【推荐1】Pianist Jean-Francois Maljean has released a piano piece to commemorate (纪念) the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, which kicked off with a grand opening ceremony held at the National Stadium on Feb 4. Titled for Beijing Olympics, the piano piece, which is about 3 minutes, was asked by the Chinese embassy in Belgium, with the aim of celebrating Chinese New Year and to welcome the Winter Olympics. He also wrote a song to support Wuhan in its fight against COVID (新冠)-19 in 2020 and another song for Xi’an in December.

Born in Verviers, Belgium, Maljean started to learn the piano at age 6. At about 12, the classically trained pianist became interested in a diverse range of musical genres (体裁，类型), especially pop music like that of The Beatles.

He had planned to compose a song and English author Robert Murray, the pianist’s friend, even started to write the lyrics about the Olympic Games. However, due to the short time, Maljean ended up just composing a piano piece, which was later released in the form of a music video featuring images of winter sports. “I think that a piano piece works even better than a song. Since winter sports mainly give an impression of speed, I composed a mostly very fast piece, though there are some slower moments. And it works very well,” says Maljean, 68, who recorded the piece at his own studio in Belgium. Maljean recalls that he visited the capital and spent some time in China, where he was featured in a documentary for Belgian television. He traveled to many places in China, including Changchun in Jilin province, Guizhou province and Shanghai, and landed in Beijing to visit Olympic sites.

1. What is the first paragraph mainly about?

A．Maljean’s works about China.	B．Maljean’s experiences in China.
C．Maljean’s contribution to COVID.	D．Maljean’s general introduction.

2. What can we infer about Maljean from the passage?

A．He is a sports enthusiast in skiing.

B．His documentary was filmed in Belgian.

C．He composed a song for Beijing Olympics.

D．He travelled to several Chinese provinces.

3. Why does Maljean think the piano piece is better than a song?

A．Because he prefers pop music to pop songs.

B．Because it has Chinese classical music elements in it.

C．Because the lyrics are not in accordance with the music.

D．Because it highlights the characteristics of winter sports.

4. What kind of person is Maljean？

A．Simple and logical	B．Generous and patient.
C．Talented and caring.	D．Adventurous and sensitive.

【推荐2】The recent story on Tik Tok showed how two neighbors found companionship during the lock-down because of the pandemic, thanks to a share the love of the piano.

The story started when Giorgio Lo Porto heard his neighbor playing the piano through their dividing wall. Lo Porto, an Italian living in London, decided to reach out to his neighbor and left a note asking him or her to play My Heart Will Go On. The mystery never agreed, leading Lo Porto to send another note suggesting they play a duet (二重奏) together from the comfort of their own homes. The mystery neighbor started playing the piano at 2: 00 pm, and when he stopped after finishing a part of the song, Lo Porto continued. Over time, the duets between the two complete strangers became a regular weekend appointment.

Weeks later, the pair finally met and it was better than expected. The mystery pianist happened to be a 78-year-old Polish man named Emil, who was living in temporary accommodation until his house was sold. He lost his wife in December due to COVID- 19 and all he had left was the piano. And the reason why he played at 2: 00 pm every weekend was that he and his wife used to do that.

The pair finished a final duet together—Beethoven’ s Moonlight Sonata—before Emil moved out at the end of February.

While this is heartwarming in itself, the story has a heartbreaking ending: On March 14, Lo Porto shared that his old neighbor had passed away in his sleep. He said, “Now he is reunited with his wife.”

While saying goodbye to Emil, Lo Porto wrote, “Dear Emil, I knew very little about you, but you changed my life. You give me back my passion, and we shared that with the world. You will be in my heart. I’ ll keep playing, thinking of how powerful music can be. You said I was your light, but you’ ve been mine, too. Bye, Emil.”

1. What happened after Lo Porto left the second note for Emil?

A．They shared their playing skill with each other.

B．They composed a new song based on a classic.

C．They perform the music together through the wall.

D．They reached out to neighbors to cheer them up.

2. Why did Emil play the piano at a special time?

A．To advertise his house.	B．To comfort strangers.
C．To upload his updates.	D．To remember his wife.

3. What is the sad part of the story in the author’ s opinion?

A．Emil’ s passing away.

B．Lo Porto’ s departure.

C．Their final performance.

D．The unfamiliarity between them.

4. What does Lo Porto mainly convey at last?

A．It is easy to say goodbye.

B．He admired Emil’ s ambition.

C．Music is a universal language.

D．Emil positively influenced him.

【推荐3】Many people believe that teaching children music makes them smarter, better able to learn new things. Researchers, however, have found that there’s one thing musical training does not do. They say it does not make children more intelligent.

Samuel Mehr is a graduate student at Harvard’s School of Education. He said it is wrong to think that learning to play a musical instrument improves a child’s intellectual development. He says the evidence comes from studies that measured the mental ability of two groups of 4-year-olds and their parents. One group attended music class, the other went to a class that places importance on the visual arts — arts that can be seen. “The evidence there is ‘no.’ We found no evidence for any advantage on any of these tests for the kids taking part in these music classes,” said Mehr.

Samuel Mehr says researchers have carried out many studies in an effort to learn whether musical training can make children smarter. He says the results have been mixed. He says only one study seems to show a small percentage increase in IQ, intellectual scores among students after one year of music lessons. He does not believe that IQ is a good measure of a child’s intelligence. He says researchers in his study compared how well children in the musical training group did on mental processing tasks or projects, then the results were compared to those of children who did not take lessons. There was no evidence that the musical training group did much better on the mental tasks than the other group. The researchers confirmed the results with a larger group of children and their parents.

Mr Mehr says music lessons may not offer children a fast easy way to gain entry to the best schools later of their life. But he says the training is still important for cultural reasons. In his words, “We teach music because music is important for us.”

He notes that the works of writer William Shakespeare are not taught, so the children will do better in physics. He says Shakespeare is taught because it is important. “And I don’t think music needs to be any different than that.”

1. Different from the common belief, Samuel Mehr believes that ______.

A．playing musical instrument makes children more intelligent

B．musical training has no evident link to children’s intelligence

C．learning to play musical instrument is not worthwhile at all.

D．music lessons can increase children’s IQ and make them smarter

2. How did Samuel Mehr try to prove his own belief?

A．By attending music lessons himself.	B．By consulting experts.
C．By comparing different groups.	D．By talking to parents.

3. What does the underlined words “the results” in paragraph 3 refer to?

A．Music lessons probably help to gain better performance.

B．Musical training has no positive effect on children at all.

C．Music lessons have different influences on different people.

D．Musical training cannot possibly make children smarter.

4. Why does the author mention “William Shakespeare” in the last paragraph?

A．To tell us music is taught because of its great importance.

B．To show us the importance of studying Shakespeare’s works.

C．To argue that music lessons cannot make children smarter

D．To make us realize Shakespeare is as important as music.

【推荐1】Selective breeding, also known as artificial selection, is a process used by humans to develop new organisms with desirable traits. It can be used to produce tastier fruits and vegetables, crops with greater resistance to pests, and larger animals that can be used for meat.

Perhaps the earliest example of selective breeding is the domestic dog. Scientists believe that the domestic dog evolved from the wild gray wolf, and through artificial selection, humans were able to create hundreds of different dog breeds. As people domesticated and bred dogs, they favored specific traits, like size or intelligence, for certain tasks, such as hunting, shepherding, or companionship. As a result, many dog breeds vastly differ in appearance, a unique phenomenon in the animal world, as different breeds of a single species generally look like each other. The Chihuahua and the Dalmatian, for instance, are both dogs, yet they share few physical features.

Selective breeding has also been practiced in agriculture for thousands of years. Almost every fruit and vegetable eaten today is a product of artificial selection. By picking out wild cabbage plants with specific characteristics, farmers were able to create a variety of vegetables from a single source, each with differing flavors. Broccoli, for example, was developed from wild cabbage plants that hadn't enough flower development while kale came from Brassica oleracea with larger leaves.

Corn is an unusual product of selective breeding. Unlike rice, wheat, and cabbage, which have clear ancestors, there is no wild plant that looks like corn. The earliest records of corn indicate that the plant was developed in southern Mexico 6,000—10,000 years ago from a grass called teosinte. Scientists believe that early Mexican farmers selected only the largest and tastiest seeds of teosinte for planting. This process allowed Mexicans to develop corn very quickly, as small changes in the plant's genetic makeup had dramatic effects on the grain's taste and size.

Without selective breeding, many of the plants and animals on earth today would not exist. However, every coin has two sides.

1. What does the author intend to do in Paragraph 1 ?

A．Introduce a new topic for discussion.	B．Add some background information.
C．Provide scientific data for readers.	D．Explain a scientific study method.

2. Chihuahua and Dalmatian are mentioned to show           .

A．selective breeding is very successful

B．selective breeding leads to biodiversity

C．selective breeding brings difference in appearance

D．selective breeding might bring about new species

3. What is special about corn as a product of selective breeding?

A．It has genetic makeup opposite to teosinte.	B．It is the earliest plant developed by Mexicans.
C．It hasn't an ancestor in Mother Nature.	D．It shares few physical similarities with its ancestors.

4. What might be discussed in the paragraphs following the last one?

A．More examples of selective breeding.	B．Disadvantages of selective breeding.
C．Influence of selective breeding on species.	D．Comparison between natural and selective breeding.