1 . Cultural Websites
Ancient GreeceThis is a guide with rich information and pictures to Ancient Greece, covering art, architecture, politics, Olympics, geography, history and other topics. The photo gallery with bird’s-eye images of Greek art is of note. Contents include maps, biographies and related links, though little in the way of engaging multimedia. The website last updated in 2008, and some links are broken.
GettyGetty, an online museum, focuses on the visual arts and serves both general audiences and specialized professionals. Its Research Library is accessible to both on-site and far-away users. The Explore Art part permits you to look through many of the works of art on show. You can also view present or past exhibitions. There are also topics for discussion on many sides of art and art history.
Library of CongressThe website contains main source materials connecting to the history and culture of the United States. It offers more than 7 million digital artworks from more than 100 historical collections. You can select collections to search and explore teaching and learning ideas with American memory.
Internet History Sourcebooks ProjectThe website is wonderful collections of public area and copy-permitted historical texts for educational use. With pages designed specifically to help teachers and students, it contains hundreds of well-organized sources and also includes links to visual and hearing materials, as art and archeology play an important role in the study of ancient history.
1. How is Ancient Greece different from other websites?| A．It covers art. | B．Its renewal is suspended. |
| C．Its topics include history. | D．It contains historical culture. |
| A．View artworks on display. | B．Purchase art pieces online. |
| C．Serve the Research Library. | D．Join the scientific discussion. |
| A．They focus on ancient science. | B．They provide teaching materials. |
| C．They deal with American issues. | D．They have several hundred pages. |
2 . Tired of standing in line? Wait a bit longer, and you may never have to again.
Amazon has opened 24 of its Amazon Go stores, which use cameras and artificial intelligence (AI) to see what you’ve taken off shelves and charge you as you walk out. Some companies are closely copying Amazon’s approach to using Al-powered cameras fixed in ceilings. But others are trying an entirely different way to skip the checkout: smart shopping carts, companies have added cameras and sensors to the carts, and are using AI to tell what you’ve put in them. Customers pay by entering a credit card, or through an online payment system. When a customer exits the store, a green light on the shopping cart shows that their order is complete, and they’re charged.
The companies behind the smart carts, including Caper and Veeve, say it’s much easier to add technology to the shopping cart than to an entire store. Amazom’s Go stores rely on hundreds of cameras in the ceiling. The shelves also include sensors to tell when an item is removed. Ahmed Beshry, co-founder of Caper, believes the technology to run Go is too expensive to use in a large-format grocery store. Neither Caper nor Veeve have said how much their smart shopping carts will cost, making it difficult to compare the different formats. Shariq Siddiqui, CEO of Veeve, said, “We’re always happy when Amazon is doing something. They force retailers to get out of their old school thinking.”
Each time a business uses artificial intelligence and cameras, it raises questions about customers’ privacy and the effect on jobs. Beshry notes that the cameras in his shopping cart point down into the cart, so only a customer’s hand and part of their arm will be captured (拍摄) on camera.
1. What do we know about the smart shopping carts?| A．They are linked to the cameras fixed in the ceilings. |
| B．They are not able to recognize goods put in them. |
| C．They flash the green light when the order is finished. |
| D．They can tell customers where to find what they want. |
| A．It may reduce the cost of running a store greatly. |
| B．It is likely to help retailers to think differently. |
| C．It has attracted many more retailers than before. |
| D．It costs much more than their shopping carts. |
| A．That goods in the stores may be more expensive. |
| B．That they can only buy goods online. |
| C．That somebody may know their privacy. |
| D．That they have to wait in a line for a longer time. |
| A．The new technology improves retail sale. |
| B．Smart shopping carts will let you skip the line. |
| C．Al-powered cameras are used in retail stores. |
| D．Artificial intelligence affects the future of job market. |
3 . Technology is more than an abstract concept associated with advanced tools and systems. It also shapes the way people behave, grow and develop, both within their own lives and in their relationships with others. While technology has developed over thousands of years, the last century has seen an explosion in technology that has influenced fundamental changes in how humans see the world and interact with others. Specifically, the Internet and mobile devices have completely changed the way people interact with each other. There has been a debate going on whether technology is benefiting human communication or ruining it.
Undoubtedly, technology is helping people build newer and necessary communication skills. In business, office employees and managers use technology to send emails to one another, which is considered a communication skill. On social media, just share a few of your images and people start communicating on and about your images according to their viewpoint. With the outbreak of COVID-19, in order to work on the projects, the students use their phones to reach their teachers and classmates.
However, technology is sometimes considered to disconnect people from others around them. With cell phones, most people think that it’s easier and more convenient to text instead of meeting in person. Lucas Lengacher, an undergraduate from Huntington University , claims in his article that at least 42.91% people respond to messages immediately yet only 2.83% people don’t check their phones in the morning. In his research he found that “almost 60 percent of people felt disconnected from others around when they were on their phones”.
1. Human interaction has been basically influenced by ______.| A．people’s relationships | B．social systems |
| C．mobile devices | D．communication skills |
| A．By analyzing data. | B．By providing cases. |
| C．By defining a concept. | D．By making comparisons. |
| A．Phones disconnect us when we are together. |
| B．Phones are becoming more and more popular. |
| C．People communicate less because of physical distance. |
| D．Phones are helping people build newer communication skills. |
| A．Positive. | B．Skeptical. | C．Objective. | D．Indifferent. |
4 . Every Saturday night, all through that lazy spring, I used to take a rose to Miss Caroline Wellford. Every Saturday night, rain or shine, at exactly eight o’clock.
Miss Caroline was abandoned by her future husband Jeffrey Pinniman, who married Christine Marlowe, a younger and prettier girl. It almost became a scandal (丑闻) in our town. Miss Caroline could hear unkind things about her everywhere she went. For six months she had shut herself up in her house and seemed determined to turn herself into an odd old maid. She looked like a ghost that night when I delivered the first rose. “Hello, Jimmy,” she said listlessly (无精打采地). When I handed her the box, she looked shocked — “For me?”
Again the next Saturday, at exactly the same time, I found myself delivering another rose to Miss Caroline. The third time she opened the door so quickly that I knew she must have been waiting. There was a little color in her cheeks and her hair no longer looked so straggly (散乱地).
The morning after my fourth trip to her house, Miss Caroline played the organ again in church. She held her head high with the rose pinned to her blouse. Week after week I delivered the rose, and gradually Miss Caroline returned her normal life.
When I made my final trip to Miss Caroline’s house, I said, as I handed her the box, “This is the last time I’ll bring this, Miss Caroline.” She hesitated and invited me to come in and handed me a model of a sailing ship, exquisitely (精巧地) carved. She said. “I’d like you to have it. You’ve brought me great happiness, Jimmy — you and your roses.”
Fleeing back to the shop, I looked in the file where Mr. Olsen kept his untidy records, and I found what I was looking for. “Pinniman,” it said.
The years went by, and one day I came again to Olsen’s flower shop. My old boss and I talked a while. Out of curiosity, I asked, “D’you suppose that Mrs. Pinniman ever knew her husband was sending flowers to his old flame?” “Jeffrey Pinniman never even knew about it.” Mr. Olsen smiled, “It is a lady who said she wasn’t going to sit around watching Miss Caroline make a martyr (长期受折磨者) of herself at her expense.”
1. Who is the person that sent the rose?| A．Miss Caroline. | B．Mrs. Pinniman. | C．Mr. Olsen. | D．Jeffery Pinniman. |
| A．Deserted by her husband, Caroline lived in a mess. |
| B．People in the town all show great sympathy for Miss Caroline. |
| C．Jimmy had thought Jeffery Pinniman sent roses to Miss Caroline. |
| D．Christine put an end to the marriage of Miss Caroline and Jeffery Pinniman. |
| A．Kind and considerate. | B．Awful and selfish. |
| C．Active and helpful. | D．Thoughtful and patient. |
| A．A poor woman. | B．A special Saturday night. |
| C．A rose from a stranger. | D．A rose for Miss Caroline. |
5 . Working at an investment bank in New York City in the mid-2010s. Anna Sacks was living the life—just not the life she wanted. Sure, she was happy. But she wanted to do something that felt important and was fulfilling on a deeper level.
Sacks packed up her life and moved to Connecticut for three months to participate in Adamah, a Jewish farming program that focuses on sustainable living and growing sustainable food. The Adamah program opened Sacks’s eyes to the damage consumer culture is doing on a local, national, and global level, and the need to find solutions. From then on, she began what she calls “trash (垃圾) walking.”
While walking around her neighborhood, Sacks, 31, picked through rubbish to look for reusable items. Soon, her trash walks expanded to include company rubbish along with residential trash. Surprisingly, she discovered a wide range of really great stuff—like clothing, dinnerware, and food—all of which she documents on Instagram and TikTok.
Under the name The Trash Walker, Sacks quickly gained popularity for her educational, funny, and surprising videos that highlight the problems with consumerism and share information about how to live a more sustainable life. “The root issue is overproduction, which leads to overconsumption, which leads to a large amount of waste,” she says. Sacks’s videos have gone viral many times, causing shockwaves through the industries she calls out.
Trash walking has given Sacks a nearly endless supply and she shares much of her “treasure” with others. She tries giving them informally to family, friends, or individuals she knows may need a specific item. Then she takes the remaining items to free stores so other New Yorkers can benefit from her treasure-hunting.
Sacks’s main focus is simply getting people to pay attention to how many unnecessary things they buy and then throw away. “Once you become aware of the way you consume, you can see ways you improve,” she says.
1. What inspired Sacks to begin her “trash walking”?| A．Her desire to live a richer life. | B．The great need for household stuff. |
| C．Her involvement in a project. | D．The wish to be an Internet star. |
| A．Funny stories. | B．Views on consumption. |
| C．Educational courses. | D．Solutions to problems. |
| A．She donates all to the charity. | B．She keeps most for her family. |
| C．She gives away much to others. | D．She sells some to individuals. |
| A．Trash Walker: Find Treasure in Trash. |
| B．Trash Walking: A Tough Journey. |
| C．Trash Walker: Live in the Moment. |
| D．Trash Walking: A New Career. |
6 . Wild turkeys are a familiar sight throughout New Hampshire, where flocks wander along roadsides and through backyards.
In 1975, Ted Walski, the biologist for New Hampshire Fish and Game, released 25 turkeys from the back of his truck in Walpole, a town in the western part of the state. It was part of a reintroduction effort to bring back a species that had been wiped out in New England before the Civil War, where it used to suffer heavy blows — forests vanished for unknown reasons and people got their own way to hunt.
“Originally, I never thought it would get beyond a few thousand turkeys,” says Walski, who spent nearly 50 years working with the birds before retiring in 2019.
Instead, New Hampshire’s turkey population has exploded beyond all expectations, now around 45,000 animals — the highest since the reintroduction, and probably the most the state can approach. Reintroduction efforts in neighboring states and around the country have created a similar story — there are 70,000 wild turkeys in Maine, up to 50,000 in Vermont, and more than 30,000 in Massachusetts — all of which total up to about six million animals reproducing in all states but Alaska.
So what made the wild turkey one of the most successful wildlife reintroduction programs in American history? Most likely, it’s due to the bird’s surprising and unexpected ability to live among humans. In the suburbs, turkeys can take advantage of edge habitat, like woods and open spaces, and dine on a never-ending buffet of food provided by people — particularly birdseed. Besides, it doesn’t hurt that native predators, such as wolves and cougars, have largely disappeared from most parts of the turkey’s range.
But everyone is not thankful for the New England turkey boom. The infamously bold birds are troublesome, disturbing traffic and pecking at front doors, as well as potentially dangerous. In 2019, a 35-year-old pregnant woman was attacked by turkeys on the streets of Cambridge, Massachusetts — twice. As conflicts between these 20-pound birds and people are on the rise, particularly during the spring breeding season, wildlife officials are trying to cope with the reality that the turkey is here to stay.
1. What had made turkeys extinct in New England before the Civil War?| A．Disappearing forests and unrestricted hunting. |
| B．Ted Walski’s reintroduction policy and its effects. |
| C．Turkeys’ inability to reproduce and coexist with humans. |
| D．Native predators’ occupation of most parts of turkeys’ range. |
| A．Their explosive population is completely out of the control of New Hampshire. |
| B．The number of wild turkeys amounts to around six million in Alaska. |
| C．Their abilities to reproduce fall short of people’s expectations. |
| D．They feed on adequate food from human beings. |
| A．It is urgent to protect wild turkeys from being attacked. |
| B．Turkeys are posing a potential threat to natural environment. |
| C．Nobody appreciates the increase in turkeys due to their evil deeds. |
| D．Measures will be taken to tackle conflicts between turkeys and humans. |
| A．New England witnesses a turkey boom but not all appreciate it. |
| B．The wildlife reintroduction program of wild turkeys is quite successful. |
| C．Wild turkeys’ sharp increase does harm to human beings and environment. |
| D．There is a contradictory relationship between wild turkeys and human beings. |
7 . Two things changed my life: my mother and a white plastic bike basket. I have thought long and hard about it and it’s true. I would be a different person if my mom hadn’t turned a silly bicycle accessory into a life lesson that I carry with me today.
My mother and father were united in their way of raising children, but it mostly fell to my mother to actually carry it out. Looking back, I honestly don’t know how she did it. Managing the family budget must have been a very hard task, but she made it look effortless. If we complained about not having what another kid did, we’d hear something like, “I don’t care what so-and-so got for his birthday, you are not getting a TV in your room, a car for your birthday or a lavish sweet-16 party.” We had to earn our allowance by doing chores around the house. I can still remember how long it took to polish the legs of our coffee table. My brothers can no doubt remember hours spent cleaning the house. Like the two little girls growing up at the White House, we made our own beds (no one left the house until that was done) and picked up after ourselves. We had to keep track of our belongings, and if something was lost, it was not replaced.
It was summer and, one day, my mother drove me to the bike shop to get a tire fixed — and there it was in the window. White, shiny, plastic and decorated with flowers, the basket winked at me and I knew — I knew — I had to have it.
“It’s beautiful,” my mother said when I pointed it out to her. “What a neat basket.”
I tried to hold off at first. I played it cool for a short while. But then I guess I couldn’t stand it any longer: “Mom, please can I please, please get it? I’ll do extra chores for as long as you say. I’ll do anything, but I need that basket. I love that basket. Please, Mom. Please?”
I was desperate.
“ You know,” she said, gently rubbing my back while we both stared at what I believed was the coolest thing ever, “If you save up you could buy this yourself.”
“By the time I make enough it’ll be gone!”
“Maybe Roger here could hold it for you,” she smiled at Roger, the bike guy.
“He can’t hold it for that long, Mom. Someone else will buy it. Please, Mom, please?” “There might be another way,” she said.
And so our paying plan unfolded. My mother bought the beautiful basket and put it safely in some hiding place I couldn’t find. Each week I eagerly counted my growing savings increased by extra work here and there (washing the car, helping my mother make dinner, delivering or collecting things on my bike that already looked naked without the basket in front). And then, weeks later, I counted, re-counted and jumped for joy. Oh, happy day! I made it! I finally had the exact amount we’d agreed upon....
Days later the unthinkable happened. A neighborhood girl I’d played with millions of times appeared with the exact same basket fixed to her shiny, new bike that already had all the bells and whistles. I rode hard and fast home to tell my mother about this disaster. This horrible turn of events.
And then came the lesson I’ve taken with me through my life: “Honey, your basket is extra-special,” Mom said, gently wiping away my hot tears. “Your basket is special because you paid for it yourself.”
1. What can we learn from the first two paragraphs?| A．The mother raised her children in an unusual way. |
| B．The writer envied the daughters of the U.S. president. |
| C．The writer’s parents shared the duty to bring up children. |
| D．Managing budget is an effortless job to most housewives. |
| A．well worth the effort she had made | B．the most valuable she had ever obtained |
| C．an unnecessary accessory to her bike | D．something the bike couldn’t do without |
| A．the basket cost more than she had saved |
| B．someone else had got a basket of the same kind |
| C．her paying plan was spoiled |
| D．a neighborhood girl bought a nicer bike |
| A．Save money for a rainy day. | B．Good advice is beyond all price. |
| C．Earn your bread with your sweat. | D．God helps those who help themselves. |
8 . I was born in a poor community on the north side of Boston, US, raised by a single mother who didn’t finish 3rd grade, lived each day on food stamps and attended what the media called “the most dysfunctional (功能失调的) public school district”. Not many people expected much of me, so I had to expect.
On my 13th birthday, I bought a poster of Harvard to hang in my room. Being at Harvard became what I dreamt about. Even if my electricity was cut off, I still woke up at 5:30, because I knew that my poster of Harvard was still hanging only two feet away from me.
Reminding myself of my goal each day made it easy to say no to the same choices I saw my peers making, because those paths wouldn’t have had me closer to my goal. Being poor could not take away my power to decide what I choose to do with my day. The poster gave me the courage to send emails to about 50 Harvard students to ask for feedback on my application essays; it gave me the energy to study just one more hour on my SATs when my friends were asleep; and it gave me the determination to submit just one more scholarship application when 180 others had already turned me down.
Every day, I could feel myself getting closer and closer to my goal as my writing got better, my SAT score increased, and my scholarship checks started coming in. Finally, an email arrived from Harvard. The first word was “Congratulations!” A month later, Harvard flew me up to visit the campus where for the first time I stepped onto my dreaming land.
Who you are today is the result of the decisions you made yesterday, and who you will be tomorrow will be the result of the choices you make today. Who do you want to be tomorrow?
1. What can we learn about the author from the first two paragraphs?| A．All people expected too much of him. |
| B．He grew up in a happy family. |
| C．He accepted the greatest education. |
| D．He had high expectation of himself. |
| A．He spent more time preparing for the exams. |
| B．He learnt from his peers from time to time. |
| C．He often wrote feedbacks on others’ essays. |
| D．He turned to his teacher when facing problems. |
| A．Intelligent and humorous. | B．Generous and selfless. |
| C．Determined and hardworking. | D．Courageous and friendly. |
| A．Failure is the mother of success. |
| B．Perseverance can help realize your dream. |
| C．Easier said than done. |
| D．It’s never too late to study. |
9 . The Best Free Tourist Places in America
Alaska: Anchorage Market and Festival
Although Anchorage isn’t the capital of Alaska, it is the state’s largest city with the largest population. The Anchorage Market and Festival is open and free of charge on weekends. Anchorage is at the beginning of the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail, where walks can last between two hours and a half. It’s free, of course.
Arkansas: Walmart Museum
Lying in the northwest corner of Arkansas is Bentonville, which gave birth to a little mall you may have heard of. It's Walmart, one of the biggest companies in the world at present. It is free to visit the Walmart Museum, which attracts thousands of visitors every year. And just outside the town is the well-known Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, which is also free.
Connecticut: Yale University
New Haven, Connecticut was the first place in the U.S. to offer pizza to the hungry and the homeless, including students of Yale University. While in New Haven you can go on a tour of the campus, where many beautiful buildings have existed for a long time. It’s the university where President Bushes, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Journalist Bob Woodward, and Samuel F.B. Morse studied.
Kansas: Santa Fe Trail
Western Kansas has very little light pollution. So as you travel along, stop once in a while and stare at the night sky. The Santa Fe Trail goes through Kansas and you can still walk the longest remaining distance of the road just outside Dodge City.
1. What may especially attract visitors to Bentonville?| A．The chance to get free pizza. | B．The chance to get trained in a large company. |
| C．The chance to get a good knowledge of Walmart. | D．The chance to join interesting festivals. |
| A．Play games with students of Yale. | B．Shake hands with famous people. |
| C．Admire old buildings. | D．Attend some free parties. |
| A．Bentonville. | B．Western Kansas. | C．Anchorage. | D．New Haven. |
10 . How much do you love animals? Maybe not as much as photographer Joel Sartore. He is traveling the world to take pictures of as many animals as he can find, which allows people to focus on the beauty and uniqueness of each animal.
Sartore is working to take photos of all 20,000 different types of animals living in the world’s zoos, aquariums (水族馆) and wildlife shelters. And he’s already taken nearly 15,000! He hopes his photos will raise awareness of these planet’s most endangered creatures, and that he can document them before they’re gone. “My job is to tell their stories and hope that the world cares in time,” he told The Weather Channel in 2022.
Sartore calls his project the Photo Ark, like the story of Noah’s Ark, in which a large boat is built to save every type of animal in the world from a flood. He founded the Photo Ark in 2006 in his hometown of Lincoln, Nebraska.
He doesn’t just take his animal photos in the usual zoo environment, however — he puts each animal on a black or white background with studio lights. This helps him photograph their true colors, and lets people see a little mouse as clearly as a big elephant — and look each animal right in the eye. “When people connect to animals through eye contact, we’ve got a real chance at changing human behavior,” Sartore says.
The response has indeed been huge. Sartore has more than 1.6 million followers online and a best-selling series of Photo Ark books. He asks people to buy his books and photos, give money to the Photo Ark, and support zoos, aquariums and wildlife shelters near where they live.
1. According to the text, Sartore needs to take another ______ photos for his project.| A．5,000 | B．10,000 | C．15,000 | D．20,000 |
| A．To make a living in this way. | B．To help save animals in danger. |
| C．To meet his own interest in animals. | D．To offer another way to learn about animals. |
| A．Some are black and white. | B．They are about animals in danger. |
| C．They were taken in the natural habitat. | D．Some were taken in designed environment. |
| A．Unclear. | B．Doubtful. | C．Supportive. | D．Disappointed. |
