“Selfie” (自拍) joins ranks of dictionary words.
In 2002, an Australian man went to his friend’s 21st birthday party. He got drunk, tripped on some steps and cut his lip. He took a picture of his injuries and shared it with his friends on an online forum. “And sorry about the focus,” he wrote, “it was a selfie.” That was the first recorded use of the word “selfie”, according to linguistic experts at Oxford Dictionaries.
On Nov 19, Oxford Dictionaries declared “selfie” Word of the Year for 2013, in honor of the term having taken over the world thanks to millions of smart phone self-portraits and the resulting shares on social media.
So what does the choice of the word say about our culture? Mary Elizabeth Williams, writing in Salon
magazine, says the word reminds us that contemporary culture is defined by our narcissism(自恋).Megan Jackson from a local newspaper points out a selfie may only focus on appearance.
Selfies invite judgment based on appearance alone. What kind of cultural influence does this have on women? Erin Gloria Ryan on Jezebel says selfies teach young woman to obsess over their appearance and judge themselves on the basis of beauty rather than accomplishments. “They’re a reflection of the warped way we teach girls to see themselves as decorative,” said Ryan.
In Slate magazine, Rachel Simmons has the opposite view. She argues that selfies are an example of young women promoting themselves and taking control of their own self-presentation. Think of each one, she says, as “a tiny pulse of girl pride —a shout-out to the self”.
1.Which of the following is true about the first use of “selfie”?
A. The Australian man created it to celebrate his friend’s 21st birthday.
B. The Australian man created by chance when he got drunk and shared his photo online.
C. The Oxford Dictionary used it to thank the creation of smart phone.
D. The social media were so advanced that they made the word transmitted.
2.The underlined word “tripped” in the first paragraph probably means “________”.
A. traveled B. stepped lightly
C. fell down D. made mistakes
3.Who holds a positive opinion towards selfie in the life of women?
A. Mary Elizabeth. B. Megan Jackson.
C. Erin Gloria Ryan. D. Rachel Simmons.
4.The text is mainly concerned with ________.
A. the introduction of the word “selfie”
B. the choice of the word “selfie”
C. the history of the word “selfie”
D. the characteristics of the word “selfie”
Tayka Hotel De Sal
Where: Tahua, Bolivia
How much: About $95 a night
Why it’s cool: You’ve stayed at hotels made of brick or wood, but salt? That’s something few can claim. Tayka Hotel de Sal is made totally of salt—including the beds (though you’ll sleep on regular mattresses (床垫) and blankets).The hotel sits on the Salar de Uyuni, a prehistoric dried-up lake that’s the world’s biggest salt flat. Builders use the salt from the 4,633-square-mile flat to make the bricks, and glue them together with a paste of wet salt that hardens when it dries. When rain starts to dissolve the hotel, the owners 
just mix up more salt paste to strengthen the bricks.
Green Magic Nature Resort
Where: Vythiri, India
How much: About $240 a night
Why it’s cool: Ridding a pulley(滑轮)-operated lift 86 feet to your treetop room is just the start of your adventure. As you look out of your open window—there is no glass!—you watch monkeys and birds in the rain forest canopy. Later you might test your fear of heights by crossing the handmade rope bridge to the main part of the hotel, or just sit on your bamboo bed and read. You don’t even have to come down for breakfast—the hotel will send it up on the pulley-drawn “elevator”.
Dog Bark Park Inn B&B
Where: Cottonwood, Idaho
How much: $92 a night
Why it’s cool: This doghouse isn’t just for the family pet. Sweet Willy is a 30-foot-tall dog with guest rooms in his belly. Climb the wooden stairs beside his hind leg to enter the door in his side. You can relax in the main bedroom, go up a few steps of the loft in Willy’s head, or hang out inside his nose. Although you have a full private bathroom in your quarters, there is also a toilet in the 12-foot-tall fire hydrant outside.
Gamirasu Cave Hotel
Where: Ayvali, Turkey
How much: Between $130 and $475 a night.
Why it’s cool: This is caveman cool! Experience what it was like 5,000 years ago, when people lived in these mountain caves formed by volcanic ash. But your stay will be much more modern. Bathrooms and electricity provide what you expect from a modern hotel, and the white volcanic ash, called tufa, keeps the rooms cool, about 65℉in summer.(Don’t worry—there is heat in winter.)
1.What is the similarity of the four hotels?
A. Being expensive. B. Being beautiful.
C. Being natural. D. Being unique.
2.What does the underlined part “Sweet Willy” refer to?
A. The building of Dog Bark Park Inn B&B.
B. The name of a pet dog of the hotel owner.
C. The name of the hotel.
D. The name of the hotel owner.
3.Which of the hotel makes you have a feeling of living in the far past?
A. Tayka Hotel De Sal B. Green Magic Nature Resort
C. Dog Bark Park Inn B&B D. Gamirasu Cave Hotel
Our house was directly across the street from the clinic entrance of John Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. We lived downstairs and rented the upstairs rooms to the patients at the clinic.
One evening as I was fixing supper, there was a knock at the door. I opened it to see a truly awful-looking man. He’s hardly taller than my eight-year-old son. “Good evening. I’ve come to see if you’ve a room. I came for a treatment this morning from the eastern shore, and there’s no bus till morning.” He told me he’d been huntin
g for a room since noon but with no success. “I guess it’s my face…I know it looks terrible, but my doctor says with a few more treatments…” For a moment I hesitated, but his next words convinced me: “I could sleep in this chair on the porch. My bus leaves early in the morning.”
I told him we would find him a bed. When I had finished the dishes, I talked with him. He told me he fished for a living to support his five children, and his wife, who was hopelessly crippled (残疾的) from a back injury. He didn’t tell it by way of complaint. Next morning, just before he left, as if asking a great favor, he said, “Could I come back and stay the next time?” He added, “Your children made me feel at home.”
On his next trip he arrived a little after seven in the morning. As a gift, he brought a big fish and the largest oysters (牡蛎) I had ever seen. I knew his bus left at 4:00 a.m. and I wondered what time he had to get up in order to do this for us.
In the years he came to stay overnight with us and there was never a time that he did not bring us vegetables from his garden. I know our family always will be grateful to have known him; from him we learned how to accept the bad without complaint when facing the misfortune.
1.Why did the author agree to let the man spend the night in his house at last?
A. Because the man said others refused to accommodate him.
B. Because the man said he would not cause much inconvenience.
C. Because the man said he had come from the eastern shore.
D. Because the man said he had been hunting for a room since noon.
2.How long would it take the man to travel from his home to Baltimore by bus?
A. About 1 hour. B. About 2 hours.
C. About 3 hours. D. About 4 hours.
3.From the text we can know that __________.
A. the author’s children were kind and friendly to the man
B. the man was fed up with his hard-work and his family
C. John Hopkins Hospital provided rooms for the patients to live in
D. the author and his family were thought highly of by his neighbors
4.The author’s family were grateful to know the man because __________.
A. he often brought them fish and vegetables from his garden
B. he paid them money for his staying
C. he taught them how to accept the bad without complaint
D. he stayed only overnight with the writer’s family
假定你是李华。你班同学决定为小明举办生日聚会。请你写信邀请外教Susan参加，要点包括：
⒈ 时间：周五晚8点至9点
⒉ 地点：学生俱乐部
⒊ 内容：生日歌、蛋糕、游戏等
⒋ 要求：备小礼物
注意：⒈ 词数100左右，开头语已为你写好；⒉可以适当增加细节，以便行文连贯；⒊ 答案必须写在答题卡相应的位置上。
Hi, Susan,
We’re throwing a surprise party for Xiaoming’s birthday.
短文改错（共10小题；每小题1分，满分10分）
假段定英语课上老师要求同桌之间交换修改作文，请你修改你同桌写的以下作文。文中共有
10处语言错误，每句中最多有两处。错误仅涉及一个单词的增加、删除或修改。增加：在缺词处
加一个漏字符号(
)，并在其下面写出该加的词。删除：把多余的词用(＼)划掉。
修改：在错的词下画一横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。
注意：1.每处错误及其修改均仅限一词；
1． 只允许修改10处，多者（从第11处起）不计分。
I hardly remember my grandmother. She used to holding me on her knees and sing old songs. I was only four when she passes away. She is just a distant memory for me now.
I remember my grandfather very much. He was tall, with broad shoulder and a beard that turned from black toward gray over the years. He had a deep voice, which set himself apart from others in our small town, he was strong and powerful. In a fact, he even scared my classmates away during they came over to play or do homework with me. However, he was the gentlest man I have never known.
阅读下面材料，在空白处填入适当的内容（不多于3个单词）或括号内单词的正确形式。
Are you facing a situation that looks impossible to fix?
In 1969,the pollution was terrible along the Cuyahoga River Cleveland, Ohio. It _1.___（be）unimaginable that it could ever be cleaned up. The river was so polluted that it ___2.____(actual)caught fire and burned. Now, years later, this river is one of _3._most outstanding examples of environmental cleanup.
But the river wasn’t changed in a few days _4.____even a few months. It took years of work__5.______(reduce ) the industrial pollution and clean the water. Finally, that hard work paid off and now the water in the river is___6._____(clean) than ever.
Maybe you are facing an impossible situation. Maybe you leave a habit _7.___is driving your family crazy. Possibly you drink too much or don’t know how to control your credit card use. When you face such an impossible situation ,don’t you want a quick fix and something to change immediately?
While there are __8.______(amaze) stories of instant transformation, for most of us the___9.______(change) are gradual and require a lot of effort and work, like cleaning up a polluted river. Just be 10. (patience)
