【推荐1】You might think homeless people always live on the street. But being homeless can mean different things. In the United States people living in temporary (临时的) homes are also homeless people.

Sandy’s family have moved (搬) many times in the last five years, because they can only live in homeless shelters (收容所) and small rooms in apartments for some months at a time. Now, Sandy, her four brothers and her mother live in a small room in Brooklyn. Another family of four lives in the apartment’s other bedroom. Every day, Sandy gets up early to her school that is on the other side of the city.

According to the report, New York students living in shelters miss (错过) about a month of school on average (平均). Homeless students in the city also have lower test scores, and 43 percent do not graduate (毕业) from high school. Because of that, many social workers come to help the homeless students. But many children are still not getting the help they need.

For Sandy, school is like home. She knows that if she wants to be a doctor, she needs to do well, and she uses her long bus-and-subway ride back to Brooklyn to do homework. Also, Sandy often helps her mother with housework after school. Some nights, after cleaning, the family watch shows on a small TV on the dresser. But they have to go to bed early, so that they need enough energy (精力) for another long day ahead.

【推荐1】The new high-speed railway connecting Beijing with China’s northeastern provinces not only shortens travel time, but also has high technology and an environmentally friendly design. The new line opened on Friday and showed China’s strong ability to build high-tech and green high-speed railway and infrastructure（基础设施）.

The new line links Beijing with Shenyang, Changchun and Harbin—the capital cities of China’s three northeastern provinces—and shortens travel time between Beijing and Harbin in the northern most Heilongjiang province to less than 5 hours. Two old routes took more than 7 or 8 hours. Trains running on the line will initially travel at a top speed of 300 kilometers per hour, the company said, but then its maximum design speed is 350 km/h.

A part of the route from Harbin to Shenyang, Liaoning, was put into operation in 2012. Another part from Shenyang to Chengde, Hebei, began to serve in 2018. The 192 km part from Chengde to Beijing opened on Friday. To reduce noise from railway operations, engineers designed a 1,840-meter “tunnel-like” sound barrier（屏障）on the part that passes a residential area between Beijing’s fourth and fifth ring roads.

The new line has 46 bridges and 30 tunnels. The station is based on environmentally friendly thoughts, the station’s designer Wang Qingyi said. Also, an electricity-saving system has been used to save energy. Because of the new design, lights are not turned on during the day, when the lobby is bright enough for passengers.

A new type of bullet train that can operate under temperatures as low as -40℃ runs on the line. The new train can endure（忍受）extremely cold weather, and provides Braille on the door of restrooms, said Ren Mengyi, the chief leader.

【推荐2】Many people around us like keeping cats as their pets. But do you think you know them a lot? Maybe not.

Cats like to eat mice and fish for some reason. People kept the earliest cats in Egypt (埃及), mainly because they could catch mice easily. In those days, people in Egypt often ate fish from the Nile River. They shared the fish with their cats. That’s why the smell of fish also interests cats a lot later. But there is another reason. Cats need a lot of taurine (牛磺酸) to see clearly at night. And mice and fish just have the taurine they need, so cats eat them because of their own needs.

Lots of people like to eat fish, but they might be afraid of fish bones. When you see a cat eating fish, you must have a question: Why are cats not afraid of fish bones? In fact, when cats eat fish, their special tongues (舌头) will help them not to eat fish bones. The cats’ esophaguses (食道) are also different. They can easily spit out the fish bones in their stomachs.

The reason why cats are afraid of water might go back to their ancestors (祖先). The ancestors of cats had to live outside. When they drank water from the river, they were afraid of being caught by other dangerous animals. So every time they drank it, they were very careful and worried. And this habit still stays in their DNA now.

根据材料内容选择最佳答案。

A．

B．

C．

D．

【推荐3】Around 20 centimeters in length and with a 40-centimeter wingspan, this short-legged small bird is a common visitor of our beautiful Shenzhen.

With a white eye ring and a brown patch (斑) across the eye, the common sandpiper (鹬) is brown on the top of its body and white on the under parts. Its breast has a set of dark b rown patches and dark brown markings over the upper parts of the body.

Three special things about this small bird are its running speed, an unstoppable up-and-down movement of its tail and a constant (不间断的) nodding of its head.

It lives in northern areas from East Europe and Central Asia to Japan. During the winter months, it migrates (迁徙) to warmer locations in Africa and South Asia, including Shenzhen. It is common to see these beautiful birds along the margins (边缘) of rivers, lakes, ponds, and ocean shores. In Shenzhen Bay Park, they can be seen searching for food animals such as insects, spiders, frogs or small fish. When unable to find animal food sources, they feed on plants.

Another interesting fact about the common sandpiper is that they are very likely to return to the areas they visited previously. So over the years you will likely see them visiting the exact same locations during their migration.