【推荐1】As we age, even if we’re healthy, the heart just isn’t as efficient in processing oxygen as it used to be. In most people the first signs show up in their 50s or early 60s. And among people who don’t exercise, the changes can start even sooner.

“Think of a rubber band. In the beginning, it is flexible, but put it in a drawer for 20 years and it will become dry and easily broken,” says Dr. Ben Levine, a heart specialist at the University of Texas. That’s what happens to the heart. Fortunately for those in midlife, Levine is finding that even if you haven’t been an enthusiastic exerciser, getting in shape now may help improve your aging heart.

Levine and his research team selected volunteers aged between 45 and 64 who did not exercise much but were otherwise healthy. Participants were randomly divided into two groups. The first group participated in a program of non-aerobic exercise-balance training and weight training-three times a week. The second group did high-intensity aerobic (有氧的) exercise under the guidance of a trainer for four or more days a week. After two years, the second group saw remarkable improvements in heart health.

“We took these 50-year-old hearts and turned the clock back to 30-or 35-year-old hearts,” says Levine. “And the reason they got so much stronger and fitter was that their hearts could now fill a lot better and pump a lot more blood during exercise.” But the hearts of those who participated in less intense exercise didn’t change, he says.

“The sweet spot in life to start exercising, if you haven’t already, is in late middle age when the heart still has flexibility,” Levine says. “We put healthy 70-year-olds through a yearlong exercise training program, and nothing happened to them at all.”

Dr. Nieca Goldberg, a spokeswoman for the American Heart Association, says Levine’s findings are a great start. But the study was small and needs to be repeated with far larger groups of people to determine exactly which aspects of an exercise routine make the biggest difference.

1. What does Levine want to explain by mentioning the rubber band?

A．The right way of exercising.	B．The aging process of the heart.
C．The difficulty of keeping fit.	D．The causes of a heart attack.

2. What does Levine’s research find?

A．Middle-aged hearts get younger with aerobic exercise.

B．High-intensity exercise is more suitable for the young.

C．It is never too late for people to start taking exercise.

D．The more exercise we do, the stronger our hearts get.

3. What does Dr. Nieca Goldberg suggest?

A．Making use of the findings.	B．Interviewing the study participants.
C．Conducting further research.	D．Clarifying the purpose of the study.

【推荐2】Although nobody can make sure that by adopting a specific lifestyle you will be able to live a longer life, there are certain things you can do to increase your chances of living longer.    1     .

Healthy diet habits

    2     A diet based on healthy principles can not only improve your mood, but also help you keep a healthy weight.

    3    

It has been proven by many studies that people who are happy live a better life. To find happiness in your life, you have to ask for it and follow it.

Relaxation (放松)

Relax as much as possible.    4     . Relaxation means everything that makes you feel good and happy. This may be watching a nice movie or going to a basketball match.

Physical exercise and activity

This is the most well­-known guideline (指导方针). Exercise offers a lot of benefits to your health and can help you live longer. Exercising can help your body function better.

    5    

It has been proven by many researches that people who sleep 7 hours per day enjoy a happier and healthier life.

A．Sleep

B．Be happy

C．Any form of exercise is beneficial for you

D．Here are five most important habits for a better life

E．People who want to live longer should learn how to relax

F．People who have negative thoughts end up with low confidence

G．Following a healthy diet is among the best ways to enjoy a life

【推荐3】Taking a regular afternoon nap（小睡）may bring better mental functions（心理机能）in old people, a study has found. Researchers found sleeping in the afternoon has something to do with better memory in the ageing Chinese population.

The study, published in online journal General Psychiatry, examined the sleep patterns of 2,214 healthy people aged 60 and over in several large cities in China, including Beijing and Shanghai. Of those who took part in the study, 1,534 took a regular afternoon nap of between five minutes and two hours, while 680 did not.

Participants（参与者）in the study were asked how often they napped during the week, with answers from once a week to every day. The average length of nighttime sleep was around 6.5 hours in both groups, though no information was about how long they sleep.

All participants took part in a dementia（痴呆）screening test to check their mental functions across a number of areas The researchers found important differences in memory, with scores higher among the napping group.

“In addition to reducing sleepiness, mid-day naps offer a lot of benefits such as strengthening memory, preparation for following learning, and emotional stability, but these effects were not observed in all cases,” the researchers said.

However, the researchers did point out the research could not prove whether afternoon naps put off the dementia of older people, or whether they might be a sign of dementia. The researchers plan to continue their research to understand the details of these connections, and hope to publish more work in this field in the future.

1. According to the text，afternoon naps can help old people___________.

A．remember things better	B．keep their promises
C．treat others with kindness	D．live a rich life

2. How did the researchers get the findings?

A．By watching the old people's regular afternoon nap.

B．By comparing the participants' mental functions

C．By showing many facts about old people's dementia.

D．By asking the participants to take many physical examinations

3. What can we know from the last paragraph?

A．Afternoon naps can put dementia off.

B．The participants will write more works.

C．There will be a further study on afternoon naps.

D．The author of the text wants to make the study.

4. What does the text mainly talk about?

A．The advantages of afternoon naps for the old.

B．The harm of old people's dementia.

C．The connection between living longer and dementia.

D．The way to develop the habit of taking afternoon naps

【推荐1】Ageing and robots are more closely related than you might think. Young countries with many children have few robots. Ageing nations have lots. The countries with the largest number of robots per industrial worker include South Korea, Singapore, Germany and Japan. which have some of the oldest work forces in the world.

The connection does not merely reflect the fact that young countries tend to be poor and cannot afford fancy machines, which they do not need anyway. It holds good within rich countries, too. Those with relatively few robots compared with the size of their workforce include Britain and France, both of which (by rich-country standards )are ageing slowly.

Two recent studies quantify the connection. Daron Acemoglu of MIT and Pascual Restrepo of Boston University show that, between 1993 and 2014, the countries that invested the most in robotics were those that were ageing the fastest measured as a rise in the rate of people over 56 compared with those aged 26-55. The authors posit a rule of thumb a ten-point rise in their ageing rate is associated with 0.9 extra robots per thousand workers.

A study from Germany used different measures but reached the same conclusion. They found that the growth in the number of robots per thousand workers rises twice as fast as the fall in the growth rate of the population (e.g. if) population growth falls by 1%, the growth in robot density rises by 2%). Population growth is closely related to age structure.

These findings should not be surprising. Robots typically substitute for labour. That is why many people fear that they will destroy jobs. Countries with plenty of young workers do not need labour substitutes. Wages there also tend to be low making automation unprofitable. But ageing creates demand for automation in two ways. First, to prevent output falling as more people retire, machines are necessary to substitute for those who have left the workforce or to enable ageing workers to continue to do physical labour. Second, once people have retired they create markets for new kinds of automation, including robots that help with the medical and other requirements of caring for people who can no longer look after themselves

1. What can we infer from the article?

A．Ageing is closely related to robots

B．Ageing countries have few robots.

C．Robots are needed in young countries.

D．Young and rich countries want more robots.

2. Which of the following best explains" posit "underlined in Paragraph 3?

A．Want.	B．Remove.
C．Assume.	D．Obey.

3. How much will the robot population grow if the human population growth decreases by 3%?

A．1%.	B．2%.
C．3%.	D．6%.

4. Why does ageing create demand for robots?

A．Because retired people have lower wages.

B．Because robots are substitutes for retired worker.

C．Because robots are unprofitable in young countries.

D．Because the retired need the same robots they used before.

【推荐2】Maybe you think the richer the happier. As the richest countries in the world, you’d expect that Qatar and Japanese people would also be the happiest. Seeing as though they have the highest life expectancy (平均寿命).

But clearly wealth and good health do not guarantee happiness after both countries failed to make the top ten most positive countries.

The survey of nearly 150, 000 people around the world found that seven of the world’s 10 countries with the happiest attitudes are in Latin America.

Gallup asked about 1,000 people in each of 148 countries if they were well-rested, had been treated with respect, smiled or laughed a lot, learned or did something interesting and felt feelings of enjoyment the previous day.

In Panama and Paraguay, 85 percent of those surveyed said yes to all five, putting those countries at the top of the list. They were followed closely by El Salvador, Venezuela, Trinidad and Tobago, Thailand. Guatemala, the Philippines, Ecuador and Costa Rica.

The people least likely to report positive emotions lived in Singapore, the wealthy and orderly city-state that ranks among the most developed in the world. Other wealthy countries also sat surprisingly low on the list. Germany and France tied with the poor African state of Somaliland for 47th place.

Many of the seven countries which were most positive do poorly in traditional measures of well-being, like Guatemala, a country torn by decades of civil war followed by waves of gang-driven criminality that give it one of the highest murder rates in the world. “In Guatemala, it’s a culture of friendly people who are always smiling,” said Luz Castillo, a 30-year-old surfing instructor. “Despite all the problems that we’re facing, we’re surrounded by natural beauty that lets us get away from it all.”

The poll (民意测验) shows that wealthy nations can also be deeply unhappy ones. And poverty-stricken ones are often full of positivity, or at least a close approximation of it.

1. Which of the following country is the happiest one according to the passage?

A．Qatar.

B．Panama.

C．Japan.

D．Singapore.

2. The passage tells us        decides people s happiness.

A．wealth

B．good order

C．health

D．positive emotions

3. From the passage we can infer          .

A．The richest countries are in Asia

B．People in poor countries are unhappy

C．The happiest countries have good social order

D．People in Guatemala face the difficulty positively because of its beautiful nature

4. What is the best title of the passage?

A．The World Countries	B．The World Happiest Region
C．The World Happiness Index	D．The Wealthy Countries in the World

【推荐3】Self-driving cars have been backed by the hope that they will save lives by getting involved in fewer crashes with fewer injuries and deaths than human-driven cars. But so far, most comparisons between human drivers and automated vehicles have been unfair.

Crash statistics for human-driven cars are gathered from all sorts of driving situations, and on all types of roads. However, most of the data on self-driving cars' safety have been recorded often in good weather and on highways, where the most important tasks are staying in the car's own lane and not getting too close to the vehicle-ahead. Automated cars are good at those tasks, but so are humans.

It is true that self-driving cars don't get tired, angry, frustrated or drunk .But neither can they yet react to uncertain situations with the same skill or anticipation of an attentive human driver, nor do they possess the foresight to avoid potential perils. They largely drive from moment to moment, rather than think ahead to possible events literally down the road.

To a self-driving car, a bus full of people might appear quite similar to an uninhabited corn field. Indeed, deciding what action to take in an emergency is difficult for humans, but drivers have sacrificed themselves for the greater good of others. An automated system's limited understanding of the world means it will almost never evaluate ( 评估) a situation the same way a human would. And machines can't be programmed in advance to handle every imaginable set of events.

Some people may argue that the promise of simply reducing the number of injuries and deaths is enough to support driverless cars. But experience from aviation (航空) shows that as new automated systems are introduced, there is often an increase in the rate of disasters.

Therefore, comparisons between humans and automated vehicles have to be performed carefully. To fairly evaluate driverless cars on how well they fulfill their promise of improved safety, it's important to ensure the data being presented actually provide a true comparison. After all, choosing to replace humans with automation has more effects than simply a one-for-one exchange.

1. What makes the comparison between self-driving cars and human-driven cars unfair?

A．Self-driving cars never get tired.	B．Statistics are collected differently.
C．Machines can make decisions faster.	D．Self-driving cars know the world better.

2. What does the underlined word”perils” in Paragraph 3 most probably mean?

A．Dangers.

B．Self-driving cars.

C．Pedestrians.

D．Human-driven cars.

3. In which aspect can self- driving cars beat human-driven cars?

A．Driving steadily.	B．Climbing steep slopes.
C．Evaluating the cost of loss.	D．Making complex decisions.

4. Where is the text most likely from?

A．A poster.

B．A novel.

C．A brochure.

D．A magazine.

【推荐1】Country music is one of the most popular kinds of music in the United States today because it is about simple but strong human feelings and events---love, sadness, good times, and bad times. It tells real-life stories and sounds the way people really talk. As life becomes more complicated (复 杂的), it is good to hear music about ordinary people.

Country music, sometimes called country-western, comes from two kinds of music. One is the traditional music of the people in the Appalachian Mountains in the eastern United States. The other is traditional cowboy music from the West. The singers usually play the guitars, and in the 1920s they started using electric guitars. At first, city people said country music was low class. It was popular mostly in the South. But during World WarⅡ, thousands of southerners went to the Northeast and Midwest to work in the factories. They took their music with them. Soldiers from the rest of the country went to army camps (军营)in the South. They learned country music. Slowly, it became popular all over the country.

Today country music is also popular everywhere in the United States and Canada---in small towns and in New York City, among black and white, and among educated and uneducated people. About 1,200 radio stations broadcast country music twenty-four hours a day. English stars sing it in British English, and people in other countries sing it in their own languages. The music that started with cowboys and southerners is now popular all over the world.

1. Where does country music come from according to the passage?

A．The Northeast and Midwest.	B．Factories and army camps in the South.
C．The Appalachian Mountains and the West.	D．Real-life stories in small towns.

2. Where was country music mainly popular before World War II?

A．In the South.	B．In the North.
C．In the Midwest.	D．In the Northeast.

3. Which of the following is NOT true according to the passage?

A．Country music is about human feelings and events.

B．Country music is sung by stars all in English.

C．Country music is popular among city people today.

D．City people didn't like country music at first.

【推荐1】第三部分：阅读理解
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
We bet that on cold wintry days, many of you love to stay in your warm home and, every now and then, come out into the kitchen for a snack. Unfortunately, plenty of creepy-crawly critters(爬行生物) like to do the same thing!
Winter is the time when bugs (虫子) invade your house without an invitation. The season can be tough for such creatures. In winter the air is cold, the ground is hard and many trees have no leaves. So bugs do what they have to do to survive.
Monarch butterflies head south to warmer climates. Ants crowd in deep underground colonies and eat food they have been storing all year. Many insects go into a deep sleep called diapause. There’re different kinds of diapause, but all are similar to hibernation, a time when bigger animals become inactive in the cold. Insects go into an inactive period, too, but it often isn’t when the temperature drops.
They rely on more dependable signals in the environment. For example, many insects can tell how much sunlight there’s each day. They use that to tell them when to shut down. Bugs are cold-blooded, meaning that their inside temperature is the same as the outside. They can’t move much when it gets below 40 degrees Fahrenheit. So they search for any warm place.
They’re looking for protection. These guys have been doing this for 300 million years, so they don’t really know they’re coming into your house. The home is a recent event in terms of their evolutionary behavior. They enter through tiny cracks or come in unnoticed on your clothes or shoes. Remember that they may be invading your homes for warmth and food, but they don’t care about humans.
1. What is the purpose of the first paragraph?

A．To point out that humans like to stay at home in winter.

B．To mean that humans and bugs have the same living habits.

C．To mean that bugs will invade the house for their winter.

D．To put forward the idea that bugs are not welcome in winter.

2. According to the text, what is diapause?

A．It is the same as the animals’ hibernation.

B．It often appears in warm areas all the year.

C．It is done to keep bugs active in winter.

D．It is a deep sleep similar to hibernation.

3. What often decides bugs’ diapause?

A．The lower local temperatures.	B．The amounts of sunlight.
C．Kinds of environmental signals.	D．The insects’ inside temperature.

4. According to the text, bugs invade humans’ homes to ______.

A．attack humans	B．look for enough food
C．seek for protection	D．show their evolutionary results

5. What would be the best title for the text?

A．Bugs’ life on cold wintry days

B．Why bugs invade your home in winter?

C．Good relations between humans and bugs

D．What does diapause mean?

【推荐2】There’s no substitute for taking an English course in a high quality language school in an English-speaking country. ESL-lounge Student has partnered with some of the best language schools in the UK. Choose a school from below. We can offer discounts on English courses!

Burlington School, London

Burlington School is located in Parsons Green, 15 minutes by underground from the centre of London. Our standard of teaching is high, with course in General and Specialist English. The coffee bar is open all day serving freshly--cooked meals, and the school organizes a range of social activities to complement (补充) the classes. Students live either in homestays or in one of our hostels.

See Burlington School courses and save 10%.

University of Liverpool, English Language Centre

You can have confidence in the University of Liverpool, which is ranked in the top 10% of higher education institutions worldwide. While studying here, you will benefit from modern and dynamic English teaching methods in small classes of fewer than 16 students.

See University of Liverpool courses and save 12%.

Interactive English School, Brighton

We are a small friendly school. Being a small school means we can cater for your individual needs more easily than larger schools can. All of our teachers are native speakers, qualified and experienced. Our prices are very affordable and start from £60 per week for full-time courses of 20 lessons.

See Interactive English School courses and save 7%.

New School of English, Cambridge

The New School of English is located in the beautiful city of Cambridge. The school is open all year and provides a range of English courses for adults from all over the world (minimum age 16). These courses cover General English as well as courses for professional looking to focus on specific topic areas. They have a range of accommodation choices for students.

See New School of English courses and save 5%.
1. What can we know about Burlington School?

A．It is open all year.	B．It is located in London.
C．It provides no accommodation.	D．It offers no social practice classes.

2. How is New School of English different from the others?

A．It sets a strict age limit.

B．Its accommodation is optional.

C．Its teachers are qualified and experienced.

D．It offers General and Specialist English courses.

3. Who would be interested in the schools?

A．English professors.	B．Native English speakers.
C．Foreign English learners.	D．Staff of ESL-lounge Student.

【推荐3】Sharing a Sense of Style

When I woke up on Aug 4, 2016, there was only one thing on my mind: what to wear. A billion thoughts raced through my brain in the closet. I didn’t want to come off as trying too hard, but I also didn’t want to be seen as a slob (懒汉). Not only was it my first day of high school, but it was my first day of school in a new state; first impressions are everything, and it was important for me to impress the people who I would spend the next four years with.

This was my third time being the new kid. But this time was different because my dad promised that I would start and finish high school in the same place. This time mattered, and that made me nervous.

After meticulously raiding my closet, I proudly came out in a dress from Target. The soft cotton was comfortable, and the ruffled (有褶饰边的) shoulders added a hint of fun. Yes, this outfit was the one. An hour later, I felt powerful as I headed toward room 1136. But as I entered class, my jaw dropped to the floor.

Sitting at her desk was Mrs Hutfilz, my English teacher, sporting exactly the same dress as me. I kept my head down and tiptoed to my seat. I made it through my minute (简短的) introduction speech until Mrs. Hutfilz stood up, jokingly adding that she liked my style. Although this was the moment I had been afraid of from the moment I walked in, all my anxiety surprisingly melted away, and the students paid attention as I shared my story. My smile grew as I laughed with the students. After class, I stayed behind and talked to Mrs. Hutfilz, relieved to make a humorous and real connection.

Looking back four years later, the ten minutes I spent afraid of giving my speech were really not worth it. My first period of high school certainly made the day unforgettable in the best way and taught me that Mrs. Hutfilz has an awesome sense of style!

1. Why did the author attach great importance to her clothes on the first day of high school?

A．She followed her father’s advice.

B．She was unconfident about herself.

C．She cared too much about her appearance.

D．She wanted to make a good impression.

2. What does the underlined word “meticulously” in paragraph 3 probably mean?

A．Excitedly.	B．Carefully.
C．Casually.	D．Suddenly.

3. How did the author probably feel after noticing her teacher’s dress?

A．Annoyed.	B．Confused.
C．Proud.	D．Embarrassed.

4. What is the author’s purpose in writing the article?

A．To share a memorable experience.

B．To explore the troubles with dressing.

C．To introduce her stylish English teacher.

D．To stress the importance of first impressions.