1 . China is one of the world’s ancient civilizations and has the earliest outstanding bronze casting technology. Here we’ve created a list of 4 museums where you can gain an in-depth understanding of Chinese bronze.
Sanxingdui Museum
Address: Sanxingdui Ruin Site, 133 Xian Road, Guanghan, Deyang, Sichuan province
Hours: Comprehensive Gallery (the first exhibition hall): 8:30-18:00; Bronze Gallery (the second exhibition hall): 8:30-18:30. Last tickets sold at 17:00. Closed on the morning of Chinese New Year’s Eve
Ticket booking: 0838-5651526
General admission: Gallery ticket 80 yuan
Note: Children shorter than 1.2m (including 1.2m) can visit the gallery free of charge. The ticket must be used on the day it is sold and authorizes one visit to each gallery.
National Museum of China
Address: East side of Tian’anmen Square, Dongcheng district, Beijing
Hours: 8:30-17:00 (no entry after 16:30)
General admission: Free (passport required for entry), Closed Mondays (except for national holidays)
E-mail: webmaster@chnmuseum.cn
Shanghai Museum
Address: 201 Renmin Avenue, Huangpu district, Shanghai
Hours: 9:00-17:00 (no entry after 16:00), Closed Mondays (except for national holidays)
E-mail: webmaster@shanghai-museum.org
General admission: free (a max of 8, 000 admitted daily)
Hunan Museum
Address: 50 Dongfeng Road, Changsha, Hunan province
Hours: 9:00-17:00 (no entry after 16:00), Closed Mondays (except for national holidays) and the eve of Chinese New Year
Tel: (+86-731) 8415833, 84475933
E-mail: web@hnmuseum.com
General admission: Free (passport required for entry)
1. Which museum should you choose for your family to visit next Monday?A.Sanxingdui Museum | B.Hunan Museum |
C.Shanghai Museum | D.National Museum of China |
A.They are all free of charge. | B.They all set a deadline for entry. |
C.They all lie in the south of China. | D.They can all be available through E-mail. |
A.Science | B.Today’s News | C.Entertainment | D.History and Culture |
2 . After three decades of teaching, Jim Stanley, a chorus and piano teacher at Cartersville High School in Cartersville, Georgia, Atlanta, is getting ready to retire. But before he goes, there was one thing he wanted to do:
Stanley
Little did he
“I choked up a little bit. But I tried to keep the
Stanley was
A.exclaimed | B.restored | C.reunite | D.fortified |
A.came out | B.calmed down | C.came true | D.woke up |
A.viral | B.artificial | C.rewarding | D.accessible |
A.stood by | B.came up with | C.resulted in | D.learned from |
A.entering | B.thinking | C.confirming | D.showing |
A.melody | B.emphasis | C.association | D.opportunity |
A.mistake | B.launch | C.witness | D.know |
A.gathering | B.jumping | C.winning | D.singing |
A.swam | B.flew | C.bounded | D.sought |
A.tears | B.ban | C.emotion | D.happiness |
A.definitely | B.tightly | C.violently | D.deeply |
A.smart | B.loyal | C.delightful | D.difficult |
A.sent | B.inspired | C.achieved | D.reserved |
A.acceptance | B.arrival | C.charm | D.encouragement |
A.encounter | B.count | C.impact | D.mess |
3 . There’s a new AI bot: ChatGPT, and you’d better pay attention, even if you aren’t into artificial intelligence. The tool is an AI chatbot system that OpenAI released in November 2022 to show off and test what a very large, powerful AI system can achieve.
ChatGPT remembers the thread of your dialogue, using previous questions and answers to inform its next responses. It derives its answers from huge volumes of information on the Internet. ChatGPT is built on top of the OpenAI GPT-3 family of large language models and is fine-tuned (a method of transfer learning) using both supervised and reinforcement learning (监督和强化学习).
You can ask ChatGPT anything, like explaining physics, asking for birthday party ideas and getting programming (编程) help. Perhaps it’s not smart enough to replace all humans yet, but it can be creative, and its answers can sound downright authoritative. A few days after its launch, more than 1 million people were trying out ChatGPT. UBS analyst Lloyd Walmsley estimated in February 2023 that ChatGPT reached 100 million monthly users in January, accomplishing in 2 months what took TikTok about 9 months and Instagram two and a half years.
ChatGPT is free to use at the moment because it is still in its research phase. But when too many people hop onto the server (服务器), it overloads and can’t process your request. It just means you should try visiting the site at a later time when fewer people are trying to access it. If you want to skip the wait and have reliable access, there is an option for you. As of Feb. 1, 2023, OpenAI has a ChatGPT pro plan, ChatGPT Plus, which allows users to have general access even during peak times. This service does come at a cost of $20/month.
However, ChatGPT can not replace Google. ChatGPT is an artificial intelligence bot that provides solutions to your questions, but Google is a search engine in which you can search for as much information as possible. ChatGPT has limited knowledge due to its programming but Google has unlimited knowledge which is updated every day.
1. What does paragraph 2 mainly tell us about ChatGPT?A.Its language model. | B.Its working theory. |
C.Its design inspiration. | D.Its development process. |
A.To show the popularity of ChatGPT. |
B.To stress the high cost of inventing ChatGPT. |
C.To present the creativity of artificial intelligence. |
D.To prove the necessity of developing tools for chatting online. |
A.Guiding users to experience free services. |
B.Allowing net surfers to skip advertisements. |
C.Helping researchers detect the failure of the system. |
D.Offering consumers priority access during peak hours. |
A.It operates based on limited data. |
B.It takes more time to search for solutions. |
C.It can only update information at a fixed time. |
D.It may provide replies unrelated to the questions. |
4 . Exercise can mean a lot of things to a lot of people, so there are a lot of great reasons to exercise.
Sometimes exercise can feel like a bit of a
I have had depression a couple of times and I also have general anxiety disorder. I found that longboarding around the city really
When I was 23, my grandpa sadly passed away. Hearing my mom’s message, I was
A.desire | B.disaster | C.reality | D.task |
A.reasons | B.treatments | C.theories | D.origins |
A.ensure | B.donate | C.transform | D.permit |
A.appreciate | B.attach | C.confirm | D.reduce |
A.reducing | B.targeting | C.remaining | D.challenging |
A.improved | B.exhausted | C.recognized | D.prepared |
A.piece | B.period | C.group | D.number |
A.swimming | B.jogging | C.running | D.climbing |
A.accident | B.cure | C.failure | D.disease |
A.resolved | B.destroyed | C.conducted | D.stimulated |
A.fought for | B.stood for | C.paid for | D.applied for |
A.picnic | B.swim | C.run | D.walk |
A.lacked | B.lost | C.beat | D.folded |
A.actually | B.currently | C.probably | D.suddenly |
A.deepens | B.strengthens | C.releases | D.shapes |
5 . My 7-year-old daughter Leeny always has her nose in a book. She even took to reading in the car on the long drive to summer camp, which was where she lost the book. This is the first lost library book in my life. My family has always been over-educated, but we were poor. I didn’t own books. I borrowed books. However, my daughters have more books now than I owned my whole childhood, and I knowingly contribute to it by adding to the stacks (堆). So it’s probably my fault that when Leeny realized she had lost the book, she shrugged. “Sorry. I can’t find it,” she said. “It’s only $20, right? What’s the big deal?”
I felt the need to make her feel responsible for the book. She agreed to help me clean the chicken coop (笼子) in trade for my paying the library fine. I thought this idea was very clever because cleaning the coop is some work I had been avoiding for months. It was summertime and dust floated in the air. But my girl, my animal-loving mini-me, thought shoveling chicken poop (铲鸡粪) was the most fun she’d had on a Saturday morning in a long time. She didn’t feel any of the emotions that punishment is supposed to introduce. In fact, she looked as if she might lose another on purpose in order to clean the coop again. I stood, somewhat dumbfounded (目瞪口呆的), watching her.
It took me a while to realize what had happened, why my punishment had failed so completely and why I didn’t care. The fact is that I had Leeny help me clean the chicken coop. I was there, too, shoveling chicken poop, fetching the clean straw and feed. Leen’s little sister, Vicki, was inside watching a cartoon while my husband paid bills. Only Leeny and I were outside. She had me all to herself for the first time since Vicki was born, and she was enjoying all the attention for once. I don’t know what she learned about responsibility, but I found that I didn’t care about the book any more. We bonded over that unpleasant job and spent quality time together: mother, daughter, and chicken poop.
1. How did Leeny find reading?A.It was very challenging. | B.It was of great value. |
C.It was full of enjoyment. | D.It cost a large fortune. |
A.The author didn’t own many books. |
B.Leeny feel irresponsible for the lost book. |
C.The author’s daughters own too many books. |
D.The author could never have enough books to read. |
A.Ashamed. | B.Astonished. | C.Embarrassed. | D.Upset. |
A.What I owe to Leeny is more attention. |
B.My punishment failed, but I didn’t care. |
C.My daughter drove me crazy, but I felt grateful. |
D.What my daughter loves is cleaning chicken coops. |
6 . English is full of funny expressions that don’t always make sense. Idioms are phrases and sentences that do not mean exactly what they say. Even if you know the meaning of each word, you may not understand the idiom because you don’t understand the culture behind it. Here are some English idioms based on animals.
When children jump around and act silly, their parents may tell them to stop “monkeying around”.To “monkey around” means to do things that are not useful or serious, or to simply waste time.
Many American families have and love pet dogs. But for some unknown reason, Americans use “dog” in a phrase that means to feel unwell. If you are “as sick as a dog”, you’re really, really sick.
Sometimes you may also hear cats mentioned in conversations, “I told you to keep that secret, but you have just ‘let the cat out of the bag’!” You probably guessed it — that idiom means to reveal a secret or tell facts that were previously unknown.
Dogs and cats don’t always get along, but they appear side by side in a commonly used idiom. When it rains heavily, people might say it’s “raining cats and dogs”.
Heavy rain often ruins people’s plans for outdoor activities. But on a lovely day, you can have a picnic. If a swarm (一群) of tiny bugs love your food and start to hover (盘旋) around you, it would be really annoying. That experience perfectly explains why people often tell someone who keeps bothering them to “stop bugging me”.
Idioms are very common in both spoken and written English. If you want to have a better understanding of English, you have to learn idioms.
1. According to Paragraph 1, which is right about idioms?A.Expressions which are based on animals. |
B.Expressions with rich cultural background. |
C.Expressions that always make sense. |
D.Expressions which are easy to understand. |
A.Children jump around and waste time. |
B.Children do something useful and serious. |
C.Children play with monkeys with their parents. |
D.Children spend time playing with their family pets. |
A.Dogs and cats always get along nicely. |
B.Bugs can be used to show your annoyance. |
C.Americans believe cats can give away secrets. |
D.Americans use the idiom “as sick as a dog” to describe a healthy man. |
A.By sharing experiences. |
B.By making comparisons. |
C.By giving examples. |
D.By listing figures. |
7 . Scientists at the Sanxingdui Ruins in southwest China’s Sichuan Province continue to unearth over 500 relics from an ancient Chinese civilization that dates back over 3,000 years.
The findings unearthed in June include a fully preserved gold mask, which stands at 37. 2cm wide and16. 5cm tall. The new gold mask reminded people of the one found in March, which was far more damaged. Scientists said the gold mask is the largest, and most well preserved, of similar golden relics discovered at the Sanxingdui Ruins, and it is consistent with the idea that gold was important to people of the area called the Shu state.
The gold mask has similar facial features to bronze statues discovered in the area. It has large eyes covering much of the face, a big nose, huge ears and a flat, wide mouth. The strange facial features led some people to suggest they were aliens. However, Wang Wei, the director of the Institute of Archaeology at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, explained, “There is no chance that Sanxingdui belongs to an alien civilization. These wide-eyed masks look strange because the makers wanted to copy the look of deities (神灵). They shouldn’t be considered as the look of everyday people.”
Besides the mask, other discoveries included bronze statues, a knife made out of jade and a series of relics made of ivory, among many others. Many of the bronze relics are brand new discoveries and unique to anything found before in China. Chinese scientists said they are highly detailed, with statues showing facial features that fit well with the gold mask, which make them as valuable resources for the research of ancient Shu and give better perceptiveness about the ancient Shu state, home to a mysterious civilization until the recent discoveries proved its existence. Chinese scientists believe they are entering a “key stage” and expect to find a series of relics that will change how people think about ancient China.
1. What do we know about the gold mask from paragraph 2?A.It was discovered in March. |
B.It was the first to be dug at the site. |
C.It is the most complete relic ever discovered. |
D.It is the largest size of its kind unearthed at the site. |
A.The significance of the gold mask. |
B.The characteristics of the gold mask. |
C.The findings in the Sanxingdui Ruins. |
D.The digging process of the Sanxingdui Ruins. |
A.Insight. | B.Civilization. |
C.Development. | D.Introduction. |
A.An Ancient Shu State Was Newly Discovered |
B.Mysterious Sanxingdui Ruins Reveal More Relics |
C.Sichuan Province Is the Birthplace of a New Civilization |
D.New Sanxingdui Ruins Catch the Attention of Chinese scientists |
8 . Last week my cousin asked me, “What do you want to have when you get rich?”
I thought about it, and answered, “I want to have a library in my own house.” My cousin laughed, “You are a crazy girl. There are so many people who won’t even let you study, yet you are thinking about having your own library.”
His words reminded me of a day when I was in second grade. I was walking to school carrying my books when a man came up to me and grabbed my books. He tore them into pieces and left.
Afraid, I ran toward school, crying. I was still crying in the corner of the classroom until my teacher Mrs. Smith came over and asked me why. I told her what had happened. Mrs. Smith kissed me on my cheeks and asked me if I understood why the man tore up my books. She said, “Because they are frightened of you and that someday you will recognize who they are and what is right and what is not. Your books are weapons(武器) that you can use to get an education and become more powerful. The more you use them, the more you will be able to defend yourself and prove them wrong.”
Now I am older and I know that people like that man are the opposite of a literate (有文化的) woman. Our education is our power over them. And I will keep dreaming of a library at home.
To pick up books and draw the power of knowledge from them can fight against fear and inequality in life, and can give us the courage to hold on to our dreams.
1. What does the author dream of?A.Getting rich. | B.Defeating the men. |
C.Having a big house. | D.Having a library at home. |
A.She dropped out of school. |
B.She was teased by her cousin. |
C.Her books were robbed of and torn. |
D.She fought against a man for her books. |
A.The teacher was wise and caring. |
B.The author had proven the man wrong. |
C.The author used books as weapons to fight. |
D.The teacher blamed her due to losing books. |
A.Knowledge is power. | B.Experience must be bought. |
C.All roads lead to Rome. | D.Fear always springs from ignorance. |
9 . Featured Bike Tours in Italy
Lake Como & the Italian Lake District
Italy’s Lake Com o tour is deeply loved by cyclists. Among dramatic hills and waters, riding is relatively easy along flat bike paths and breathtaking valleys. The beautiful waters of three major lakes — Garda, Iseo and Como — are never far from sight as you sample good wines in Franciacorta.
Daily Mileage:7 — 32 miles
Cycling Level: Moderate
Cost: $395
Tuscany, Lucca to Siena
On this self-guided bicycling vacation, you’ll ride from Lucca to Siena at your own pace. Visit Leonardo da Vinci’s hometown of Vinci. Ride into the famous wine region of Chianti. Stay in welcoming hotels along the way.
Daily Mileage: 3 — 40 miles
Cycling Level: Moderate /Challenging
Cost:$265
Valleys of the Dolomites
Road cycling the Dolomites was never easier, as you ride along mostly flat or downhill bike paths. Along the way, you’ll explore historic cities, and meet an ancient culture found nowhere else on Earth. You’ll also be fueled by local meals and end each day in 4-star accommodations!
Daily Mileage: 4 — 36 miles
Cycling Level: Easy
Cost: $595
Coastal Villages of Tuscany
Tuscany’s amazingly beautiful coast begs to be explored by bicycle. Beautiful towns dot (星罗棋布于) the countryside, surrounded by trees that hug the waters of the Tyrrhenian Sea. At the end of each day, you can relax in the natural pool and springs of an Etruscan caldarium (高温浴室).
Daily Mileage: 8 — 39 miles
Cycling Level: Moderate
Cost:$475
1. Which of the following tours charges the lowest fee?
A.Valleys of the Dolomites. | B.Coastal Villages of Tuscany. |
C.Tuscany, Lucca to Siena. | D.Lake Como & the Italian Lake District. |
A.Bathe in natural springs. | B.Enjoy beautiful lake scenes. |
C.Stay in 4-star accommodations. | D.Visit Leonardo da Vinci’s hometown. |
A.In a travel brochure. | B.In a research paper. |
C.In a science magazine. | D.In a geography textbook. |
10 . While I was riding bike, I noticed a man about a half mile in front of me. He was traveling at a lower speed. I decided to
I started to ride faster, and every block, I
After 1 made it, I
Isn’t that what
We spend most of our time and energy competing with others instead of reaching our
Feel
A.stop | B.approach | C.pass | D.follow |
A.immediately | B.gradually | C.slowly | D.quickly |
A.gave way to | B.took control of | C.made fun of | D.caught up with |
A.anxious | B.positive | C.aware | D.doubtful |
A.professional | B.champion | C.loser | D.fighter |
A.identified | B.expected | C.realized | D.observed |
A.missed | B.reached | C.taken | D.made |
A.hides | B.matters | C.impresses | D.exists |
A.concentrated | B.successful | C.careful | D.concerned |
A.never | B.likely | C.still | D.hardly |
A.neighbourhood | B.destination | C.power | D.turn |
A.Illegal | B.Equal | C.Unhealthy | D.Fair |
A.ahead of | B.next to | C.together with | D.far behind |
A.responsible | B.confident | C.graceful | D.grateful |
A.challenge | B.determination | C.path | D.wisdom |