Sam, an unemployed piano tuner, said it was only the second thing he had ever won in his life. The first thing was an Afghan blanket at a church raffle （抽獎(jiǎng)）when he was 25 years old. But this was much bigger: it was $120,000! He had won the Big Cube（骰子）, a state lottery game. To win, a player must first guess which number a turning cube will stop on. The cube has six numbers on it: 1X, 10X, 50X, 100X, 500X, and 1000X. If he is correct, the player must then guess which of two selected variables is going to be greater. So, just guessing which number appears on the cube does not ensure that you will win any money.

Sam correctly guessed 1000X, but he still had to choose between two variables. One variable was the number of cars that would run the stop sign at Hill Street and Lake Avenue in six hours. The other variable was the number of times that a teenage boy would change TV channels in a three-hour period. This was a tough decision.

Finally, Sam threw a coin. It came up heads, so Sam picked the teenager. He picked right. The stop sign was run only 76 times, but the teen clicked 120 times. Sixty-year-old Sam jumped for joy, for he had just won 1000 times 120, or $120,000. Sam dreamily left the lottery studio. Talking excitedly on his cell phone while crossing the street, he got hit by a little sports car.

Sam is slowly getting better. He was in the hospital for a month. His hospital bill was $110,000. And the insurance company for the little sports car’s owner sued Sam to court for $9,000 worth of repairs. Also, Sam still has to pay federal taxes on his winnings. Sam doesn’t play the state lottery any more. He says it’s better to be unlucky.

1．Which of the following can be the best title of the story?

A．Man Won $ 120,000                      B．Better to Be Unlucky

C．A traffic Accident                       D．Dream Came True

2．Sam won the Afghan blanket        years ago.

A．25                      B．60                       C．35                      D．76

3．What would have happened if Sam had chosen the stop sign between the two variables?

       A．Sam could have won $ 76,000.

       B．The teenager could have been the winner of the lottery game.

       C．Sam couldn’t have won anything.

       D．The teenager could have changed channels less than 120 times.

4．Which of the following statements is true according to the story?

      A．Sam has always been fortunate in lottery games.

       B．Sam was the one to blame for the accident.

       C．Sam paid the federal taxes right after the lottery game.

       D．Sam supports his family by winning lottery games

The Original London Sightseeing Tour-Hop On Hop Off

    “When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life, for there is in London all that life can afford. ——Dr Samuel Johnson 1709-1784.”

Duration: 24 hours pass

Welcome to London and welcome to The Original Tour. Providing more than just a great way to travel around the capital, founded nearly 60 years ago at the time of The Festival of Britain, The Original Tour is now the largest and most popular sightseeing operator in the world.

The Original Tour has become set up as the basic introduction to London. You are invited to experience all the magical sights and sounds of London in a comfortable and safe environment.

There is a full commentary（講解）in English and a choice of six other languages on selected routes. Live English speaking guides appear on the yellow route service. Your tour tickets are completely unrestricted. Each route makes frequent stops-simply hop off where want to and return to the same stop to continue your tour.

You can relax and enjoy the tour while your children (and everyone else’s)are entertained and informed by the highly praised “Kids’ Club” commentary and their free London activity packs. “Kids’ Club” is featured on the red route service.

Your ticket includes a free Thames River cruise（巡游）.You can choose between a 24 hour river cruise hopper pass OR the 50-minute circular tour depending on the time you have available.

1．The Original London Sightseeing Tour is            .

       A．a(chǎn) tourist guides organization                  B．a(chǎn) travel magazine

       C．a(chǎn) public transport system                      D．a(chǎn) bus tour company

2．Dr. Samuel Johnson’s words are put at the beginning of the advertisement to            .

       A．show the excellence of the Original London Tour.

       B．draw the reader’s attention

       C．tell the readers about the bright side of London

       D．prove the writer’s opinion

3．The underlined words hop off means            .

       A．get off                B．take off               C．put off                D．turn off

4．Among the following descriptions about The Original Tour,            is correct.

      A．There is a commentary in 7 languages on all the routes offered.

       B．Tourists with children had better choose the yellow route.

       C．A ticket holder can take either a 24-hour or 50-minute cruise for free.

       D．There are not English-speaking guides on all the routes.

For many families, spending on heating means sacrificing other basic things, according to Robert Coard, president of Action for Boston Community Development Inc(ABCD), a national organization which offers fuel（燃料）assistance to low-income families.

“They say they are having a problem of either heating or eating,” he said.

Ellen Campbell, a 29-year-old single mother of a five-year old daughter who is one of ABCD’s clients（客戶(hù)）, said after spending $350 for rent, her $531 monthly assistance check hardly covers all her expenses even when she’s not paying for heating oil.

“I just don’t know how I’m going to do it . I’m definitely worried. It’s going to be over $3 a gallon（加侖）. It’s crazy, ” said Campbell, who lives in Boston.

The bad news for people like Campbell is that some specialists don't think heating oil prices have hit their top yet. “I think the crude oil（原油）price will probably hit $100 in the coming weeks and that will flow through to the heating oil price,” said Rick Mueller, a crude oil analyst at Energy Security Analysis Inc in Boston.

A series of factors, including a worldwide increasing need for oil, have brought up oil prices. Although specialists think prices will fall sooner or later, forecasts put it too far off to be of comfort during the freezing winter months.

1．The writer intends to tell us that           .

       A．the rising price of heating oil has brought people into great trouble

       B．the increasing price of crude oil has become a worldwide problem

       C．a(chǎn)n increasing number of people are running into poverty

       D．ABCD is an organization which aims to help poor people

2．It can be inferred that           .

       A．the government will help to solve the problem of oil price soon

       B．$ 100 a barrel is the highest oil price people can accept

       C．the oil price may not drop until after this winter

       D．the oil price has risen just because of a greater need

3．This passage most probably appears in the section of           in a newspaper.

       A．a(chǎn)dvertisement                                      B．sport &entertainment

       C．politics news           D．economy news

Which gender is the most talkative? No matter what you answer, you are partially right.

A recent Gallup Poll showed that both men and women believe that women possess the gift of talking and some even believe women are biologically built for conversation, but all of that is challenged in research published in the November issue of Personality and Social Psychology Review.

In a recent research by Campbell Leaper and Melanie Ayres, they collected all of the available evidence from decades of scientific study and systematically combined the findings into an overall picture of the differences between men and women regarding talkativeness.

They found a small but reliable tendency（趨勢(shì)）for men to be more talkative than women in certain cases, such as when they were conversing with their wives or with strangers. Women talked more to their children and to their college classmates.

They type of speech was also explored in the research. The researchers discovered that, with strangers ,women were generally more talkative when it came to using speech to ensure her connection to the listener, while men’s speech focused more on an attempt to influence the listener. With close friends and family, however there was very little difference between genders in the amount of speech.

1．This passage mainly talks about a research conducted by            .

       A．Gallup Poll                                          B．Personality and Social Psychology Review

       C．Campbell Leaper and Melanie Ayres       D．the author

2．Which of the following statements describes the main idea of the passage?

       A．Women are born more talkative than men.

       B．Men are born more talkative than women.

       C．Women and men are talkative in different cases.

       D．Women are no more talkative than men.

3．The underlined word gender means            .

       A．people                 B．nationality            C．culture                D．sex

4．Talking with strangers,            .

       A．women are more talkative than with people they know

       B．men are more talkative than with their wives

       C．women prefer to listen more rather than speak more

       D．men speak a lot to have their opinions accepted

When the Spanish first brought chocolate back to Europe, it was still being served as a drink, but soon went through an important change: the chili pepper（紅辣椒）was replaced by sugar. The new sweetened chocolate drink was so expensive that few could afford, but by the 17th century the drink was common among European noblemen. In England, which was somewhat more equality favored than the rest of Europe, chocolate was more widely available. Those who could afford it could enjoy chocolate drinks in the new coffee and chocolate houses of London.

As cacao（可可樹(shù)）became more commonly available, people began experimenting with new ways of using it. Chocolate began to appear in cakes and other foods. But it wasn’t until 1828 that the “modern era” of chocolate making and production began.

The introduction of cocoa powder not only made creating chocolate drinks much easier, but also made it possible to combine chocolate with sugar and then remix it with cocoa butter to creat a solid. Others began to build on Van Houten’s success ,experimenting to make new chocolate products. In 1849, English chocolate maker Joseph Storrs Fry produced what was the world’s first eating chocolate.

Today, the Swiss are famous for their chocolate, and rightly so. In the late 19th century, they developed a number of processes that contributed greatly to creating the solid chocolate candy that we all enjoy today. Two major developments occurred in 1879. First, Daniel Peter, a Swiss chocolate producer, had the idea of using powdered milk（invented by Swiss Chemist Henri Nestle in 1867） to make a new kind of chocolate, milk chocolate. Second, Rudolph Lindt invented a process called “conching. ” which  greatly improved the quality of chocolate candy by making it more mixable.

1．Before beings brought into Europe by Spanish, chocolate was           .

       A．a(chǎn) sweet candy                                     B．a(chǎn) spicy（辣的）drink

       C．a(chǎn) sweet drink                                      D．a(chǎn) spicy candy

2．The passage mainly discusses the development of          .

       A．cacao                                                 B．chocolate drinks

       C．chocolate candies                                D．chocolate houses

3．More people drank chocolate in England than in the rest of Europe in the 17th century because          .

       A．the English were richer                         B．the English liked sweets better

       C．the English had more equal rights          D．there were fewer noblemen in England

4．The milk chocolate was invented in          .

       A．1828                   B．1849                   C．1867                   D．1878

5．What information will most probably be provided following the last paragraph?

       A．Chocolate products and new chocolate making techniques in the 20th century.

       B．The popularity of Swiss chocolate.

       C．The exploration of market possibilities of chocolate products in the 19th century.

       D．Other uses of cocoa powder.

以下標(biāo)有題號(hào)的每一行均有一個(gè)錯(cuò)誤，請(qǐng)找出，并按下列情況改正。

此行多一個(gè)詞：把多余的詞用斜線劃掉，在該行右邊橫線上寫(xiě)出該詞，并也用斜線劃掉。

此行缺一個(gè)詞：在缺詞處加一個(gè)漏字符號(hào)（^），在該行右邊橫線上寫(xiě)出該加的詞。

此行錯(cuò)一個(gè)詞：在錯(cuò)的詞下劃一橫線，在該行右邊橫線上寫(xiě)出改正后的詞。

注意：請(qǐng)?jiān)诖痤}卡上作答。

Last month we bought our two year-old daughter the little            1．       

dog. There are many children of her age where we live, and we           2．       

thought a dog would make her less alone. We were right. They            3．       

play together happily all days long. Our daughter now smiles and         4．       

laughs a lot more than she used. In a way it is like having two              5．       

children in the house. All of them are very untidy, and they cry            6．       

when they do not get what they want. The dog is easy to look             7．       

after it than my daughter. It always eats up all its food an we don’t      8．       

have piles of dirty clothes to wash. My wife was also happy                9．       

because I have given up smoke. The god doesn’t like the smell.        10．       

—Thank you ever so much for the book you sent me.

—        .

A．No, thanks                                                 B．I’ m glad you like it

C．Please don’ t say so                                    D．No, it’s not so good

—This is _________room I told you before.

—I see. Isn’t it ________bright one?

A．the; a           B．a(chǎn); a        C．the; the              D．a(chǎn); the

I’d like to live somewhere _________the sun shines all year long.

A．which         B．that       C．where         D．in which

The car ran down the hill, and the driver ________, according to the newspaper, to have been killed.

A．said            B．was saying     C．was said         D．had been said