Scientists who try to predict earthquakes have gotten some new helpers recently—animals.
That’s right, animals. Scientists have begun to understand what farmers have known for thousands of years. Animals often seem to know in advance that an earthquake is coming, and they show their fear by acting in strange ways. Before a Chinese quake in 1975, snakes awoke from their winter sleep early only to freeze to death in the cold air. Cows broke their halters (缰绳) and tried to escape. Chickens refused to enter their cage. All of this unusual behavior, as well as physical changes in the earth, warned Chinese scientists of the coming quake. They moved people away from the danger zone and saved thousands of lives.
One task for scientists today is to learn exactly which types of animal behavior predict quakes. It’s not an easy job. First of all not every animal reacts to the danger of an earthquake. Just before a California quake in 1977, for example, an Arabian horse became very nervous and tried to break out of his enclosure. The Australian horse next to him, however, remained perfectly calm. It’s also difficult at times to tell the difference between normal animal restlessness and “earthquake nerves”. A zoo keeper once called earthquake researchers to say that his cougar had been acting strangely. It turned out that the cat had an upset stomach.
A second task for scientists is to find out exactly what kind of warnings the animals receive. They know that animals sense far more of the world than humans do. Many animals can see, hear, and smell things that people do not even notice. Some can sense tiny changes in air pressure, gravity, or the magnetism of Earth. This extra sense probably helps animals predict quakes.
A good example of this occurred with a group of dogs. They were shut in an area that was being shaken by a series of tiny earthquakes. (Several small quakes often come before or after a large one.) Before each quake a low booming sound was heard. Each boom caused the dogs to bark wildly. Then the dogs began to bark during a silent period. A scientist who was recording quakes looked at his machine. It was acting as though there were a loud noise too. The scientist realized that the dogs had reacted to a booming noise. They also sensed the tiny quake that followed it. The machine recorded both, though humans felt and heard nothing.
In this case there was a machine to monitor what the dogs were sensing. Many times, however, our machines record nothing extraordinary, even though animals know a quake is coming. The animals might be sensing something we measure but do not recognize as a warning. Discovering what animals sense, and learning how they know it is a danger signal, is a job for future scientists.
1.Through the passage the writer hopes to explore __________.
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A．why animals send a danger signal before an earthquake |
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B．how animals know when an earthquake is coming |
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C．why animals not men have good sense of danger |
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D．how much animals know about an earthquake |
2. During an earthquake in China in 1975, _________.
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A．chickens refused to go out of their cage |
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B．snakes were frozen to death in their caves |
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C．snakes awoke from their winter sleep earlier |
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D．cows broke their halters and escaped from their sheds |
3.Which of the following is one of earthquake nerves according to the passage?
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A．An Arabian horse tried to escape from his enclosure. |
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B．A cougar had an upset stomach unexpectedly. |
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C．An Australian horse was perfectly calm. |
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D．A cat acted very strangely in a zoo. |
4.The scientists did an experiment with a group of dogs to _________.
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A．find out that the machine could record unusual happenings |
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B．compare the reactions of animals and those of humans |
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C．prove that animals could sense more than humans |
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D．find out what exact warnings animals sent |
There was once, in a little market-town not far from Upsala (瑞典一城市), a peasant who lived there with his family, digging the earth during the week and singing in the choir on Sundays. This peasant had a little daughter to whom he taught the musical alphabet before she knew how to read. Daae was a great musician, perhaps without knowing it. Not a violinist in Scandinavia played as he did. His reputation was widespread and he was always invited to set the couples dancing at weddings and other festivals. His wife died when Christine was entering upon her sixth year. Then the father, who cared only for his daughter and his music, sold his land and went to Upsala in search of fame and fortune. He found nothing but poverty.
He returned to the country, wandering from fair to fair, playing his Scandinavian music pieces, while his child, who never left his side, listened to him in delight or sang to his playing. One day, at Ljimby Fair, Professor Valerius heard them and took them to Gothenburg. He insisted that the father was the first violinist in the world and that the daughter had the making of a great artist. Her education and instruction were provided for. She made rapid progress and charmed everybody with her prettiness, her grace of manner and her real eagerness to please.
When Valerius and his wife went to settle in France, they took Daae and Christine with them. "Mamma" Valerius treated Christine as her daughter. As for Daae, he became ill with homesickness. He never went out of doors in Paris, but lived in a sort of dream which he kept up with his violin. For hours at a time, he remained locked up in his bedroom with his daughter, playing and singing, very, very softly.
Daae seemed not to recover his strength until the summer, when the whole family went to stay at Perros-Guirec, in a far-away corner of Brittany, where the sea was of the same color as in his own country. Often he would play his saddest tunes on the beach and pretend that the sea stopped its roaring to listen to them. And then he persuaded Mamma Valerius to allow him to leave for a while. At the time of the "pardons," the village festivals and dances, he went off with his violin, as in the old days, and was allowed to take his daughter with him for a week. They gave the smallest villages music to last them for a year and slept at night in a barn, refusing a bed at the inn, lying close together on the straw, as when they were so poor in Sweden. At the same time, they were very neatly dressed, refused the halfpence offered to them; and the people around could not understand the behaviour of this country violinist, who walked heavily on the roads with that pretty child who sang like an angel from Heaven. They followed them from village to village.
1. When he was in the countryside, Daae did NOT __________.
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A．work on his land |
B．sing in the choir on Sundays |
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C．make a fortune at weddings and festivals |
D．teach his daughter how to sing |
2.The 3rd sentence “He insisted …” in the 2nd paragraph showed Professor Valerius’ ______.
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A．hope for Daae and Christine |
B．appreciation of Daae and Christine |
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C．sympathy for Daae and Christine |
D．love for Daae and Christine |
3. While Daae was in Paris, he never went out of doors because he was ________.
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A．always sleepy |
B．so homesick that he fell ill |
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C．too busy teaching his daughter |
D．willing to be locked up with his daughter |
4. What made people curious about the father and daughter was that _______.
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A．the father made very good music |
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B．the daughter sang like an angel from Heaven |
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C．the father walked strangely with his daughter |
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D．they appeared to be badly off but refused money offered |
Do you remember the game “Telephone”? A message gets passed from person to person, and everyone laughs at how distorted(曲解) it becomes. As a game, telephone can be fun. In real life, sending messages through third parties fouls things up. It is important for family members who have “business” with other family members to take it up directly.
When tension arises in a relationship between two people, a frequent way of dealing with this is to send messages through a third person. Family doctors refer to the process as ‘triangulation”. Following a quarrel, a mother may say to her son, “Tell your father to pass the salt”, which may be answered by, “Tell your mother to get her own salt.” In many long cases of triangulation, the middleman becomes severely disturbed.
Two years ago, Ruth and Ralph Gordon brought their 17-year-old daughter for treatment. Lucille was not doing well in school, using drugs heavily. When I began to work with her, she was uncommunicative and aggressive. After some time, however, she opened up and told me her parents rarely talked to each other, but both used her as a middleman. Mrs. Gordon was sexually unsatisfied and suggested to Lucille that she ask her father to go for marriage advice. Mr. Gordon told Lucille that he was seeing another woman, and he urged Lucille to speak to her mother about improving her behaviour. Caught in this confusing situation, Lucille became more and more troubled. It wasn’t until she refused to play middleman that she began to improve. When either parent began to send a message through her, she learned to say, “Tell him/her yourself!”
You’ll find that when family members learn to dial each other directly, there’s rarely a busy signal or wrong number. With direct dialing, a sense of freshness is created.
1.The underlined words “foul things up” in the 1st paragraph means ________.
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A．create things |
B．improve things |
C．remove things |
D．ruin things |
2.“Triangulation” in the 2nd paragraph refers to _________.
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A．the process of sending messages through a 3rd person |
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B．the middleman who becomes severely disturbed |
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C．the tension in a relationship between 2 people |
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D．the argument between a mother and a father |
3. Through the example of Lucille and her parents, the writer hopes to tell the readers that _______.
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A．family members should learn to get their messages across directly |
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B．parents should send their children taking drugs for treatment |
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C．children can hardly get used to their parents’ troubles |
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D．children should refuse the requests of their parents |
I recently heard a story about a famous research scientist who had made several very important medical breakthroughs. What set him so far apart from others?
He1.that, in his opinion, it all came from an2.from his mother that happened when he was about 2 years old. He had been trying to3.a bottle of milk from the refrigerator when he lost his 4.on the slippery(光滑的) bottle and it 5., making its contents pouring all over the kitchen floor.
When his mother came into the kitchen, instead of6.at him, giving him a lecture, or punishing him, she said: “Robert, what an(a)7.and wonderful mess you have made! I have8.seen such a huge pool of milk. Well, the damage has already been done. Would you like to9.down and play in the milk for a few10.before we clean it up?”
Indeed, he did. After a few minutes, his mother said: “You know, Robert,11.you make a mess like this, you have to clean it up at last and restore everything to its proper12.. So, how would you like to do that? We could use a sponge, a towel, or a mop. Which do you13.?” He chose the sponge and together they14.up the milk.
His mother then said: “You know, what happened just now is a15.experiment in how effectively to carry a big milk bottle with two tiny hands. Let’s16.out in the back yard and fill the bottle with water and see if you can17.a way to carry it without dropping it.” The little boy18.that if he held the bottle at the top near the lip with both hands, he could carry it without dropping it.
This scientist then19.that it was at that moment that he knew he didn’t need to be afraid to make20..
Wouldn’t it be great if all parents would respond the way Robert’s mother responded to him?
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The newly-built shopping mall provides goods that compete ______ product quality, reliability and above all variety.
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A．in honor of |
B．in terms of |
C．in the name of |
D．in the form of |
It seems that most educators ______ the plan for Advanced Assessment for Admission, which gives rise to a complete reform of College Entrance Exams.
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A．consist of |
B．complain of |
C．approve of |
D．dream of |
