1 . We all have our favourite music, films or books — but which are the most popular ever?

The most popular album (音乐专辑) Thriller by Michael Jackson At the time Jackson started writing his best-selling album Thriller, he hoped that his album would sell 50 million copies. He was wrong — it sold over ten million more than that. Even today around 130,000 copies are sold in the USA every year.

The most popular classical music Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony When Beethoven was alive, his Fifth Symphony wasn’t his most popular piece of music. But now most people know the da da da dah introduction. In the 20th century, the first four notes (音符) were used by other musicians to make different types of music like hiphop and rock and roll.

The most popular novel A Tale of Two Cities Many people think the best-selling book of all time is one of the Harry Potter books. It’s true that all the Harry Potter books together have sold about 450 million copies. But the most popular single novel is much older. A Tale of Two Cities was written by Charles Dickens in 1859 and has sold 250 million copies.

The most popular ________ The Shawshank Redemption The Shawshank Redemption, directed by Frank Darabont in 1994, didn’t make much money at the cinema. It only became popular later on video, DVD and TV. It was based on a book by Stephen King. The writer sold the story for only a dollar.

1. The best word for the blank is ________.

A．painting

B．film

C．poem

D．sculpture

2. Which of the following is true?

A．Thriller turned out to be more popular than Michael Jackson expected.

B．The Fifth Symphony was used in many other music forms by Beethoven.

C．A Tale of Two Cities has sold more copies than all the Harry Potter books.

D．The Shawshank Redemption made much money as soon as it came out.

3. Which section of a magazine is the passage probably from?

A．Sports Time.

B．Science Study.

C．Culture World.

D．Nature Watch.

2 . Traffic lights are red, yellow and green. They are very important signals (信号). Traffic lights are usually placed at busy street corners to help control traffic. Sometimes, they are on streets near schools and shops, too. Most young children are taught what each of the colored lights means, so everybody can stay safe.

The first traffic signals were used for trains. The signals were put alongside railway tracks   (轨道). The color red was used to mean “stop” because it warned people of danger. A red light was also the easiest color to see from a distance. Train drivers could see the red “stop” light ahead and had enough time to slow down and stop their trains. A green light was used to mean “take care” and a white light meant “go”.

However, there were many dangerous accidents on the train tracks. Some train drivers thought a star shining in the night sky was a white light that meant “go”. So the signals were swapped. The “go” light was changed to green and the “take care” light was changed to white.

During these times, people travelled by train or in carts pulled by horses. Years later, when cars were built, people began to drive them because they could travel much faster than horses. However, the road rules for drivers were not very clear and many people were hurt crossing the roads. Yellow warning signs had to be placed beside the roads to remind drivers to take care and allow people to cross safely.

Today, towns and cities all over the world have traffic lights. Red and green lights match the signals used on the railways. Yellow lights are easy to see, so they are used to warn drivers that they should slow down and prepare to stop.

1. Why was the color red used to mean “stop”?

A．It reminded people of traffic rules.

B．It helped trains run smoothly.

C．It gave people a warning of danger.

D．It was the first color people thought of.

2. What does the underlined word “swapped” in Paragraph 3 mean?

A．Designed.

B．Exchanged.

C．Suggested.

D．Compared.

3. In which order did the “take care” light develop?
a. A white light               b. A green light.                      c. A yellow light.

A．a一c一b

B．b一c一a

C．a一b一c

D．b一a一c

4. What is the passage mainly about?

A．The advantages of traffic lights.	B．The history of traffic lights.
C．The importance of traffic lights.	D．The meanings of traffic lights.

3 . Just like Mickey Mouse, Hello Kitty is a famous cartoon character. You can see her on many ______ of things, like bags, clothes, food and books. People all over the world love the ______ Hello Kitty.

44 years ago, a Japanese company Sanrio made Hello Kitty. It first ______ on a wallet. To people’s ______, in the artist’s design, Hello Kitty is a ______! That’s why people always see her ______ with two feet.

Hello Kitty is in the third ______ in her school. Her favorite ______ is apple pie. She lives with her parents and twin sister ______ London. It is quiet there. And her grandpa and grandma live far away in a forest. On weekends, her father often drives his ______ to take them to visit her ______. It’s ______ that Hello Kitty even has a pet cat like herself.

The artist said 44 years ago, many Japanese worked and ______ in Britain, so she made Hello Kitty a(n) ______ person. Hello Kitty has a very______ life now. She’s the symbol of all the good things.

1.

A．shapes

B．kinds

C．colors

D．prices

2.

A．cute

B．careless

C．angry

D．possible

3.

A．wrote

B．brought

C．appeared

D．turned

4.

A．hope

B．surprise

C．answer

D．dream

5.

A．girl

B．boy

C．cat

D．dog

6.

A．laughing

B．talking

C．standing

D．eating

7.

A．floor

B．grade

C．name

D．place

8.

A．drink

B．person

C．restaurant

D．food

9.

A．inside

B．from

C．near

D．far

10.

A．bike

B．car

C．horse

D．bus

11.

A．friends

B．teachers

C．grandparents

D．classmates

12.

A．interesting

B．important

C．different

D．normal

13.

A．played

B．lived

C．solves

D．invited

14.

A．Australia

B．British

C．Chinese

D．American

15.

A．difficult

B．meaningless

C．happy

D．unlucky

4 . Coca-Cola is enjoyed all over the world. 1. 6 billion gallons are s    1     every year, in over one hundred and sixty countries. The d    2     was invented by Dr. John Pemberton in Atlanta, on 8 May 1886，but it was g    3     the name Coca-Cola by his partner, Frank Robinson. In the first year, only nine drinks a day were sold. The business was bought by a man called Asa Candler in 1888，and the first factory was o    4     in Dallas, Texas, in 1895. Coca-Cola is still made there now. Billions of bottles and cans have been p    5     since 1895. It is certain that Coca-Cola will be drunk f    6    into the twenty-first century.

5 . What is a museum? A museum is a good place to keep ______ and beautiful things. A museum may be a place to learn about science. A museum can be a place _____ art of humans or animals.

What is inside a museum? Some museums _____ old cars and airplanes. _____ museums have pictures and sculptures. Others have rocks and old bones. One museum even has ______ coal mine inside!

Many cities have museums. Some very small _____ have museums， ____ . Indianapolis has a _____ museum. Children do not have to pay to get in. Children often go to the museum. They like _____ at the dinosaur bones. They see a white bear ten feet tall，They go inside an old log cabin（小木屋）. On Saturday，Indianapolis children can ______ talks about animals and trees.

1.

A．new

B．old

C．Good

D．important

2.

A．for

B．in

C．about

D．on

3.

A．has

B．have

C．there is

D．there are

4.

A．A bit

B．A little

C．Much

D．Many

5.

A．the

B．an

C．a

D．/

6.

A．homes

B．towns

C．villages

D．countries

7.

A．too

B．also

C．either

D．neither

8.

A．adults

B．people's

C．children's

D．boy's

9.

A．see

B．to see

C．look

D．to look

10.

A．listen

B．listening

C．hear

D．hearing

6 . The British Museum is the biggest museum in the world. Inside，you feel smaller than usual. There are many things to see.

The story of the British Museum goes back three hundred years to one unusual man，Sir Hans Sloane，doctor to King George Ⅱ. The doctor collected books，drawings，clothes，money，animals，flowers，things fromall over the world. The doctor wanted everything to stay together when he died，so that people could come and have a look. The British Museum began. King George Ⅱ gave his library，and the museum started to grow.

The British Museum opened in 1759，six years after Sir Hans Sloane died. At first the museum was only open three days a week and only ten people could enter in an hour. There wasn't much time to see things. Visitors had to run though the rooms.

By about 1800， things began to get better. Wonderful statues， three thousand years old， arrived from Egypt. King George Ⅳ sold all his books to the museum secretly. A hundred years ago not only old books but also new ones arrived at the museum，and more people came to read them. Since then many famous men have written and studied there. And the library is growing faster and faster. There are four kilometers of new shelves every year and there are about two million visitors every year.

1. Sir Hans Sloane was interested in ___________ .

A．collecting all kinds of books

B．collecting all kinds of drawings

C．collecting all kinds of money

D．collecting all kinds of things

2. When you go inside the British Museum， you feel smaller than usual because ___________ .

A．the museum is empty

B．the museum is very big

C．there are too many things in i

D．you are too small

3. Sir Hans Sloane died ___________ .

A．in 1753

B．in 1759

C．in 1765

D．in 1800

4. At first， the visitors had to run through the museum because ___________ .

A．there are only several things to see

B．the museum was the biggest one in the world

C．they were not interested in the things in it

D．they had only one hour to see all the things in it

5. The passage is mainly about ___________ .

A．Sir Hans Sloane

B．George Ⅱ

C．the history of British Museum

D．the books in the museum

7 . In many countries around the world，May 1^st is a holiday which is called Labor Day or Workers' Day.It is an interesting holiday that honors working people and their jobs.But do you know how it started？

During the late 1880s, in many parts of he world.people worked for fourteen to sixteen hours a day in factories,but made very little money.Later,in the United States and Canada,working people got together to set up unions（工会）.The union leaders asked factory bosses for shorter working time and higher salaries（工资），but many of the bosses ▲ .

On May 1^st ,1886,men and women in the United States and Canada stopped working and went onto the streets.They walked through cities and towns to force bosses to let them work eight hours a day. In the city of Chicago,several people died in fighting with the police.Over the next few years, people in cities around the world stopped working on May 1^st to honor workers everywhere. By the early twentieth century, the first of May became a national holiday in many countries.

However, in the United States and Canada, May 1^st is not a holiday. North Americans celebrate Labor Day on the first Monday in September. Today in the United States, Labor Day is mostly about having fun. People enjoy a long weekend and often celebrate it by having picnics with friends or family. In many parts of the United States, Labor Day is also the last day of summer vacation, and students return to school the next day.

根据短文内容，选择正确答案。
1. How long did people work a day in factories in the late 1880s？

A．For 8---10 hours.	B．For 10---12 hours.
C．For 12---14 hours.	D．For 14---16 hours.

2. Which can be the best for ▲ ？

A．refused their ideas	B．accepted their ideas
C．agreed with them	D．understood them

3. What does the underlined word“force”mean？

A．感激

B．迫使

C．宣扬

D．欣赏

4. Which is the right order（顺序）of the following events？
①Working people began to fight for better life.
②People stopped working on May 1^st   to honor workers.
③Working people set up unions.

A．①②③

B．②①③

C．③②①

D．③①②

5. How do people often celebrate Labor Day in America nowadays？

A．By working all day.	B．By giving gifts to working people.
C．By having fun with friends or family.	D．By having a big ceremony.

8 . 补全短文阅读下面短文，根据短文内容，从短文后的A—E选项中选出适当的选项补全短文，使短文完整、通顺。
    1     It has around 3 billion fans — nearly half the world’s population! And about 300 million people play this game. That’s 4 percent of the world’s population!
    2     Many people in old days played early forms of this modern game. Cuju(蹴鞠)，a ball-kicking game in China, was reported as early as 2,500 B.C. Around the same time in Greece, people were also playing a similar ball game with any part of the body except hands.
But modern soccer didn’t become official(官方的) until 1863. An Englishman called Cobb Morley introduced the idea of a soccer association(联盟).     3     From then on, other associations in the countries were set up. They came together to build up the FIFA, which organizes the World Cup.
It’s not easy to tell what makes soccer so popular.     4     Soccer needs only two feet and a ball. This makes it a sport that developing countries can easily play. Some of the sport’s best players come from these poor nations.
    5     The sport’s no-hands rule makes beautiful dance — like movements on the field. What’s more, this sport excites the heart. Teams might score only a few times each match, so matches can turn around suddenly.
No one knows who will win at the next World Cup. But one thing is certain: The world will be watching.

A．He also wrote the sport’s official rules.

B．Soccer is the world’s favorite sport.

C．Soccer performances are pleasing to the eyes.

D．It’s hard to say where soccer’s birthplace is.

E．But one reason is how simple the sport is.

9 . The first cartoons appeared in newspapers. They told stories using ________. The first photographed cartoon film (in 1906) was about humorous _________. In the film, an artist _________ pictures of two faces on a blackboard. The faces came to life. They smiled and a small dog jumped through a ring.

There were lots of ________ in early cartoons. One famous early cartoon character was Felix the Cat.

Walt Disney started to ________ films in the 1920s. Some of his earliest films were about a famous story, Alice in Wonderland, ________ in Disney’s films it was called Alice in Cartoon Land. Walt Disney’s most famous cartoon character was Mickey Mouse. He appeared in 1928, first in a black-and-white film ________ sound, then very soon after that in a talking film and later in colour. A Mickey Mouse film was the first cartoon film with sound to become really _________.

Today, over a hundred years _________, cartoons are still popular with people of all ________. They will probably be popular for many more years in the future.

1.

A．pictures

B．words

C．languages

D．books

2.

A．birds

B．cats

C．mice

D．faces

3.

A．bought

B．drew

C．wrote

D．saw

4.

A．planets

B．animals

C．hearts

D．countries

5.

A．make

B．lead

C．see

D．miss

6.

A．as

B．since

C．but

D．and

7.

A．from

B．on

C．in

D．without

8.

A．clever

B．popular

C．soft

D．latest

9.

A．later

B．ever

C．out

D．perhaps

10.

A．prizes

B．ages

C．hobbies

D．heroes

10 . The Silk Road is a historically important international trade route between China and the Mediterranean(地中海). It began during the Western Han Dynasty and has been a bridge between East and West for over 2,000 years.
The ancient road started from Chang’an(now Xi’an) and ended in Eastern Europe, near today’s Turkey and the Mediterranean Sea. It was about 6,500 kilometers long and went across one-fourth of the earth.
The Silk Road got its name in the 19th century because Chinese silk used to be carried along this road. Silk, jade, ceramics and iron went west to Rome. And from the west came glass, gems and food like carrots.
The Silk Road was very important to both China and the rest of the world. It was more than an ancient international trade route. Besides trade, knowledge about art science and literature, as well as crafts and technologies was shared across the Silk Road. In this way, languages and cultures developed（发展） and influenced（影响） each other.
Today，China is trying to build the“21st Century Marine（海洋的）Silk Road”．With the help of APEC held in Beijing in November 2014, the dream of One Belt One Road   (the “Silk Road Economic（经济的）Belt”and “21st Century Marine Silk Road”)（“一带一路”） is coming true.
1. The underlined word “route” in Paragraph 1 probably means

A．方式

B．路线

C．成就

D．关系

2. When did the Silk Road begin?

A．In the 19th century	B．In the 18 th century
C．During the Western Han Dynasty.	D．During the Eastern Han Dynasty

3. How long was the ancient Silk Road?

A．It was about 6, 500 meters long.

B．It was about 5,000 kilometers long.

C．It went across one-third of the earth.

D．It went across one-fourth of the earth.

4. Why was it named the Silk Road?

A．Because Chinese silk was carried along this road.

B．Because Chinese silk was made along this road.

C．Because things were traded from market to market along this road.

D．Because the ancient traders bought and sold things along this road.

5. It can be inferred（推断） from this passage that

A．the Silk Road was only an ancient international trade route

B．many new silk roads have been built by the Chinese government so far.

C．the Silk Road was a very important line of communication connecting（连接）East and West

D．the Silk Road prevented the development of languages and cultures between East and West.