In Europe, many people make friends between their countries through town twinning. Town or city twinning means two towns in different countries agree and decide to become “twins” with a sister city relationship.
The people find pen friends in the twin town. They exchange newspapers and stamps. The school teachers discuss teaching methods with the teachers in the twin town. Officials visit the twin town for celebrations. Ordinary people travel to the twin town, too, but not very often if it is far away.
Sometimes, schools even exchange their classes for two or three weeks! For example, German middle school students study for a while at the school in their twin town in Britain, staying with British families. A few months later, their British friends come to study in Germany.
Many British towns are so pleased with the results of the twinning that they set out to find more than one twin town! Tonbridge, a small town, for example, has twin towns in both Germany and France.
Town twinning can help make friends. It helps students improve their language skills, and also helps people to understand the differences between nations.
1. Twin towns develop______.| A．between European countries and China | B．in the English-speaking countries only |
| C．in the same country | D．between different countries |
| A．3 | B．4 | C．5 | D．6 |
| A．to earn more money | B．to set up schools |
| C．to improve students’ language skills | D．to develop industry and agriculture |
| A．Town Twinning | B．Friendly Towns |
| C．Exchanging Teachers and Students | D．Peace and Understanding |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】“Homestay is a form of study-abroad program.It allows the visitor to stay with a local family to better understand the local lifestyle.It also helps to improve the visitor’s language ability.If you wish to learn more about foreign cultures or to get foreign experience,you should join this kind of holiday.
After we got to London,we went to stay with different families.I was lucky that my host family (寄宿家庭)was a white couple who had a daughter about my age.
The holiday was a valuable experience for me.I enjoyed every minute of it.
| A．Yes,time really flew fast. |
| B．I am sure you won’t be disappointed. |
| C．After this meeting,I always thought about this kind of holiday. |
| D．It took me 8 hours to fly to London. |
| E．They treated me as a daughter of their family. |
| F．The holiday was filled with activities every day. |
| G．This is really a good choice. |
【推荐2】Why should you learn Sign Language? Do you want to improve your communication with a family member or friend who is deaf? Do you want to be able to communicate with deaf people in general? Would you like to advance in your career by being able to communicate in ASL? Do you want to be a Sign Language interpreter?
Sign language is not just a random (随意的) collection of gestures but a full-blown (完全成熟的) language in its own right, complete with its own grammatical rules. Each country or region has its own sign language, as different from each other as English is from Spanish. Each version of sign language is somewhat linked to the spoken language in its region. For example, American sign language does share similarities with English, even though it is its own language.
The advantages of knowing sign language in addition to a spoken language are many. Communication becomes possible on many levels with the deaf community, with other people either hearing or not in any of the above situations, as well as many more.
While other languages take years to learn, American Sign Language can be taught in a much shorter time period. It is one of the easiest languages to learn because most of the signs were developed to mimic the actual word or phrase it is representing. Even the alphabet signs look like the letters of the English alphabet.
American Sign Language, or ASL, is the third most used language in the United States. Used by the deaf community, interpreters, and friends and family of the deaf. There are a lot of sites on the internet that not only shows you the sign with video, but will help you practice reading signs as well.
Teaching even hearing babies sign language seems to be the fashion in recent years and for good reason. Communicating in sign language is fun and natural as babies naturally use body gestures in early communication. Teaching baby sign language actually appears to enhance the learning of verbal skills and brain development of the children involved.
1. Which two regions share similarities in their sign language?| A．Spain and Britain. |
| B．Mexico and USA. |
| C．Australia and Canada. |
| D．Japan and Korea. |
| A．is a collection of gestures |
| B．is easier to learn than English |
| C．is not very popular in USA |
| D．has no link to the spoken language |
| A．increase self-confidence |
| B．provides more choices of career |
| C．trains brains |
| D．is interesting |
| A．help them talk sooner |
| B．help them walk sooner |
| C．increase communication at a very early age |
| D．enrich relationship with parents and the people who take care of them |
| A．What is sign language? |
| B．The advantages of knowing sign language. |
| C．The relation of American sign language and English. |
| D．Ways of learning sign language. |
【推荐3】Spain's Royal Theatre and China's National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA) have signed agreement on exchange of audiovisual materials through an online platform. The agreement will allow consumers to view materials on demand.
“The NCPA will offer one opera and four concerts live, as well as five documentaries to present them on the platform. With the launch of this project, viewers from several countries will be able to view them on the Internet,”said Wang Ning, the president of the NCPA.
Wang Ning also said the agreement was positive for both institutions because “culture is connected”. “We are going to present the classical operas of the world to the Chinese audience, and we also want to introduce some Chinese operas to the world to help the exchange between different cultures. It doesn't matter if it is from the East or the West. Art has a common character,”he added.
The Royal Theatre, which opened in 1850, is now considered to be the most important centre for classical music, opera and ballet in Spain. The agreement is another step towards greater collaboration between the two institutions which have enjoyed a close relationship for several years. He said the relationship between the Royal Theatre and China had received an important boost following the visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan to the theatre on 28 November 2018 during their official visit to Spain.
“We are working to take flamenco(弗拉明科舞) to China, to carry out Joint university projects and exchange activities so our respective people can see how each other works,” he explained.
1. The NCPA promised to offer _____.| A．Peking Opera shows | B．cartoons |
| C．documentaries and concerts | D．flamenco |
| A．To introduce Chinese operas to the world |
| B．To introduce Spanish operas to the Chinese audience |
| C．To carry out joint university projects and exchange activities |
| D．To promote the exchange between cultures |
| A．Encouragement. | B．Rise. | C．Drop. | D．Success. |
| A．On an Internet blog. | B．From a magazine. |
| C．From a news agency app. | D．In a textbook. |
【推荐1】Which is more important for parents, making more money to give the kids a better life or spending more time with them? It is a problem for parents and it is not easy to decide. A new study shows that today’s parents are spending more time with their children than parents in the past. According to the study, today’s college-educated mothers spend about 21.2 hours a week taking care of their children. But women with less education spend about 15.9 hours. Before 1995, it was only 12 hours.
Dads are spending more time on ball games. Before 1995, fathers with college educations only spent about 4.5 hours a week playing with their children. Today, it increases to 9.6 hours a week. For fathers with high school education, the time goes up from 3.7 hours to 6.8.
These days, parents don’t care more about the cleaning or the cooking. They are trying their best to spend time with their families. As for the kids, they don’t mind how much time their parents spend with them. They just want to enjoy the time their parents do be with them.
So, take part in the kids’ activities when you are with them, such as helping with homework or playing soccer with them.
1. How long do college-educated mothers spend taking care of their kids a week?| A．About 9.6 hours. | B．About 12 hours. |
| C．About 15.9 hours. | D．About 21.2 hours. |
| A．Women with less education spend about12 hours staying with their kids, |
| B．Mothers in the past spent less time staying with kids than mothers these days. |
| C．Mothers with college education are lazier than those with less education. |
| D．Dads spend more time staying with their kids than mothers do. |
| A．About 4.5 hours. | B．Less than 9 hours. |
| C．About 13.5 hours. | D．About 18 hours. |
| A．They care about how much money their parents can make. |
| B．They care about how much time their parents spend with them. |
| C．They care if their parents are really with them. |
| D．They care if their parents can give them a better life. |
【推荐2】How did the sea horse get its name? It’s not hard to guess. The top half of this fish looks like a small horse. But looking at the sea horse’s tail, you might think “sea monkey” is a better name. Then there’s the sea horse’s pouch (口袋). “Sea kangaroo” might also be a good name for this fish.
Sea horse live in warm ocean waters all over the world. They keep safe from other fish by hiding in plants and grasses that grow under the sea. They can also change colors to match their surroundings (环境). A sea horse in one place for hours at a time by winding its tail around a plant. It feeds on live food, such as small shrimp (虾). For a fish that doesn’t move around much, the sea horse eats a lot—in just one day, a sea horse can eat 3,000 shrimp!
A sea horse keeps the same mate for its whole life, and it’s the male (雄性的) sea horse that gives birth to baby sea horses. How does this happen? Baby sea horse start out as eggs, which come from the female’s (雌性的) body. The male carries the eggs in its pouch for about three weeks until they hatch (孵化). Soon after the babies are born, the female gives her mate a new set of eggs.
Sadly, the number of sea horses is becoming smaller. Why is this happening? Some places where sea horses once lived have been filled in to make new land. Also, many sea horses are caught and sold as aquarium (水族馆) fish. This really is not a good idea because most sea horses don’t live long in aquarium. The best place for a sea horse is the ocean.
1. The sea horse got its name because of its_______.| A．pouch | B．head |
| C．skin | D．tail |
| A．It rolls up. | B．It runs away quickly. |
| C．It remains still. | D．It hides in plants and grasses. |
| A．like to move around | B．feed on small sea animals |
| C．live in cold ocean waters | D．change color with the temperature |
| A．She carries them around. | B．She hides them in sea grasses. |
| C．She puts them in the male’s pouch. | D．She hatches them. |
| A．They grow at a very low speed. |
| B．Their food is becoming less and less. |
| C．They are killed by people for food. |
| D．Their homes are being destroyed. |
【推荐3】For as long as we’ve known about it, humans have searched for a cure for cancer. Across the world, countless amounts of time and money have been spent on researching a way to stop this terrible disease. But now, it seems like the answer could have been inside our own bodies the whole time.
Recently, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the USA, a government agency that’s responsible for health care, approved a new form of gene therapy that could mean the end of a certain type of cancer.
The therapy allows scientists to “train” the immune (有免疫力的) cells of sick patients to fight leukemia—a form of blood cancer that mostly affects young people.
The exciting new treatment works by removing healthy immune cells from the patient, known as T-cells, which are then changed to be able to “hunt down” cancer cells.
The cells are then put back into the patient before they begin to get rid of the patient’s leukemia over time, similar to how the body fights off other illnesses.
“This is truly an exciting new day for cancer patients,” Louis J. DeGennaro, president of The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, said in a news release.
Up until now, a long and painful marrow transplant (骨髓移植) was the only option for many leukemia patients.
In this procedure, healthy blood cells are taken from a donor and placed into the sick patient, who also has to go through chemotherapy (化疗) to allow their body to adjust to the new cells.
But with a recovery rate of around 83%—according to a news release published by the FDA—it’s hoped that the days of painful trips to the hospital, or even death, are over for leukemia sufferers.
“We’re entering a new frontier in medical innovation with the ability to reprogram a patient’s own cells to attack a deadly cancer,” FDA representative Scott Gottlieb said in the release. “New technologies such as gene and cell therapies hold the potential to transform medicine and our ability to treat and even cure many incurable illnesses.”
1. What is the author’s main purpose in writing the passage?| A．To compare different ways of curing leukemia. |
| B．To report on a breakthrough in cancer treatment. |
| C．To explore the potential of gene and cell therapies. |
| D．To show scientists’ efforts in search of a cure for cancer. |
| A．By replacing sick blood cells with healthy ones. |
| B．By using changed T-cells to destroy cancer cells. |
| C．By removing sick blood cells during a marrow transplant. |
| D．By using chemotherapy to improve the patient’s immune system. |
| A．It can give them a better chance of survival and recovery. |
| B．It can improve their ability to fight off all kinds of cancer. |
| C．It can reduce their pain in the process of the marrow transplant |
| D．It can save them many more trips to the hospital and cause more deaths. |
| A．A biology textbook. | B．A research paper. |
| C．A medical magazine. | D．A travel brochure. |
