All the wisdom of the times, all the stories that have delighted mankind for centuries, are easily and cheaply available to all of us in books, but we must know how to make use of this treasure. The unluckiest people in the world are those who have never discovered how satisfying it is to read good books.
I’m very interested in people and finding out about them. Some of the most amazing people I’ve met could only  be found in a writer’s imagination, then in his book, and then, again, in my imagination. I’ve found in books new friends and new worlds.
Reading is fun, not because the writer is telling you something, but because it makes your mind work. Your own imagination works along with the writer’s or even goes beyond his. Your experience, compared with his, brings you to the same or different conclusions, and your ideas develop as you understand his.
Every book stands by itself, like a one-family house, but books in a library are like houses in a city. Although they are separate(分開的), in some way they are connected with each other. The same ideas, or related(相關的) ones, appear in different places; the human problems that repeat themselves in life repeat themselves in books, but with different solutions(解決方法) according to different writings at different times. Books influence each other. They connect the past, the present and the future and have their own generations (age groups), like families. Wherever you start reading, you connect yourself with one of the families of ideas, and in the end, you not only find out about the world and the people in it, you find out about yourself, too.
Reading can only be fun if you expect it to be. If you concentrate on(專注于) books somebody tells you “ought” to read, you probably won’ t have fun. But if you put down a book you don’t like and try another till you find one that means something to you, and then relax with it, you will almost certainly have a good time — and if you become, as a result of reading, better, wiser, kinder, or more gentle, you won’t suffer during the process.
【小題1】Which of the following ideas may the writer of this article agree with?

A．You will never meet amazing people in your life unless you read.

B．You think actively instead of getting facts passively（被動地）when reading.

C．You will get much delight from any book that you are told to read.

D．You can relax yourself by reading because it involves little thinking.

【小題2】What can we learn from Paragraph 4?

A．We can often find something connected with ourselves in books.

B．Different writings at different times share the same characteristics.

C．The same problems will appear in different books with similar solutions.

D．Reading books which are written for your generation is more helpful to you.

【小題3】What’s the writer’s purpose of writing this article?

A．To advise us to enjoy ourselves by reading.

B．To encourage us to make full use of libraries.

C．To encourage us to find out solutions in books.

D．To advise us to discuss books with other people.

Among the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, the oldest one is the Great Pyramid of Giza. There are three large pyramids at Giza, outside the modern capital of Egypt, Cairo. The largest and most famous one is called the Great Pyramid. The workers built it as a tomb (墳墓) for the Pharaoh Khufu (法老胡夫).
It took more than twenty years to build the Great Pyramid. When it was built, the pyramid was about 146.5 metres high. Over the years it has lost about eight metres off its top.
The pyramid is made of large stone blocks (石塊) — 2,300,000 of them! Each of these blocks weighs over 2,000 kilograms. The ancient Egyptians did not have any modern machines. How did they build the pyramid? The pyramid shows that the ancient people were intelligent and had great skills.
People once thought that the Egyptians made slaves (奴隸) do all the work on the Great Pyramid. But in fact, they used farmers.
【小題1】From the passage we can learn that _____.

A．Giza is the modern capital of Egypt

B．there are only three pyramids in Egypt

C．the Pharaoh Khufu built the Great Pyramid by himself

D．the Great Pyramid was built (被建) as a tomb for the Pharaoh Khufu

【小題2】According to the passage, the height of the Great Pyramid may be_____ metres now.

A．146.5

B．138. 5

C．154.5

D．156. 5

【小題3】What does the underlined word “intelligent” mean in Chinese?

A．聰明的

B．辛苦的

C．誠實的

D．熱情的

【小題4】In fact, the Egyptians used ____ to build the pyramid.

A．machines

B．slaves

C．farmers

D．children

【小題5】What is the writer’s purpose in writing this passage?

A．To invite people to visit the Great Pyramid.

B．To give information about the Great Pyramid.

C．To describe his or her trip to the Great Pyramid.

D．To tell how he or she feels about the Great Pyramid.

In a few years, most people will know that a healthy, happy, loving family is a joy and it is a necessary part for building a strong society. But there are still some people who don’t believe family life can be an enjoyable experience.

Some people already accepted the idea of the “me generation” so they fail to understand that there is a time in life when they have to give up their time to something more valuable.

At a time when adults need to think about the needs of their family, they will be doing other important things. Some people will spend too much time working for a more powerful car or a bigger house so that they can proudly say that they have them. Some will be doing dangerous things so that they may tell their stories to their friends, and others will recite things like “ I must become the best I can be.”  or “I don’t want to be at the bottom.” The needs of their family will be forgotten and they never seem to have time for the family.

Many people have not experienced a strong helpful perfect family life, so they have never discovered its worth. Many people have always experienced family life as a flight, so they can’t find time and energy for work.

But it is really very important that we all expect good family relations. We need to realize and value the importance of what can be achieved by loving each other in the family. It is also important for our society to encourage family members to create happiness.

1.What does the writer expect family life to be like?

A．Happy experience.

B．A strong society

C．Too much work

D．A flight

2.What is meant by “me generation”?

A． I will do whatever the family want me to do.	B．Nothing is more important than myself.
C．I always agree with people around.	D．The generation is my age group.

3.Why haven’t some people discovered the worth of family life?

A．They are not married.	B．They grow in a happy family.
C．They don’t live with the family.	D．They have never enjoyed family life.

4.What is the writer’s purpose of writer the passage?

A．To ask people to study family life.

B．To tell people to work hard for the family.

C．To advise people to create happy family life.

D．To give people some examples of family members.

 

All the wisdom of the times, all the stories that have delighted mankind for centuries, are easily and cheaply available to all of us in books, but we must know how to make use of this treasure. The unluckiest people in the world are those who have never discovered how satisfying it is to read good books.

I’m very interested in people and finding out about them. Some of the most amazing people I’ve met could only  be found in a writer’s imagination, then in his book, and then, again, in my imagination. I’ve found in books new friends and new worlds.

Reading is fun, not because the writer is telling you something, but because it makes your mind work. Your own imagination works along with the writer’s or even goes beyond his. Your experience, compared with his, brings you to the same or different conclusions, and your ideas develop as you understand his.

Every book stands by itself, like a one-family house, but books in a library are like houses in a city. Although they are separate(分開的), in some way they are connected with each other. The same ideas, or related(相關的) ones, appear in different places; the human problems that repeat themselves in life repeat themselves in books, but with different solutions(解決方法) according to different writings at different times. Books influence each other. They connect the past, the present and the future and have their own generations (age groups), like families. Wherever you start reading, you connect yourself with one of the families of ideas, and in the end, you not only find out about the world and the people in it, you find out about yourself, too.

Reading can only be fun if you expect it to be. If you concentrate on(專注于) books somebody tells you “ought” to read, you probably won’ t have fun. But if you put down a book you don’t like and try another till you find one that means something to you, and then relax with it, you will almost certainly have a good time — and if you become, as a result of reading, better, wiser, kinder, or more gentle, you won’t suffer during the process.

1.Which of the following ideas may the writer of this article agree with?

A．You will never meet amazing people in your life unless you read.

B．You think actively instead of getting facts passively（被動地）when reading.

C．You will get much delight from any book that you are told to read.

D．You can relax yourself by reading because it involves little thinking.

2.What can we learn from Paragraph 4?

A．We can often find something connected with ourselves in books.

B．Different writings at different times share the same characteristics.

C．The same problems will appear in different books with similar solutions.

D．Reading books which are written for your generation is more helpful to you.

3.What’s the writer’s purpose of writing this article?

A．To advise us to enjoy ourselves by reading.

B．To encourage us to make full use of libraries.

C．To encourage us to find out solutions in books.

D．To advise us to discuss books with other people.

 

Even though global warming may have made the weather more mild, many animals are still hibernating（冬眠）. It’s too bad that humans can’t hibernate. In fact we almost did.
Apparently, at times in the past, farmers in France liked a semi-state of human hibernation. So writes Graham Robb, a British scholar who has studied the sleeping habits of the French farmers. As soon as the weather turned cold, people all over the France shut themselves away and practiced the forgotten art of doing nothing at all for months.
In line with this, Jeff Warren, a producer at CBC Radio’s The Current, tells us that the way we sleep has changed since the invention of lighting.
When historians began studying texts of the Middle Ages, they noticed something referred to as “first sleep”, which was not clarified, though. Now scientists are telling us our ancestors most likely slept in separate periods. The business of eight hours’ continuous sleep is a modern invention.
In the past, without the artificial light, humans went to sleep when it became dark and then woke themselves up around midnight. The late night period was known as “The Watch”. It was when people actually kept watch against wild animals, although many of them simply moved around or visited family and neighbors.
According to some sleep researchers, a short of insomnia（失眠）at midnight is not a disorder. It is normal. Humans can experience another state of consciousness（清醒狀態）around their sleeping, which happens in the brief period before we fall asleep or wake ourselves in the morning. This period can be a creative time for some people.
Playing with your sleep rhythms（節奏）can be dangerous, as worry may set in. Medical science doesn’t help much in this case. It offers us medicines for a full night’s continuous sleep, which sounds natural; however, according to Warren’s theory, it is really the opposite of what we need.
【小題1】The late night was called “The Watch” because it was a time for people ______.

A．to set time to catch animals

B．to remind others of the time

C．to guard against possible dangers

D．to wake up their family and neighbors

【小題2】We can infer from the last paragraph that people should ______.

A．sleep in the way animals do

B．follow their natural sleep rhythms

C．keep to the eight-hour sleeping way

D．ask doctors for help if they can’t sleep

【小題3】What is the writer’s purpose in writing the passage?

A．To throw new light on human sleep.

B．To encourage people to sleep less.

C．To give some suggestions on insomnia.

D．To find out people’s hibernating history.