Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: Grandma Moses is among the most famous twentieth-century painters of the United States,yet she did not start painting until she was in her late seventies.As she once said to herself:" I would never sit back in a rocking chair,waiting for someone to help me." No one could have had a more productive old age. She was born Anna Mary Robertson on a farm in New York State,one of five boys and five girls.At twelve she left home and was in domestic service until,at twenty-seven,she married Thomas Moses,the hired hand of one of her employers.They farmed most of their lives,first in Virginia and then in New York State,at Eagle Bridge.She had ten children,of whom five survived;her husband died in 1927. Grandma Moses painted a little as a child and made embroidery pictures as a hobby,but only changed to oils in old age because her hands had become too stiff to sew and she wanted to keep busy and pass the time.Her pictures were first sold at the local drugstore and at a market and were soon noticed by a businessman who bought everything she painted.Three of the pictures exhibited in the Museum of Modern Art,and in 1940 she had her first exhibition in New York.Between the 1930's and her death,she produced some 2,000 pictures:detailed and lively _ of the country life she had known for so long,with a wonderful sense of color and form."I think really hard till I think of something really pretty,and then I paint it" she said. Question: According to the passage,Grandma Moses began to paint because she wanted to _ . - make herself beautiful - keep active - earn more money - become famous
keep active
------
Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: Going green is something that affects every single one of us. Whether by recycling those plastic water bottles, or by cutting down on electricity in your home, the importance of going green on a personal level is extremely important. But, when you're a millionaire NBA basketball star, how do you help out the environment? Yao Ming is a basketball player that plays for the Houston Rockets and has spoken out against hunting of sharks for fins, a delicious food in his native China. He is also the United Nations' Environmental champion. His goal is to raise awareness of climate change and energy-saving. "I will work with young people across the world and try to inspire them to plant trees, harvest rainwater and to become environmental champions in their own communities." The Philadelphia Eagles, a professional American football team, are really doing their part to give back to the community. The Eagles Go Green page has a "Green Energy Calculator" and according to the web site fans have saved $ 73,674.90 a year and saved 666,320 pounds of CO per year. Also, the Eagles have set up a "Stop global warming virtual march on Washington", a march across America for one year, through the Internet with a goal to bring fans together and to urge leaders to deal with the serious problem of global warming now. Bob Burnquist, a Brazilian skateboarder, is a member of Action Sports Environmental Coalition and founder of a program that gets organic foods and farming into schools for healthy lunch programs. Bob also has a huge homegrown organic farm where he hosted a gathering in celebration of Earth Day. Kelly Slater is a surfer and eight-time champion, but he also supports saving the coral reefs world wide. He has founded the Kelly Slater Invitational Competition which raises funds and awareness for Reef Check, which is able to get its message out to a large group of guests including professional surfers, film and music stars, and other famous people. Question: According to the passage, Yao Ming wants to _ . - help the Houston Rockets win the NBA championship - ask the United Nations to protect sharks in China - encourage young people to care about the environment - train more young people to become players of NBA
encourage young people to care about the environment
------
Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: Recordings of angry bees are enough to send big, tough African elephants running away, a new study says. Beehives -either recorded or real-may even prevent elephants from damaging farmer's crops. In 2002, scientist Lucy King and her team found that elephants avoid certain trees with bees living in them. Today, Lucy wants to see if African honeybees might discourage elephants from eating crops. But before she asked farmer to go to the trouble of setting up beehives on their farms, she needed to find out if the bees would scare elephants away. Lucy found a wild beehive inside a tree in northern Kenya and set up a recorder. Then she threw a stone into the beehive, which burst into life. Lucy and her assistant hid in their car until the angry bees had calmed down. Next,Lucy searched out elephant families in Samburu National Reserve in northern Kenya and put a speaker in a close to each family. From a distance, Lucy switched on the pre-recorded sound of angry bees while at the same time recording the elephants with a video camera. Half the elephant groups left the area within ten seconds. Out of a total of 17 groups, only one group ignored the sound of the angry bees. Lucy reported that all the young elephants immediately ran to their mothers to hide under them. When Lucy Played the sound of a waterfall instead of the angry bees to many of the same elephant families, the animals were undisturbed. Even after four minutes, most of the groups stayed in one place. Lucy is now studying whether the elephants will continue to avoid the sound of angry bees after hearing it several times. She hasn't tested enough groups yet to know, but her initial results were promising enough to begin trials with farmers. She has now begun placing speakers in the fields to see if elephants are frightened away. Question: Which of the following is true according to the passage? - Young elephants ignore African honeybees. - Waterfalls can make elephants stay in one place. - Elephants do not go near trees with bees living in them. - Farmers do not allow Lucy to conduct tests in their fields.
Elephants do not go near trees with bees living in them.
------