Claude Monet(莫奈) was born in 1840 in Paris, France. When he was five, his family moved to a place on the coast where he spent a lot of time on the beaches. It was here that he started to understand novels(小說)．

As a boy he __21__friends and family by drawing caricatures(漫畫)．They were all pleased with his paintings. But at 18 his way of painting changed when he  __22__friends with Eugene Boudin who encouraged him to paint pictures out of doors. This is when his life as a(n)  __23__began. His family was  __24__ that he refused to go to art school. Instead Monet worked with other artists in their workrooms in Paris. In 1862 he became part of a group of impressionist(印象主義的) painters. During the 1860s he sold almost  __25__paintings but this didn’t stop him painting even though he always had problems with money.

Monet married his first wife in 1870 and had two sons. His second wife Alice, who had six children with her, lived with Monet and Monet’s children. After __26__houses several times, Monet found a house to rent(租) for his large family in a small village called Giverny in 1883, about 84 kilometers from Paris. He fell in love  __27__the place and it became his home for the rest of his life.

At last Monet began to  __28__his paintings and in 1890 he bought the house at Giverny. Monet was a loving gardener and created beautiful gardens there. His gardens inspired over 500 of his greatest paintings. Monet’s large paintings of the water lilies in his water garden, painted between 1916 and 1926, are some of his most famous. Monet gave these paintings to the people of  __29__. You can see them in Paris.

Towards the end of his life, Monet started to lose his __30__. This was the worst thing that could happen to a painter. It happened slowly over 16 years and by 1923 he was nearly blind. When Monet was very old and had bad health, he kept painting until a few months before his death in December 1926. 

(　　)46.A. had    B. loved    C. kept  D. pleased

(　　)47.A. met    B. made    C. fought  D. found

(　　)48.A. writer  B. painter  C. actor  D. teacher

(　　)49.A. glad    B. helpful  C. angry  D. satisfied

(　　)50.A. no      B. all     C. little  D. any

(　　)51.A. buying  B. building  C. moving  D. repairing

(　　)52.A. with    B. in      C. around  D. at

(　　)53.A. draw    B. sell    C. watch  D. collect

(　　)54.A. France  B. Britain  C. America  D. Australia

(　　)55.A. taste  B. weight  C. money  D. eyesight

 

連線

1．Whose hat is this？　　　　　　　　  A．My favourite colour is green．

2．Are these your pants？　　　　　　   B．Sure．

3．What’s your favourite colour？　　  C．It’s Li Ming’s．

4．How many pencils do you want？　　   D．Yes，they are．

5．Can I have a pen？　　　　 　　　　  E．Six．

 

This was one of the interesting games I liked best when l was a little girl．My sisters and I used to play it for hours at a time．

We had twenty-six small pieces of cardboard．On each of these we had printed a letter of the alphabet（字母表）．Before we started to play，we decided what the game would be about．Let us imagine that we chose to play animals．One of us would then mix up（弄亂）the cards and turn over one of them．If the letter on the card happened to be C，we would try to think，as quickly as possible，of an  animal which began with C，such as cat，cow，camel and so on．The one who first gave the name of the animal received that card．This was done with each of the twenty-six cards．In the end the person who had the most cards won the game．

1．Which of the following drawings is like the cardboard?

2．How many cards do you need to win the game?

A．All．                                B．Half．

C．None．                                    D．More than anyone else has．

3．Why did the writer and her sisters like the game very much?

A．It helped them to know more about animals．

B．It helped them to remember the names of animals．

C．They could learn something while they had a good time．

D．They were working hard at English．