Important tips for better flash (閃光燈、閃光) photos
     Don't stand too far back from your subject. The flash on most cameras will not cover any subject well over
three metres away. Even in non-flash photos many photographers stand too far away from their subjects. As a
result, the subjects are small with great areas of unimportant background.
     Watch the background carefully and be sure there are no mirrors or shiny things to reflect (反射) the flash
back to the camera lens (鏡頭).
     When taking pictures of people, ask them not to look into the lens but at a point over your shoulder, because
it is very possible that the flash will reflect from their eyes and there will be red eyes in the photo.
     Try to give the subjects an interesting background. If there is nothing for two metres behind the subject, the
background will come out black or very dark. Of course, you don't want an untidy background, because it will
take people's attention away from your subject.
     If taking a picture of a baby, be sure the room is as light as possible so that the flash does not hurt his / her
eyes.

1. To avoid red eyes in the photo, the best place people should look at is _____.

A. the sun in the sky
B. the mirror behind the photographer
C. the lens of the camera
D. a point over the photographer's shoulder

2. Which of the following is the right way to take a flash picture of a baby in a room?

A. Making the room as light as possible.
B. Having the baby sit in front of a mirror.
C. Helping the baby look at the camera lens.
D. Keeping the baby five metres away from the camera.

3. When taking flash pictures, we should be sure that _____.

A. there is nothing shiny in the background
B. there are interesting things in front of the subjects
C. there are as many beautiful things as possible in the background
D. there are great areas of black or dark background

     Imagine this: a television screen has the size and thickness of a piece of paper. You carry it around in
your pocket and take it out when you want to watch a show. Imagine a guitar so tiny that you can't see
it with the human eye, but you can hear sound when its strings are pulled.
     Nanotechnology (納米技術(shù)) is the science that deals with doing things in a very small way, and it is
being studied and developed all over the world. Many scientists say nanotechnology will produce the next
industrial revolution (工業(yè)革命).
     Perhaps nanotechnology will have the biggest influence on medical science. Imagine nanobots (納米
機(jī)器人) in medicine. Thousands or even millions of tiny machines can be sent into the human body with
specific tasks. For example, they can be designed to find and destroy cancer cells or viruses (病毒).
Other machines may stay in the human body forever to help organs (器官) that are not working properly.
     When could all of these happen? Scientists predict that most of these are possible in the next 30 years.
Thousands of scientists around the world are working on these micro-machines. Nanotechnology is just
around the corner.

1. The two examples in Paragraph 1 are used to _____.

A. introduce the smallest television
B. introduce a new kind of guitar
C. introduce the topic of the passage
D. show how small the world is

2. Nanotechnology _____.

A. will cause an industrial revolution
B. deals with things in old ways
C. has studied the whole world
D. was developed many years ago

3. The underlined word "they" in the third paragraph refers to (指代) "_____"?

A. scientists
B. human bodies
C. specific tasks
D. tiny machines

4. The tiny machines _____.

A. are too small to be repaired
B. can be put in a human body to kill viruses
C. may not work well in a human body
D. can take the place of human organs

5. The underlined phrase "around the corner" in the last sentence means "_____".

A. far away
B. at present
C. in the near future
D. impossible

     About 98% of children in China's 410 poorest western counties (縣) had got nine-year compulsory
education (九年義務(wù)教育) by the year 2007.
     Until now, the nine year compulsory education, six years in primary school and three years in the
middle school, has covered 368 out of the 410 poorest western counties. And the children in other 42
counties have got education in primary school.
     Helping children go to school started in 2004, children in these counties got education for only about
6. 7 years. To help more children go to school, the program is trying to make them pay less for education,
give money to poor students, and build boarding schools for the children far from schools. From 2004 to
2007, the central government spent 10 000 000 000 yuan building more than 7 600 boarding schools for
about 4 000 000 students in 953 counties in the western areas.
     During the program, about 11 000 000 000 yuan was given by the central and local governments to
build a distance teaching network (遠(yuǎn)程教育網(wǎng)) in countries. By the end of 2007, more than 100 000 000
primary and middle school students in villages had enjoyed the teaching network as the students in cities.
     Since 2006, the central government has also given money to encourage college graduates to teach in
poor areas. In the past two years, about 33 000 college graduates have gone to teach in those poor western
areas.

1. The nine-year compulsory education has covered _____ poorest counties until now.

A. 42
B. 368
C. 410
D. 953

2. The program started to help _____ to pay less for education and get more education in 2004.

A. students in villages
B. students in cities
C. college students
D. children in cities

3. The central government spent 10 000 000 000 yuan building more than 7 600 _____ in the western areas.

A. cities
B. poor counties
C. boarding schools
D. colleges

4. _____ spent 11 000 000 000 yuan building the distance teaching network in countries.

A. The central government
B. The local governments
C. The college
D. A and B

5. There have been about _____ college graduates to teach in the poor western areas in the past two years.

A. 953
B. 33 000
C. 4 000 000
D. 100 000 000

                                Thumbs Down to Texting  屈指發(fā)短信
     Do you have a mobile phone? Do you send text messages to your friends and family?
     Text messaging or "texting" is becoming very popular. But, scientists have discovered that texting can
give us problems with our hands. Be careful! Too much texting can cause swelling in our thumbs. Our
thumbs were not made for pushing small buttons, over and over. Scientists call this problem RSI. We spoke
to a doctor called Harriet Wilson, who treats many sick people with RSI. She says we need to see how much
time we are spending in typing text messages. If we are spending more than 10-15 minutes at once, we could
have problems in the future.
     As mobile phones develop, they are getting smaller with buttons closer together. Texting with a smaller
phone is worse than using a larger phone with bigger buttons. Using a computer keyboard and playing video
games can cause the same problem. So more and more people could find themselves with RSI. Among them,
most are university students and teenagers, as they do not know the risks of spending so much time using
computer, video games and mobile phones. If we don't do something about this, too many young people could
grow up in terrible pain.

1. What is becoming very popular now?
    ____________________________________
2. Does the word "once" mean "one time" in the second passage? 
    ____________________________________
3. What kind of people are easier to have the problem of RSI? 
    ____________________________________
4. What can also cause RSI except texting? 
    ____________________________________
5. Which is easier to cause the problem of RSI, using smaller mobile phones or larger ones? 
    ____________________________________

     We all dream although we remember only a few of our dreams. Some people train themselves to remember
their dreams. As soon as they wake up, they record what their dreams were about.
     Scientists believe that we have different kinds of sleep. One kind is called R.E.M. R.E.W. stands for rapid
eye movement. During this kind of sleep our eyes move quickly, even though they are closed. Although we are
asleep, there is a lot of brain activities. We probably have dreams at this time.
     Sometimes people talk in their sleep. In these dreams the dreamer is usually unhappy or worried about
something. The worst of the dreams are so frightening that we call them nightmares. In a nightmare we often
dream that we are being closed or that we are trapped in some way.
     Scientists or others have written books about the meanings of dreams. The most famous of these scientists
was Sigmund Freud who wrote a hundred years ago. He suggested different meanings to certain kinds of
dreams. It is possible, however, that every dream has a special meaning only for the person who dreams it,
and that this dream about something in that person's life.

1. How can we tell if someone is having an R.E.M. dream?

A. They are talking in their sleep.
B. They are worried about something.
C. Their eyes are moving quickly.
D. her eyes are moving slowly.

2. What does the word "nightmare" in the 3rd paragraph means in Chinese?

A. 噩夢(mèng)
B. 睡眠
C. 美夢(mèng)
D. 失眠

3. What is the main idea of Paragraph Four?

A. Bad Dreams
B. The meaning of dreams
C. People and their dreams
D. R.E.M. and sleep and dreams

     Dr. Irene Pepperberg, a scientist at the University of Arizona, has worked with Alex for nineteen years,
teaching Alex to speak and understand wasn't easy at first. He had to learn one word at a time. Irene and an
assistant (助手) would teach Alex by showing him what a word meant. Irene would hold up an object, saying
"What's this?" Her assistant would give the word-"candy", for example-while Alex watched. Irene would praise
(表?yè)P(yáng)) her assistant, then ask Alex the name for the object. When he got it right, Irene would praise him and
give him the object to play with as a reward. It took Alex many weeks to learn his first word. After that, each
new word became easier and easier for him.
     Why did Irene spend so much time getting a parrot to talk? Scientists like Irene are interested in discovering
how intelligent (聰明) animals are and how their brains work. But studying animal intelligence has been difficult,
partly because animals haven't been able to communicate (交流) clearly with humans. Teaching Alex to speak
words that he understands has let Irene talk to him directly. She can ask him questions, and he can answer them
in English. In this way, Irene is finding out what kinds of things Alex's brain can do. She has found that parrots
are much smarter than scientists used to think.

1. According to the passage, how is Alex remarkable (不尋常的)? 

A. He can use the English language to answer questions.
B. He uses words in English instead of bird calls to call other birds.
C. He can copy the pronunciations of more than 100 English words.
D. Alex has a brain that is much bigger than those of other parrots.

2. How did Dr. Pepperberg teach Alex to speak with understanding?

A. She said the same word all day long so that Alex could repeat it.
B. She taught Alex a special sign language.
C. She gave Alex rewards if he would say what she said.
D. She gave Alex a candy every time he answered correctly.

3. Why did Dr. Pepperberg teach Alex to speak with understanding?

A. She wanted to prove it could be done.
B. She wanted to provide a model for people who want talking birds.
C. She wanted to find out how many words parrots could remember.
D. She wanted to find out what kinds of things his brain could do.

4. According to the passage, Alex has proved that _____.

A. birds are not the only animals that can learn a language.
B. parrots are much cleverer than scientists used to think.
C. birds are just as intelligent as humans.
D. teaching parrots to speak a human language isn't very difficult.

     The Year of the Dog has gone and this year we have pigs. What words can we think of for pigs? Some
bad words maybe, like silly, dirty, greedy (貪婪)…But, are these true?
     When we see pigs, they are usually in dirty water or behind dirty fences. But pigs also want to be clean
if they can. Pigs have no sweat glands( 汗腺), so they have to get cool in water when they feel hot.
     If people are greedy, we say they "pig out". Yes, pigs love eating a lot. But they are useful to people.
People not only eat their meat, but also use other parts of pigs. Pig skin is used for glue and shoes. The hair
can be used to make brushes. Sometimes, pigs are even used to make medicine.
     "He is as silly as a pig!" This expression is wrong. Pigs are very smart animals. Among all animals, they
are the third cleverest-monkeys, dolphins and pigs. Scientists think the training of pigs is easier than the
training of dogs and cats. Pigs have a very good sense of smell (嗅覺(jué)). They can find things nearby or
faraway. They can also help the police to sniff-out drugs (毒品) at an airport or at a train station.

1. In this passage, the writer mainly wants to tell us that _____.

A. pigs are always very silly, dirty and greedy
B. pigs are as clever as monkeys and dolphins
C. people's ideas about pigs are not always correct

2. Pigs usually like to stay in water in hot weather because they can _____ there.

A. clean themselves
B. drink water
C. get cool

3. The _____ of pigs can be used to make glue.

A. skin
B. meat
C. hair

4. The training of pigs is easier because _____.

A. they are smarter than dogs and cats
B. they can do everything easily
C. they have a very good sense of smell

5. The underlined phrase "sniff out" probably means _____ something by nose.

A. smell
B. discover
C. feel