Question

A baby giraffe is born 10 feet high and usually lands on its back. Bringing a giraffe into the world is a tall order. In his book, A View from the Zoo, Gary Richmond describes how a new-born giraffe learns its first lesson.

The mother giraffe lowers her head long enough to take a quick look. Then she puts herself directly over her child. She waits for about a minute, and then she does the most unreasonable thing. She throws her long leg and kicks her baby, so that it’s sent sprawling (四脚朝天).

When it doesn’t get up, what the mother has done is repeated again and again. The struggle (挣扎) to rise is important. As the baby giraffe grows tired, the mother kicks it again. Finally, it stands for the first time. Then the mother giraffe kicks it off again. Why? She wants it to remember how it can get up. In the wild, a baby giraffe must be able to get up as quickly as possible to stay with its group, where there’s safety.

Another writer named Irving Stone understood this. He spent a lifetime studying great people, writing stories about such men as Michelangelo, Vincent van Gogh, Sigmund Freud, and Charles Darwin.

Stone was once asked if he had found something unusual about these great people. He said, “I write about people who sometime in their life have a dream of something. They’re beaten over the head, knocked down and for years they get nowhere. But every time they stand up again. And at the end of their lives they’ve realized some small parts of what they set out (着手) to do.”

1. The expression “a tall order” in Paragraph 1 most probably means ______.

A. a happy thing           B. a difficult thing

C. a big dream             D. a beautiful place

2.A View from the Zoo is a book written by      .

A. Gary Richmond    B. Charles Darwin

C. Irving Stone     D. Vincent van Gogh

3.The mother giraffe puts herself over her child and throws her long leg and kicks her baby because she       .

A. is an unkind mother

B. likes watching her bay sprawling

C. doesn’t want her baby to live with her

D. wants to train her baby to get up in this way

4. The writer mainly wants to tell the readers that

A. the giraffe is an unusual animal

B. we should learn to be a careful writer

C. learning to get up leads to success

D. A View from the Zoo is a good book to read

Answer

1.B

2.A

3.D

4.C

【解析】

试题分析：这篇短文主要讲述了把小长颈鹿带到这个世界上来是非常艰巨的工作。长颈鹿妈妈是通过踢打的方式让小长劲鹿学会站起来。许多伟人也是在不断的失败中才有所建树。

1.B词义猜测题。纵观文中语句理解可知。把长颈鹿带到这个世界上是件非常艰巨的任务，故选B。

2.A细节理解题。从文中“In his book, A View from the Zoo, Gary Richmond describes how a new-born giraffe learns its first lesson.”可知书是Gary Richmond写的，故选A。

3.D细节理解题。根据文中“She wants it to remember how it can get up.”可知踢它的目的就是让他站起来，故选D。

4.C主旨大意题。根据文中语句理解可知，本文主要介绍了让人们学会面对困难，要用不怕吃苦的精神，经过摔打之后，吸取教训，再拼搏，才能成功。故选C。

考点：考查科普类阅读。