Americans do many different things during their vacations. Some people stay at home and enjoy time with their families. They may go to a local swimming pool, zoo or museum. Other people travel to enjoy large national parks, the mountains, the ocean, or large amusement parks. Many people visit interesting American cities or historic areas. Some people visit family members in other states. Still other Americans visit foreign countries.
Recently there is a new use for vacation time — learning about a new kind of job. This program is called Vocation Vacations. People pay between six hundred and five thousand dollars to work at a job for a few days or a week.
Brian Kurth of Portland, Oregon, started Vocation Vacations. He says it serves a valuable purpose. It gives people a chance to try out a job they always wanted without leaving their present job.
People use Vocation Vacations to try many kinds of jobs around the United States. These are jobs that anyone can learn to do. For example, they can learn how to make beer, wine, cheese or cakes. They can help train dogs or horses. They can learn how to be a hunting and fishing guide or a gardener. They can work with a sports announcer, television producer, wedding planner or photographer. Or they can learn how to operate a very small hotel, called a “bed and breakfast”.
Vocation Vacations recently added several new jobs. They include comedians, dog-sled (雪橇) drivers and hair stylists. The company says the most popular job so far is winemaking.
The Vocation Vacations Website recently asked visitors what prevents them from working at their dream job. More than two thousand people answered. Forty-two percent said the main block is money. Lack of the right education or experience was the answer given by twenty-five percent. Other answers included fear of failure and lack of family support.
1.From the first paragraph we can learn that on holiday .
A. Americans often try out new jobs
B. Americans prefer to travel
C. what Americans usually do
D. how Americans enjoy themselves at home
2.What is “Vocation Vacations” according to the passage?
A. The best way of enjoying time with one’s family.
B. A program of learning a new job on holiday.
C. A chance to learn how to operate a hotel.
D. The most popular jobs around the US.
3.It seems that most of the jobs in Vocation Vacations are .
A. difficult B. boring
C. expensive D. enjoyable
4. When people take the jobs in vocation vacations, .
A. they can choose many kinds of them
B. they can get some money for their work
C. they must have much experience
D. they must have a lot of money
高二英语阅读理解中等难度题
Americans do many different things during their vacations. Some people stay at home and enjoy time with their families. They may go to a local swimming pool, zoo or museum. Other people travel to enjoy large national parks, the mountains, the ocean, or large amusement parks. Many people visit interesting American cities or historic areas. Some people visit family members in other states. Still other Americans visit foreign countries.
Recently there is a new use for vacation time — learning about a new kind of job. This program is called Vocation Vacations. People pay between six hundred and five thousand dollars to work at a job for a few days or a week.
Brian Kurth of Portland, Oregon, started Vocation Vacations. He says it serves a valuable purpose. It gives people a chance to try out a job they always wanted without leaving their present job.
People use Vocation Vacations to try many kinds of jobs around the United States. These are jobs that anyone can learn to do. For example, they can learn how to make beer, wine, cheese or cakes. They can help train dogs or horses. They can learn how to be a hunting and fishing guide or a gardener. They can work with a sports announcer, television producer, wedding planner or photographer. Or they can learn how to operate a very small hotel, called a “bed and breakfast”.
Vocation Vacations recently added several new jobs. They include comedians, dog-sled (雪橇) drivers and hair stylists. The company says the most popular job so far is winemaking.
The Vocation Vacations Website recently asked visitors what prevents them from working at their dream job. More than two thousand people answered. Forty-two percent said the main block is money. Lack of the right education or experience was the answer given by twenty-five percent. Other answers included fear of failure and lack of family support.
1.From the first paragraph we can learn that on holiday .
A. Americans often try out new jobs
B. Americans prefer to travel
C. what Americans usually do
D. how Americans enjoy themselves at home
2.What is “Vocation Vacations” according to the passage?
A. The best way of enjoying time with one’s family.
B. A program of learning a new job on holiday.
C. A chance to learn how to operate a hotel.
D. The most popular jobs around the US.
3.It seems that most of the jobs in Vocation Vacations are .
A. difficult B. boring
C. expensive D. enjoyable
4. When people take the jobs in vocation vacations, .
A. they can choose many kinds of them
B. they can get some money for their work
C. they must have much experience
D. they must have a lot of money
高二英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析
More than half of Americans do not take all their vacation days,even though they think they need one more holiday. And nearly a third of workers who take a break check their emails from the boss every other day and some even keep in touch hourly.
“We’re workaholics(工作狂)’,”said Samuel Nahmias.“From a general perspective,this has a lot to do with the economic situation in the US. More and more people are unemployed.”
With jobless numbers reaching 9.6 percent,people who have jobs seem to be unwilling to take time off.“It is not a great picture and that affects vacations. People are not going on vacation as much and those who are going on vacation are being more selective about where they are going.”Nahmias explained.
Unlike European countries where four or more weeks of holiday each year is normal,27 percent of people questioned in the poll said they had 6 to 10 days of annual leave and 20 percent had less than 3 days.With more people on unemployment lists in America,those still with jobs are facing more responsibility at work,which is reflected in their lack of time off.
The majority of workers who did not take time off mentioned too many responsibilities or stress at work,while some people said they simply did not have time to plan a holiday.“People are more conscious of what they are doing and when they are going on vacation because they don’t want to look bad in this situation,”Nahmias explained.
Technology is also playing a part with smartphones enabling workers to keep in contact in ways that were not possible before.It has to do with technology and the level of concern about what is going on in the office.
1.Americans don’t take all their vacation days because ________.
A.they devote themselves to the whole work
B.they are afraid that they may lose their jobs
C.they are asked to keep in touch with their bosses
D.they aren’t in need of holidays at all
2.What does Nahmias mean by saying the underlined words in Paragraph 3?
A.Travelling makes people unwelcome.
B.People are unwilling to go on short vacations.
C.The economic situation remains at a low point.
D.People are more selective about places of interest.
3.We can infer from Paragraph 4 that ________.
A.Unemployment rate is higer in America than that in Europe
B.European economic situation is better than that in America
C.Americans are more hardworking than Europeans
D.More people are losing their jobs in Europe
4.What’s the main idea of the text?
A.Americans are all workaholic.
B.Many Americans don’t choose to take vacations.
C.Unemployment is going from bad to worse.
D.US economic situation becomes worse and worse.
高二英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析
Americans have taken over from the Indians many things besides their continent! Where did corn, potatoes, tomatoes, chocolate and maple sugar come from? The Indians. Who invented moccasins, snowshoes and hammocks? The Indians!
A list of the tools, plants, materials and designs we owe to the Indians would include hundreds of items. But there is something far more familiar, something that is always at hand. It is used daily by every American: a large vocabulary of Indian words.
Potato, tomato, chocolate, moccasin and hammock came into English from Indian languages. So did cocoa, tobacco, maize (an Indian word for corn) and succotash. Some words have changed on the way. Potato, for example, comes from a word that sounds like “batata”. Cocoa began as “cacahuatl”.
Some meanings have also changed. The long Indian word from which succotash comes means “something broken off in bits”. Indian women often varied their dishes by mixing bits of one food with another. White men who ate an Indian dish of mixed lima beans (青豆) and corn began using the Indian word to mean this particular mixture.
Put on your moccasins and take a walk in the country. If it is a cold day and you wear a mackinaw, your jacket will be as Indian as your shoes. But mackinaw came from “michilimackinac”, the Indian name of a place where a fort (集市) served as a trading post. Bright-colored blankets or jackets bought at the post soon became known as “mackinaws”.
Early white visitors to the continent found Indian words useful for the things new to them. But some Indian sounds, such as the “tl” at the end of many words, were hard to say. That is why “coyotl” became coyote and “tomatle” became tomato.
Some words simply seemed too long. So, “musickwautash” became succotash and “rockahominy” became hominy.
1.The first two paragraphs may serve as a(n) ________.
A. explanation B. introduction C. comment D. background
2. Which of the following has been changed for easier pronunciation?
A. Batata B. Chocolate C. Tomatle D. Rockahominy
3. Some words have changed because ________.
A. they are too long
B. nobody can use them
C. the things they refer to have disappeared
D. they are too difficult for people to write
4. What is the passage mainly about?
A. How Indian traditions affect us.
B. Why Indian words were changed.
C. Things we owe to the Indians.
D. Indian words all around us.
高二英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析
During the tenday vacation,they traveled to many parts of France ________their own expense.
A. on B. with
C. at D. in
高二英语单项填空简单题查看答案及解析
Many people travel during the holiday season but do not make sure that their houses and homes 1. (protect). Crimes go up 2. (rapid) during the winter and summer holiday seasons. Here are some things 3. you should keep in mind when you go on holiday.
Always give 4. (strange) the feeling that you are at home. Have the snow 5. (clean) off your stairs or out of your driveway during the winter season. You might ask someone to park 6.car in your driveway.
Tell your newspaper deliverer that you are not at home.7. (have) a pile of newspapers and other mail on your doorsteps tells people that you are not at home, so you could also have a neighbor or a relative get your mail every day.
Fix a timer(定时器) in some of your rooms turns lights on and 8.during different time of 9. day. Some TVs also come with a timer that you could set to be turned on during certain time. Have motion(运动)sensitive lights outside your house that keep thieves away 10.you are not at home.
高二英语短文填空困难题查看答案及解析
Many people travel during the holiday season but do not make sure that their houses and homes1.(protect). Crime goes up2.(rapid) during the winter and summer holiday seasons. Here are some things that you should keep in mind when you go on a holiday.
Always give3.(strange) the feeling that you are at home. Have the snow4.(clean) off your stairs or out of your driveway during the winter season. You might ask someone to park5.car in your driveway.
Tell your newspaper deliverer that you are not at home.6.(have) a pile of newspapers and other mail on your doorsteps tells people that you are not at home, so you could also have a neighbor7.a relative get your mail every day.
Fix a timer in some of your rooms8.turn lights on and9.during different time of the day. Some TVs also come with a timer that you could set to be turned on during certain time. Fix motion(运动) sensitive lights outside your house 10.(keep) thieves away when you are not at home. Safety is what really counts.
高二英语短文填空中等难度题查看答案及解析
Why do we laugh and get amusement from so many different things, from puns (双关语) to pratfalls? Why are some things funny to some people and not to others? How is that while a successful joke can cause pleasure, a sick one can cause serious harm?
Over the centuries, various scholars have attempted to produce a universally agreed-upon theory of humor. Plato and Aristotle introduced the superiority(优越感) theory, the idea that people laugh at the misfortune of others. Their theory seems to explain teasing, but it doesn’t work well for knock-knock jokes. Sigmund Freud argued for his relief theory, the concept that humor is a way for people to release psychological tension and reveal their inner fears and desires. His theory works well for dirty jokes, less well for most puns.
The majority of humor expels today agree with the incongruity theory, the idea that humor arises when there’s a gap between what people expect to happen and what actually happens. Incongruity has a lot going for it — jokes with unexpected funny lines, for example, fit well. But scientists have found that in comedy, unexpectedness is overvalued.
With the goal of developing a new, more satisfactory explanation, I produced “the gentle violation(违背)theory”, the idea that humor arises when something seems wrong or threatening, but is actually OK or safe. A dirty joke, for example, trades on moral or social violations, but it’s only going to get a laugh if the person listening is open enough to consider the subject OK to talk about. Similarly, puns can be seen as linguistic violations that still make grammatical sense.
And while most humor theories have struggled to account for tickling (挠痒痒), or just avoided the phenomenon altogether, my theory accounts for even this kind of laughter. Tickling involves violating someone’s physical space in a gentle way. People can’t tickle themselves — because it isn’t a violation.
1.What is the author’s attitude towards Plato and Aristotle’s theory?
A. Critical. B. Approving
C. uncaring D. Unclear
2.According to Sigmund Freud’s theory, we can infer that __________ .
A. people will laugh when they see others suffer
B. telling dirty jokes is a relief of one’s nervous feelings’
C. unexpectedness can explain how humor works
D. tickling doesn’t involve psychological tension
3.According to the author, why are some things funny to some people but not to others?
A. Because the sense of humor varies greatly from person to person.
B. Because people have different expectations for the same thing.
C. Because some people lack the sense of safety deep in their heart.
D. Because people’s understanding of violation is different.
4.What is the author’s main purpose of writing this passage?
A. To draw people’s attention to the research of humor.
B. To criticize people’s misconceptions about humor.
C. To explain what exactly causes people to laugh.
D. To prove the sense of humor can be developed.
高二英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析
Why do we laugh and get amusement from so many different things, from puns(双关语) to pratfalls(出洋相)? Why are things funny to some people and not to other? How is it that while a successful joke can cause pleasure, a sick one can cause serious harm?
Over the centuries, various scholars have tried to produce a universally agreed-upon theory of humor. Plato and Aristotle introduced the superiority theory, the idea that people laugh at the misfortune of others. Their theory seems to explain teasing, but it doesn't work well for knock-knock jokes. Sigmund Freud argued for his relief theory, the concept that humor is a way for people to release psychological tension and reveal their inner fears and desires. His theory works well for dirty jokes, less well for most puns.
The majority of humor experts today agree with the incongruity(不和谐) theory, the idea that humor arises when there's a gap between what people expect to happen and what actually happens. Incongruity has a lot going for it-jokes with unexpected funny lines, for example, fit well. But scientists have found that in comedy, unexpectedness is overvalued.
With the goal of developing a new, more satisfactory explanation, I produced “the gentle violation(侵犯) theory”, the idea that humor arises when something seems wrong or threatening, but is actually OK or safe. A dirty joke, for example, trades on moral or social violations, but it's only going to get a laugh if the person listening is open enough to consider the subject OK to talk about. Similarly, puns can be seen as linguistic violations that still make grammatical sense.
And while most humor theories have struggled to explain tickling (挠痒痒),or just avoided the phenomenon altogether, my theory accounts for even this kind of laughter. Tickling involves violating someone's physical space in a gentle way. People can't tickle themselves - because it isn't a violation.
1.What is the author's attitude towards Plato and Aristotle's theory?
A.Approving. B.Critical.
C.Unconcerned. D.Uncertain.
2.According to Sigmund Freud's theory, we can infer that ___________.
A.people will laugh when they see others suffer
B.tickling doesn't involve psychological tension
C.unexpectedness can explain how humor works
D.telling dirty jokes is a relief of one's nervous feelings
3.According to the author, why are some things funny to some people but not to others?
A.Because the sense of humor varies greatly from person to person.
B.Because people have different expectations for the same thing.
C.Because some people lack the sense of safety deep in their heart.
D.Because people's understanding of violation is different.
4.What is the author's main purpose of writing this passage?
A.To draw people's attention to the research of humor.
B.To criticize people's misunderstandings about humor.
C.To explain what exactly causes people to laugh.
D.To prove the sense of humor can be developed.
高二英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析
There are many things in different areas ________ we can do to reduce the possible dangers of AIDS.
A.where | B.there | C.what | D.that |
高二英语单项填空简单题查看答案及解析
There are many things in different areas ________ we can do to reduce the possible dangers of AIDS.
A.where B.there C.what D.that
高二英语单项填空中等难度题查看答案及解析