Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: "This is really a very fast game, the fastest I've seen so far this year. Both sides are fighting for the ball all the time. The crowd is loving every minute of it. They are shouting at the top of their voices." "Wills has the ball now. This is only his third game for Scotland, but he's playing so well that it won't be his last. I'm quite sure." "Wills passes the ball to Cotton. Cotton kicks it over the heads of the waiting Frenchmen, towards the goalmouth. But he's too far away, Dupond picks it up easily, and throws it to Patou, put on the left." "France and Scotland still have one goal each, and there are only two minutes left of the game. But during that time, anything can happen. Patou kicks the ball across to Croat. It is a beautiful kick, but Steven jumps and just stops the ball with the side of his head. Meunier is there. He passes to Crozat, and Crozat, without waiting a second, puts the ball into the back of the goal. It takes everybody by surprise. I have never seen a goal like it." "The game is over. France has won the cup." Question: Why cannot Cotton kick the ball into goalmouth? - because Dupond picks it up - because he is too far away - because Steven jumps and just stops the ball with the side of his head - because this is only his third game for Scotland
because he is too far away

Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: According to US research, it can take up to ten years to become a near-native English speaker. Asian and Spanish students took between five and ten years to reach native speaker performance in English-only schools. Fluency obviously doesn't happen overnight. But time can definitely make you a better speaker. After testing his own memory, German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus discovered that humans forget most of what they learn in the first 20 minutes. So cramming right before a speaking exam is not likely to be as effective as practicing regularly over time. The more you practice, the more familiar new words will become. In the classroom, studies have also shown that repeating oral tasks improves a speaker's performance. One of the best repetition exercises is the 4/3/2 technique. Speakers give the same talk to three different listeners with a progressive decrease in delivery time, starting at four minutes, then three, and finally two minutes. This exercise has been proven to help learners speak faster. It can also result in less hesitation and more grammatical accuracy. While time dose make a difference when it comes to speaking perfect English, it would not hurt to brush up on your other language skills. Studies have also shown that reading can increase your speaking vocabulary. After one month of an extensive reading program, a 27-year-old student of French became more familiar with 65 percent of the new words. Aside from choosing the right learning methods, having certain personality traits may also help. US Stephen Krashen believes those with high motivation, self-confidence and a low level of anxiety are better equipped for speaking success. Krashen says students who don't have these qualities are more likely to have a "mental block". "Even if they understand the message, the input will not reach the part of the brain responsible for language acquisition," he writes in his book Principles and Practice in second Language Acquisition. Question: According to the passage, if you want to be a near-native speaker, you need _ . - long-term speaking practice and much reading - speaking practice for ten years only - long-term speaking practice, much reading and certain qualities - cramming new words every day
long-term speaking practice, much reading and certain qualities

Q: Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: As long as I can remember, I've always loved to draw. But my interest in drawing wasn't encouraged very much. Growing up in the 1950s, in Grand Rapids, Michigan, boys were supposed to be athletic. Certain peer pressures encouraged little fingers to learn how to hold footballs rather than crayons. My early love for drawing developed into a love for telling stories through pictures. Stories began as fragments of pictures in my mind. I created a story by posing questions to myself. I called it the "what if" and "what then" approach. For example, for my book The Polar Express, I started out by thinking "What if a boy gets on that train? Where does he go?" From the time I come up with the idea, write and illustrate the book, and deliver it to the printer, it takes about seven months. First, I begin thinking of the idea. Then I imagine the pictures and the story. A good picture book should have events that are visually _ . I first consider scenes that are exciting to look at and then my challenge is to weave a story around those pictures. The next step is putting the illustrations and story down on paper. When you first look at my illustrations, you see ordinary, everyday things. But if you look closer, things might not seem quite so simple. When I'm writing a book, I always try to create something strange or puzzling in each picture. By using artistic strategies, I can give the drawing a kind of mysterious quality. All of my books are picture books, so they are generally thought of as books for children. But when I make them, I think of the books as being for everybody -- for people of all ages. When I was a kid, I had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up, but now I'm really glad I became an artist and a storyteller. Question: Which of the following is TRUE about the author? - He did well when he was at school. - He only wrote something for children. - He tried his best to meet the readers' taste. - He regretted not working hard at drawing.
A: He tried his best to meet the readers' taste.

*Question*
Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: A new study says one part of the human brain may become smaller as the result of a condition known as jet lag. Jet lag results from flying long distances in an airplane. Jet lag interferes with a person's normal times for sleeping and waking. People with jet lag may feel extremely tired for several days. They also may have problems thinking clearly and remembering. Kwangwook Cho is a researcher at the University of Bristol in Britain. He reported the findings of his jet lag study in the publication Nature Neuroscience. The study involved twenty young women who worked for international airlines. The women had served passengers on airplanes for five years. These flight attendants flew across many countries and at least seven time zones. In the study, the flight attendants had different amounts of time to recover from jet lag. Half the women spent five days or fewer in their home areas between long flights. The other half spent more than fourteen days in their home areas. Mister Cho took some fluid from the women's mouths to measure levels of a hormone that increases during stress. He tested them to see if they could remember where black spots appeared on a computer screen. And he took pictures of their brains using magnetic resonance imaging. This is a way to measure the size of the brain's temporal lobes. It was found that the women who had less time between flights had smaller right temporal lobes. This area of the brain deals with recognizing and remembering what is seen. The same group performed worse and had slower reaction times on the visual memory test. And their saliva samples showed higher levels of stress hormones. Mister Cho says he believes the brain needs at least ten days to recover after a long trip. He says airline workers told him their ability to remember got worse after working on planes for about four years. Other studies have shown that increased feelings of stress can cause a loss of cells in the part of the brain that controls memory. Scientists say more tests are needed to study the... Question: What is the subject discussed in the test? - The cause of jet lag. - A story of a group of flight attendance. - A research about the effects of jet lag on the brain. - The importance of having enough rest after long flights.
**Answer**
A research about the effects of jet lag on the brain.