A rainforest is an area covered by tall trees with the total high rainfall spreading quite equally through the year and the temperature rarely dipping below 16℃.Rainforests have a great effect on the world environment because they can take in heat from the sun and adjust the climate. Without the forest cover, these areas would reflect more heat into the atmosphere，warming the rest of the world. Losing the rainforests may also influence wind and rainfall patterns, potentially causing certain natural disasters all over the world.

In the past hundred years, humans have begun destroying rainforests in search of three major resources (资源): land for crops, wood for paper and other products, land for raising farm animals. This action affects the environment as a whole. For example，a lot of carbon dioxide(二氧化碳)in the air comes from burning the rainforests. People obviously have a need for the resources we gain from cutting trees but we will suffer much more than we will benefit.

There are two main reasons for this. Firstly, when people cut down trees, generally they can only use the land for a year or two. Secondly, cutting large sections of rainforests may provide a good supply of wood right now, but in the long run it actually reduces the world’ s wood supply.

Rainforests are often called the world’s drug store. More than 25% of the medicines we use today come from plants in rainforests. However, fewer than 1% of rainforest plants have been examined for their medical value. It is extremely likely that our best chance to cure diseases lies somewhere in the world’s shrinking rainforests.

1.Why did humans destroy rainforests in the past hundred years?

2.Rainforests can help to adjust the climate because they________.

3.What does the word “this” underlined in the third paragraph refer to?

4.It can be inferred from the text that________.

5.What might be the best title for the text?

America is a mobile society. Friendships between Americans can be close and real, yet disappear soon if situations change. Neither side feels hurt by this. Both may exchange Christmas greetings for a year or two, perhaps a few letters for a while — then no more. If the same two people meet again by chance, even years later, they pick up the friendship. This can be quite difficult for us Chinese to understand, because friendships between us flower more slowly but then may become lifelong feelings, extending (延伸) sometimes deeply into both families.  Americans are ready to receive us foreigners at their homes, share their holidays, and their home life. They will enjoy welcoming us and be pleased if we accept their hospitality (好客) easily.  Another difficult point for us Chinese to understand Americans is that although they include us warmly in their personal everyday lives, they don’t show their politeness to us if it requires a great deal of time. This is usually the opposite of the practice in our country where we may be generous with our time. Sometimes, we, as hosts, will appear at airports even in the middle of the night to meet a friend. We may take days off to act as guides to our foreign friends. The Americans, however, express their welcome usually at homes, but truly can not manage the time to do a great deal with a visitor outside their daily routine. They will probably expect us to get ourselves from the airport to our own hotel by bus. And they expect that we will phone them from there. Once we arrive at their homes, the welcome will be full, warm and real. We will find ourselves treated hospitably.  For the Americans, it is often considered more friendly to invite a friend to their homes than to go to restaurants, except for purely business matters. So accept their hospitality at home!

1.The writer of this passage must be ______.

2.Which of the following statements is TRUE according to the passage?

3.From the last two paragraphs we can learn that when we arrive in America to visit an American friend, we will probably be ______.

4.The underlined words  “generous with our time” in Paragraph 3 probably mean ______.

5.A suitable title for this passage would probably be “______”. 

I found out one time that doing a favor for someone could get you into a lot of trouble. I was in the eighth grade at the time, and we were having a final test. During the test, the girl sitting next to me whispered something, but I didn’t understand. So I leaned over her way and found out that she was trying to ask me if I had an extra pen. She showed me that hers was out of ink and would not write. I happened to have an extra one, so I took it out of my pocket and put it on her desk.

Later, after the test papers had been turned in, the teacher asked me to stay in the room when all the other students were dismissed. As soon as we were alone she began to talk to me about what it meant to grow up; she talked about how important it was to stand on your own two feet and be responsible (负责任) for your own acts. For a long time, she talked about honesty and emphasized the fact that when people do something dishonest, they are really cheating themselves. She made me promise that I would think seriously about all the things she had said, and then she told me I could leave. I walked out of the room wondering why she had chosen to talk to me about all those things.

Later on, I found out that she thought I had cheated on the test. When she saw me lean over to talk to the girl next to me, it looked as if I was copying answers from the girl’s test paper. I tried to explain about the pen, but all she could say was it seemed very very strange to her that I hadn’t talked of anything about the pen the day she talked to me right after the test. Even if I tried to explain that I was just doing the girl a favor by letting her use my pen, I am sure she continued to believe that I had cheated on the test.

1.The story took place exactly ____ .

2.The girl wanted to borrow a pen, because ____ .

3.The teacher saw all this, so she asked the boy ____ .

4.The thing(s) emphasized in the teacher’s talk was (were) ____ .

5.The boy knew everything ____ .

British people eat less fruit and vegetables than other people in Europe. As a result,  British now has one of the worst heart disease __16.______(record) in the world., and each year more and more people have other health problems such as _17_____(be) too fat. Also, children eat much _18.______(little)fruit and vegetables than before. The government is very worried about that and has to do something to change it.

With the help of the government, _19______3-year Food Dude Program began _20_______ September, 2005. The program __21_____(start) by the University of Wales Bangor. It tries to help children eat more fruit and vegetables __22______in school and at home. Over 30,000 children from 150 primary shcools have joined the program. Children wathch the six parts of the Food Dudes cartoon over 16 school days. It's just long enough to get the children ____23____(eat) fruit and vegetables again and again until they begin to like the taste.

The results show that the program has been a great success, and will soon become popular around the world. Even the US and Canada take the Food Dudes Program very ___24____(serious) and in 2006 it ___25____(win) the World Health Organization best practice award.

Is it difficult for you to get up in the morning? Do you sometimes oversleep？ Are you often late for work or school? Yes? Then Hiroyuki Sugiyama of Japan has a (an)    1   bed for you. Hiroyuki's bed will get you up in the morning! Here is how it      2   .

The bed    3  an alarm clock. First, the alarm clock rings. You have a few minutes to wake up. Next, a tape recorder in the bed plays   4  music or other pleasant sounds. The tape recorder in Hiroyuki's bed plays a recording of his girlfriend. She whispers in a sweet  5 , "Wake up, darling, please." A few minutes later, a second recording   6  . The sound recording can be loud music or   7 sounds. Hiroyuki hears a recording of his boss shouts, "Wake up immediately,   8 you'll be late!"

If you don't get up  9 the second recording, you will be sorry! A mechanical "foot" is in the bed. The mechanical foot kicks you in the head. Then the bed waits a few  10 minutes. What! You're still in bed! Slowly the   11 of the bed rises higher and higher. The foot of the bed goes lower and lower.   12 the bed is vertical (垂直的). You slide off the bed and onto the floor. You are out of bed and     13 

Hiroyuki made his bed because he wanted to   14  a contest. He works for Honda Motor Company. Once every two years Honda has a contest for its 200,000 employees ---"All-Honda Idea Contest". The employees think of new ideas. If their ideas win, the employees win   15  . Hiroyuki Sugiyama won a lot of money for his bed.

假设你是新华中学的学生李华，高中毕业后想到美国弗吉尼亚大学(University of Virginia)计算机专业深造，请根据以下提示用英语写一封入学申请：

1．性别，年龄，毕业学校；   2．学习情况及特长；

3．申请入学的理由；        4．联系方式：lihua93@ yahoo. com

注意：1．词数：120～150；       2．可适当增加细节，以使行文连贯；

3．开头和结尾已为你写好，不计人总词数。

Dear Sir or Madam,

I look forward to your prompt reply.

Yours sincerely,

Li Hua

阅读下面短文，并根据短文后的要求回答问题（请注意问题后的字数要求）。

[l]Fear and pain are two of the most useful things that human beings and animals have, if they are properly used. If fire did not hurt when it burnt, children would play with it until their hands were burnt away. Similarly, if pain existed but fear didn’t, a child would burn himself again and again, because fear would not warn himself to keep away from the fire that had burnt himself before. A really fearless soldier is not a good soldier because he will soon be killed; and a dead soldier is of no use to his army. Fear and pain are therefore two guards without which human beings and animals might soon die out.

[2] In our first sentence we suggested that fear should be properly used. If, for example, you never go out of your house because of the danger of being knocked down and killed in the street by a car, you are letting fear rule you too much. Even in your house you are not absolutely safe: A plane may crash on your house, or you may get cancer!

[3] The important thing is not to let fear rule you, but to use fear as your servant and guide instead. Fear will warn you of dangers; then you have to decide what action to take.

[4] In many cases, you can take quick and successful action to avoid the danger. For example, you see a car coming straight towards you. Fear warns you, then you jump out of the way, and all is well.

[5] In some cases, however, you decide that there is nothing that you can do to ___________. For example, you can’t prevent a plane crashing onto your house. In this case, fear is no longer of any use, and you have to try to overcome it.

1.What is mainly talked about in this passage? (no more than 15 words)

_________________________________________________________________________

2.How does the author support his idea in Paragraph 2? (no more than 5 words)

_________________________________________________________________________

3.Why does the author say that a fearless soldier is not a good soldier? (no more than 15 words)

_________________________________________________________________________

4.What benefit can we get from “fear” according to the passage? (no more than 10 words)

__________________________________________________________________________

5.Fill in the blank in Paragraph 5 with proper words. (no more than 5 words)

__________________________________________________________________________

In a growing number of English classes, teachers are leaving the classic novels on the shelf and letting students select the books they read. Supporters say that the new approach, called reader’s workshop, helps develop a love for reading in students who are bored by classic literature. They argue that the best way to motivate students to read more is to offer them more choices.

Not all educators are on the same page, however. They worry that students who choose trendy, less challenging titles over the classics won’t be exposed to the great writing and key themes of important works of literature.Student reporters Donald and Sarah express their ideas about this new approach.

Donald thinks that we should turn the page. Students should be allowed to select the books they read in English class. He says he and his classmates are allowed to pick their own books in class. That makes them more focused, and they look forward to class time. Tristin, a classmate of his at Clinton Middle School agrees. “I’m reading books that I want to read, which makes class more fun and interesting,” he says. Offering students a choice may also improve test scores. Studies by Professor John Guthrie of the University of Maryland found that students in grades 4 through 6 who had some choices in the books they read showed improved reading comprehension skills during testing. Giving students the chance to decide what they read helps build a lifelong love for reading. Isn’t that what we want for our students?

Sarah holds a different view. She thinks teachers know more about books than students do. When an English teacher assigns a book, he or she keeps in mind the reading level of most students in the class. Students who choose their own books might be cheating themselves by picking books that are not up to their reading level or that are too difficult. Furthermore, a whole class can discuss a book it reads together. That makes it easier for some kids to understand what they are reading. “The students wouldn’t be able to hold a meaningful conversation if they were all reading different books,” says Kristin, an English teacher at Fleetwood Area Middle School. “If they read the same book, their conversations would be more in-depth.”

1.What’s the meaning of the underlined sentence “Not all educators are on the same page”?

2.Donald thinks that the new approach could __________.

3.Sarah thinks that the new approach might __________.

4.Who has the same attitude towards the new approach with Kristin?

5.The author develops the text mainly by __________.

Young children whose mothers talk with them more frequently and in more detail about people’s thoughts and feelings tend to be better at taking another person’s perspective（观点）than other children of the same age.

That’s what researchers from the University of Western Australia found in a new study published in the journal Child Development.

“Parents who frequently put themselves in someone else’s shoes in conversations with their children make it more likely their children will be able to do the same,” said lead author Brad Farrant.

Researchers of the UWA’s Telethon Institute for Child Health Research looked at the influence of how parents interact with their children to learn more about how people develop the ability to take another’s perspective.

The two-year study involved more than 120 Australian children aged between four and six, including children with typically developing language and others delayed in language acquisition（习得）.

The children completed tasks which were designed to assess their language skills, ability to infer others’ beliefs and use these to predict others’ behavior, and their ability to shift flexibly between different perspectives.

Among children with typically developing language, the researchers found that mothers who talked more often and in greater detail about people’s thoughts and feelings — commenting on how another person might react to a particular situation as well as their own feelings about the topic — had children with better language skills and better perspective-taking skills.

Children with delayed language acquisition were also delayed in their development of perspective-taking skills. This displays the role played by language as children develop the ability to take another’s perspective.

“Solving the many challenges that the world faces today requires us all to get better at taking the perspective of other people,” said Brad Farrant.

1.According to the text, to help children gain better perspective-taking skills, parents should __________.

2.Which of the following is TRUE about the study?

3.Which have an effect on the development of children’s perspective-taking skills?

4.In the last paragraph, Brad Farrant __________.

5.According to the text, we can learn __________.

Famous as “the king of chefs and the chef of kings,” Auguste Escoffier helped raise the position of cooking from a laborer’s task to an artist’s job. Escoffier was born on October 28, 1846, in the small village of Villeneuve-Loubet, near Nice, France. Among the key figures in the boy’s life was his father, who worked primarily as a blacksmith（铁匠）. His grandmother, an enthusiastic cook, was perhaps more responsible than anyone for introducing the boy to an appreciation of the delights of cooking.

Young Escoffier attended the local school until age 12, upon which time his father thought it necessary that the boy learn a trade. In school he had shown a talent for drawing, yet he was told to regard this art only as a hobby, and to find his career in a more practical profession. Thus his father took him to Nice in 1859, where he would work as an apprentice（学徒）in his uncle’s restaurant, the respectable Le Restaurant Francais.

At Le Restaurant Francais, Escoffier was not treated as the close relative of the boss. Rather, he experienced a classically demanding apprenticeship. For this strictness of training he would later, in his memoirs（回忆录）, express gratefulness. During this time Escoffier also attended night school, and had to deal with his studies as well as the demands of a promising career.

When Escoffier was 19 and had taken on yet more responsibilities in his uncle’s restaurant, a customer recognized his skills and offered him work in Paris. This was the owner of Le Petit Moulin Rouge, one of the finest restaurants in Paris, where Escoffier was to become a sous-chef, ranking below the head chef. After three years in this position, he rose to the level of head chef, wearing the respected chef’s hat.

1.It was his __________ who first influenced Escoffier to be interested in cooking.

2.We can infer that as a schoolboy, Escoffier might hope to be __________.

3.According to Paragraph 3, Escoffier __________.

4.Which of the following can best describe Escoffier?

5.What is the text mainly about?