A thief entered the bedroom of the 30^th President of the United States, who met him and helped him escape punishment.

The event happened in the early morning hours in one of the first days when Calvin Coolidge came into power, late in August, 1923. He and his family were living in the same third-floor suite(套房) at the Willard Hotel in Washington that had occupied several years before. The former President’s wife was still living in the White House.

Coolidge awoke to see a stranger go through his clothes, remove a wallet and a watch chain.

Coolidge spoke, “ I wish you wouldn’t take that.”

The thief, gaining his voice, said, “ Why?”

“ I don’t mean the watch and chain, only the charm(表墜). Take it near the window and read what is impressed on its back,” the president said.

The thief read, “ Presented to Calvin Coolidge.”

“ Are you President Coolidge?” he asked.

The president answered, “ Yes, and the House of Representatives（眾議院）gave me the watch charm. I’m fond of it. It would do you no good. You want money. Let’s talk this over.”

Holding up the wallet, the young man said in a low voice, “ I’ll take this and leave everything else.”

Coolidge, knowing there was 80 dollars in it, persuaded the young man to sit down and talk. He told the President he and his college roommate had overspent during their holiday and did not have enough money to pay their hotel bill.

Coolidge added up the roommate and two rail tickets back to the college. Then he counted out 32 dollars and said it was a loan(借款).

He then told the young man, “ There is a guard in the corridor.” The young man nodded and left through the same window as he had entered.

1.What caused the thief to meet the President

A. He knew the president had lots of money.  B. He knew the president lived in the suite.

C. He wanted to be a rich businessman.      D. He wanted to steal some money.

2.Why did Calvin Coolidge live at the Willard Hotel in those days?

A. Because the former president was still in the White House.

B. Because the former First Lady hadn’t left the White House.

C. Because the First lady liked to live there.

D. Because he liked there.

3. Coolidge counted out 32 dollars______.

A. in order not to be killed by the thief

B. in order to be out of danger

C. so as to help the young student overcome his difficulty.

D. because he had no more money.

4.The young man’s roommate went back to college _____.

A. by air           B. by water         C. by bus           D. by train

5.Which of the following might happen afterwards?

A. The young man repaid the 32 dollars.

B. The thief was put into prison.

C. The President told many reporters the thief’s name.

D. The President ordered the young man to repay the money.

 

Why do men die earlier than women? The latest research makes it known that the reason could be that men's hearts go into rapid decline when they reach middle age.

    The largest study of the effects of ageing on the heart has found that women's longevity may be linked to the fact that their hearts do not lose their pumping power with age.

    "We have found that the power of the male heart falls by 20--25 percent between 18 and 70 years of age,”said the head of the study, David Goldspink of Liverpool John Moores University in the UK.

    "Within the heart there are millions of cells that enable it to beat. Between the age of 20 and 70，one-third of those cells die and are not replaced in men,”said Goldspink. "This is part of the ageing process."

    What surprises scientists is that the female heart sees very little loss of these cells. A healthy 70-year-old woman's heart could perform almost as well as a 20-year-old one's.

   "This gender difference might just explain why women live longer than men,”said Goldspink.

    They studied more than 250 healthy men and women between the ages of 18 and 80，focusing on healthy persons to remove the confusing influence of disease.

    The team has yet to find why ageing takes a greater loss on the male heart, said Goldspink.

    The good news is that men can improve the health of their heart with regular exercise. Goldspink stressed that women also need regular exercise to prevent their leg muscles becoming smaller and weaker as they age.

1.

The underlined word“l(fā)ongevity" in the second paragraph probably refers to ______.

    A. health          B. long life        C. ageing           D. effect

2.

The text mainly talks about ______.

    A. men's heart cells                   B. women's ageing process、

    C. the gender difference               D. hearts and long life

3.

According to the text, the UK scientists have known that

    A. women have more cells than men when they are born

    B. women can replace the cells that enable the heart to beat

    C. the female heart loses few of the cells with age

    D. women never lose their pumping power with age

4.

If you want to live longer, you should

    A. enable your heart to beat much faster      

B. find out the reason for ageing

    C. exercise regularly to keep your heart healthy 

D. prevent your cells from being lost

5.

We can know from the passage that

    A. the reason why ageing takes a greater loss on the male heart has been found out

    B. scientists are on the way to finding out why the male heart loses more of the cells

    C. the team has done something to prevent the male from suffering the greater loss

D. women over 70 could lose more heart cells than those at the age of 20

 

 

October 15th is Global Handwashing Day.  Activities are planned in more than twenty countries to get millions of people in the developing world to wash their hands with soap.

Experts say people around the world wash their hands but very few use soap at so-called critical moments. These include after using the toilet, after cleaning a baby and before touching food.

Global Handwashing Day is the idea of the Public-private Partnership for handwashing with soap. The goal, they say, is to create a culture of handwashing with soap. The organizers say all soaps are equally effective at removing disease-causing germs （細(xì)菌）. They say the correct way to wash is to wet your hands with a small amount of water and cover them with soap. Rub it into all areas, including under the fingernails. Then, wash well under running water. Finally, dry your hands with a clean cloth.

The Partnership says soap is important because it increases the time that people spend washing. Soap also helps to break up the dirt that holds most of the germs. And it usually leaves a pleasant smell, which increases the chances that people will wash again.

It also says that washing hands with soap before eating and after using the toilet could save more lives than any medicine. It could help reduce cases of diarrhea （痢疾）, which is the second leading cause of child deaths, killing more than one and a half million children a year, by almost half.

1.What does the author intend to tell us in the passage?

A. To keep healthy by washing hands.     B. To wash hands with soap.

    C. To take action to wash hands.         D. To wash hands often.

2.Which of the following is the right way to wash hands?

    a. Washing hands well.                 b. Covering hands with soap.

    c. Drying hands.                      d. Rubbing hands with soap.

    e. Wetting hands.

    A. a--c--b--e--d                       B. e--d--a--b--c

    C. a--c--b--d--e                       D. e--b--d--a--c

3.Which fact can’t explain why soap is important?

    A. It gives people a longer handwashing time.

    B. It helps to remove a lot of germs from hands.

    C. It attracts people to do more handwashing.

    D. It gets all people into the habit of washing hands.

4.According to the last paragraph, diarrhea is a disease that ________.

    A. kills half of the kids in the developing countries a year

    B. causes the greatest number of child deaths

    C. can be prevented to some degree by washing hands with soap

D. can’t be cured without washing hands

 

 

By the third year of teaching I’d begun to expect Christmas break more for the school holiday and less for the excitement of the children. I was teaching fourth grade and my students had made me   36   . I just had to get through one of the hardest days of the school year.

  　The morning bell rang. I walked   37   through the cold into the overly heated school building. Twenty-two smiling faces   38   me at the school bus stop. I forced myself to   39   their smiles. Back into the classroom, they   40  , comparing plans for the   41  . I had to remove one student from each arm   42   I could take a seat at my desk for my morning duties. Before I could find my roll book（點(diǎn)名冊(cè)） my desk was covered with   43   and gifts followed by a   44   of “Merry Christmas” wishes.

  　“Oh, thank you,” I must have   45   a million times. Each gift was truly special to me, except my   46   mood. It was kind of them to   47   me. After a while, I heard a small nervous   48   say my name. I looked up to see Brandon standing   49   by my desk, holding a small, round gift. “This is for you.”

  　“Thank you, Sweetheart.” I laid it on my desk with the others.

  　“Um, could you   50   it now?”

  　I gently tore at the paper and tape. “  51  ,” he said, “it’s breakable.” Slowly I opened a small, green Christmas tree ornament（裝飾物）, complete with a hook already   52  . It dawned on me what he had done. Then a nearby student said that he just pulled that off his own tree. I tried to keep my   53   back.

   Later that day, I sat   54   the ornament in my hands. Was I really so important to this child that he had searched for something to give me? Now every year as I   55   pull a green Christmas ball from my ornament box, I remember the deep influence my students have on me.

1.A. excited        B. tired               C. amazed           D. relaxed

2.A. eagerly         B. aimlessly           C. gently           D. heavily

3.A. watched        B. greeted         C. delighted            D. warned

4. A. return            B. forget          C. ignore           D. refuse

5.A. calmed     B. settled         C. chatted          D. argued

6.A. study           B. weekend         C. vacation         D. lesson

7. A. before             B. when            C. after                D. because

8.A. letters            B. books           C. chalks           D. cards

9.A. knowledge      B. collection          C. series               D. bunch

10.A. confirmed     B. assessed            C. responded        D. explained

11.A. pleased       B. low             C. thrilled         D. angry

12. A. talk about       B. think of            C. turn to          D. connect with

13.A. call          B. sound           C. shout                D. voice

14. A. shyly             B. bravely         C. rudely           D. sadly

15.A. classify      B. collect         C. open             D. check

16. A. Careful      B. Dangerous       C. Patient          D. Hasty

17.A. exposed       B. adapted         C. adjusted         D. attached

18.A. trees         B. hooks           C. gifts                D. tears

19.A. looking into      B. turning over        C. giving away      D. packing up

20.A. anxiously     B. hurriedly           C. delicately           D. casually

 

 

PART FOUR  WRITING

SECTION A

Directions: Read the following passage. Complete the diagram by using the information from the passage.

Write NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each answer.

Society is a web of relationships, requiring all parties(群體) to work together to create something good. What makes society work best are effective(有效的) relationships that are based on mutual(相互的) understanding. If you understand what people want and why they want it, you can usually find a way to make progress together.

High-quality relationships make people happy. Some people living in the poorest communities have almost nothing but turn out to be the happiest because they share a life together. If effective relationships are working, happiness is always possible.

Here are some simple tips for building effective relationships.

Listen to and try to understand others’ positions and feelings. Listening in itself can lead to understanding, and if you understand someone else fully, then you know how to work better with him or her.

Openly express your needs and feelings. Sometimes we expect people—particularly those close to us at home or work—to understand what we want and to give us what we need intuitively(憑直覺(jué)地). However, people are so complicated and so different that even when they have lived together for 60 years, they can still surprise each other. So we need to say what we need and to express how we feel.

In order to make our relationships more effective, we should treat ourselves and other people with respect. Respect is one of the most important elements of any good relationship.

Finally, learn to face differences correctly. Learning this takes time and can be uncomfortable. However, if we can try to remove differences in an effective way, we are more likely to build exciting and satisfying relationships with others.

By doing these things you may discover that the happiness you long for is much closer than you thought.