【推荐1】The ability to use tools is rare in the animal world. Recently, cockatoos(凤头鹦鹉) have been proven capable of more than just using tools.

According to a paper published in Current Biology in February, 2023, scientists designed various tasks for a group of cockatoos. The first task was getting a nut out of a puzzle box, requiring two tools: first a short, sharp tool used to cut the membrane(薄膜), then a long stick to get the nut out of a hole. Five out of 10 cockatoos were able to reach the nut. In the following tasks, the cockatoos were observed picking up tools before doing the task, showing their ability to plan ahead. Researchers also noticed that each cockatoo had a different way of carrying and using the tools.

Using a set of tools means that the animal can “solve problems through flexibly applying some insight of a given situation,” Mark Briffa at the University of Plymouth, UK, told CNN.

The great intelligence of cockatoos makes them popular pets—they can mimic(模仿) sounds and dance to music. However, these smart birds may suffer from mental health issues as well. Common signs of stress and anxiety include biting and feather picking, according to the PetMD website. Biting is often regarded as a form of attack, but sometimes cockatoos bite others due to stress and fear. Feather picking can be a more serious sign that the cockatoo is unhappy. In extreme conditions, a cockatoo may pluck(拔) out all of its feathers.

Some other pets show similar troubling behaviors too. For example, according to Discover magazine, pet dogs may chew their nails or lick their bodies so much that they form ulcers(溃疡). Pets desire attention, joy and excitement. As scientists learn more about animal intelligence, we should keep in mind that they may suffer from psychological illnesses just like we do.

1. What was the first task designed to test the cockatoos’ ability to use tools?

A．Picking up a nut using a long stick.

B．Breaking open a nut with a sharp tool.

C．Cutting a hole in a puzzle box and reaching a nut inside.

D．Carrying a set of tools to a specific location.

2. What did scientists discover about the cockatoos from their studies?

A．Most of them managed to reach the nut.	B．They used the tools in different ways.
C．They were unable to plan ahead.	D．They couldn’t use a set of tools.

3. What is a sign of stress and anxiety in cockatoos, according to the article?

A．Developing ulcers.	B．Mimicking sounds.
C．Quickly flapping their wings.	D．Plucking and picking at their feathers.

4. Which of the following is a suitable title for the text?

A．Cockatoos’ intelligence comes at a price	B．Cockatoos keep their tools safe
C．Cockatoos are much smarter than we think	D．What makes cockatoos a popular pet?

【推荐2】A rat may seem like an unlikely candidate to receive a gold medal for bravery and devotion to duty. However, six-year-old African rat Magawa, which was honored with Britain’s highest animal award on September 25, 2020, is no ordinary rat. Over the past five years, the “HeroRAT” has saved hundreds of lives by detecting 39 landmines and 28 unexploded items in Cambodia.

Landmines were used during wars to protect important areas such as borders, camps or bridges and to restrict the movement of opposing armies. But it became extremely difficult to remove the explosives once the conflicts ended. Today, over 60 million people in 59 countries live in daily fear of landmines.

Magawa is one of hundreds of HeroRATs that have been trained by an animal charity in Belgium to detect landmines since the 1990s. The charity, which teaches the animals by rewarding them with tasty food each time they smell out a landmine and send signals to the handlers, says the intelligent rats are ideal for the dangerous job. They are easy to train, and more importantly, light enough not to set off the hidden explosives even if they mistakenly walk over them. The rats, which use their sharp smelling skills to identify the chemicals in landmines, are also more efficient than human-held metal detectors.

Magawa, which has been working in Cambodia since 2016, is the charity’s most successful HeroRAT. In addition to being accurate, it can screen an area the size of a tennis court in 30 minutes. This task would take a human with a metal detector up to 4 days! Over the past 4 years, the powerful animal has helped clear over 141,000 square meters of land, equal to 20 football fields.

Every discovery made by Magawa has reduced the risk of injury or death for local people. Hopefully, with brave detection animals like Magawa hard at work, the threats will soon be all removed.

1. What makes the rats the best choice for the dangerous job?

A．The rats’ weight and sense of smell.	B．The rats’ intelligence and experience.
C．The charity’s method of training the rats.	D．The delicious food for rewarding the rats.

2. What are the numbers in paragraph 4 used for?

A．Presenting the charity’s success.	B．Illustrating the rat’s natural talents.
C．Emphasizing the rat’s great efficiency.	D．Showing the inability of metal detectors.

3. Which of the following is not mentioned in the text?

A．Where Magawa is working now.	B．What the landmines were used for.
C．When Magawa began to be trained.	D．How the HeroRATs detect landmines.

4. What is the main idea of the text?

A．Landmines are difficult to remove for human beings.

B．Rats are cleverer than humans at discovering dangers.

C．Landmines present deadly threat to Cambodian people.

D．A rat receives a gold medal for its life-saving contributions.

【推荐3】Dogs are likely to have complex (复杂的) feelings such as jealousy (嫉妒) and pride, according to a new scientific research.

Dogs feel very jealous when they find that they are unfairly treated. And they do not like seeing their owners being kind to other creatures, especially other dogs. They often react negatively (消极地) when their owners bring home new pets, the research found. “Dogs show a strong dislike to unfair treatment,” Dr. Friederike Range of the Vienna University said.

At first, people believed most animals are short of the “sense of self” , which is needed to experience so-called secondary feelings such as jealousy. These are more complex than feelings such as anger or joy.

Besides dogs research, another research includes cows, horses, cats and sheep, and all the results have shown that animals have far more “sense of self” than we thought.

Dr Paul Morris, a psychologist (心理学家) at the University of Portsmouth who studies animal emotions, told The Sunday Times, “We are learning that dogs, horses, and perhaps many other species are far more emotionally complex than we ever realized. They can suffer simple forms of many emotions we once thought only primates (灵长类) could experience.”

In research among dog owners, Dr Morris found almost all of them reported jealous behavior by their pets. The dog often tried to keep their owner away from a new lover in the early days of a relationship.

Behavioral experts suggest that owners should keep a close relationship with the dog as usual when a new pet or child comes along in order to prevent jealous activity from the dog.

1. What is true about dogs and humans according to the passage?

A．Dogs usually have more feelings than humans.

B．Dogs feel unhappy when their owners show kindness to other animals.

C．Humans are angry about their dogs’ negative feelings.

D．Dogs are often treated unfairly by humans.

2. The underlined part “They” in paragraph 2 probably refers to ________.

A．dog owners

B．experts

C．dogs

D．primates

3. The writer of the passage may agree that ________.

A．dog owners should be kind to their dogs if they want to bring home a new one

B．dogs have all the same feelings as human beings

C．dogs would love to have other animals around them

D．dog owners can keep more animals at home to make their dogs happy

4. The passage is probably taken from ________.

A．a textbook

B．a magazine

C．a travel book

D．a news report

【推荐1】When the weather gets cold, we can put on more clothes, stay next to a fireplace, turn on the air conditioner or simply travel to a warmer city to spend the winter – people have many different ways of coping with the cold.

But things are not as easy for plants. Unlike humans, plants can’t move to escape the cold or generate heat to keep themselves warm. So how do they manage to survive the freezing winter?

It turns out that plants have their own strategies too, said a study published on Dec 22 in the journal Nature.

According to researcher Amy Zanne of George Washington University, US, the cold is a big challenge for plants. Their living tissues can be damaged when they freeze. “It’s like a plant’s equivalent to frostbite (冻疮),” Zanne told Science Daily. Also, the process of freezing and thawing (解冻) can cause air bubbles to form in the plant’s water transport system. “If enough of these air bubbles come together as water thaws they can block the flow of water from the roots to the leaves and kill the plant,” she explained.

To live through cold weather, plants have developed three traits, according to the study. Some plants, such as oak trees, avoid freezing damage by dropping their leaves before the winter chill sets in – effectively shutting off the flow of water between roots and leaves – and growing new leaves and water transport cells when the warm spring returns.

Other plants, pine trees for example, protect themselves by narrowing their water transport cells, which makes it easier for cells to travel among air bubbles.

The third strategy is also the most extreme – some plants die on the ground in winter and start growing as new plants from seeds when conditions get warmer.

However, the study also found that these smart strategies were developed very slowly – over millions of years of evolution. This leads scientists to worry that plants may not be able to deal with human-caused climate change, which has only started occurring over the past few decades.

Scientists are hoping that this study can help people find possible ways to save plants from the threat of climate change.

1. What is the article mainly about?

A．Why plants are not afraid of the winter chill.

B．The ways that plants survive cold weather.

C．Changes in plants’ water transport system in winter.

D．How plants evolve to keep up with climate change.

2. According to the article, if a plant freezes in the winter, ______.

A．it produces more living tissues to stay alive

B．its leaves quickly fall out and its roots begin to die

C．its water transport cells are narrowed

D．its water transport system could be blocked

3. How do oak trees usually survive the cold winters?

A．By dropping their leaves before winter.

B．By narrowing their water transport cells.

C．By widening their water transport cells.

D．By dropping seeds on the ground so that the new trees can grow in the spring.

4. What are scientists worried about when it comes to plants according to the article?

A．Plants may not be able to adapt to the increasingly cold climate.

B．Human activities might have a great impact on the pace of plants’ evolution.

C．Plants may not be able to evolve fast enough to adapt to human-caused climate change.

D．The strategies plants develop are not good enough to protect them against cold.

【推荐1】We moved to Elmont in 1956. I was 4 years old. Elmont was a wonderful place to grow up. There were lots of kids，great schools and we had a big yard. Having grown up a city kid, my father, Nicholas Denaro, believed that grass was not just to look at, but that children were meant to play on it. We played games and badminton there. A white fence separated our backyard from a small wood. My friends and I jumped the fence and climbed trees.

My father had the most amazing hands. He could fix anything. He gave those amazing hands to his son, my younger brother, Frank, who also became handy around the house. But my father saved his green fingers for me. He grew flowers, tomatoes, strawberries and figs and he shared his love of gardening with me.

Fourteen years ago, I went to a local nursery and purchased a fig tree for Dad for Father’s Day. My mother, Bridget Denaro, called it the best gift I could have given him. He planted it exactly in the middle of the front yard.

He loved that tree and enjoyed delicious figs every year, except just after Sandy hit in 2012. He was so disappointed when cold weather just after the superstorm froze all the remaining figs.

In 2015，my father died of aspirating pneumonia (呼吸性肺炎) at 97. We sold our family home of 61years last year. We left behind Dad's tree, full of figs waiting to ripen. We briefly-considered taking it with us, but decided that his Father's Day fig tree belonged in Elmont. The new owners generously allowed me to take some branches so that I could have a precious reminder of my much-loved father and the Elmont home.

1. What can we learn about the author from the first paragraph?

A．She grew up in a city.	B．She only liked climbing trees.
C．She had a happy childhood.	D．She was naughty and stubborn.

2. What did Father teach the author?

A．How to garden well.	B．How to play games.
C．How to color fingers.	D．How to fix everything.

3. Why did Father fail to enjoy figs in 2012?

A．He was ill in hospital.	B．The cold hit the fig tree.
C．The tree didn’t bear figs.	D．He moved to another city.

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

A．To show her love of figs.	B．To share her childhood.
C．To remember her father.	D．To introduce her experience.

【推荐2】On November18, 1995, Itzhak Perlman, the world famous violinist, came on stage to give a concert at Lincoln Centre in New York City. If you have ever been to a Perlman concert, you know that getting on stage is not easy for him. He got polio（小儿麻痹症）as a child, and has to walk with the aid of two crutches（拐杖）now.

That night Perlman walked slowly to his chair. Then he sat down and began to play. But, suddenly, one of the strings on his violin broke. You could hear it break---it broke with a loud noise. People thought to themselves, “He would have to get up to either find another violin or find another string for this one.”

But he didn’t. Instead, he waited a moment, closed his eyes and then signaled the conductor to begin again. The orchestra began, and he played from where he had stopped. He played with such passion and such power. Of course, everyone knows that it is impossible to play a symphonic work with just three strings. But that night Itzhak Perlman refused to know that. You could see him changing and recomposing the piece in his head. When he finished, there was a silence in the room. Then people rose and cheered. We were all on our feet, doing everything we could to show how much we appreciated what he had done.

He smiled and then he said in a quiet tone, “You know, sometimes it is the artist’s task to find out how much music you can make with what you have left.” His words have stayed in my mind ever since I heard them. That is also the way of life. Perhaps our task in this quickly changing world in which we live is to make music, at first with all that we have, and then, when that is no longer possible, to make music with what we have left.

1. Holding a concert is challenging for Perlman because ______.

A．He is just a world famous violinist

B．He has never performed on stage before

C．He has difficulty in moving his body

D．He is physically disabled as a result of a disease

2. When Perlman had just begun playing, ______.

A．He fell ill suddenly

B．There was something wrong with the violin

C．An accident happened and caused a disturbance

D．A very loud noise arose from the audience

3. If one of the strings suddenly broke, what would an ordinary player do?

A．He would play another violin.

B．He would cancel the concert.

C．Another performer would play instead.

D．The concert would be put off.

4. The lesson we draw from the story is that ______.

A．What we have is more important than what is lost

B．We should not care about what is lost

C．We should make the best of what we have

D．The way of life is to always live with music

【推荐3】The average American child spends three to five hours a day watching TV. In 1961, the average child began to watch television at age three; however, today it is nine months. Yet, most parents think that television has bad influence on their children. For example, in the early 1970s, my parents believed that my bad eyesight was the result of sitting too close to the screen, and they therefore made my stay at least six feet from it. Today, most people have no such worry, but many new ridiculous (荒谬的) sayings have appeared:

TV makes kids stupid. The opposite is true. Many children watch more educational programs when they are pre-schoolers. When they grow up, they can read more books and have much better ideas to solve difficult problems than other children.

TV makes kids violent. The real story is not so simple. Hundreds of studies show that watching violence on TV makes children more aggressive (好斗的). But a study of over 5,000 children also finds that some positive programs make children kinder. The problem is that kids are increasingly watching shows with violence instead of those suitable for their age.

Sitting around watching TV makes kids overweight. An experiment finds that when children watch less television, they do lose extra weight; however, reducing their television time does not make them more active. The real problem lies in snacking (吃零食), a widespread habit for kids.

TV helps kids get to sleep. The opposite is true. The more television children watch, the more likely they are to have irregular sleep and nap(小睡) patterns. Allowing kids to watch television is part of the problem, not the solution.

1. Which one is the advantage of educational TV programs?

A．They will improve children’s ability to get along with others.

B．They will make children solve difficult problems better than others.

C．They are likely to make children more aggressive.

D．They will make sure of children’s success in the future.

2. Why are children spending much time watching TV likely to be fat?

A．Watching TV makes children lazy and inactive.

B．Watching TV makes children sleepy.

C．Watching TV doesn’t burn up as much fat as doing sports.

D．Children like to snack while watching TV.

3. What influence does watching TV have on a child’s sleep?

A．It will make children form a bad habit of sleeping.

B．Children’s sleep time will be greatly reduced.

C．Children are likely to sleep deeper after watching TV.

D．It will make children sleep easier.

4. What is the purpose of this text?

A．To increase people’s knowledge of watching TV.

B．To warn parents of the disadvantages of watching TV.

C．To explain the bad influences that watching TV has on children.

D．To correct parents’ wrong ideas of television’s effect on children.

【推荐1】Putting food into the microwave for a couple of minutes may seem utterly harmless. However, a new study has found Europe's stock of these quick-cooking ovens emit(排放) as much carbon as nearly 7million cars and the problem is growing. With costs falling and kitchen appliances becoming common, owners are throwing many microwave after an average of eight years. This is pushing sales of new microwave which are expected to reach 135 million every year in the EU by the end of the decade.

A study by the University of Manchester worked out the emissions of carbon dioxide-the main greenhouse gas responsible for climate change-at every stage of microwaves, from manufacture(生产) to waste disposal(处理). "It is electricity consumption by microwaves that has the biggest impact on the environment," say the authors, who also calculate that the emissions from using 19 microwaves over a year are the same as those from a car. According to the same study, efforts to reduce consumption should focus on improving consumer awareness and behaviour to use appliances more efficiently. For example, electricity consumption by microwaves can be reduced by adjusting the time of cooking to the type of food.

However, David Rea professor of carbon management argues that, although microwaves use a great deal of energy, their emissions are minor compared to those from cars. In the UK alone, the car emissions are far more than all those from microwaves in the EU. Backing this up, recent data show that passenger cars in the UK emitted 69m tonnes of CO2 in 2015.This is 10 times the amount this new microwave oven study estimates for annual em1sS1ons for all the microwave ovens in the whole of the EU. Further, the energy used by microwaves 1s lower than any other form of cooking. Among common kitchen appliances used for cooking, microwaves are the most energy efficient. followed by a stove and finally a standard oven. Thus, rising microwave sales could be seen as a positive thing.

1. What is the finding of the new study?

A．Quick-cooking microwave ovens have become more popular.

B．The frequent use of microwaves may do harm to our health.

C．CO2 emissions constitute a major threat to the environment.

D．The use of microwaves emits more CO2 than people think.

2. What recommendation does the study by the University of Manchester make?

A．Cooking food of different varieties.

B．Improving microwave users' habits.

C．Eating less to cut energy consumption.

D．Using microwave ovens less frequently.

3. What does Professor David Really try to argue?

A．There are far more emissions from cars than from microwaves.

B．People should be persuaded into using passenger cars less often.

C．The UK produces less CO2 than many other countries in the EU.

D．More data are needed to show whether microwaves are harmful.

【推荐2】If you’re DIY-minded, you can build your own solar power system. In some cases, you can even build your own solar panels(电池板), although the amount that you can effectively DIY home solar depends on how much you want to power. Making your own solar panel is a time-consuming process and requires some electrical skills. However, it can also be very rewarding---learning to build your own panel is a great way to understand how solar-electricity is produced.

Before you can build your own solar panels, you first need to understand how solar cells produce electricity. If you’ve bought individual solar cells(they can be purchased online), the basic process for building your own solar panel goes like this: Prepare the backing(垫板) for your panel. Many DIY solar panel builders prefer to use a wooden board as the base for their solar cell. You’ll need to drill holes in the board so that the wires for each cell can pass through. Wire your solar cells together. This requires some experience with electrical work. Use a soldering iron to attach wire to the solar cells and then link each of the cells together. Attach cells to your backing. If possible, attach each solar cell to the backing individually. This makes it easier to replace a single cell in the event that becomes damaged or is not operating properly.

At this point you have a functional solar panel that can produce electricity when the sun shines. However, a solar panel by itself is not useful. If you are trying to produce electricity to power devices in your home, you need to pair your panel with an inverter(换流器) that will turn direct current(DC) power from the sun into the alternating current(AC) power used in most modern electronic devices.

1. How does the author like building DIY solar panel in Para. 1?

A．It is easy.

B．It is necessary.

C．It is common

D．It is worthwhile

2. What’s the first step of building your own solar panels?

A．Master how to manage it.	B．Prepare the backing for your panel.
C．Purchase individual solar cells.	D．Drill holes in the wooden board.

3. Why are solar cells connected to the wooden board separately?

A．To produce more power.	B．To replace damaged cells easily.
C．To fix cells to the backing.	D．To pass through the board easily.

4. What can be inferred from the text ?

A．People without electrical skills behave worse in DIY solar panels.

B．A wooden board is a must in building your own solar solar power.

C．How to pair an inverter depends on how much you want to power.

D．A functional solar panel can give power to your home devices directly.

【推荐3】My family moved from Taiwan to a small town in central Georgia, where my dad got a visa for his family and a job. I had just learned English, and from what little I could gather from my classmates, Santa Claus would come down one’s chimney and put toys in one’s stocking on Christmas Eve! What a great country, I thought. After I looked up “stocking” in my Chinese-English dictionary, I knew what I had to do.

On that fateful night after everyone went to bed, I took my longest, cleanest knee sock and attached it to a nail already on the mantel(壁炉).

Obviously, the previous owners of this house were on strangers to this Santa character. I woke up before everyone else on Christmas Day and ran to the fireplace. To make a sob story short, I was hit with the sock, and stuffed it in the back of a drawer. Santa was dead.

Every December since then, the topic of Christmas memories would unavoidably come up, and I would amuse my friends with my poor-little-me story. I had to make it as funny as possible, or else I would cry.

How could I know that Santa was just late? Nine years ago, on Christmas Eve, an older man with a white beard and a red can knocked on my front door. He said, “I’ve been looking for you for twenty-five years.” He handed me a bulging red stocking, winked, and lent. On top of the stocking was a card. It read:“For Becky— I may have missed you in the second grade, but you’ve always lived in my heart, Santa”

Through tear-barred eyes, I recognized the handwriting of Jill, a friend I had met just two months before. I later discovered that the older man was her father. Jill had seen the hurt little girl underneath the thirty-something woman and decided to do something about it.

So now I believe that Santa is real, I don’t mean the twinkle-eyed character of children’s mythology or the creation of American holiday marketers. Those Santas annoy and sadden me. I believe in the Santa Claus that lives inside good and thoughtful people. This Santa does not return to the North Pole after a crazy delivery but lives each day purposefully, rally listens to friends, and then plans deliberate acts of kindness.

1. What does the underlined part “what I had to do” in Paragraph 1 refer to?

A．Waiting for Santa Claus.	B．Putting a stocking on the mantel.
C．Asking for gifts from her parents	D．Looking up “stocking” in the dictionary

2. It can be inferred from the passage that the author’s parents ________.

A．didn’t love their child at all

B．didn’t know the previous owners of the house

C．didn’t know much about Christmas tradition

D．didn’t have enough money to buy the author Christmas presents

3. By writing the passage, the author speaks highly of ________.

A．friendship	B．parenting
C．religion	D．tradition