“If you talk to the plants, they will grow faster and the effect is even better if you’re a woman.” Researchers at Royal Horticultural Society carried out an experient to find that the voice of a woman gardener makes plants grow faster.
The experiment lasted a month and by the end of the study scientists managed to discover that tomato plants grew up two inches taller when women gardeners talked to them instead of male.
Sarah Darwin was the one making the plants registered the best growth. Her voice was the most “inspiring” for plants than those of nine other gardeners when reading a passage from The Origin of Species. The great-great-granddaughter of the famous botanist(植物学家) Charles Darwin found that her plant grew about two inches taller than the plant of the best male gardener.
Colin Crosbie, Garden Superintendent at RHS, said that the finding cannot yet be explained. He assumes that women have a greater range of pitch（音高） and tone（音调） which might have a certain effect on the sound waves that reach the plant. “Sound waves are an environmental effect just like rain or light ,”said Mr Grosbie.
The study began in April at RHS Garden Wisley in Survey. Scientists started with open auditions(听力) for the people who were asked to record passages from John Wyndham's The Day of the Triffids, Shakespeare’s A Midsummer's Night Dream and Darwin's The Origin of Species.
Afterwards researchers selected a number of different voices and played them to 10 tomato plants during a period of a month. Each plant had headphones（耳机） connected to it. Through the headphones the sound waves could hit the plants. It was discovered that plants that “listened” to female voices on average grew taller by an inch in comparison to plants that heard male voices.
Miss Darwin said, “I think it is an honor to have a voice that can make tomatoes grow, and especially fitting because for a number of years I have been studying wild tomatoes from the Galapagos Island at the Natural History Museum in London.”
1.What does the passage talk about?
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A．Plants enjoy men’s voices than women’s. |
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B．A botanical experiment in a museum. |
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C．Voice’s influence on plant growing. |
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D．Strange phenomenon（现象） at Royal Horticultural Society. |
2.What does the underlined sentence in paragraph 4 mean?
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A．Plants need sound as well as rain and light. |
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B．Sound is basic for the plant to grow. |
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C．Sound has a good effect as rain or light does. |
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D．Plants can’t live without sound, rain or light. |
3.Sarah Darwin is most likely a (an)_____.
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A．botanist |
B．gardener |
C．astronomer |
D．environmentalist |
4.What can we learn from the passage?
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A．The experiment ended in May. |
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B．Scientist can explain the findings clearly. |
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C．Plants enjoy listening to the passages from masterpieces. |
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D．The findings are of great importance to human beings. |
I still remember my first day at school in London and I was half-excited and half-frightened. On my way to school I wondered what sort of questions the other boys would ask me and practiced all the answers: “I am nine years old. I was born here but I haven’t lived here since I was two. I was living in Farley. It’s about thirty miles away. I came back to London two months ago.” I also wondered if it was the custom for boys to fight strangers like me, but I was tall for my age. I hoped they would decide not to risk it.
No one took any notice of me before school. I stood in the center of the playground, expecting someone to say “hello”, but no one spoke to me. When a teacher called my name and told me where my classroom was, one or two boys looked at me but that was all.
My teacher was called Mr. Jones. There were 42 boys in the class, so I didn’t stand out there, either, until the first lesson of the afternoon. Mr. Jones was very fond of Charles Dickens and he had decided to read aloud to us from David Copperfield, but first he asked several boys if they knew Dickens’ birthplace, but no one guessed right. A boy called Brian, the biggest in the class, said: “Timbuktu”, and Mr. Jones went red in the face. Then he asked me. I said: “Portsmouth”, and everyone stared at me because Mr. Jones said I was right. This didn’t make me very popular, of course.
“He thinks he’s clever,” I heard Brian say.
After that, we went out to the playground to play football. I was in Brian’s team, and he obviously had Dickens in mind because he told me to go in goal. No one ever wanted to be the goalkeeper.
“He’s big enough and useless enough.” Brian said when someone asked him why he had chosen me.
I suppose Mr. Jones, who served as the judge, remembered Dickens, too, because when the game was nearly over, Brian pushed one of the players on the other team, and he gave them a penalty (惩罚). As the boy kicked the ball to my right, I threw myself down instinctively (本能地) and saved it. All my team crowded round me. My bare knees were injured and bleeding. Brian took out a handkerchief and offered it to me.
“Do you want to join my gang (帮派)?” he said.
At the end of the day, I was no longer a stranger.
1.The writer prepared to answer all of the following questions EXCEPT “ ”.
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A．How old are you? |
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B．Where are you from? |
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C．Do you want to join my gang? |
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D．When did you come back to London? |
2.We can learn from the passage that .
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A．boys were usually unfriendly to new students |
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B．the writer was not greeted as he expected |
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C．Brian praised the writer for his cleverness |
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D．the writer was glad to be a goalkeeper |
3.The underlined part “I didn’t stand out” in paragraph 3 means that the writer was not .
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A．noticeable |
B．welcome |
C．important |
D．foolish |
4.The writer was offered a handkerchief because .
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A．he threw himself down and saved the goal |
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B．he pushed a player on the other team |
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C．he was beginning to be accepted |
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D．he was no longer a newcomer |
My parents ran a small restaurant in Seattle. It was open twenty-four hours a day, six days a week. And my first real job, when I was six years old, was 36 the diners’ shoes. My father had done it when he was young, so he taught me 37 to do it well, telling me to 38 to shine the shoes again if the customer wasn’t 39 .
I was proud of working in the restaurant 40 I was also working for the good of the family. But my father 41 said that I had to meet certain standards(标准) to be part of the team. I 42 to be on time, hard-working, and polite to the 43 . I was 44 paid for the work I did at the restaurant. One day I made the mistake of suggesting to Dad that he 45 give me $10 a week. He said, “OK. How about you paying me for three meals a day you have here? And for the times you bring in your friends 46 free soft drinks?” He 47 the amount of money I owed him, about $40 a week.
I remember returning to Seattle after being 48 in the US Army for about two years. I had just been promoted（升职） to Captain at that time. And full of pride, I walked into my parents’ restaurant, but the 49 thing Dad said was, “How about your 50 up tonight?” I couldn’t 51 my ears! I am an officer in the Army! But 52 didn’t matter. As far as Dad was concerned, I was just 53 member of the team. I reached for the mop(拖把).Working for Dad has taught me that the devotion(奉献) to a 54 is above all. It has nothing to do with 55 that team is for a family restaurant or the US Army.
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The following years are _______to see a rise in production.
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A．likely |
B．possible |
C．perhaps |
D．probable |
The tickets for the show have all been sold out. In other words, the tickets are not ____ now.
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A．accurate |
B．accessible |
C．acceptable |
D．available |
-- If you break the rules again, you are sure to be punished.
---_______? I don’t care.
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A．What if |
B．How come |
C．What for |
D．So what |
