Part IV Reading Comprehension (Reading in Depth) (25 minutes)

Section A

Directions: In this section, there is a passage with ten blanks. You are required to select one word for each blank from a list of choices given in a word bank following the passage. Read the passage through carefully before making you choices. Each choice in the bank is identified by a letter. Please mark the corresponding letter for each item on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre. You may not use any of the words in the bank more than once.

As the plane circled over the airport, everyone sensed that something was wrong. The plane was moving unsteadily through the air, and 47 the passengers had fastened their seat belts, they were suddenly 48 forward. At that moment, the air-hostess 49 .She looked very pale, but was quite 50 .Speaking quickly but almost in a whisper, she 51 everyone that the pilot had 52 and asked if any of the passengers knew anything about machines or at 53 how to drive a car. After a moment 54 , a man got up and followed the hostess into the pilot's cabin. Moving the pilot 55 , the man took his seat and listened carefully to the 56 instructions that were being sent by radio from the airport below. The plane was now dangerously close to ground, but to everyone's relief, it soon began to climb.

A. although B. anxious

C. thrown D. shifted

E. appeared F. urgent

G. presented H. aside

I. even J. informed

K. calm L. least

M. fainted N. length

O. hesitation

Section B

Direction: There are 2 passage in this section. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A), B), C) and D). You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre.

Passage One

Questions 57 to 61 are based on the following passage.

In the early days of the internet, many people worried that as people in the rich world embraced new computing and communications technologies, people in the poor world would be left stranded on the wrong side of a “digital divide.” Yet the debate over the digital divide is founded on a myth — hat plugging poor countries into the internet will help them to become rich rapidly.

This is highly unlikely, because the digital divide is not a problem in itself, but a symptom of deeper, more important divides: of income, development and literacy. Fewer people in poor countries than in rich ones own computers and have access to the internet simply because they are too poor, are illiterate, or have other more immediate concerns, such as food, health care and security. So even if it were possible to wave a magic wand and cause a computer to appear in every household on earth, it would not achieve very much: a computer is not useful if you have no food or electricity and cannot read. Yet such Wand-waving — through the construction of specific local infrastructure projects such as rural telecenters — is just the sort of thing for which the UN's new fund is intended.

This sort of thing is the wrong way to go about addressing the inequality in access to digital technologies: it is treating the symptoms, rather than the underlying causes. The benefits of building rural computing centers, for example, are unclear. Rather than trying to close the divide for the sake of it, the more sensible goal is to determine how best to use technology to promote bottom-up development. And the answer to that question turns out to be remarkably clear: by promoting the spread not of PCs and the Internet, but of mobile phones.

57. What is the main idea of this passage?

A) Plugging poor countries into the Internet will help them to become rich rapidly.

B) Poor countries should be given more basic devices other than advanced ones.

C) Rich countries should help poor ones becoming rich.

D) People in poor countries cannot afford devices such as computer.

58. What did the author mean by referring "digital divide." (Line 3, Para. 1)?

A) Digital technology will make the gap between rich world and poor world wider.

B) Digital technology will divide people into rich and poor world.

C) People can be divided digitally.

D) To divide people in digital world is wrong.

59. We can infer from the 2nd paragraph that.

A) people in poor countries cannot use computer because of illiteracy.

B) poor people cannot use computers.

C) there would be no magic to cause a computer to appear in every household on earth.

D) people in poor countries need more basic living conditions than computers.

60. Considering the following sentences, which one would the author most agree?

A) Digital technology is useless.

B) Digital divide will help poor countries becoming rich.

C) Poor people need more immediate concerns, such as food, health care and security.

D) Mobile phones should be promoted firstly.

61. The following passage will probably be:

A) How to promote using of mobile phones.

B) How to use technology to promote bottom-up development.

C) The benefits of building rural computing centers.

D) How to meet the need of food, health and security in poor countries.