A new plan for getting children to and from school is being started by a local government in Eastern
England. This could end the worries of many parents fearful for their children"s safety on the roads.
Until now the local government have been prepared to provide bus services for children living more
than three miles from their school, or sometimes less if special reasons existed. Now it has been decided
that if a group of parents ask for help in organizing transport they will be prepared to go ahead, as long as
the arrangement will not lose money and children taking part will be attending their nearest school.
The new plan is to be fired out this term for children living at Milton who attend Impington School. The children live just within the three-mile limit and the local government said in the past that they would not
undertake to provide free transport to the school. But now they have agreed to offer a sum of money for
a bus service from Milton to Impington School and back, a plan which has the support of the school"s
headmaster. Between 50 and 60 parents have said they would like their children to take part. Final
calculations have still to be carried out, but a government official has said the cost to parents should be
less than ?20 a term. They have been able to arrange the service at a low cost because there is already
an agreement with the bus company for a bus to take children who live further away to Impington. The
same bus would now just make one more journey to pick up the Milton children. The official said they
would get in touch with other groups of parents who in the past had asked if transport could be provided
for their children, to see if they would like to take part in the new plan.
B. To relieve the traffic pressure.
C. To save time for the parents and students.
D. To help the parents save money
B. By limiting the number of the students.
C. By getting the support from the headmaster.
D. By linking(连接) the new bus service with the existing one.
B. The children can choose whatever school they like.
C. The parents can get rid of their worries.
D. The students in Impington school can have free bus rides.
B. an advertisement
C. a headmaster"s report
D. a newspaper article
touch Tom Cruise, all we will feel is air. But does a baby have this understanding?
To see whether babies know objects are solid, T.Bower designed a method for projecting an optical
illusion (视觉影像) of a hanging ball. His plan was to first give babies a real ball, one they could reach
out and touch, and then to show them the illusion. If they knew that objects are solid, and they show
surprise in their faces and reach out for the illusion and found empty air, they could be expected
movements. All the 16-to 24-week-old babies tested were surprised when they reached for the illusion
and found that the ball was not there.
Grown-ups also have a sense of object permanence. We know that if we put a box in a room and
lock the door, the box will still be there when we come back. But does a baby realize that a ball that rolls
under a chair does not disappear or go to never-never land?
Experiments done by bower suggest that babies develop a sense of object permanence when they are
about 18 weeks old. In his experiments, Bower used a toy train that went behind a screen. When
16-week-old and 22-week-old babies watched the toy train disappear behind the left side of the screen,
they looked to the right, expecting it to reappear. If the experimenter took the train off the table and lifted
the screen, all the babies seemed surprised not to see the train. This seems to show that all the babies had a sense of object permanence. But the second part of the experiment showed that this was not really the
case. The researcher substituted (替换) a ball for the train when it went behind the screen.
The 22-week-old babies seemed surprised and looked back to the left side for the train. But
16-week-old babies did not seem to notice the switch (更换). Thus, the 16-week-old babies seemed to
have a sense of "something permanence," while the 22-week-old babies had a sense of object
permanence related to a particular object.
B. effects of experiments on babies
C. babies" understanding of objects
D. different tests on babies" feelings
B. keeps its shape
C. still stays solid
D. is beyond reach
B. A screen
C. A film
D. A box
B. The older babies preferred toy trains to balls
C. The younger babies liked looking for missing objects.
D. The babies couldn"t tell a ball from its optical illusion.
This may sound like something someone would say today. But in fact, an unknown citizen who lived
in Rome in 52 wrote it.
We all love new inventions. They are exciting , amazing and can even change our lives.
But have all these developments really improved the quality of our lives?
Picture this: You"re rushing to finish your homework on the computer. Your mobile phone rings, a
QQ message from your friend appears on the screen, the noise from the television is getting louder and
louder. Suddenly the computer goes empty and you lose all your work. Now you have to stay up all night
to get it done. How calm and happy do you feel?
Inventions have speeded up (加速) our lives so much that they often leave us feeling stressed (压力)
and tired. Why do you think people who live far away from noisy cities, who have no telephones, no
cars, not even electricity often seem to be happier? Perhaps because they simpler lives.
On e family in the UK went "back in time" to see what life was like without all the inventions we have
today. The grandparents, with their daughter, and grandsons Benjamin, 10, and Thomas,7, spent nine
weeks in a 1940s house. They had no washing machine, microwave, computer or mobile phones.
The grandmother, Lyn, said, "It was hard physically, but not mentally." She believed life was less
materialistic. "The more things you have , the more difficult life becomes." She said. The boys said they
found less to fight over, such as their computer. Benjamin also noticed that his grandmother had changed
from being a trendy, beer-drinking granny, to one who cooked things.
Here are some simple ways to beat the stress often caused by our inventions!
Don"t be available all the time. Turn off your mobile phone at certain times of the day.
Don"t check your e-mail every day.
Don"t reply to somebody as son as they leave a text message just because you can. It may be fun at
first, but it soon gets boring.
B. improvements of our life with technology
C. the important roles technology plays in our everyday life
D. major changes which will be likely to happen to technology
in order to _______.
B. tell us what life was like long time ago
C. make us wonder what causes such a thing to happen
D. point out that you experience some big problems and they may be the same
B. they were curious about how people lived without modern inventions
C. they were troubled by modern inventions
D. living in a different time would be a lot of fun for them
B. Free
C. Able to be used
D. Able to be found by others
Many feel more pressure to succeed. They also tend to look only to their parents as role models in the
absence of brothers and sisters.
In India, 10-year-old Saviraj Sankpal founded a support group for the tiny minority of only children.
Among other things, the group does volunteer work to counter (反对) the myth that they are not
responsible. "People think we"re treated too kindly and ruined," says Sankpal, a computer engineering
students. "But I"d like to remind them how lonely it can get."
Most only children, however, say they wish for sisters or brothers only when it comes to caring for
aging, unhealthy parents. Britain"s David Emerson, co-author of the book The Only Child, says that such
a person bears terrible burden in having to make all the decisions alone. Emerson knows from
experience: After his father died, he chose to move his elder mother from their family home, where she
was vulnerable (易受攻击的)to house breakers, to a new one with more security. "The move was quite
hard on her, and she might feel that I pushed her into it," he says. "After all, I am left with that
responsibility."
In the future, more and more only children will likely face similar choices. With working mothers
increasing, many families are finding they simply don"t have the time, money or energy to have more than
one child. As only children become common, perhaps the world will realize that the charge made against
them is unjust.
B. subjective
C. ironic
D. Humorous
B. let their only children make all the decisions alone
C. set good examples for their only children
D. found a support group for their only children
B. doesn"t want to leave her alone
C. wants to share the responsibility with her
D. is worried about her safety
B. be responsible for bringing up her only child
C. have and bring up only one child
D. devote all her energy to her job
B. only children are ruined and irresponsible
C. most only children want to share their responsibility with their parents
D. most only children have no brothers and sisters
discovered that some of his wheat was lying flat on the ground. The fattened (压平的) wheat formed
a circle about six meters across. Around this circle were four smaller circles of flattened wheat. The
five circles were in a formation like five dots. During the following years, farmers in England found the
strange circles in their fields more and more often.
The circles are called "crop circles" because they appear in the fields of grain - usually wheat or corn.
The grain in the circles lies flat on the ground but never broken; it continues to grow, and farmers can
later harvest it. Farmers always discover the crop circles in the morning, so the circles probably form
at night. They appear only in the months from May to September.
At first, people thought that the circles were a hoax. Probably young people were making them as
a joke, or farmers were making them to attract tourists. To prove that the circles were a hoax, people
tried to make circles exactly like the ones that farmer had found. They couldn"t do it. They couldn"t
enter a field of grain without leaving tracks(痕迹), and they couldn"t flatten the grain without breaking it.
Many people believe that beings from outer space are making the circle to communicate with us
from far away and that the crop circles are messages from them.
Scientists who have studied the crop circles suggested several possibilities. Some scientists say
that a downward rush of wind leads to the formation of the circles - the same downward rush of air
that sometimes causes an airplane to crash. Other scientists say that forces within the earth cause the
circles to appear. There is one problem with all these scientific explanations: crop circles often appear
in formations, like the five-dot formation. It is hard to believe that any natural force could form those.
B. his grain was growing up in circles.
C. his grain was moved into several circles
D. some of his wheat had fallen onto the ground.
B. a special way to plant crops
C. a research on the force of winds
D. an experiment for the protection of crops.
B. The farmers couldn"t make the circles round.
C. The farmers couldn"t leave without footprints.
D. The farmers couldn"t keep the wheat straight up.
B. Strange Flying Objects
C. The Power of Natural Forces
D. The discovery of Strange Circles
they do before they start speaking, and later starters are often long listeners. Most children will
"obey" spoken instructions some time before they can speak , though the word " obey" is hardly
accurate as a description of the eager and delighted cooperation usually shown by the children.
Before they can speak, many children will also ask questions by gesture and by making questioning
noises.
Any attempt to study the development from the noises babies make to their first spoken words
leads to considerable difficulties. It is agreed that they enjoy making noises, and that during the first
few months one or two noises sort themselves as particularly expressive as delight, pain, friendliness,
and so on. But since these can"t be said to show the baby"s intention to communicate, they can hardly
be regarded as early forms of language. It is agreed, too, that from about three months they play with
sounds for enjoyment, and that by six months they are able to add new words to their store. This
self-imitation(模仿) leads on to deliberate(有意的) imitation of sounds made or words spoken to
them by other people. The problem then arises as to the point at which one can say that these imitations
can be considered as speech.
It is a problem we need to get out teeth into. The meaning of a word depends on what a particular
person means by it a particular situation; and it is clear that what a child means by a word will change
as he gains more experience of the world. Thus the use, at seven months, of "mama" as a greeting for
his mother cannot be dismissed as a meaningless imitation of what other people say continues after the
child has begun to speak for himself. I doubt, however, whether anything is gained when parents take
advantage of this ability in an attempt to teach new sounds.
B. they need different amounts of listening
C. they are all eager to cooperate with the adults by obeying spoken instructions.
D. they can"t understand and obey the adult"s oral instructions.
B. probably do not hear enough language spoken around them
C. usually pay close attention to what they hear
D. often take a long time in learning to listen properly
C. a sign that he means to tell you something D. an imitation of the speech of adults
B. is not especially important because the changeover takes place gradually
C. is one that should be properly understood because the meaning of words changes with age
D. is one that should be completely ignored because children"s use of words is often meaningless
B. children no longer imitate people after they begin to speak
C. children who are good at imitating learn new words more quickly
D. even after they have learnt to speak, children still enjoy imitating
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- 1When I returned to my hometown, I almost got lost. Almost __
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