根据以英语作为母语的人数计算，英语是最多国家使用的官方语言，英语也是世界上最广泛的第二语言，以下是2016届高三英语上学期第二次模拟考试，请考生认真练习。

第一节(共15小题;每小题2分，满分30分)

阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项(A、B、C和D)中，选出最佳选项，并在答题卡上将该项涂黑。

A

On a February day during an unusually mild winter, I found myself missing the snowy beauty. I enjoyed the feeling that comes from watching snow fall gently from heaven while I’m cosy inside with a good fire burning in the stove. But there were more serious concerns, like the lack of rainfall making our woods more accessible to summer forest fires. Local ski fields and hotels, all dependent on a snowy season, felt sorry for the vacant lifts, empty restaurants and unused snowmobiles.Then I happened to see three little robins (知更鸟) fly into our yard. What were they doing here? West of us, in the Willamette Valley, wild flowers burst this time of year. But here in central Oregon, even if a groundhog ( 土拨鼠) had wanted to appear, it couldn’t have broken through the frozen earth. And yet, these robins had arrived.

Their presence brought me a flow of happiness. It felt like a celebration as I dug into my bag of birdseed and spread a handful on the ground. Above me, the deep blue sky was cloudless, perfectly quiet but for some smoke from a neighbor’s chimney. The lively cold made the air fresh and clean.

My robins jumped lightly toward the seed. My soul jumped with them, feeling equally carefree.

Caught up in the moment of spring fever, I checked out snowless flower beds. To my delight, I spotted a green branch sticking out through the brown soil. Despite the cold, it wasn’t ready to go back inside. Just a short meeting with those robins had renewed my spirit. The next day I would return to my outdoor work with a cheerful heart and a hopeful eye for these signs of spring.

21.The author missed a snowy winter because snow could       .

A. prevent forest fires                                   B. boom his business

C. promise an early spring                                D. bring him a good feeling

22.The author felt happy when finding ______.

A. the sky was deep blue with clouds

B. three little robins flew into his yard

C. wild flowers burst in the Willamette Valley

D. a groundhog appeared through the frozen earth

23.We can infer from the passage that the author _____.

A. would enjoy wild flowers the next day

B. thought winter was already over

C. longed for the coming of spring

D. loved robins the most

B

Kelly Reeves was getting ready for a trip when her phone slipped into a sink full of water. Panic moment! She quickly picked up the wet phone and tried to turn it on, but nothing worked. Her first reaction? She got dressed, drove to the nearest store, and bought a new mobile at full price.

A new study finds that fear of losing your phone is a common illness. About 66 percent of those surveyed suffer from nomophobia or “no mobile phone phobia”. Interestingly, more women worry about losing their phone than men.

Fortunately, there’s a solution.

The first step is to figure out if you have nomophobia. Checking your phone too often is one thing, but the true sign of a problem is that you can’t conduct business or go about your routine when the fear becomes so severe.

Do you go to unusual lengths to make sure you have your phone? That’s another sign of a problem. If you find you check your phone plenty of times per hour, or a total of an hour per day, there may be a problem.

Some of the treatments are similar to those for treating anxiety attacks: Leaving the phone behind and not checking e-mail or text messages, and then learning to tolerate the after anxiety. Even if this leads to a high level of worry and stress, the solution is to push through the fear and learn to deal with not having your phone.

Of course, there are also technological alternatives. Luis Levy, a co-founder at Novy PR, says he uses an application called Cerberus that can automatically track the location of his phone. To find it, he can just go to a Web site and see the phone’s location.

He also insures his phone through a service called Asurion. The company’s description of its product reads like a prescription for anxiety: “60 million phones are lost, stolen or damaged each year. You’ll have complete peace of mind knowing that your phone is protected and you can quickly reconnect with family, friends and work, as soon as the very next day!”

24. Why does the author mention Kelly’s experience in the first paragraph?

A. To introduce the topic for discussion.

B. To inform us that mobile phones are useful.

C. To warn us that we should be careful.

D. To tell us we should get phones ready for a trip.

25. The underlined word “nomophobia” in Paragraph 2 means ________.

A. habits of using mobile phones

B. fear of losing mobile phones.

C. eagerness for new mobile phones.

D. independence of mobile phones.

26. Which of the following is a way to treat nomophobia?

A. Avoiding using phone for some time

B. Learning more about modern technology.

C. Protecting one’s phone against any damage.

D. Not using a mobile phone in one’s daily work.

27. What is the passage mainly about?

A. Attitude toward mobile phone.

B. New mobile phone technology.

C. Disadvantages of mobile phone

D. Solutions to nomophobia

C

I have had just about enough of being treated like a second-class citizen, simply because I happened to be that put-upon member of society-a customer. The more I go into shops and hotels, banks and post offices, railway stations, airports and the like, the more I’m convinced that things are being run only to suit the firm, the system, or the union. There seems to be a new motto for so–called “service” organizations ---- Staff Before Service. How often, for example, have you queued for what seems like hours at the Post Office or the supermarket because there aren’t enough staff on duty at all the service counters? Surely in these days of high unemployment it must be possible to increase counter staff. Yet supermarkets, hinting(暗示) darkly at higher prices, claim that bringing all their cash registers into operation at any time would increase expenses. And the Post Office says we cannot expect all their service courters to be occupied “at times when demand is low.”

It’s the same with hotels. Because waiters and kitchen staff must finish when it suits them, dining rooms close earlier or menu choice shrinks. As for us guests(and how the meaning of

that word has been cut away little by little), we just have to put up with it. There’s also the nonsense of so many friendly hotel night porters having been gradually withdrawn from service in the interests of “efficiency” (i.e. profits) and replaced by coin-eating machines  which supply everything from beer to medicine, not to mention the creeping threat of the tea–making set in your room: a kettle with teabags, milk bags and sugar. Who wants to wake up to a raw teabag? I don't, especially when I am paying for “service”.

Our only hope is to hammer our annoyance whenever and wherever we can and, if all else fails, restore that old saying----Take Our Custom(购买) Elsewhere.

28. In the author’s opinion ,the quality of service is changing because___________.

A. the staff are less considerate than employers

B. customers are becoming more demanding

C. customers are unwilling to pay extra money

D. more consideration is given to the staff than customers

29. The disappearance of old-style hotel porters is caused by the fact that__________.

A. self-service provides a cheaper alternative

B. the personal contact is less appreciated nowadays

C. machines are more reliable than human beings

D. few people are willing to do this type of work

30. The author’s final solution to the problem discussed in the passage is ___________.

A. to put up with whatever service is provided

B. to go where good service is available

C. to make full use of all kinds of coin-eating machines

D. to make strong complains wherever necessary

31. The main purpose of the passage is________.

A. to explain the reduced supply of good staff

B. to inform readers of the lack of cooperation among staff

C. to argue against deliberate understaffing and declining service

D. to give an account of the condition of inefficient staff