Have you used “um…” “like…” “you know…” in your speech? Catch words(口头禅) are unnecessary words used to fill up dead paces while you speak. Speaking too many catch words is like a bad habit that we are unaware of. While most people tend to ignore it in everyday conversation, in a formal speech or an interview, too many catch words can make even the best presentation look bad.{#blank#}1{#/blank#}

    Stop when we are in doubt. Catch words are used more often when a person is unsure about the sentence to use next.{#blank#}2{#/blank#}If you are lost or in doubt over what to say next, just stop speaking, take a long pause, breathe in , figure out what to say and start again.

    Speak consciously and slowly. If the speech is too long and you talk continuously without thinking, then you might also be pushing in a few catch words in between.

    {#blank#}3{#/blank#}It is best to memorize the tricky parts of the speech, like the introduction and the conclusion where a majority of the catch words are used.

{#blank#}4{#/blank#} Preparing for the speech is very important when trying to remove catch words. Make it a point to pause when there is a comma or give two pauses at the end of the sentence. If certain words in the speech need to be emphasized then underline them and practice them as they need to be said.

    Avoid catch words in conversations. Get a friend or your partner to help you out when rehearsing a conversation.{#blank#}5{#/blank#} Although it can be an unpleasant and often embarrassing process, but in the long run it helps in cutting down on catch words.

A. Practise your speech when you can.

B. Remember the saying that silence is golden.

C. Therefore we can find out best friends to guide us well.

D. Anytime you use a catch word, the friend can point it out.

E. So we should learn some ways to avoid speaking such words.

F. Structure the speech well to include as much information as is needed.

G. The mind is so busy trying to figure out what to say that there is a strong urge to speak such words.

    They wear the latest fashions with the most up­to­date accessories(配饰)．Yet these are not girls in their teens or twenties but women in their sixties and seventies. A generation which would once only wear old­fashioned clothes is now favouring the same high street looks worn by those half their age.

    Professor Julia Twigg，a social policy expert，said，“Women over 75 are now shopping for clothes more often than they did when they were young in the 1960s.In the 1960s buying a coat for a woman was a serious matter. It was an expensive item that they would purchase only every three or four years—now you can pick one up at the supermarket whenever you wish to. Fashion is a lot cheaper and people get tired of things more quickly.”

    Professor Twigg analysed family expenditure(支出)data and found that while the percentage of spending on clothes and shoes by women had stayed around the same—at 5 or 6 per cent of spending—the amount of clothes bought had risen sharply.

    The professor said.“Clothes are now 70 per cent cheaper than they were in the 1960s because of the huge expansion of production in the Far East. In the 1960s Leeds was the heart of the British fashion industry and that was where most of the clothes came from，but now almost all of our clothes are sourced elsewhere. Everyone is buying more clothes but in general we are not spending more money on them.”

    Angela Barnard，who runs her own fashion business in London，said older women were much more affected by celebrity(名流)style than in previous years.

She said，“When people see stars such as Judi Dench and Helen Mirren looking attractive and fashionable in their sixties，they want to follow them. Older women are much more aware of celebrities. There's also the boom in TV programmes showing people how they can change their look，and many of my older customers do yoga to stay in shape well in their fifties. When I started my business a few years ago，my older customers tended to be very rich，but now they are what I would call ordinary women. My own mother is 61 and she wears the latest fashions in a way she would never have done ten years ago.”

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。

    In 1841, a book was published which astonished the world. It was called “Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan”. The author John Loud Stephens had just returned from a long, difficult and dangerous journey through the thick rain forest of southern Mexico and Guatemala. He had once been there with Frederick Catherwood, an architect and artist, to search for the remains of a lost civilization known as the Mayas(玛雅). Very little was known about the Mayas at that time, but Catherwood's drawing in the book showed incredible cities with temples, pyramids and other buildings as impressive as those of their northern neighbors, the Aztecs. These cities, however, were deserted. The inhabitants(居民) had disappeared almost a thousand years before.

    Since that time, far more has been learned about this remarkable civilization. The Mayas had a highly-developed system of government and of agriculture, as well as an incredibly accurate system of measuring time. They were also wonderful engineers capable of moving huge blocks stone long distances and cutting them to accurate shapes and sizes.

    And yet although the Mayas knew about the wheel, they never used it. Neither did they use metals other than copper. What is ever more surprising is that they suddenly abandoned many of their cities and built new ones in the jungle. Some time around AD 900, Mayan civilization collapsed(崩溃). By the year 1200, their last great capital, Chichen Itza, was deserted.

    Who were these strange people and the even stranger gods they worshipped? What brought about their sudden and mysterious collapse? Some writers have tried to prove that the Mayas had contact with visitors from space and even that they themselves came from another planet. Some people believe that their civilization came to an end because the Mayas never developed a proper resistance to local germs and diseases. All we really know is that when the first Europeans appeared off their coast in 1517, this great and mysterious culture was only a memory.

    Christmas is a time for relaxing, having fun and spending time with family and friends.{#blank#}1{#/blank#}It can be difficult to find the motivation for study when everyone around you is having so much fun. So, here are my top five tips for revising effectively over the Christmas break.

    Set aside a few hours a day to revise.

    Find the best time to revise and make sure that you stick to your timetable! For example, I find that I work best in the morning.{#blank#}2{#/blank#}

Plan something fun to do every day.

    Even if it's just going for coffee with a friend or watching a film at home, this will give you something to look forward to and motivate you to finish your revision.

    Explain to your family why your revision is important.

    {#blank#}3{#/blank#}So, make efforts to tell them why your exams are important. Perhaps you can agree to do something nice with them when your exams are over.

    {#blank#}4{#/blank#}

    It is important to take some time to relax. When you do get back to revising, you'll probably find it easier to concentrate. Pick the most important days for you and your family to concentrate on celebrating Christmas!

    Remember that it won't last forever.

    You might have to spend your Christmas revising this year, and perhaps for a few more years, but soon enough you'll be free of exams forever.{#blank#}5{#/blank#}Have a great Christmas and make sure you find a balance between studying and celebrating. Good luck in your exams!

A. Spare your time for your family.

B. Make sure that you take a few days off!

C. So I get up fairly early and do a few hours of revision.

D. Sometimes it can be difficult for family to understand you.

E. However, for many of us, it is also time to prepare for January exams.

F. Otherwise, you may probably fall into trouble with your friends and family.

G. And after spending time revising, your future Christmases will seem even better!

    In areas like the Central United States that get lots of tornadoes, there^'s a common piece of celestial （天上的）fortune-telling that green skies mean a tornado is on its way. Research has shown that it isn^'t quite as simple as that, but scientists have found that if you see a green sky, you should probably go inside. As far as most scientists can tell, the green skies around powerful thunderstorms are usually a combination of red sunsets and water droplets.

    Daytime skies are blue because blue shorter wavelengths of visible light tend to bounce off （反射）air molecules better than red longer wavelength light. So the blue light gets bounced all over the sky and looks like it's coming from everywhere. Meanwhile, around sunset sunlight travels through so much atmosphere that just about all the blue is bounced away from the horizon, leaving all those reds and oranges behind. The sunset might look exclusively （独有的）red and orange, but there's still some green and even blue light hidden in there, just far less than the other colors. But for us to notice the remaining green light, it needs to hit something that reflects green light much better than red. That's where water comes in.

    Big tall threatening storm clouds are made of water droplets, and even though water is best at reflecting blue light, it can still reflect green pretty well, much better than reds and oranges, so under just the right conditions, the water in and around a cloud can bounce the green light hidden in the sunset right into our eyes making the sky look green.

    Still, none of the conditions that can turn skies green are unique to the clouds that produce tornadoes. Sometimes they just lead to lots of rain, and maybe some hail. So if you see huge storm clouds rolling in and a green tint （色调）in the sky, it doesn't necessarily mean there^'s about to be a tornado, but it does mean you should probably head indoors.

    People who like travelling have their reasons. They believe that travelling can help them expand their field of view, especially in the geographical and historical sense. They also think that touring will give them more chances to enjoy different kinds of food and experience new things that would never be brought by other activities. But those who dislike travelling also have some reasons.

    Travelling, in my opinion, does more good than harm. Most importantly, it broadens our mind. We can get in touch with other civilizations, cultures, customs and ideas.

Through history, most people travelled because of necessity (必要性)—not for pleasure. People travelled just in order to remain alive. They searched for food to eat or places to live in. They sometimes ran away from enemies. This is not to say that no one ever travelled just for the fun of it. In ancient times, for example, rich Romans travelled all the way to Greece to take part in the Olympic Games, and festivals. Of course, some people decided to travel just out of curiosity (好奇心). They wanted to find out what it looked like beyond the horizon (地平线). Also business travel has been going on for centuries. Traders could not only make money but also learn to speak several languages and be introduced to different cultures.

    So, travelling does enrich our mind and draw new ideas to us. There is no doubt that we can get much from it.