1 . My new teacher is cool. Her name is Paula so we call her Miss Paula.
The first time we met her she said we are going to be good friends and that good friends are always nice to each other.
Miss Paula has been teaching us a lot of things. Some of us used to get in trouble for talking in the hallway (过道). Miss Paula says she can’t change the rule that we can’t make noise in the hallway but we can still talk to each other. She is teaching us sign language. I already know how to say “hello” and “how are you” with my hands. Now we love it when we have to walk somewhere and we are always quiet except for a laugh or two.
Miss Paula likes everybody even Sam and nobody likes Sam. He never does what he’s told but now he is doing better. Miss Paula says every single one of us is perfect and beautiful just the way we are. I guess that includes Sam.
This week at school was really the best ever. I didn’t even get in trouble when I thought I would because I spilled (洒) milk on my homework and had to hand it in when it was still wet. Miss Paula just smiled and asked “What’s this?” So I told her what happened. Miss Paula put it near the window to make it dry. She said the sun had been waiting for such an important job as this and would be happy to help us.
Well I have to go and get ready for bed now. I have school in the morning and I want to wake up early so I will have time to pick Miss Paula some flowers.
1. From the passage we know that Miss Paula ________.A.is strict with the writer | B.changed the school rules |
C.is very kind to her students | D.uses sign language in class |
A.Sam dislikes his new teacher. | B.Sam has made some progress. |
C.Sam is often praised by Miss Paula. | D.Sam is one of the writer’s best friends. |
A.Bored. | B.Excited. | C.Relaxed. | D.Worried. |
A.loves and respects her new teacher | B.is a bit afraid of her new teacher |
C.always picks her teacher some flowers | D.wrote this article in the morning |
2 . An extreme sport like BMX (Bicycle Motocross) may not be the first thing that comes to mind to help overcome a mental health condition. However, that is
As a child, Ducarroz spent every
The tale began when a BMX video on YouTube inspired her to try the extreme sport. She saved up for a bike. Then she began practicing
“The bike made me get out of the house, go to the skate park, and
The 26-year-old is now one of the world’s best female BMX freestylers. Ducarroz now has her
Though she still suffers occasional
“MindTricks started because of my own
A.precisely | B.automatically | C.roughly | D.temporarily |
A.expectant | B.boring | C.spare | D.urgent |
A.slight | B.mild | C.occasional | D.severe |
A.end | B.fulfill | C.measure | D.resist |
A.put off | B.ate away | C.took over | D.slowed down |
A.concepts | B.tricks | C.facilities | D.models |
A.confidence | B.muscle | C.patience | D.fortune |
A.likely | B.hesitant | C.ready | D.effortless |
A.slowly | B.abruptly | C.swiftly | D.eventually |
A.blocked | B.pushed | C.left | D.hooked |
A.luck | B.sight | C.standard | D.training |
A.panic | B.heart | C.delight | D.annoyance |
A.carefully | B.privately | C.safely | D.humbly |
A.appearance | B.medals | C.posts | D.choices |
A.ashamed | B.reserved | C.collapsed | D.enlightened |
3 . Choose Your One-Day-Tours!
Tour A - Bath &Stonehenge including entrance fees to the ancient Roman bathrooms and Stonehenge -£37 until 26 March and £39 thereafter. Visit the city with over 2,000 years of history and Bath Abbey, the Royal Crescent and the Costume Museum, Stonehenge is one of the world’s most famous prehistoric monuments dating back over 5,000 years.
Tour B - Oxford & Stratford including entrance fees to the University St Mary’s Church Tower and Anne Hathaway’s -£32 until 12 March and £36 thereafter. Oxford: Includes a guided tour of England’s oldest university city and colleges. Look over the “city of dreaming spires(尖顶)” from St Mary‘s Church Tower. Stratford: Includes a guided tour exploring much of the Shakespeare wonder.
Tour C - Windsor Castle &Hampton Court: including entrance fees to Hampton Court Palace -£34 until 11 March and £37 thereafter. Includes a guided tour of Windsor and Hampton Court, Henry VILL’s favorite palace. Free time to visit Windsor Castle(entrance fees not included).With 500 years of history, Hampton Court was once the home of four Kings and one Queen. Now this former royal palace is open to the public as a major tourist attraction. Visit the palace and its various historic gardens, which include the famous maze(迷宫) where it is easy to get lost!
Tour D –Cambridge including entrance fees to the Tower of Saint Mary the Great -£33 until 18 March and £37 thereafter. Includes a guided tour of Cambridge, the famous university town, and the gardens of the 18th century.
1. Which tour will you choose if you want to see England’s oldest university city?A.Tour A | B.Tour B |
C.Tour C | D.Tour D |
A.Windsor Castle & Hampton Court | B.Oxford & Stratford |
C.Bath & Stonehenge | D.Cambridge |
A.It used to be the home of royal families | B.It used to be a well-known maze |
C.It is the oldest palace in Britain | D.It is a world-famous castle |
4 . A teacher gave his students a test. Most of the students finished all the questions without much effort
All of the students thought that this question was some kind of
So they all
“
He went on to say, “In your lives and careers, you will
Over the following days each of the students
A.while | B.until | C.since | D.after |
A.cleans | B.manages | C.supports | D.guards |
A.pity | B.risk | C.story | D.joke |
A.natural | B.clear | C.possible | D.unusual |
A.address | B.family | C.name | D.age |
A.left behind | B.lifted up | C.put away | D.handed in |
A.unanswered | B.open | C.out | D.unprepared |
A.exercise | B.experiment | C.test | D.match |
A.Possibly | B.No | C.Sure | D.Never |
A.love | B.help | C.respect | D.meet |
A.important | B.unique | C.intelligent | D.honest |
A.consideration | B.attention | C.discussion | D.protection |
A.look | B.smile | C.listen | D.play |
A.remembered | B.proved | C.explained | D.realized |
A.lesson | B.opinion | C.premise | D.argument |
5 . The hustle and bustle(喧嚣)of life, walking back and forth from the ideal to reality, and the inner confusion hidden behind a social mask-these daily experiences are recorded by Chinese youths in lines of poetry online. Recently, 124 Bilibili internet users shared their works in a poem collection.
One blogger on Xiaohongshu who goes by the nickname Gehuaren is one such poetry lover. The twenty-something girl not only writes poems as a form of entertainment in her spare time, but also improvises(即兴创作)poems for others at night markets in Yunnan. As a street-stall poet, Gehuaren often writes pieces of poetry quickly based on themes from customers. Once the poem has been completed, she refuses to change her work because she feels her poems reflect her first reaction. For her, everything in the world, no matter trivial or significant, can serve as her poetic inspiration. “A glass, a tree in the dawn or a person who once talked with me…these all could become themes for my poems,” said Gehuaren.
With free writing with a regular rhythm and broad themes, her poems strike a chord with many young people online, helping her gain over 190, 000 followers. Many have made comments “I feel healed by your poems because I can find beauty from unnoticeable things and in turn, slow down to reflect on my life.”
Apart from poetry, various means such as vlogging and photosharing can be used to record moments of daily life. But young people consider poetry to be the best way to express them. “Taking photos or vlogging can just show the object or emotions in real life. Yet poetry, which can be used to excite the imagination, shows the beauty of daily life, ”an 18-year-old said. So when he is inspired by the beauty of daily life, the boy writes it down into lines of poetry and then shares them with his friends on his WeChat Moments.
No matter why young people write their unique brand of poems, they are attempting to take every moment in lives seriously, face their lives bravely and actively express themselves.
1. How does Gehuaren find inspiration for her poems?A.By referring to traditional Chinese poems. |
B.By attending various online poetry lectures. |
C.By exploring great moments in life. |
D.By observing everyday life. |
A.They are original and full of imagination. |
B.They have a strong sense of rhythm. |
C.They record the beauty of small and ordinary things. |
D.They reflect the differences between the ideal and reality. |
A.Positive. | B.Neutral. | C.Cautious. | D.Objective. |
A.They hope to avoid challenges. |
B.They intend to impress their peers. |
C.They try to escape from the busy life. |
D.They make their thoughts known bravely. |
6 . It was a typical summer day in my small town, with the sun shining and the sky clear. I was sitting on my porch, enjoying the peaceful view of the rolling hills and the calm lake, when suddenly a strong wind blew in from the west. The peaceful sky turned dark as a storm approached.
I went inside, grabbing my raincoat and heading to the barn to secure the animals. The cows were nervous, sensing the approaching storm. I quickly tied them up and ran back to the house, just as the rain started to pour down. The wind was howling and the rain was pounding against the windows. Lightning and thunder followed, making the atmosphere even more electric. I sat by the window, watching the raging storm and praying that everything would be okay.
After what seemed like hours, but was only a few minutes, the storm passed. The clouds moved away, revealing a bright and sunny sky. I walked outside, taking in the fresh air and surveying the damage. The trees were bent over and some branches had been blown off. Our vegetable garden was flooded, but other than that, everything seemed to be fine. I breathed a sigh of relief as I realized that no serious damage had been done.
That evening, as I sat by the fireplace with a cup of hot coffee, I reflected on the experience. It reminded me that nature can be both powerful and unpredictable, but that we must persevere and adapt to whatever it throws at us. The next morning, as I watched the sun rise over the now-calm landscape, I felt a sense of pride knowing that my family and I had weathered the storm together.
1. What does the word “weathered” mean in the last paragraph?A.enjoyed | B.survived | C.forecasted | D.changed |
A.Angry | B.Relieved | C.Scared | D.Sad |
A.Problem and solution | B.Cause and effect |
C.in order time | D.by Comparison |
A.The author explains how to prepare for and cope with a storm. |
B.The author describes how a storm ruined his day and his garden. |
C.The author compares and contrasts the different weather conditions in his town. |
D.The author recounts how he and his family withstood a sudden storm and learned a lesson from it. |
7 . Pieter Bruegel’s iconic 1565 painting The Harvesters hangs at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The work showed people harvesting wheat nearly as tall as they were.“nowadays, however, if you walk through a wheat field, you basically see that wheat is about knee-height. The reduced height is essentially a consequence of breeding (培育)along with genes for increasing production to feed a growing population,” biologist De Smet explained.
De Smet says wheat is just one example of how historical artwork can allow us to track the transformation of food crops over time. He teamed up with art historian Vergauwen, a friend since childhood, to document such artwork around the world. They have been mainly looking at things where they can spot changes in shape, color and size.
Their interest in plants in artwork began with a visit to the Hermitage Museum, where they noticed an odd-looking watermelon in an early-17th-century painting. It appeared to be pale and white on the inside. Biologist De Smet assumed the painter had done a poor job. But art historian Vergauwen had a different idea. “No, this is one of the best painters ever from that era. So if he painted it like that, that’s the way it must have looked like,” he explained.
Other paintings revealed that both red and white watermelons were grown during the 17th century.“With all the genetic knowledge we now have, we can look in more detail how something comes about,”De Smet said. “For example, until the 18th century, European strawberries appeared tiny in paintings-they then grew in size as they were crossbred with North American varieties.”
Ultimately, the team hopes to create an online research database of historical plant artwork. They seek the contributions of art enthusiasts around the world via the social media. “However,” Vergauwen reminds, “if you’re going to use, for example, Picasso to try and understand how a pear looked in the early 20th century, you might be misled.”
1. What can we learn about the painting The Harvesters?A.It shows how people successfully grew wheat. |
B.It proves that wheat was much shorter in the past. |
C.It explains the consequence of different breeding methods. |
D.It gives clues about how wheat in the 16th century looked like. |
A.Their preference for food crops. |
B.Their friendship since childhood. |
C.Their divided views on an old painting. |
D.Their shared interest in Hermitage Museum. |
A.Art enthusiasts are not careful enough. |
B.Abstract paintings often mislead people. |
C.The source paintings need to be realistic. |
D.Picasso’s paintings are hard to understand. |
A.To comment on historical plant paintings. |
B.To tell interesting stories behind plant artwork. |
C.To inform readers of a scientific breakthrough. |
D.To introduce a study on food crop transformation. |
8 . Conservation scientist Kim Williams-Guillen was trying her best to come up with a way to save endangered sea turtles (海龟) from egg thieves when she had an “aha” moment: If she placed a fake (假的) egg containing a GPS tracker in the reptiles’ nests, she might be able to track the thieves.
Williams-Guillen found a flexible plastic material to mimic (仿造) the shell of real eggs. She and colleagues then used a 3D printer to produce the fakes of the same size, weight, and texture and put the smallest GPS tracking devices inside each. The researchers then went to four Costa Rican beaches, where green sea turtle come ashore to make their nests. As mothers laid their eggs under cover of night, the researchers slipped a fake egg into each nest. Once the fakes are covered in sand and mix with the real eggs, it’s very difficult to tell the difference between the two.
Of the 101 fake eggs, 25 were taken by thieves. The farthest moving egg traveled 137 kilometers inland. The fake egg sent its final signal the next day from a residential property, suggesting that the research team had tracked the eggs through “all of the players in the entire chain.”
By understanding that chain, Williams-Guillen says researchers can identify trading hot spots. She emphasizes that the tracker is not a way to catch local thieves, many of them living in poverty, but a tool to better understand their routes, which could help them and eventually law enforcement (执法部门) identify larger players in the chain.
In the meantime, Williams-Guillen and her colleagues are working to get their fake eggs to other sea turtle conservation organizations. Ultimately, though, scientists and nonprofits are going to engage communities with local outreach and education programs to save sea turtles. She says, “The real meat and potatoes of conservation isn’t going to come from deploying (布署) eggs.”
1. What can be learnt from paragraph 2?A.Fake eggs are made and employed. | B.Sea turtles have become endangered. |
C.Sea turtles lay eggs during the daytime. | D.The idea of fake eggs came into being. |
A.To confirm whether the fake eggs really work. |
B.To provide data for doing research on turtle eggs. |
C.To arrest the locals stealing the turtle eggs from the beach. |
D.To identify the trading routes and get the big players punished. |
A.Deploying eggs needs advocating further. |
B.Turtle conservation mainly relies on joint efforts. |
C.She feels disappointed with the local communities. |
D.Deploying eggs makes no difference in preserving turtles. |
A.Saving endangered sea turtles is urgent |
B.Endangered turtles can be traced with GPS |
C.GPS eggs helps to save endangered sea turtles |
D.A conservation scientist is devoted to protecting sea turtles |
Bad news sells. If it bleeds, it leads. No news is good news, and good news is no news. Those are the classic rules for the evening broadcasts and the morning papers. But now that information is being spread and monitored(监控) in different ways, researchers are discovering new rules. By tracking people’s e-mails and online posts, scientists have found that good news can spread faster and farther than disasters and sob stories.
“The ‘if it bleeds’ rule works for mass media,” says Jonah Berger, a scholar at the University of Pennsylvania. “They want your eyeballs and don’t care how you’re feeling. But when you share a story with your friends, you care a lot more how they react. You don’t want them to think of you as a Debbie Downer.”
Researchers analyzing word-of-mouth communication—e-mails, Web posts and reviews, face-to-face conversations—found that it tended to be more positive than negative(消极的), but that didn’t necessarily mean people preferred positive news. Was positive news shared more often simply because people experienced more good things than bad things? To test for that possibility, Dr. Berger looked at how people spread a particular set of news stories: thousands of articles on The New York Times’ website. He and a Penn colleague analyzed the “most e-mailed” list for six months. One of his first findings was that articles in the science section were much more likely to make the list than non-science articles. He found that science amazed Times’ readers and made them want to share this positive feeling with others.
Readers also tended to share articles that were exciting or funny, or that inspired negative feelings like anger or anxiety, but not articles that left them merely sad. They needed to be aroused(激发) one way or the other, and they preferred good news to bad. The more positive an article, the more likely it was to be shared, as Dr. Berger explains in his new book, “Contagious: Why Things Catch On.”
1. What do the classic rules mentioned in the text apply to?
A.News reports. | B.Research papers. |
C.Private e-mails. | D.Daily conversations. |
A.They’re socially inactive. |
B.They’re good at telling stories. |
C.They’re inconsiderate of others. |
D.They’re careful with their words. |
A.Sports new. | B.Science articles. |
C.Personal accounts. | D.Financial reviews. |
A.Sad Stories Travel Far and Wide |
B.Online News Attracts More People |
C.Reading Habits Change with the Times |
D.Good News Beats Bad on Social Networks |
10 . There are some disabled people in the world who fight an unseen battle within themselves every day. They never cry or
About nine years ago, I was in a car accident. The driver slept, and the car fell in the ditch. As a result, I suffered
The days I spent in the hospital were
That’s how this experience helped me in
A.pray | B.insist | C.forgive | D.complain |
A.survivors | B.victims | C.fighters | D.painters |
A.slight | B.personal | C.ordinary | D.multiple |
A.cut | B.cured | C.broken | D.separated |
A.gradually | B.completely | C.desperately | D.fortunately |
A.comfort | B.search | C.control | D.rescue |
A.in vain | B.in sorrow | C.in trouble | D.in relief |
A.admitted | B.walked | C.rushed | D.showed |
A.experiments | B.surgeries | C.examinations | D.cooperations |
A.joyful | B.dreadful | C.helpful | D.regretful |
A.fed up | B.filled up | C.kept up | D.caught up |
A.frustrated | B.scared | C.tense | D.angry |
A.endless | B.colorless | C.limitless | D.priceless |
A.time | B.belief | C.decision | D.opportunity |
A.exploring | B.investing | C.introducing | D.encouraging |