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II. Grammar and Vocabulary
Section A
Directions: After reading the passages below, fill in the blanks to make the passages coherent and grammatically correct. For the blanks with a given word, fill in each blank with the proper form of the given word; for the other blanks, use one word that best fits each blank.
(A)
Left Handedness
What do Leonardo da Vinci, Marie Curie, and Albert Einstein have in common? They were all left-handed, along with other famous people including Barack Obama. In fact, an estimated 13 percent of the world’s population (25)______ be left-handed.
Most people are right-handed. This fact also seems to have held true (26)______ history. In 1977, scientists studied works of art made at various times starting with cave drawings from 15,000 B.C. and ending with paintings from the 1950s. Most of the people (27)______ (show) in these works of art are right-handed.
Many researchers claim (28)______ (find)relationships between left-handedness and various physical and mental characteristics. However, (29)______ of these connections are very weak, and others have not been proven.What makes a person become right-handed rather than left-handed? As yet, no one really knows for sure. (30)______ ______ ______ reasons may be behind it, people’s attitudes toward left-handedness have changed a lot over the years. There are even a number of shops (31)______ (specialize) in selling products for left-handed people, such as left-handed scissors, can openers, guitars, and even a left-handed camera.In 1976, Left-Handers International, a group of left-handed people in Topeka, Kansas, in the United States, decided to start (32)______ annual event in order to clear up misunderstandings about left-handedness.
(B)
Motivating Students
(33)______ ______ a young child might be nervous about starting school, he or she is often excited on the first day of school. Perhaps that excitement lasts through the first few years of school. But over time, many children are much (34) ______ (excited) about going to school because school becomes a place of “all work and no play.” As the years go by, students
(35)______(pressure) to do more work and to do it better, make better test scores, and have a higher class rank. It is therefore not surprising that by middle school many students lose interest in school and learning.
Teachers face a big challenge in such a situation. When they enter a classroom
(36)______ ______ most of the students do not want to be there and do not want to study, how can they teach? Some teachers may be tempted to focus their energy on the handful of students in the classroom who show an interest in (37)______(learn). Other teachers have to reward “good” students and punishing “bad” students in the hope (38)______ this may somehow motivate all students to try harder.
Through his own teaching experience, Dr. Richard Lavoie became interested in the problem of motivating students. He (39)______(wonder) what motivates some students to want to learn. In studying this question, Dr. Lavoie discovered that other people have done a lot of research into this question already. However, those people do not work in schools. The people who seemed to know the most about (40)______ motivates kids were researchers who work for companies that were advertising products such as toys and music for children.
Section B
Directions: Complete the following passage by using the words in the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.
A. adequately B. advances C. neighbour D. colonize E. concerns
F. create G. intensively H. settlers I. smart J. journey
K. survive
“Once we spread out into space and establish independent colonies, our future should be safe,”Stephen Hawking says.Stephen Hawking, one of the world’s most important scientists, believes that to __41__, humans must move into space.
Today, the United States, India, China, and Japan are all planning to send astronauts back to Earth’s closest __42__: the moon. Each country wants to create space stations there between 2020 and 2030. These stations will __43__prepare humans to visit and later live on Mars or other Earth-like planets.
Robert Zubrin, a rocket scientist, thinks humans should __44__ space. He wants to start with Mars. Why? There are several advantages: for one, sending people to the moon and Mars will allow us to learn a lot—for example, whether living on other planets is possible. Then, we can eventually__45__ new human societies on other planets. In addition, the __46__ we make for space travel in the fields of science, technology, medicine, and health can also benefit us here on Earth.
But not everyone thinks sending humans into space is a(n)__47__ idea. Many say it’s too expensive to send people, even on a short __48__. And most space trips are not short. A one-way trip to Mars, for example, would take about six months. People travelling this kind of distance face a number of health problems. Also, for many early space __49__, life would be extremely difficult. On the moon’s surface, for example, the air and the sun’s rays are very dangerous. People would have to stay indoors most of the time.
Despite these __50__, sending people into space seems certain. In the future, we might see lunar(月球上的) cities and maybe even new human cultures on other planets.
