Everyone knows that flamingos are tropical birds. A resident of Ottawa, however, spotted a flamingo one cold November day. The bird, called Elisha, was more than 300 miles from home when she landed in Ottawa. Elisha was living in a bird compound in a small town near Connecticut when she got lost. Why was the bird flying around? “She was probably trying to migrate,” says a naturalist. “A flamingo’s natural instinct is to migrate to warmer weather in winter.”

For the past few years, Elisha has lived in a bird compound with other birds, ducks, and swans. In summer, the birds spend their time in a shallow pond. In winter they live in a large, heated greenhouse. One day, Elisha took off and flew about 50 miles to the Connecticut River. Her caregivers tried to get her back and planned to clip（夾�。﹉er wings so she wouldn’t fly away again. But every time they approached, Elisha managed to get away. “That’s a smart bird,” said a news reporter. “She probably knew she was about to get her wings clipped.”

Back in Ottawa, wildlife experts were trying to rescue Elisha before she froze to death. But it wasn’t easy. First they put up a giant mirror to attract her and placed plates of food next to her. Next, they gathered together plastic flamingos . They set the plastic birds up in a park nearby,  “We were hoping that Elisha would like being in a group, even if it is plastic. Maybe she would fall in love or something,” a rescue worker said. That didn’t work either. “She’s not easy to catch, ” said a compound worker in Connecticut. “We couldn’t catch her either. She seems to like her freedom.”

Finally, after a dozen rescue attempts by almost 100 volunteers, Elisha was captured. “I guess she got hungry,” said a rescue worker. “We were about to give up when we saw her looking for food at the edge of the river. She couldn’t find anything to eat because the water was frozen. ” Elisha put her head in the water to feed. When she came up they caught her in a net. Then she flew back to Connecticut, this time by plane.

1．Why was Elisha found in Ottawa in November?

      A．She was meant to find something to eat.

       B．She got lost in an attempt to migrate.

       C．She intended to stay away from a bird group.

       D．She had to land in Ottawa for a break.

2．Which of the following was NOT used when people tried to catch Elisha?

       A．A large mirror.                                     B．Plates of food.

       C．Plastic flamingos.                                D．Ducks and swans.

3．What can we learn from the text?

       A．It is more than 300 miles away from Ottawa to Connecticut.

       B．Two attempts had been made before Elisha was captured.

       C．Elisha was almost frozen to death when caught in a net.

       D．Rescue workers gave up their effort to catch Elisha.

4．What can we infer from the text?

      A．Elisha didn’t like her caregivers and managed to get away.

       B．Connecticut is a tropical area.

       C．The rescue of Elisha cost a lot of money.

       D．Elisha would never try to leave her group again.

5．Which of the following can be the best title for the passage?

       A．The Lost Flamingo                               B．Lost & Found

       C．Bird Rescuers                         D．Flamingos

Every October, over 1,400 hunters hit the woods in the Pacific Northwest. They’ re looking for something worth millions. The hunt isn’t for gold, it’s for mushrooms. To some people, mushrooms are more valuable than gold. The mushrooms are called “matsutake” in Japanese. They have a wonderful scent and are highly prized in Japan. In the same way that North Americans associate Thanksgiving with eating turkey, people in Japan associate autumn with matsutake mushrooms. They often wrap single perfect matsutake mushrooms with green leaves and give them as gifts. People use the mushrooms in soups and special dishes.

Matsutake mushrooms grow all over, in China, Turkey, South Korea, Bhutan, and Mexico. But the best place to find them is in the United States, in the Pacific Northwest on the border of Oregon and California. There, the mushrooms grow abundantly and the quality is excellent. They can sell for ＄300 a pound and have even gone up to ＄ 600 a pound.

The mushroom hunt is a multi – million – dollar business, and it has its risks. “There are a lot of people out in the woods, and they’re all looking for the same thing. The first week in October, there were more than 1,400 pickers,” says a forestry official. “The harvest can produce 1.2 million pounds of the mushrooms. That’s worth about ＄18 million. It’s no wonder there are holdups.” Jack Spencer, a mushroom picker, agrees. “You have to be careful,” he says. “A guy with a gun can run out of the woods and say ‘Hand over your mushrooms!’” But most seasons are trouble – free. Hunters must buy permits, and the number of hunters in the area is restricted.

“The challenge is finding these matsutake mushrooms,” Jack says. Hunters go out into the woods with maps and suggestions from friends. They look for places where certain trees grow together. Mushroom hunters can walk for hours and find only a few mushrooms. But then suddenly , they may hit the jackpot – a huge patch of mushrooms.

1．Which of the following statements is true according to the passage?

       A．Mushrooms grow best in some Asian countries.

       B．Mushroom hunters cause great damage to the woods.

       C．In North America, mushrooms are worth much more than gold.

       D．It takes a lot of work and patience to get a good harvest of the mushrooms.

2．What does the second paragraph mainly talk about?

       A．Matsutake mushrooms are highly valued in Japan.

       B．North Americans celebrate Thanksgiving by eating turkey.

       C．Mushrooms wrapped with green leaves are perfect gifts.

       D．Mushrooms are often used to cook special soups and dishes.

3．The underlined word “holdups” is closest in meaning to            .

      A．delays                 B．a(chǎn)dventures           C．robberies             D．challenges

4．It can be inferred from the passage that           .

       A．mushroom hunters are free from trouble if they are careful

       B．those hunting for the mushrooms in the Pacific Northwest are mostly Japanese

       C．hunters are not free to hunt for mushrooms in the woods

       D．mushrooms are of good quality where they grow abundantly

5．Which is the best title for the passage?

       A．How to Find Matsutake Mushrooms      B．Hand Over Your Mushrooms!

       C．Where to Find Matsutake Mushrooms    D．Food Culture in Japan

The old idea that talented children “burn themselves out” in the early years, and, therefore, are subjected to failure and at worst, mental illness is unfounded. As a matter of fact, the outstanding thing that happens to bright kids is that they are very likely to grow into bright adults.

To find this out, 1,500 gifted persons were followed up to their thirty – fifth year with these results:

On adult intelligence tests, they scored as high as they had as children. They were, as a group, in good health, physically and mentally. 84 per cent of their group were married and seemed content with their lives.

About 70 per cent had graduated from college, though only 30 per cent had graduated with honors. A few had even dropped out, but nearly half of these had returned to graduate.

Of the men, 80 per cent were in one of the professions or in business management or semiprofessional jobs. The women who had remained single had office, business, or professional occupations.

The group had published 90 books and 1, 500 articles in scientific, scholarly, and literary magazines and had collected more than 100 patents.

In a material way they did not do badly either. Average income was considerably higher among the gifted people, especially the men, than for the country as a whole, despite their comparative youth. In fact, far from being strange, most of the gifted were turning their early promise into practical reality.

1．The underlined word unfounded is closest in meaning to           .

       A．unclear               B．baseless               C．a(chǎn)mbiguous           D．reasonable

2．The survey of bright children was made to           .

       A．find out whether the talented children had all become great leaders

       B．prove that talented children “burn themselves out” in the early years

       C．discover the percentage of those mentally ill among the gifted

       D．prove that most talented children are likely to turn their early promise into practical reality

3．Intelligence tests showed that           .

       A．bright children were unlikely to be mentally healthy

       B．between childhood and adulthood there was a considerable loss of intelligence

       C．talented children were most likely to become gifted adults

       D．the grown – up talented children got higher scores than in their childhood

4．The author seems to suggest that           .

       A．marriage affects gifted women’s career

       B．gifted women earn more money than gifted men

       C．bright girls are less likely to become bright adults than bright boys

       D．however hard bright children work, their physical and mental health won’t be affected

5．The survey showed that most of the people surveyed           .

       A．collected a patent                                 B．published books

       C．dropped out of college     D．enjoyed success and happiness

Everybody loves a fat pay rise. Yet pleasure at your own can disappear if you learn that a colleague has been given a bigger one. Indeed, if he has a reputation for incompetence in their work, you might even be extremely angry. Such behavior is regarded as “all too human”, with the underlying assumption that other animals would not be capable of this finely developed sense of grievance（委屈）. But a study by Sarah Brosnan and Frans de Waal of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, which has just been published in Nature, suggests that it is all too monkey as well.

The researchers studied the behavior of females brown capuchin monkeys. They look cute. They are good – natured, co – operative creatures, and they share their food willingly. Above all, like their female human counterparts, they tend to pay much closer attention to the value of “goods and services” than males. Such characteristics make them perfect candidates for Dr. Brosnan’s and Dr. de Waal’s study. The researchers spent two years teaching their monkeys to exchange tokens（代幣）for food. Normally, the monkeys were happy enough to exchange pieces of rock for slices of cucumber. However, when two monkeys were placed in separate but adjoining chambers（鄰室）, so that each could observe what the other was getting in return for its rock, they became markedly different.

In the would of capuchins grapes are luxury goods（and much preferable to cucumbers）. So when one monkey was handed a grape in exchange for her token, the second was reluctant to hand hers over for a mere piece of cucumber. And if one received a grape without having to provide her token in exchange at all, the other either tossed her own token at the researcher or out of the chamber, or refused to accept the slice of cucumber. Indeed, the mere presence of a grape in the other chamber（without an actual monkey to eat it） was enough to reduce anger in a female capuchin.

1．The statement “it is all too monkey as well” implies that           .

       A．monkeys also get angry with each other

       B．feeling angry when unfairly treated is also monkeys’ nature

       C．monkeys, like humans, tend to be friendly to each other

       D．no other animals other than monkeys are so much like humans

2．Female capuchin monkeys were chosen for the research most probably because they         .

       A．like to weigh what they get

       B．look cute and good - natured

       C．co – operate with each other willingly

       D．pay close attention to researchers’ instructions

3．The monkeys’ “tokens” were nothing but          .

       A．slices of cucumber                              B．pieces of rock

       C．grapes                                                D．luxury goods

4．The other monkey refused to accept the slice of cucumber offered by the researcher because          .

       A．she was not hungry at the time

       B．she wanted it to be given to other monkeys

       C．the fist monkey was offered something better

       D．she found it smaller than that given to the first monkey

5．According to the passage, in order to keep peace and harmony within a society, it is important that          .

       A．a(chǎn) perfect law should be made               

       B．every member should be given a pay rise

       C．every member should respect others

       D．every member should be treated fairly

People have wondered for a long time how their personalities and behaviors are formed. It is not easy to explain why one person is intelligent and another is not, or why one is cooperative and another is competitive.

Social scientists are, of course, extremely interested in these types of questions. They want to explain why we possess certain characteristics and exhibit certain behaviors. There are no clear answers yet, but two distinct schools of thought on the matter have developed. As one might expect, the two approaches are very different from each other. The controversy is often conveniently referred to as “nature or nurture（養(yǎng)育）”.

Those who support the “nature” side of the conflict believe that our personalities and behavior patterns are largely determined by biological factors. That our environment has little, if anything, to do with our abilities, characteristics and behavior is central to this theory.

Taken to an extreme, this theory maintains that our behavior is pre – determined to such a great degree that we are almost completely governed by our instincts（本能）.

                                     , that is, they advocate education, are often called behaviorists. They claim that our environment is more important than our biologically – based instincts in determining how we will act. A behaviorist, B. F. Skinner, sees humans as beings whose behavior is almost completely shaped by their surroundings. The behaviorists maintain that, like machines, humans respond to environmental stimuli（刺激）as the basis of their behavior.

Let us examine the different explanations about one human characteristic, intelligence, offered by the two theories. Supporters of the “nature” theory insist that we are born with a certain capacity for learning that is biologically determined. Needless to say, they don’t believe that factors in the environment have much influence on what is basically a predetermined characteristic. On the other hand，behaviorists argue that our intelligence levels are the product of our experiences. Behaviorists suggest that the child who is raised in an environment where there are many stimuli which develop his or her capacity for appropriate responses will experience greater intellectual development.

1．What is the best title of the passage? （Please answer within 10 words.）

2．Which sentence in the passage can be replaced by the following one?

However, those who support the “nurture” theory maintain that it is people’s experiences that determine how clever they are.

3．Please fill in the blank in the 5th paragraph with proper words or phrases to complete the sentence.（Please answer within 10 words）

4．Are you one the “nature” side or on the “nurture” side? Why? （Please answer within 30 words.）

5．Translate the underlined sentence in the first paragraph into Chinese.

In recent years       global warming is becoming       concern for people all over the world.

A．the ; the   B．不填；不填     C．不填;a      D．the；不填

The official ticketing website of the 2008 Olympic Games opened on March 8, which the ticket ______prices for each event .

A．will list     B．is listed    C．is listing   D．lists

She had a tense expression on her face ,      she was expecting trouble .

A．even though   B．a(chǎn)s though    C．so that    D．now that 

This new machine is technically far       to the previous type.

A．superior   B．junior       C．senior      D．equal

—When can we go to visit you ?

—Anytime you feel like       .

A．one   B．it      C．so    D．that