We all enjoy the colors of autumn leaves. Did you ever wonder how and why a fall leaf changes color? Where do the yellows and oranges come from? To answer those questions, we first have to understand what leaves are and what they do.

      Leaves are nature's food factories. Plants take water from the ground through their roots. They take a gas called carbon dioxide from the air. Plants use sunlight to turn water and carbon dioxide into glucose, which is a kind of sugar. Plants use glucose as food for energy and as a building block for growing. The way plants turn water and carbon dioxide into sugar is called photosynthesis, which means " putting together with light. " A chemical called chlorophyll helps make photosynthesis happen. Chlorophyll is what gives plants their green color.

      As summer ends and autumn comes, the days get shorter and shorter. This is how the trees "know" to begin getting ready for winter.

      During winter, there is not enough light or water for photosynthesis. The trees will rest, and live off the food they stored during summer. They begin to shut down their food-making factories. The green chlorophyll disappears from the leaves. As the bright green fades away, we begin to see yellow and orange colors. Small a-mounts of these colors have been in the leaves all along. Covered up by the green chlorophyll, we just can't see them in summer.

     The bright reds and purples we see in leaves are made mostly in the fall. In some trees, like maples, glucose is trapped in the leaves after photosynthesis stops. Sunlight and the cool nights of autumn cause the leaves turn this glucose into a red color. The brown color of trees like oaks is made from wastes left in the leaves.

     It is the combination of all these things that make the beautiful colors we enjoy in the fall.

The writer asked two questions in the beginning in order to        .

    A. persuade readers to believe something

    B. introduce the topic of the passage

    C. get the readers excited

D. offer something to think over

Which of the following is True according to the passage?

    A. Trees don't change colours with seasons.

    B. Trees can still perform photosynthesis well in winter.

    C. Trees have colours like yellow and orange even in summer.

D. Trees don't need food in winter.

Photosynthesis is a way that ___________________________.

A. plants change water and carbon dioxide into sugar

B. plants turn water and carbon dioxide into sugar with the help of sunlight

C. plants use glucose as food for energy and growing

D. chlorophyll is a great help

Which is the best title for this passage?

    A. Colorful trees in autumn            B. Mysteries of tree colors

C. Do you enjoy tree colors?           D. Wonderful colors in autumn

STUDY  BOOKS
Basic Study Manual    Hardcover: $ 37.50
Future success depends on the ability to learn. Here are the answers to the questions most often asked by parents, teachers, business trainers and by students themselves. Read this book and learn:
* What the three barriers (障礙)to study are and what to do about them
* What to do if you get tired of a subject you are studying
* Twenty-six simple drills to help you learn how to study easily, rapidly and with full understanding
Buy and read the Basic Study Manual and use it to dramatically improve your ability to study.
…………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Study Skills for Life    Hardcover: $31.99
L. Ron Hubbard’s study technology for teenagers opens the door to their future success by giving them the ability to study and learn. Fully illustrated for easy comprehension.
…………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Learning How to Learn   Hardcover: $24.99
The basics of effective study for 8 to 12-year-olds, fully illustrated. Children who read and apply the materials in this book regain their liking for study and their ability to apply this knowledge in life. Get this book for a child you want to see win at his studies!
…………………………………………………………………………………………………….
How to Use a Dictionary Picture Book for Children   Hardcover: $34.90
In spite of billions of dollars spent on ‘educational research’, children are not taught the most basic skills of learning, even the most basic of these: how to use a dictionary. In fact, a search of educational books for children found no book that told them how to use a dictionary or that one should. Written for children 8 to 12-year-olds, this fully illustrated book will teach your child:
* How to find words in a dictionary       * The different ways that words are used
* What the different marks and symbols that are used in a dictionary mean
* How to use a dictionary to correctly pronounce words
It includes a section for parents and teachers showing you how to use this book with children. Buy this book and give it to your children to unlock their education. What’s more, you’ll just pay 50% for it before May 1, 2006.
40. Some of the four books were illustrated in order to_________
A. help readers understand them           B. persuade readers to buy them
C. reduce the cost of them                D. make them suitable to different readers
41. If you buy the four books on April 1, 2006, your will have to pay_______ for them.
A. $129.38                    B. $111.93        C. $64.69         D. $34.90
42. The purpose of the passage is to _______.
A. introduce the four books to readers      B. help children to learn English
C. enrich students knowledge about nature  D. sell the four books to students

HOW would you like to step into the world of other people’s dreams? That’s just what Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) does. His work is to steal secrets from people when they are asleep and dreaming. He has an even rarer ability: He can plant an idea in someone’s sleeping mind, and watch it grow and take root in reality. This ability is called inception.

The movie Inception (《盜夢(mèng)空間》) was on show in Chinese cinemas not long ago. It is imaginative, of course. The movie leads one to wonder just how much we know about dreams. For years, scientists and researchers have been trying to solve sleep’s greatest mystery.

Is it possible to enter someone’s dreaming mind? In the movie, DiCaprio uses a drug and a dream machine to put a scenario (某一特定情節(jié)) into someone’s sleeping mind. He then goes to sleep himself, connected to the machine, and enters the other person’s dream.

In real life, there is a machine that can read someone’s mind. A brain scanner takes pictures of brain activity, and then the software recreates images of what the person was looking at.

Researchers say it may be possible one day to record someone’s dream – without the danger (or the fun) of actually sharing that dream.

What’s a dream, anyway? A dream is a group of images and sounds our brain creates when we’re sleeping. In the 1950s, researchers discovered a sleeping condition that happened around every 90 to 120 minutes during sleep: rapid eye movement, or REM. During this period you’re fast asleep, yet your eyes move around quickly under your eyelids (眼皮) and your brain is nearly as active as during the day. That’s when most dreams happen.

What do dreams mean? Dreams are not always filled with meaning. Sometimes dreams are just your mind playing with thoughts and images from your life, or things you may have read or seen on TV. But at other times, dreams show things that you want to achieve in real life, or things that cause you trouble or stress.

1.The movie Inception is mentioned at the beginning of the article to ______.

       A. encourage readers to watch the movie

       B. tell readers about people with special dreaming abilities

       C. inform readers about the science of dreams

       D. warn reader about the threat of dream stealers

2.According to the article, how does a brain scanner work?

       A. It records dreams.

       B. It uses a special drug that causes no pain.

       C. It finds out what dreams mean.

       D. It takes pictures of brain activity and recreates images.

3. According to the article, which of the following statements about REM sleep is TRUE?

       A. Most dreams occur in REM sleep.

       B. Over the last ten years scientists have solved the mystery of REM sleep.

       C. People always remember what they have dreamed in a REM sleep.

       D. People can have REM sleep all night.

4. The article claims that ______.

       A. dreams tell us a lot about a person’s character

       B. dreams are connected to real life

       C. dreams are useful and help keep our brains active

       D. dreams are usually about meaningful things

Photos that you might have found down the back of your sofa are now big business!

In 2005,the American artist Richard Prince’s photograph of a photograph,Untitled (Cowboy),was sold for $1 248 000.

Prince is certainly not the only contemporary artist to have worked with so-called “found photographs”—a loose term given to everything from discarded(丟棄的)prints discovered in a junk shop to old advertisements or amateur photographs from a stranger’s family album.The German artist Joachim Schmid,who believes “basically everything is worth looking at”,has gathered discarded photographs,postcards and newspaper images since 1982.In his on-going project,Archiv,he groups photographs of family life according to themes:people with dogs;teams;new cars;dinner with the family;and so on.

Like Schmid,the editors of several self-published art magazines also champion(捍衛(wèi))found photographs.One of them,called simply Found,was born one snowy night in Chicago,when Davy Rothbard returned to his car to find under his wiper(雨刷)an angry note intended for someone else:“Why’s your car HERE at HER place?”The note became the starting point for Rothbard’s addictive publication,which features found photographs sent in by readers,such as a poster discovered in your drawer.

The whole found-photograph phenomenon has raised some questions.Perhaps one of the most difficult is:can these images really be considered as art?And,if so,whose art?Yet found photographs produced by artists,such as Richard Prince,may raise endless possibilities.What was the cowboy in Prince’s Untitled doing?Was he riding his horse hurriedly to meet someone?Or how did Prince create this photograph?It’s anyone’s guess.In addition,as we imagine the back-story to the people in the found photographs artists,like Schmid,have collated(整理),we also turn toward our own photographic albums.Why is memory so important to us?Why do we all seek to freeze in time the faces of our children,our parents,our lovers,and ourselves?Will they mean anything to anyone after we’ve gone?

In the absence of established facts,the vast collections of found photographs give our minds an opportunity to wander freely.That,above all,is why they are so fascinating.

1.The first paragraph of the passage is used to_______.

A.remind readers of found photographs

B.advise readers to start a new kind of business

C.ask readers to find photographs behind sofas

D.show readers the value of found photographs

2.According to the passage,Joachim Schmid_______.

A.is fond of collecting family life photographs

B.found a complaining note under his car wiper

C.is working for several self-published art magazines

D.wondered at the artistic nature of found photographs

3.The underlined word “them”in Paragraph 4 refers to“_______”.

A.the readers

B.the editors

C.the found photographs

D.the self-published magazines

4.By asking a series of questions in Paragraph 5,the author mainly intends to indicate that_______.

A.memory of the past is very important to people

B.found photographs allow people to think freely

C.the back-story of found photographs is puzzling

D.the real value of found photographs is questionable

5.The author’s attitude toward found photographs can be described as_______.

A.critical                                  B.doubtful

C.optimistic                                D.satisfied

·Basic Study Manual   Hardcover: $ 37.50

Future success depends on the ability to learn. Here are the answers to the questions most often asked by parents, teachers, business trainers and by students themselves. Read this book and learn:

   ◎ What the three barriers to study are － and what to do about them

   ◎ What to do if you get tired of a subject you are studying

   ◎ Twenty-six simple drills to help you learn how to study easily, rapidly and with full understanding

   ◎ Buy and read the Basic Study Manual and use it to improve your ability to study.

    · How to Use a Dictionary Picture Book for Children    Hardcover: $34.90

In spite of billions of dollars spent on “educational research,” children are not taught the most basic skills of learning, even the most basic of these: how to use a dictionary. In fact, a search of educational books for children found not one that told them how to use a dictionary －or that one should. Written for children 8 to 12-year old, this fully illustrated book will teach your child:

    ◎ How to find words in a dictionary

    ◎ The different ways that words are used

    ◎ What the different marks and symbols that are used in a dictionary mean

    ◎ How to use a dictionary to correctly pronounce words

     Includes a section for parents and teachers showing you how to use this book with children. Buy this book and give it to your children to unlock their education. What’s more, you’ll just pay 50% for it before May 1, 2009.

1.Some of the four books were illustrated in order to _________.

A. help readers understand the book       

B. persuade readers to buy them

C. reduce the cost of the books      

D. make the books suitable to different readers

2.The purpose of the passage meant to __________.

A. introduce the four books to readers     

B. help children to learn English

C. enrich students knowledge about nature 

D. sell the four books to readers