Q: Read the article and select the best answer. Article: Nicaragua's Cerro Negro Volcano has erupted 23 times in the past 100 years,burying homes, crops and people in lava and ashes. But recently the black mountain has become a tourist draw, thanks to a newly invented extreme sport: volcano boarding. Thousands of thrill-seekers have climbed to the top of Cerro Negro, peered into its mouth, then zipped down its rough-and--rocky 41--degree slope on special boards. The volcano-boarding speed, set by an Israeli woman, is 54 mph. "Rushing down an active volcano is something that people expect." Said Anthony Alcalde, an expert volcano boarder. The sport was developed in the mid-2000s by Darryn Webb, an Australian who had climbed the nearby Cerro Negro but was looking for a faster way to get to the bottom. He tried sliding down on surfboards, snowboards, and even a refrgerrator door before inventing a sit-down board made of plywood. "At first, Darryn planned to use a snowboard," said Gemma Cope, a British woman who now runs Big Foot, which offers volcano boarding tours. "But he realized he couldn't cut an edge for there were little rocks everywhere. So he came up with the sitting-down option and realized he can go pretty fast. " Tourists,who are nearly all foreigners,pay $28 for the experience, which begins with a truck ride on dirt roads to Cerro Negr0.a 2,400-foot--high volcano that last erupted in l999.Visitors must carry their boards during the half-hour climb to the top. There,they go straight down the slope and sometimes they have to use their feet for brakes.Along the way.The board fills with rocks and dust,making boarders almost blind.Crashes are common."l wiped out twice and ripped my pants."said Melinda Vorisek, a tourist from Miami."But I'd do it again." Another tourist added:"It was sheer terror. I was eating dirt.But how many people can say they've bombed down a volcano?" Question: From what some tourists said,we can lean that they love volcano boarding because _ Options: A: it is easier to get to the top of the mountain B: it is a good chance to see the mouth of the volcano C: it is really a challenge to overcome a volcano D: it is frightening to drop from the hill like a bomb
A: C

Q: Read the article and select the best answer. Article: What's your earliest childhood memory? Can you remember the first time you heard thunder or watched a television program? Adults seldom recall events much earlier than the year or so before entering school, just as children younger than three or four rarely keep any memory of specific, personal experiences. A variety of explanations have been put forward by psychologists for this "childhood amnesia" . One argues that the _ , the region of the brain which is responsible for forming memories, does not mature until about the age of two. But the most popular theory thinks that, since adults do not think like children, they cannot access childhood memories. Adults think in words, and their life memories are like stories. But when they search through their mental files for early childhood memories to add to this verbal life story, they don't find any that fit the pattern. It's like _ . Now psychologist Annette Simms offers a new explanation for "childhood amnesia". She argues that there simply aren't any early childhood memories to recall. According to Dr. Simms , children need to learn to use someone else's spoken description of their personal experiences in order to turn their own short-term, quickly forgotten impressions of these experiences into long-term memories. In other words, children hear others talk about their experiences--Mother talking about the afternoon spent looking for crabs at the beach or Dad asking them about their day at Ocean Park. Without the help of this kind of verbal description, says Dr. Simms, children cannot form long-term memories of their personal experiences. Question: According to the passage, it is widely believed that _ . Options: A: it is impossible for an adult to recall his experiences B: adults and children have different brain structures C: adults think in words while children think in pictures D: adults actually have no access to their childhood memories
A: D

Q: Read the article and select the best answer. Article: Students who say they never or hardly ever used dictionaries may speak English well but usually write poorly, because they make many mistakes. The students who use dictionaries most do not learn especially well either. The ones who look up every new word do not read fast. Therefore they do not have time to read much. Those who use small two-language dictionaries have the worst problems. Their dictionaries often give only one or two words as translations of English. But one English word often has many translations in a foreign language and one foreign word has many translations in English. The most successful students are those who use large college edition dictionaries with about 100,000 words but do not use them too often. When they are reading, these students first try to get the general idea and understand new words from the context. Then they reread and use the dictionary to look up only key words that they still do not understand. They use dictionaries more for writing. If they are not sure how to spell a word, they always use a dictionary. Also, if they think a noun might have an unusual plural form, they check this in a dictionary. Question: The writer thinks that _ . Options: A: choose a good dictionary, and you'll be successful in learning English B: dictionaries are not necessary to the students who learn English C: it is very important for students to use good dictionaries properly D: using dictionaries very often can't help to improve writing
A: C

Q: Read the article and select the best answer. Article: All over the world, libraries have begun the Herculean task of making faithful digital copies of the books, images and recordings that preserve the intellectual effort of mankind. For armchair scholars, the work promises to bring such a wealth of information to desktop that the present Internet may not match. Librarians see three clear benefits to going digital. First, it helps them preserve rare and fragile objects without refusing the demands of those who wish to study them. The British Library, for example, holds the only medieval manuscript of Beowulf in London. Only qualified scholars were allowed to see it until Kevin S. Kiernan of the University of Kentucky scanned the Manuscript with three different light sources and put the images up on the Internet for anyone to use. A second benefit is convenience. Once books are changed to digital form, readers can find them in seconds rather than minutes. Several people can read the same book or view the same picture at the same time. Clerks are spared the chore of reshelving. And libraries could use the Internet to lend their collections to those who are unable to visit in person. The third advantage of electronic copies is that they occupy millimeters of space on a magnetic disk rather than meters on a shelf. The cost of library buildings is increasingly high. The University of California at Berkeley recently spent $ 46 million on an underground addition to house 1.5 million books----an average cost of $30 per volume. The price of disk storage, on the contrary, has fallen to about $ 2 per 300-page publication and continues to drop. Question: Which of the following is mentioned in the text as benefits of going digital? Options: A: Fewer staff will be required in libraries. B: Libraries will be able to move underground. C: Borrowers need not go to the library building. D: Old manuscripts can be moved more easily.
A: C