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TV/ bring/ not only/ information/ but also/ entertainment.

 

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When we were on holiday, we used ________ to the beach every day.

He has been very interested in doing research on _____ since he was at high school.

(185)____

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If I ________ that Brian had to get up early, I would have woken him up.

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Do you know who _________ the ball point pen?

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A: “Sorry. Could you show me the way to the nearest bakery, please?” - B: “………….”

Read the passage below carefully, and then choose the best answer:
Traveling in the Future
These days, if you want to travel from New York to Beijing, the flight takes about 16 hours. You also have to wait at the airport, and sometimes you have to transfer onto a different airplane. If you add all of that extra time, the trip takes at least 20 hours. But in the future, the trip from New York to Beijing might only take two hours. Right now, a private company is developing something called ET3. ET3 stands for “evacuated tube transport technology”. Here is how it works. A tube goes all the way from New York to Beijing. The tube is only a few meters wide. Capsules move through the tube. Six people can sit in one capsule. The capsules use electricity instead of gasoline. For international travel, the capsules can travel at about 6,500 kilometers per hour. That is much faster than airplane – most modern airplanes usually only fly at about 800 kilometers per hour. So how is this possible? How can these capsules travel so fast? The answer is that there is no air inside the tube. When airplanes fly, they have to move through the air. The air slows the airplanes down. Because there is no air in the ET3 tubes, the capsules are able to move at a very high speed. Besides, the capsules are quite light. They only weigh 183 kilograms. There are other advantages to ET3. Because it uses electricity, it is quite clean. In addition, it is much quieter than airplanes and cars. Finally, ET3 tubes and capsules don’t require very much building material. Of course, ET3 doesn’t exist yet. The technology is still being developed. Developers still have to solve a lot of problems. The biggest problem is that right now, ET3 would be far too expensive. In order to make ET3 cheaper, we will need much better technology. It is exciting to think of how ET3 will change travel in the future. Maybe someday, you will be able to have lunch in New York and dinner in Beijing.
7. What can be inferred from the passage?

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the undelined part that needs correction in each of the following questions:
Early peoples had no need of engineering works to supply their water. Hunters and nomads camped near natural sources of fresh water, and populations were so sparse that pollution of the water supply was not a serious problem. After community life developed and agricultural villages became urban centres, the problem of supplying water became important for inhabitants of a city, as well as for irrigation of the farms surrounding the city. Irrigation works were known in prehistoric times, and before 2000 BC the rulers of Babylonia and Egypt constructed systems of dams and canals to impound the flood waters of the Euphrates and Nile rivers, controlling floods and providing irrigation water throughout the dry season. Such irrigation canals also supplied water for domestic purposes. The first people to consider the sanitation of their water supply were the ancient Romans, who constructed a vast system of aqueducts to bring the clean waters of the Apennine Mountains into the city and built basins and filters along these mains to ensure the
clarity of the water. The construction of such extensive water-supply systems declined when the Roman Empire disintegrated, and for several centuries local springs and wells formed the main source of domestic and industrial water. The invention of the force pump in England in the middle of the 16th century greatly extended the possibilities of development of water-supply systems. In London, the first pumping waterworks was completed in 1562; it pumped river water to a reservoir about 37 m above the level of the River Thames and from the reservoir the water was distributed by gravity, through lead pipes, to buildings in the vicinity. Increased per-capita demand has coincided with water shortages in many countries. Southeast England, for example, receives only 14 per cent of Britain's rainfall, has 30 per cent of its population, and has experienced declining winter rainfall since the 1980s.
In recent years a great deal of interest has been shown in the conversion of seawater to fresh water to provide drinking water for very dry areas, such as the Middle East. Several different processes, including distillation, electrodialysis, reverse osmosis, and direct-freeze evaporation, have been developed for this purpose. Some of these processes have been used in large facilities in the United States. Although these processes are successful, the cost of treating seawater is much higher than that for treating fresh water.

The word “ vicinity” in paragraph 2 refers to “     ”

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Peter is disappointed at not getting the job, but he will ______ it soon.

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions :
Faster processors and advances in memory technology have made today’s smartphones much more powerful than a lot of computers from just a decade ago. With wireless technology, people can surf the internet, play online games, send e-mail, and do (1)_________ all the things they once could only do on a computer. (2)__________, they have the power to do things constantly at their fingertips. Many people (3)_________ that while smartphones are powerful tools, they are making people reliant on them. Why would a person need to learn to read a map when he can get directions to anywhere by simply asking his phone a question? Who needs to learn maths when you have immense calculating power in your pocket at all times? What (4)__________ is there to memorise facts about history, art, or geography when that information is readily available from a portable Internet interface? There are just some of the questions being asked and answered as smartphone usage continues to spread. Like any technology, smartphones have their advantages, but they do have disadvantages as well that we must (5)__________ an eye on.

 "I have never been to Russia. I think I shall go there next year.” said Bill.

(114)_______

Read the passage below carefully, and then choose the best answer:
Incredible Shrinking Microchips
There is a popular old saying that “bigger is better”. Although this may be true in some regards, the exact opposite often applies in technology. As electronic components get smaller, it allows companies to manufacture tinier devices with more features. Thus began the never-ending quest to create the smallest microchips on the planet. Yet as these vital electronic components get smaller, they are also getting stronger and clever inventors are finding new ways in which to use them to do incredible things. Currently, the biggest limitation microchip producers face when trying to reduce chips’ size is the copper wires that provide electrical current throughout the chip. Although they can be made smaller, this can cause a whole host of problems such as melting and overheating. Thanks to the work of a few scientists from the UK though, this problem may soon be a thing of the past. Their solution is getting rid of the copper wiring altogether and using carbon nanotubes instead. Not only would this allow for smaller sizes but it would also increase the power that microchips can generate. In the end, this would translate into smaller and more powerful devices much to the delight of consumers all over the world. Corporate powerhouse Intel® has announced plans to create a line of tiny, low power chips that can be used in bracelets, smart watches, and other tiny devices. The chips will be called Intel® Quark, and they are being designed primarily to fit in biomedical devices. A key selling point to biomedical technology is that the devices have to be nonintrusive because people don’t want to carry around heavy equipment to monitor their health. If they can do this, Intel® will likely find several tablet and smartphone manufacturers who are willing to corporate Quark microchips into their devices. In a somewhat unusual project, researchers are working on a special microchip that will serve as miniature human organs in experiments. These “organ” chips could be used to test different medicines and study diseases. If realized, the technology could put an end to the use of lab mice and other animals for testing. Everyone from the largest pharmaceutical companies to the US military has shown interest in the project. Currently, the research team in charge of the project believes that within five years the organ chips will be used in practical research. It goes to show that thinking small often produces the biggest results.
7. What will “organ” chips help to do when they are completed?

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In __________ time, farmers use buffalo-drawn cart to take food home.

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
Recent technological advances in manned and unmanned vehicles, along with breakthroughs in satellite technology and computer equipment, have overcome some of the limitations of divers and diving equipment for scientists doing research on the great oceans of the world. Without a vehicle, divers often became sluggish, and their mental concentration was severely limited. Because undersea pressure affects their speech organs, communication among divers has always been difficult or impossible. But today, most oceanographers avoid the use of vulnerable human divers, preferring to reduce the risk to human life and make direct observations by means of instruments that are lowered into the ocean, from samples take from the water, or from photographs made by orbiting satellites. Direct observations of the ocean floor can be made not only by divers but also by deep-diving submarines in the water and even by the technology of sophisticated aerial photography from vantage points above the surface of more than seven miles and cruise at depths of fifteen thousand feet. In addition, radio-equipped buoys can be operated by remote control in order to transmit information back to land-based laboratories via satellite. Particularly important for ocean study are data about water temperature, currents, and weather. Satellite photographs can show the distribution of sea ice, oil slicks, and cloud formations over the ocean. Maps created from satellite pictures can represent the temperature and the color of the ocean's surface, enabling researchers to study the ocean currents from laboratories on dry land. Furthermore, computers help oceanographers to collect, organize, and analyze data from submarines and satellites. By creating a model of the ocean's movement and characteristics, scientists can predict the patterns and possible effects of the ocean on the environment.
Recently, many oceanographers have been relying more on satellites and computers than on research ships or even submarine vehicles because they can supply a greater range of information more quickly and more effectively. Some of humankind's most serious problems, especially those concerning energy and food, may be solved with the help of observations made possible by this new technology.

The word “sluggish” is closest in meaning to     .

Read the passage below carefully, and then choose the best answer:
The Film and the Novel: Twilight
When a popular book gets made into a movie, there will always be a debate about whether the novel or film is better. The filmmakers always have to consider certain things: do they want to follow the book closely to please dedicated readers, or do they want to change parts of the book if they don’t translate well on-screen? No matter what they do, there will always be people who feel the movie will never be as good as the book, people who will love the movie without ever reading the book, and people who enjoy both. The vampire series Twilight, by Stephenie Meyer, became so popular that movie companies wanted to produce it for the big screen. Most Twilight fans were excited about seeing characters such as Edward and Bella “come to life,” but there were other fans who did not trust the movie script. They assumed the scriptwriters would change parts of the story to make it seem more interesting as a movie. By the time the first Twilight movie was released, millions of people had read the series. Many of these people went on to watch the film, which made $35.7 million just on its opening day. While many fans and critics liked it and said the movie more or less followed the book’s storyline, some fans were not impressed. One change that angered them was that certain sound effects were added to the movie, such as a “whooshing” sound when the vampires jumped. This was not mentioned in the book, and many fans felt that it was too distracting. Those who liked the movie said that they enjoyed the light mood and excitement. This was very different from the book. The writing in Twilight is dark and gloomy, like many vampire novels. The movie, however, added more energy to the story and more personality to the characters. For example, many characters in the book are portrayed as being quiet, and they spend most of their time at school. But in the movie, the characters are cooler and funnier – one scene even shows them going surfing together. The director of the first movie, Catherine Hardwicke, thought it was important for the characters to be believable. She wanted them to have a wide variety of emotions, since the series is for, and about, teenagers. In the end, the films were considered a success, even if there were both happy and unhappy fans. It’s a great accomplishment to make films that are watched by millions of people, and you can’t expect to be able to please everyone all of the time.
2. Why does the passage say fans were excited to see the movie?

A _____ is a spacecraft that is designed to travel into space and back to earth several times.

(312)_______

There can be no doubt at all that the Internet has made a huge difference to our lives. Parents are worried that children spend too much time playing on the Internet, hardly (1)_____ doing anything else in their spare time. Naturally, parents are (2)_____ to find out why the internet is so attractive, and they want to know if it can be harmful for their children. Should parents worry if their children are spending that much time (3)_____ their computer? Obviously, if children are bent over their computer for hours, (4)_____ in some game, instead of doing their homework, then something is wrong. Parents and children could decide how much use the children should make of the Internet, and the child should give his or her (5)____ that it won't interfere with homework. If the child is not holding to this arrangement, parents can take more drastic steps. Dealing with a child's use of the internet is not much different from negotiating any other sort of bargain about behavior.

(64)________

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He advised me to take an English course. I_________ take it early.

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct word for each of the numbered blanks.
                       THE LIFE OF COUNTRY VET
Don Strange, who works as a vet in northern England, leads a busy life. As well as having to treat pets which are unwell, he often visits farms where problems of (1).......... kinds await him. He has lost (2)..........of the number of times he has been called out at midnight to give advice to a farmer with sick sheep or cows.
Recently, a television company chose Don as the subject of a documentary program it was making about the life of a country vet. The program showed the difficult situations Don faces every day such as helping a cow to give birth or winning the trust of an aggressive dog (3)..............needs an injection. Not all of Don’s patients are domestic animals, (4)................. , and in the program people saw him helping an owl which had a damaged wing. It also showed Don holding a meeting with villagers concerned about the damage a new road might do to their (5)......................... environment.

(5)......................

Read the reading below carefully, and then complete it with the best option A, B, C or D given below:
Wellness in the Workplace
(1)------- health care costs remain an issue of great concern for many employers. "People are working more hours, and at the same time, medical costs are rising, so it makes sense to promote wellness," says Morris Hsiu, health services coordinator for Greenview Marketing in Kelowna, British Columbia. "It costs less to build and staff a gym than it does to pay for health care, train new staff or hire temporary staff to take over when someone becomes ill (2)------- stress or overwork." At Greenview, as at other companies, employees who use the gym are more relaxed and productive and spend fewer days away from work due to illness, thus saving the company money. Hsiu recommends that companies start with small steps to (3)------- encourage good health. Some suggestions from Hsiu include bringing in instructors to provide classes in stretching or aerobics and hiring nutrition consultants for diet information

In between the (1) _______ are the Prairie Provinces and the eastern provinces of Ontario and Québec. Rolling wheat (2) _______ cover much of the Prairie Provinces—Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. They (3) _______ more than one-fifth of the world’s wheat. (4) _______ of Canada’s people live in Ontario and Québec. These two provinces are Canada’s business and (5) _______ heartland. Toronto, Canada’s largest city, is in Ontario. So is Canada’s capital, Ottawa. Montréal, the second largest city, is in Québec.

(39)______