from eight to fourteen hours a day in overcrowded and unhealthy working conditions. Sometimes a whole family group is employed, with the payment going to a parent or older relative. The children not only receive nothing or very little for their long hours of work, but also they are prevented from attending school. Therefore, when they become older they are unable to do any other kind of work.
The solution to the problem of child labor is clearly better laws to protect young children, greater supervision（监督）of industry and heavier fines for those who break the laws. Only in this way can young boys and girls be allowed to enjoy the most valuable time of their lives—childhood.
1.Which’s the main idea of the first paragraph?
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A．Children are often willing to work in large factories. |
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B．Most children are working in British factories. |
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C．The poor working conditions of child labor in Dickens’ novel. |
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D．The working conditions for children are similar to those a hundred years ago. |
2.Girls’ work is ____.
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A．not harmful to the health though it is heavy |
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B．not harmful to the health because it is light |
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C．harmful to the health though it is light. |
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D．harmful to the health because it is heavy |
3.Young children go to work ____.
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A．because they are forced to |
B．in order to be skillful in a certain kind of work |
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C．in order to be paid well |
D．in order to earn money for education |
4.To solve the problem of child labor, the writer suggests the following BUT ____.
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A．looking over factories more closely |
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B．raising their payment and improving the system of education |
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C．improving laws of protecting children’s interests |
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D．punishing lawbreakers with severer fines |
The industrial age has been the only period of human history in which most people’s work has taken the form of jobs. The industrial age may now be coming to an end, and some of changes in work patterns which it brought may have to be reversed. This seems a discouraging thought. But, in fact, it could offer the prospect of a better future for work. Universal employment, as its history show, hasn’t meant economic freedom.
Employment became widespread when the enclosures（圈地运动）of the 17th and 18th centuries made many people dependent on paid work by taking them away from the use of the land, and thus from the means to provide a living for themselves. Then the factory system destroyed the cottage industries and removed work from people’s homes. Later, as transport improved, first by rail and then by road, people traveled longer distances to their place of employment until, eventually, many people’s work lost all connection with their home lives and the places in which they lived.
Meanwhile, employment put women at a disadvantage. In pre-industrial times, men and women had shared the productive work of the household and village community. Now it became customary for the husband to go out to paid employment, leaving the unpaid work of the home and family to his wife. Tax and benefit regulations still assume this norm（准则）today, and restrict more flexible sharing of work roles between sexes.
It was not only women whose work status suffered. As employment became the dominant form of work, young people and old people were kept out — a problem now, as more teenagers disappointed and annoyed at school and more retired people want to live active lives.
All this may now have to change. The time has certainly come to switch some efforts and resources away from the utopian（乌托邦）goal of creating jobs for all, to the urgent practical task of helping many people to manage without full-time jobs.
1. From the passage we can learn that ____.
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A．jobs have existed since human came into being |
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B．the industrial age brought jobs to everyone |
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C．the industrial age brought the work patterns most people’s work has taken |
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D．in the future more and more people could get jobs as the industry is developing |
2.Before the enclosures of the 17th and 18th, people lived mainly on ____.
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A．paid work |
B．unpaid work |
C．taxes and benefits |
D．land |
3.Before the industrial age women played ____.
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A．more important roles in making a life |
B．less important roles in making a life |
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C．roles as weak as after in raising their children |
D．roles as important as men in supporting a family |
4. From the passage we can infer that ____.
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A．creating jobs for all must be changed |
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B．enough jobs must be created by our society |
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C．more and more jobs are being created |
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D．industrial age has made many people unable to live without full-time jobs |
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — A line of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes marched across the South on Friday, peeling away roofs, overturning cars and killing at least 11 people in Tennessee, officials said.
It was the second wave of violent weather to hit the state in less than a week. Last weekend, tornadoes killed 24 people in the western part of the state and destroyed more than 1,000 homes and buildings.
The storms crossed an area from northern Mississippi to northern Virginia as they moved to the northeast late Friday after developing from a low-pressure system in the central Plains.
The Nashville suburbs were the hardest hit, with at least eight deaths happening northeast of the city. Three more people were killed in a rural area about 65 miles southeast of Nashville.
Tornadoes were also reported in some other places. The storms pulled up trees, knocked down power lines and damaged buildings. What’s worse, phone lines and most businesses were out of service. Hospitals admitted at least 60 people with storm-related injuries and transferred at least nine badly injured patients to Nashville hospitals.
In southern Indiana, the storms damaged some areas with golf ball-sized hail. High winds blew the roof off a country club and overthrew a semitrailer（拖车）. As the storms moved farther east, parts of West Virginia were lashed with heavy rain and winds, great damages caused.
The number of tornadoes in the US has jumped through the first part of 2006 compared with the past few years. Through the end of March, an estimated 286 tornadoes had hit the US, compared with an average of 70 for the same three-month period in each of the past three years.
The number of tornado-related deaths was 38 before Friday's storms. The average number of deaths from 2003 to 2005 was 45 a year, the prediction center said.
1. How many deaths have the thunderstorms and tornadoes on Friday caused?
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A．Three. |
B．Eight. |
C．Eleven. |
D．Twenty-two. |
2. Which of the following statements is NOT true?
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A．Tennessee was hit twice by tornadoes within a week. |
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B．The latest tornado might start in northern Mississippi. |
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C．At least four states were hit by the tornado. |
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D．In the tornadoes of the first 3 months 38 people were killed. |
3. In the first 3 months of last 3 years, about ____ tornadoes happened each month in the US.
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A．About 23. |
B．About 70. |
C．About 98. |
D．About 210. |
4.We can infer from the report more deaths and injuries were caused because ____.
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A．the phone lines were destroyed |
B．there were enough hospitals |
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C．the people hid in their houses |
D．there was also a hail in Tennessee |
Just not a long time ago did I finish my blog about the unforgettable snowy storm that I had on Monday night in November. I got another big 36 in Seattle again. But this time, it's not snow, but the wind and rain. I have 37 seen such a strong wind before even though I had 38 the typhoon every summer when I was still in my home country.
That 39 storm was so powerful that it 40 the whole big Seattle area out of 41 . 700,000 people had no electricity, and 42 13 people have died. Seattle is famous for its evergreen trees, but those trees made a big 43 this time. They broke down the power line above the ground, 44 the road and streets, and 45 the houses.
As the last storm was still 46 in my mind, I had another personal 47 about this new storm. 48 , this time, it was not good either. I was 49 to have my TOEFL test on the second day of the stormy night. Since the whole city had no electricity, my test had to be 50 off, and I had to prepare for another one later. It was my last test for the 51 , and I already made a plan for the time after the test, but now 52 is changed.
I guess sometimes, the way that the thing 53 is not always what you 54 . And what I can do now is to fit for it. 55 , we got a free hotel room from my husband's cousin and met my lovely nephew from San Francisco.
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His invention ______ of no use by the scientists of that time．
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A．considered being |
B．considered to be |
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C．was considered to be |
D．was considered being |
---I hear John refused to tell the truth and was taken away by the police.
--- Where did you _______?
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A．pick that up |
B．put that up |
C．make that up |
D．take that up |
