1 . Paper-cut is a very special visual art of Chinese handicrafts. One saying is that it originated from the religious ceremonies or offering sacrifices (祭祀). The ancient people cut papers into animals or people. They either buried them with the dead or burned them on the funerals (葬礼), wishing things that paper stood for could be with the dead. Later, they were used during festivals to decorate gates and windows. After hundreds of years' progress, now they have become a very popular means of decoration among country folk, especially women.
It is easy to learn about cutting a piece of paper but very difficult to master it with perfection. Beginners need only a knife and paper. For craftsman, they need knives and gravers of various types to make complicated (复杂的) patterns. It can be one piece of paper or many pieces. Simple patterns can be cut with a knife. For complicated patterns, people first pasted(粘贴)the pattern on the paper and then used various kinds of knives to make it. No mistake can be made during the process otherwise the work would fail.
Paper cutting covers nearly all topics, from flowers, birds, animals, admirable people, figures in classic novels, to types of facial make-up in Peking opera. Paper cutting has various styles in different parts of China.
In the past, women living in the countryside gathered in their free time to make paper cutting, which is a way to judge their skillfulness. As society develops, fewer and fewer people learn this skill while there are some who still regard it as a profession. At present, there are factories and associations for paper cutting in China. Exhibitions and exchanges are held regularly and books of this kind are published. Paper cutting has changed from decoration to a kind of art. At the same time, paper cutting also appears in cartoons, on stage, in magazines or in TV series.
1. What may be the origin of paper-cut according to the text?| A．Special visual art. | B．Ancient story. | C．Traditional customs. | D．Religious activities. |
| A．Becoming a paper cutting artist is very easy. |
| B．Making a perfect paper cutting needs great patience and skill. |
| C．Paper cutting is limited to some topics. |
| D．Paper cutting in different parts of China has similar styles. |
| A．More and more people regard paper cutting as a profession. |
| B．Paper cutting is in danger of disappearing in the future. |
| C．Paper cutting is a way to judge a woman's skill. |
| D．Paper cutting as an art form is still very popular today. |
| A．A special kind of art form in China. | B．Some ancient religious ceremonies. |
| C．Various things are made of paper. | D．Decoration of festivals in ancient China. |
2 . I am an e-mail user. When I first started to use the e-mail system, I used to read all my e-mail. I didn't have much mail. I gave my friends my e-mail address. Soon I had more mail than wanted. Some of the mail was junk mail. I was worried. I didn't want my mail to control me.
I've tried some methods to help me get control of my mail. First, I check my mail at the same time every day. Also, I try to allow myself only 15~20 minutes every day to process my email. This doesn't always work, but I try. Sometimes I save the messages. Sometimes I read them, maybe answer a few, and then delete them.
Sometimes I get some junk mail that I'm not interested in at all, I don't even open it. I usually delete it right away. This is very much the way I go through the mail that the postal service delivers to my home.
These methods are very simple. I have some friends who are very clever with computers. From time to time, they teach me new tricks for managing my e-mail. I'm still amazed at what email can do for me! I'm still worried, however, about having too much to read.
1. Why did the author use to read all his e mails?| A．He was forced to do that. | B．He didn't have much mail. |
| C．He had nothing else to do. | D．He didn't know how to read mail. |
| A．Saving it sometimes. | B．Deleting it immediately. |
| C．Reading and answering it. | D．Passing it on to his friends. |
| A．By the help of his friends. | B．By the methods from mail. |
| C．By checking messages. | D．By controlling computers. |
| A．Worries about using mail. | B．The happiness of using mail. |
| C．Methods of dealing with mail. | D．Persuasions to avoid using mail. |
3 . If you're planning to go on a diet, or if you suffer from serious conditions like diabetes (糖尿病), knowing exactly what and how much you're eating is essential. In this day and age, we have calorie and nutritional calculators even on our smartphones, but they act only as guides, whereas Panasonic's revolutionary new device, CaloRieco, actually analyzes the food on your plate and provides accurate information about in just a few seconds.
You've probably used calorie calculators before, and you know that they only offer general information. For example, a calculator will tell you the average number of calories in a hamburger, but it can't tell you exactly how many calories are in the hamburger. The same goes for nutrients like protein or fats. And this is what makes the new CaloRieco so special.
Displayed at a recent tech show, CaloRieco is a high tech device that uses light reflection technology to determine the nutritional values of almost any food and also provide accurate calorie estimates. All you have to do is put your plate in the box-shaped device and wait between 10 and 20 seconds for it to analyze all the food on there.
Once it's done analyzing the various ingredients in your meal, CaloRieco displays the number of calories, as well as the nutritional content on an LED display. According to Panasonic, the device is able to recognize the vast majority of foods, except soups and very dark dishes.
CaloRieco can also connect to your smartphone via an app, and send all the data about analyzed foods to your handheld, so you can access it whenever you need.
Panasonic said that its outstanding invention is aimed at dieters and diabetes sufferers, both of which make up a sizable market. Unfortunately, you'll have to wait a bit longer to get your hands on your very own CaloRieco, as the device presented at the show is just a prototype (样品) which needs to be improved. It's scheduled to hit the market sometime in the next few years, but the price remains a mystery.
1. What is special about CaloRieco?| A．It is a high-tech device working as a guide. |
| B．It makes use of light reflection technology. |
| C．It only offers general information of food. |
| D．It can present the exact data of analyzed food. |
| A．It needs a long time to analyze the food. |
| B．It can count the calories of all kinds of food. |
| C．It can display the food data on the smartphone directly. |
| D．It may be well received among dieters and diabetes sufferers. |
| A．Smartphone. | B．App. | C．Data. | D．Food. |
| A．It's perfect. | B．It's promising. | C．It's costly. | D．It's portable. |
4 . Located in the southeast of Canada and with a population of approximately 6 million, Toronto is a big and beautiful city, which has developed from a relatively unknown place over the past half century to the center of culture, trade and communication in Canada.
With its colorful ethnic mix, rich history and breathtaking buildings. Toronto offers non-stop adventures to the tourists. To get a sense of how big, various and magical Toronto is, the best place to start is the CN Tower. From this point, visitors can get a bird's-eye view of the city's amazing scenery and unique geography.
In addition to being an important center of culture, trade and communication in Canada, Toronto is also a major muti-ethnic city. It is the most populous city in Canada and its citizens come from countries around the world and from different kinds of ethnic backgrounds. Every day, in most places of the city, a hundred different languages can be heard on the streets, from Hindi to Greek to French. This, perhaps, explains why former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau once said that Canada is a mosaic（嵌合体）of cultures and languages rather than a melting pot.
Street signs in Toronto are mostly in English. Weekly and daily newspapers are published in various languages, and the city hosts the successful international film festival each September. It is also home to a popular baseball team the Toronto Blue Jays. Toronto has something for everyone.
Moreover, Toronto has been rated one of the most livable cities in the world by United Nations Human Settlements Programme for many years. At the same time, Toronto is one of the safest, richest cities in the world with the highest standard of living.
1. What's the purpose of the text?| A．To draw more tourists to Toronto. |
| B．To introduce something about Canada. |
| C．To introduce some famous sights of Toronto. |
| D．To tell us how Toronto develops from the past. |
| A．Toronto is in the center of Canada. |
| B．Toronto is a city with a history of half a century. |
| C．The street signs in Toronto are all written in English. |
| D．From the top of the CN Tower we can see the whole Toronto. |
| A．It's worth visiting. |
| B．It's just a common city in Canada. |
| C．There are too many foreigners in the city. |
| D．There aren't many places of interest to visit. |
| A．A personal diary. | B．A news report. |
| C．A tourist handbook. | D．A student's notebook. |
5 . Paris
Paris, the heaven of fashion, culture and entertainment, is the most visited city in the world. It is also held as a numerous tourist destination due to the presence of the Eiffel Tower and several other historic buildings, museums and churches.
Rome
A talk about Europe is incomplete without a mention of Rome. Held as a place where one of the oldest civilizations of the world prospered(繁荣), Rome is where you'd get to see numerous castles, palaces, ancient buildings, fountains, squares and beautiful parks. Several tourists come here especially to have a look at the Renaissance architecture that the buildings of this city boast.
Barcelona
Barcelona, a major city in Spain, is regarded among the 10 best beach cities in the world. The city's coastline has clear waters and a mild climate which makes it favorite destination among sunbathers. Besides that, Barcelona has a glorious past to show off. You must wander through its busy streets and take a look at the historic buildings, castles, churches, parks and museums.
Vienna
If you are a music lover and a steady devotee of Beethoven or Mozart, then a visit to Vienna is like going on a pilgrimage(朝圣). This is because Vienna is the birthplace of these artists. You'd find their houses there and also find their memorial graves. Besides that, Vienna is known for castles, palaces, museums and historic monuments. If you are a devoted art lover, Vienna is the place for you. It has nearly a hundred museums devoted to art!
1. Which place has the most tourists in the world according to the text?| A．Vienna. | B．Barcelona. | C．Rome. | D．Paris. |
| A．The birthplace of artists. | B．Fountains. |
| C．Castles. | D．The Eiffel Tower. |
| A．Art. | B．Sports. | C．Customs. | D．Tours. |
6 . Lack of sleep among children and teenagers in China has worsened in the past decade, with more than 80 percent getting insufficient sleep on school days, a new report has found.
Chinese youngsters snooze 7. 8 hours a night on average on school days, down 0. 3 hours from 2009, according to the report released on Monday by the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Institute of Psychology.
Researchers surveyed more than 15,800 students from Henan, Hebei and Guangdong provinces from April to July, asking what time they go to bed and wake up on days they take offline classes on campus.
Only 46. 4 percent of them sleep for at least 8 hours, compared with 47. 4 percent in 2009.
According to an action plan laying out measures to be taken from 2019 to 2030 to promote the health of citizens, primary school students are recommended to get a minimum of 10 hours of sleep a night. For junior high school and senior high school students, the recommended sleep durations per night are 9 and 8 hours respectively.
By this set of standards, more than 95 percent of students from primary schools, nearly 91 percent at junior high and 84 percent at senior high, did not get enough sleep on school days, heightening the risk of them developing cognitive, mental and physical health problems, the report said.
Hou Jinqin, a researcher at the National Institute of Education Sciences who co-authored the study, suggested local authorities implement measures instructed by the Ministry of Education, such as lessening academic burdens, postponing start times at school and encouraging children to be enrolled at institutions closer to home, in order to prolong sleeping hours.
In terms of the COVID - 19 outbreak's impact on sleep, she said available research overseas shows school closures forced by the COVID - 19 epidemic have added two hours of sleep to young students studying-gat home.
In China, some studies have revealed no marked differences in sleeping patterns of students before and after school reopened, she added.
1. What does the underlined word "insufficient" in Paragraph 1 mean?| A．Unconditional. | B．Inadequate. | C．Untypical. | D．Incalculable. |
| A．7 -8. | B．8 -9. | C．≥ 9. | D．≥ 10. |
| A．Reducing their course load. | B．Starting school a bit earlier. |
| C．Attending extra — curricular courses. | D．Promoting a new sleeping pattern. |
| A．To introduce a new study on sleep habits. |
| B．To advise people to lengthen their sleeping hours. |
| C．To analyse the reasons why youngsters lack sleep. |
| D．To propose measures to handle student sleep shortfall. |
7 . How do you kill your time on your way to work? Most of us stare at our cell phones, and refuse to make eye contact with others. We just read, chat with others online or play games online. Or maybe we' re using the time between stops to do our makeup, catch up on emails, or read a few chapters of a book. However, Dina Alfasi takes a very different approach.
Each day she has to travel hours on buses and trains to get to her engineering job at a hospital in Israel . Rather than look at her cell phone in silence, she uses one very special way to have connection with strangers. It is portraits of the people she meets on public transport every day that she is taking. The paintings catch those quiet and personal moments of people readying themselves for the day ahead. Some people lean their head against the window and go to sleep, some stare into space and have a daydream, and others sit quietly to read their documents or books. Each picture catches one tiny moment in people's lives, ripe with potential for your imagination. It is wonderful for her to look at someone's commute （上下班）and make up an entire story about the rest of their daily existence, from the father travelling with a baby to the woman welcoming a change.
“ What inspires me very much are the little moments that happen every day," Dina told My Modern Met. "My work is to tell stories through a single portrait, and it proves that all you need is just to look around and find those magic moments.”
1. As for people's behaviour on the way to work, what does Paragraph 1 imply?| A．Most of us like to catch early buses. |
| B．Most of us need to go to work punctually. |
| C．Most of us tend to concentrate on our mobile phones. |
| D．Most of us feel frightened to make eye contact with others. |
| A．Sitting quietly to read her books. |
| B．Keeping chatting with others all the way. |
| C．Using phones to take photos of every scene attracting her. |
| D．Drawing people while travelling on buses and trains to work. |
| A．Sceptical. | B．Enjoyable. | C．Cautious. | D．Tolerant. |
| A．Little moments make Dina special. |
| B．Cell phone is used to take special portraits. |
| C．Dina takes portraits of others when commuting. |
| D．People go to work with different ways to kill time. |
8 . Imagine reading a story titled "Pursuing Success." That would be an inspiring story, wouldn't it? Maybe—but maybe not. It might well be the story of someone whose never-ending chase for more and more success leaves them unsatisfied and incapable of happiness.
Though it isn't a conventional medical addiction, for many people success has addictive properties. Obviously, success goes with praise. To a certain extent, praise stimulates the neurotransmitter dopamine (神经递质多巴胺)，which contributes to all addictive behaviors.
The desire for success may be born to human nature, but specialness doesn't come cheap. Success is tough work, and it requires bearing the cost of losing. In the 1980s, the physician Robert Goldman famously found that more than half of ambitious athletes would be willing to take a drug that would kill them in five years in exchange for winning every competition they entered.
Unfortunately, success is endless. The goal can't be satisfied; most people never feel “successful” enough. The high only lasts a day or two, and then it's on to the next goal. Psychologists call this the hedonic treadmill (快乐跑步机现象)，in which satisfaction wears off almost immediately and we must run on to the next reward to avoid the feeling of falling behind.
People should get off the treadmill. But quitting isn't easy for addicts. For people hooked on substances, withdrawal can be a painful experience, both physically and psychologically, research finds that depression and anxiety are common among outstanding athletes after their careers end. Olympic athletes, in particular, suffer from the “ post-Olympic blues.”
Just like wine, success in and of itself is not a bad thing. Both can bring fun and sweetness to life. But both become bossy when they are a substitute for — instead of a complement (补充物)to — the relationships and love that should be at the center of our lives.
1. What does praise function as when going with success?| A．It has nothing to do with success addiction. |
| B．It may indirectly cause success addiction. |
| C．It always brings positive results of success. |
| D．It results in all addictive behaviors except success. |
| A．To show success is a tough and cruel job. |
| B．To stress the key to success lies in efforts. |
| C．To argue that athletes deserve more rewards. |
| D．To describe the routine training of an ordinary athlete. |
| A．Satisfaction and a sense of pride. |
| B．Anxiety and short-lived happiness. |
| C．Relaxation and endless motivation. |
| D．Confidence and permanent happiness. |
| A．Stop chasing success. |
| B．Chase success at any cost. |
| C．Reflect on what matters in life. |
| D．Give up love and relationships. |
9 . About City Cruises - Red River Rover（24hr）
As the River Thames weaves its way through the heart of London there is history around every bend.
See and experience the sights and splendor of this great city from the relaxed comfort of a modern, all-weather, wheelchair-friendly City Cruises RiverLinerTM with open upper deck and spacious lower saloon with panoramic （全景的）windows. During your cruise you will have live commentary（解说）from the experienced crew giving you lots of insights you wouldn't find in the guide books.
The Hop on Hop off Pass allows you to make unlimited use of the river services between the piers（码头）of operation:
Westminster Pier: Houses of Parliament
Abbey Waterloo Pier: London Eye London Aquarium
Tower Pier: Tower of London, Tower Bridge
Greenwich Pier; Greenwich, Maritime Museum, Cutty Sark
Important Information
You should arrive at least 15 minutes before departure time.
Passenger numbers are difficult to predict each day and can vary on account of public holidays, weather condition, events, etc. City Cruises cannot guarantee that you will get the sightseeing sailing that you have booked—please ensure that you arrive in reasonable time.
All boats have seating and are fully heated.
All boats offer open space areas with great views. Many have open decks offering a better view.
Free live commentary is in English on each sightseeing cruise.
Free audio guides are available in 8 languages: Italian, French, German, Spanish, Chinese, Russian, English and Japanese.
1. What can we learn about City Cruises RiverLinerTM?| A．It doesn't provide services on windy days. |
| B．It is not accessible to disabled passengers. |
| C．It ignores the great history of River Thames. |
| D．It enables you to learn further about the sights. |
| A．Westminster Pier. | B．Greenwich Pier. |
| C．Tower Pier. | D．Abbey Waterloo Pier. |
| A．passengers sensitive to cold should wear more clothes |
| B．passengers can view landmark sights of London on board |
| C．passengers should book visits to get the guaranteed sailing |
| D．passengers can watch live commentaries in various languages |
10 . Growing up in south Florida, Rebecca dreamed of becoming a professional singer, but after a serious illness damaged her voice at college, she settled for the next-best thing.
She couldn't be an artist, but she could become a lawyer for artists. “I knew I'd go to a law school and I'd try to help musicians because even if I didn't have my own voice, I could help them find theirs,” said Rebecca, 19. “There hasn’t been a day when I've questioned my choice,”
That seems to be the case with hundreds of students who have signed up for entertainment law courses at Harvard Law School (HLS) over the last 20 years. It marks a trend among law students to change from the traditional field of corporate law and look to Working in creative industries. The trend, also noticeable at other law schools around the country, has pushed growth in the field of entertainment law.
“These students are propelled by a love for music, the arts, and show business. It's an exciting career for a music lover,” said HLS Clinical Professor of Law Brian Price, who's in charge of the Entertainment Law Clinic.
Price added, “Although entertainment lawyers work behind the scenes, they can have a bigger influence on artists' careers than managers. They review artists’ agreements, deals and contacts, making sure their customers, interests are protected.”
“Artists are becoming wise and want to be involved in the business aspects of their careers,” said Price. “When they ask for legal advice, they want to know their legal rights, and how to make good deals and find ways to make more money.” Most HLS graduates end up working in business or corporate law, though some have had successful careers in the entertainment industry. Among them are Bruce Ramer, 58, who represents customers like George Clooney and Clint East wood; Bert Fields, 52, who represents Michael Jackson.
1. What does the author want to show through the example of Rebecca?| A．The importance of learning entertainment law. |
| B．Her determination to succeed in the field of law. |
| C．The rising popularity in the field of entertainment law. |
| D．Her dull future caused by her serious illness at college. |
| A．Blown. | B．Driven. | C．Depressed. | D．Confused. |
| A．HLS is home to many famous artists. |
| B．Artists are wise enough to learn corporate law. |
| C．Artists are becoming more focused on legal needs. |
| D．Famous artists pay no attention to making money. |
| A．The Death of Rebecca's Dream. |
| B．Making It Big behind the Scenes. |
| C．Helping Musicians Improve Themselves. |
| D．A Brief Introduction to Entertainment Law. |
