Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions from 30 to 34.
Genetic modification of foods is not a new practice. It has been practiced for thousands of years under the name of "selective breeding". Animals and plants were chosen because they had traits that humans found useful. Some animals were larger and stronger than others, or they yielded more food, or they had some other trait that humans valued. Therefore, they were bred because of those traits. Individuals with those traits were brought together and allowed to breed in the hope that their offspring would have the same traits in greater measure.
Much the same thing was done with plants. To produce bigger or sweeter fruit, or grow more grain per unit of land, strains of plants were combined and recombined to produce hybrids, or crossbreeds that had the desired traits in the right combinations. All the while, however, biologists wondered: is there a more direct and versatile way to change the traits of plants and animals? Could we rewrite, so to speak, the heredity of organisms to make them serve our needs better?
In the 20th century, genetic modification made such changes possible at last. Now, it was possible to alter the genetic code without using the slow and uncertain process of selective breeding. It even became possible to blend plants and animals genetically: to insert animal genes into plants, for example, in order to give the plants a certain trait they ordinarily would lack, such as resistance to freezing. The result was a tremendous potential to change the very nature of biology.
The word "blend" in paragraph 3 mostly means ______.                                          
A.combine
B.collect
C.gather
D.carry

Diligently............... Mary studied, she never got best marks.
A.as
B.while
C.when
D.since

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions .
In the mid-nineteenth century, the United States had tremendous natural resources that could be exploited in order to develop heavy industry. Most of the raw materials that are valuable in the manufacture of machinery, transportation facilities, and consumer goods lay ready to be worked into wealth. Iron, coal, and oil - the basic ingredients of  industrial growth - were plentiful and needed only the application of technical expertise, organizational skill, and labor.
One crucial development in this movement toward industrialization was the growth of the railroads. The railway network expanded rapidly until the railroad map of the United States looked like a spider's web, with the steel filaments connecting all important sources of raw materials, their places of manufacture, and their centers of distribution.
The railroads contributed to the industrial growth not only by connecting these major centers, but also by themselves consuming enormous amounts of fuel, iron, and coal. Many factors influenced emerging modes of production. For example, machine tools, the tools used to make goods, were steadily improved in the latter part of the nineteenth century - always with an eye to speedier production and lower unit costs.
The products of the factories were rapidly absorbed by the growing cities that sheltered the workers and the distributors. The increased urban population was nourished by the increased farm production that, in turn, was made more productive by the use of the new farm machinery. American agricultural production kept up with the urban demand and still had surpluses for sale to the industrial centers of Europe.
The labor that ran the factories and built the railways was recruited in part from American farm areas where people were being displaced by farm machinery, in part from Asia, and in part from Europe. Europe now began to send tides of immigrants from eastern and southern Europe - most of whom were originally poor farmers but who settled in American industrial cities. The money to finance this tremendous expansion of the American economy still came from European financiers for the most part, but the Americans were approaching the day when their expansion could be financed in their own “money market”.
Why does the author mention “a spider's web” in paragraph 2?
A.To emphasize the railroad's consumption of oil and coal
B.To describe the complex structure of the railway system
C.To explain the problems brought on by railway expansion
D.To describe the difficulties involved in the distribution of raw materials

The passage supports which of the following statements?
A.No one really knows how the theater began.
B.Myths are no longer represented dramatically.
C.Storytelling is an important part of dance.
D.Dramatic activities require the use of costumes.

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the word that differs from the other three in the position of primary stress in each of the following questions.

A.competent   
B.advertise                 
C.reconstruct                   
D.implicate

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions.
Not until he               did he realize that he was adopted by his parents.
A.has grown up
B.grew up 
C.grows up 
D.had grown up

Exercise 3: Choose the best option A, B, C or D.
If there is a rubbish bin in every class, the classroom will become …………… .
A.harmful                   
B.dirtier                      
C.lighter                     
D.cleaner

Fill in the blank with the right word or phrase.
Help Lucy to ……........... these suitcases. They are very heavy.
A.carried
B.take
C.bring
D.carry

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions from 30 to 34.
Bitcoins are a form of virtual currency. In other words, they are a type of money that does not exist in the actual world. However, they can be used to purchase actual products and services from real companies.
The bitcoin system was created in 2009 by an enigmatic person named Satoshi Nakamoto. In fact, no one is sure if Satoshi Nakamoto is an actual person or a group of people. Bitcoins are designed to serve as an alternative to national currencies, such as dollars and euros. They can be used to pay for things online instead of cash or credit cards. When bitcoins are transferred from a buyer to a seller, the transaction is recorded in a public database.
Governments are concerned that bitcoins can easily be stolen by hackers. It has dawned on them that they might be used for illegal purposes. For example, stolen goods could be purchased without the government’s knowledge. Although more and more companies are beginning to accept bitcoins, the percentage of purchases made using bitcoins is minuscule compared to other online payment methods, such as credit cards. Instead, many bitcoin owners simply keep them as an investment since they believe their bitcoins will be more valuable in the future.
This may or may not be a wise approach. Currently, the value of bitcoins is fluctuating wildly, especially when compared to highly stable national currencies. Bitcoin investors are gambling on the hope that as this high-tech money becomes more widely accepted, its value will soar.
(Source: https://www.digitaltrends.com)
Why are bitcoins of great concern to governments?
 
A.Because bitcoins may be used in illegal transactions.
B.Because bitcoins will eventually replace national currencies.
C.Because the value of bitcoins is fluctuating wildly.
D.Because most of bitcoin owners are hackers.

Read the following passage and mark the letter A. B. C. or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions from 35 to 42.
Biological diversity has become widely recognized as a critical conservation issue only in the past two decades. The rapid destruction of the tropical rain forests, which are the ecosystems with the highest known species diversity on Earth, has awakened people to the importance and fragility of biological diversity. The high rate of species extinctions in these environments is jolting, but it is important to recognize the significance of biological diversity in all ecosystems. As the human population continues to expand, it will negatively affect one after another of Earth’s ecosystems. In terrestrial ecosystems and in fringe marine ecosystems (such as wetlands), the most common problem is habitat destruction. In most situations, the result is irreversible. Now humans are beginning to destroy marine ecosystems through other types of activities, such as disposal and runoff of poisonous waste; in less than two centuries, by significantly reducing the variety of species on Earth, they have irrevocably redirected the course of evolution.
Certainly, there have been periods in Earth’s history when mass extinctions have occurred. The extinction of the dinosaurs was caused by some physical event, either climatic or cosmic. There have also been less dramatic extinctions, as when natural competition between species reached an extreme conclusion. Only 0.01 percent of the species that have lived on Earth have survived to the present, and it was largely chance that determined which species survived and which died out.
However, nothing has ever equaled the magnitude and speed with which the human species is altering the physical and chemical world and demolishing the environment. In fact, there is wide agreement that it is the rate of change humans are inflicting, even more than the changes themselves, that will lead to biological devastation. Life on Earth has continually been in flux as slow physical and chemical changes have occurred on Earth, but life needs time to adapt-time for migration and genetic adaptation within existing species and time for the proliferation of new genetic material and new species that may be able to survive in new environments.
(Source: Internet)
The word "magnitude" in paragraph 3 mostly means _______ .
A.extent                      
B.ignorance                
C.greed                      
D.concem