1 . There are many ways to travel within a city. We can walk, cycle, or take a bus. But no matter which way we travel, we have to stick to the route(线路) the city planners laid down for us.
Parkour practitioners (跑酷爱好者), however, see the city in a completely different way. To them, there are no fixed routes. There are no walls and no stairs—since they jump, climb, roll and crawl to move across, through, over and under anything that they find in their path. The city is their playground.
The International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) has noticed that this activity is drawing more and more people to it—there are 100,000 people taking part in parkour today in the UK alone, according to the Guardian—and how it is helpful for people to be much stronger: It trains coordination and balance. So the organization is thinking about recognizing parkour as a new sport and adding it to the Olympics by 2024.
But parkour practitioners themselves don’t seem to be happy with the idea. They see parkour as “a lifestyle”, wrote the website NextSportStar. “It’s a competition against the conditions rather than just a sport.”
Indeed, many do parkour just to “escape the daily routine and experience the city in different ways”, wrote reporter Oli Mould on The Conversation. They see parkour as a way to express themselves through relaxing moves and creative routes while freeing themselves from the pressure.
It’s great that the FIG wants to develop new sport and stay close to a new cultural form. But it would be greater if they knew that not everything in life is a competition.
1. How do the parkour practitioners do parkour?| A．They move on as they wish. | B．They plan the way themselves. |
| C．They run faster than others. | D．They stick to certain routes. |
| A．It’s a special way of life. | B．It draws their attention. |
| C．It’s good for people to keep healthy. | D．It needs some rules and instructions. |
| A．It is more formal than other sports. | B．It helps people to be creative. |
| C．It’s worth adding to the sporting event. | D．It calls on people to work as a team. |
| A．A new sports competition | B．Parkour practitioners |
| C．Training in a different way | D．Making the city their own |
2 . Jose Adolfo is a banker from Peru. He encourages children to save money and offers his customers cash for recycling plastic wastes. But the remarkable thing is that he is still a child himself.
By the age of 7, he decided to create a bank for children. He was motivated by seeing his classmates skipping lunch because they had spent the little money they had on sweets or football cards. What drove him even more was the poverty he saw among children.
With the support of a local company, the 14-year-old founded the Bartselana student bank which now has more than 2,000 customers between the ages of 10 and 18. Children can withdraw (提取) money from several cashpoints of the bank. They can also monitor their balances online. What makes it different from traditional banks is that it sets savings goals for children. They have to reach those goals in order to withdraw their money.
The student bank really took off when he came up with the “Recycle Plan”, a new way for the children to earn money by collecting recyclable plastic or paper waste. Students can bring recyclable plastic bottles, used school books and old newspapers to the schools and put them into the collecting boxes. The recycling is weighed and the money goes to their bank accounts.
The bank recycles 4.4 tons of material a month and has collecting boxes in seven schools in Arequipa. More are on a waiting list. Increasingly the model is in demand in the rest of Peru and abroad.
His efforts have been noticed by Peru’s environment ministry. “He’s making an amazing change in financial (理财的) education that perhaps many adults could not come up with,” said the Peru’s environment minister, Lucia Ruiz. “He’s achieving a double goal because he’s not just designing a financial opportunity for children and teenagers but also helping to reduce waste in the country.”
1. Why did Jose create a bank for children?| A．To help poor children. | B．To provide free lunch. |
| C．To offer outdoor activities. | D．To improve school condition. |
| A．It makes saving goals. | B．It monitors the balance. |
| C．It has several cashpoints. | D．It serves customers online. |
| A．using less plastic bottles | B．using old school books |
| C．collecting plastic wastes | D．cleaning collecting boxes |
| A．It’s typical. | B．It’s successful. |
| C．It’s risky. | D．It’s well-organized . |
| A．He gave money to poor children. |
| B．He taught children how to spend money. |
| C．He helped adults receive financial education. |
| D．He contributed to financial education and recycling. |
3 . People often say, ''Children can't do math problems because parents can't do their children's homework. '' Here's an example to show what I mean.
The other day my daughter brought home her math homework. ''I have to subtract (减) 179 from 202, '' she said.
''It's quite easy, '' I said. ''You put the 202 over the 179. ''
''But we need a 10 here. Where is the 10? ''
''I don't know where the 10 is. Lets just subtract 179 from 202. Nine from two is three. You carry one and add it to seven. Eight from zero is two. The answer is 23. ''
''We can't do it that way. We have to use the 10. ''
''Well, I'm going to call your teacher to see how she subtracts 179 from 202. ''
Over the telephone, I said that I was having a bit of trouble with the homework she had given to my daughter. The teacher said, ''In the right-hand column (栏) we have units of one. The two in that column counts for two ones. The zero in the center counts for zero tens. The two in the left-hand column counts for hundreds. Are you clear? '' But I didn't think I was clear.
I hung up and found my way to the medicine box. My head was now hurting. I started putting pills of medicine into my mouth. ''How many did you take? '' My wife asked. ''I took one and then I took another—I know one and one was two, but don't ask me what it is now. ''
1. The daughter wanted __________ the other day.| A．to give her father a lesson | B．to show how difficult math was |
| C．her father to phone her teacher | D．her father to help her with her homework |
| A．Whole numbers less than 10. | B．Whole things. |
| C．Groups of lessons. | D．The smallest numbers. |
| A．angry | B．ashamed | C．sad | D．tired |
| A．The father would go to school and begin to learn math. |
| B．The father would become very ill and have to take more medicine. |
| C．The father would never do his daughter's math problems again. |
| D．The father would go to school and fight with the teacher. |
4 . Smart cities promise to bring better lives, faster transport, cleaner air and lower crime, all through the intelligent use of connected technology, said experts, and after huge investment in the field, China is leading the way.
“China’s smart cities market increases about 30 percent year-on-year in 2018, and all the provinces have begun development and construction for smart cities, with more to follow,” said an expert.
“Although most cities have started a smart city project, there is no globally unified thinking on the concept and operation of smart cities,” said Franco.
Alibaba is now involved in dozens of pilot projects across China, with its open AI (人工智能) platform Tianqing for the ET City Brain system officially launched in September. Set up by its cloud computing subsidiary (子公司), the Brain looks to make the city “think” through AI and cloud computing technologies, and help make the best of public services in real time.
Since introducing the technology, Hangzhou’s traffic jam has fallen from the fifth-worst in China in 2016, all the way to 57th place this year. “Now our experiments are mostly for government use, but we truly expect our open AI platform to enter more areas and help citizens live, work and entertain better,” said Hua.
In McKinsey Global Institute recent report Smart cities: Digital solutions for a more livable future, they find cities can use smart technologies to improve some key quality life by 10 to 30 percent — numbers that translate into lives saved, fewer crime incidents, a reduced health burden, and carbon emissions.
1. What can we say about the smart city?| A．Its concept has not been accepted by people. |
| B．It can be achieved only by lots of investment. |
| C．The worldwide standard for it has been established. |
| D．Its progress in China is among the best in the world. |
| A．Traffic jam. | B．Traffic flow. |
| C．AI platform. | D．Public services. |
| A．its traffic problem has been settled |
| B．the city has become more intelligent |
| C．its public services have greatly improved |
| D．it has made achievements in smart city construction |
| A．Smart Cities are on the Way |
| B．Outline of the Future Smart Cities |
| C．Hangzhou’s Construction of Smart Cities |
| D．Alibaba Contributes More to Smart Cities |
5 . When faced with the decision to get out of bed or have a few more minutes of sleep, which do you choose? Believe it or not, that decision could make a world of difference in the rest of your day.
About 85 percent of Americans use an alarm clock to wake up in the mornings, according to sleep researcher Till Roennenber. And while there are no official numbers on snoozing (打盹), a quick survey of social media makes it clear that hitting the snooze button is a popular pastime.
As to how the snooze button will affect your day, scientists have mixed opinions. Some scientists think people who hit the snooze button in the mornings are actually clever, creative and happy while some said that hitting the snooze button will ruin your life, or at the very least your day. "I feel that hitting the snooze button has got to be one of the worst things that ever happened to human sleep,” researcher Jonathan Horowitz said. "The chances of you ‘snoozing’ and actually experiencing a meaningful rest are close to zero.”
According to some sleep experts, when hitting the snooze button，you are in fact confusing your body and mind, and throwing yourself into a deep state of being sleepy. The body needs some time to wake up, so, when returning to what will be a light sleep for a brief period of time, you are putting your body back into a sleep mode before waking it again. At that point your body won’t know what it wants, resulting in a sort of half awaken state.
If you really want to take advantage of an alarm clock, the key is to form a healthy sleep cycle. Focus your efforts on getting enough sleep each night and waking up at the same time each day so that when your alarm goes off you feel rested.
1. What can we infer about hitting the snooze button from Paragraph 2?| A．People do it just for fun. | B．It is a common practice. |
| C．People take it seriously. | D．It is a bit childish. |
| A．It is meaningful in the long term. |
| B．It makes people become lazy. |
| C．It brings us a sense of satisfaction. |
| D．It affects our body and mind. |
| A．Forming a good sleep habit. | B．Trying to relax ourselves. |
| C．Making use of willpower. | D．Using an extra alarm. |
| A．Ways to keep refreshed in the morning. |
| B．The snooze button and people's character. |
| C．Should you rely on the snooze button? |
| D．How to avoid the light sleep mode? |
6 . Our wedding was about to begin. My throat was tight and my cheeks got red, but I didn't care. I was ready to marry David Sanchez. We’re a "nontraditional" couple: getting married not at a church but in a bookstore that supports a charity to fight H.I.V. and homelessness.
“Kim! I could walk you down the aisle（走廊）if you like!” David's father offered gently.
"I'm OK. But I appreciate that,” I said with a smile. And I was reminded, again, of my dad's absence.
My father died of cancer six weeks ago. For the last two months, we tried to make him feel comfortable and loved as he departed from this world. He always told us that he didn't like a funeral （葬礼）and insisted our wedding go forward as planned. But how could we honor him since the wedding would be the first time the family would gather after his death and some even didn't know he was sick?
During the ceremony, my dear friend Eva delivered a reading entitled "When Things Go Missing” by Kathryn Schulz. She paused and got everyone on the same page: “When we are experiencing it, loss often feels like confusion in the usual order of things. In fact, the entire plan of the universe consists of losing, and life amounts to a reverse（逆向的）savings account in which we are eventually robbed of everything.
I felt the energy full of the room. Everyone was listening. By choosing to accept the pain, we knew what a wedding does to join two families and mark the next chapter for a couple. Loss became a compass that pointed us away from a fantasy and toward celebrating the difficult realities of life.
After rings were exchanged, fried chicken was served, our friends offered so many funny and touching toasts, and finally David sang "Married” on my father’s guitar. I felt joy filling all the holes in my soul. Celebrating my father’s life at our wedding made me grateful for all the time I had spent with him, because it all goes by so fast.
1. Why did David's father offer to walk the author down the aisle?| A．To relieve her tension. |
| B．To welcome her to his family. |
| C．To play the author's late father's role. |
| D．To contribute something to the charity. |
| A．She got a compass as a wedding gift. |
| B．She enjoyed David's promise for their marriage. |
| C．She received more sympathy from families and friends. |
| D．She recalled the days spent with her father and understood life better. |
| A．Because she could keep from the pain. |
| B．Because she knew everyone was listening. |
| C．Because she got more courage for marriage and life. |
| D．Because she could read a piece of Kathryn Schulz's works. |
| A．It was held at a church. |
| B．It was a touching and happy one. |
| C．Kim and David turned it into a funeral. |
| D．There was no other activity except reading. |
7 . Milwaukee, Wisconsin, is road testing a new way to keep winter roads ice-free – by spreading on them cheese brine, the salty liquid used to make soft cheese, like mozzarella.
Wisconsin, also called "America's Dairyland," is famous for its cheese. The state produced 2.8 billion pounds of cheese last year! As a result, there was a lot of leftover cheese brine. Disposing of(处置)the brine can be expensive. So what should cheese makers do with the waste?
Normally, towns use rock salt to de-ice streets. The salt lowers waters' freezing point, causing ice to melt(融化). But using cheese brine could help both cheese producers and cities save money, while keeping roads safe. Cheese brine has salt in it, which, like the rock salt, helps lower water's freezing point.
In addition to saving money, cheese brine could also be a more environment-friendly option. Many people suspect that all the rock salt used every winter is harming the environment.
Rock salt is made of sodium chloride, the sane con-pound (化合物)in ordinary table salt. Sounds harmless, right? But while you probably add only a small amount of salt to your food, road crews spread about 20 million tons of salt on U.S. Roads every year!
The chemical washes off roads and goes into the ground. There it can pollute drinking water, harm plants. and eat away soil. By spreading cheese brine on streets before adding a layer of rock salt, Milwaukee may be able to cut its rock salt use by 30 percent.
Cheese brine has a downside too – a shell similar to that of bad milk. "I don't really mind it," Emil Norby told Modern Farmer magazine. He works for one of Wisconsin's county highway commissions and came up with the idea of using cheese brine. "Our roads smell like Wisconsin!" he said.
1. Why can cheese brine help keep winter roads ice-free?| A．It is soft. | B．It contains salt. | C．It is warm. | D．It has milk in it. |
| A．Improving air quality. | B．Increasing sales of rock salt. |
| C．Reducing water pollution. | D．Saving the cheese industry. |
| A．barking up the wrong tree | B．putting the cart before the horse |
| C．robbing Peter to pay Paul | D．killing two birds with one stone |
8 . My school appeared on the news last week because we had made an important change in our local area. Our class had planted a large garden in what was once only a vacant lot. It was a lot of work but it was all worth it. I got blisters(水泡) from digging, and we all got insect bites, too.
I learned a lot about gardening and collaboration(合作), and then I learned about the media. Our teacher telephoned the TV station and informed them of what we had accomplished. She spoke with the producer. The producer checked with the directors, but they said there were plenty of stories similar to ours. They wanted to know what was special about our particular garden, since many schools plant them.
The teacher explained that, after going on the Internet to learn about the prairie(大草原), we had made a prairie garden. We had gone to a prairie and gotten seeds from the plants, and then we planted them. We did not water the garden, but we did weed it. We decided to let nature water it with rain, since that was how prairies grew in the past. We sent a picture of the garden to the news station. In the picture, the grass was so high that it stood taller than the fourth grade students.
As a result, the producer sent a reporter to our school. He interviewed the headmaster and asked him many questions about the garden. After that, they interviewed us, and we explained to them what we had learned through this project.
That night, we watched the news, and there we were. The news reporter told our story. It was only two minutes long, but it was us. We were famous. All that work, all those blisters, it was worth it. We knew that when we saw the garden every day, but now we knew that the whole city thought so, too.
1. What seemed to be the TV directors’ initial reaction to the garden?| A．They were excited. | B．They were surprised. |
| C．They were worried. | D．They were uninterested. |
| A．Weeds were allowed to spread naturally. |
| B．The grass grew faster than common grass. |
| C．The seeds came from the plants of a prairie. |
| D．Underground water was used for the plants. |
| A．We got blisters on our hands. | B．Our hard work was worthwhile. |
| C．The garden would be famous. | D．The project would be finished. |
| A．Annoyed. | B．Curious. | C．Proud. | D．Regretful. |
9 . We have heard some interesting ways that 5G wireless technology might change our lives in the future.
5G, short for the 5th generation mobile communication technology, promises Internet speeds between 50 to 100 times faster than current 4G systems. While 5G is set to be used in some limited areas of America this year, much of the world is not expected to receive widely available service until 2023.
One project in Britain, however, is already testing this superfast technology on an unlikely group of Internet users-cows. The project was developed by American technology company Cisco Systems. It also receives money from the British government. Cisco says the program seeks to explore the future of 5G connectivity in rural areas around the world.
Testing areas were set up at farms in three rural areas of England. The cows are equipped with 5G-connected devices (装置) that link up to a robotic milking system, which uses sensors and machine learning to fully automate the process. System designers say technology takes over after a cow feels ready to be milked and walks toward an automatic gate. The device is designed to recognize each individual cow. It then positions equipment to the right body position for milking. During the process, machines release food for the cow as a reward.
Other 5G technology tools include automated brushes that turn on when the cow rubs up against them. Sensors also control the amount of light to the cows’ living areas depending on the weather. And, an automatic feeding system makes sure the animals always get enough to eat.
Duncan Forbes, head of the project, told Reuters that the project shows the farm’s cow operations can be greatly improved with 5G technology and that the experiment provides strong evidence that 5G technology can be widely used in the future, not just on farms in Britain, but in rural communities across the world.
1. What is the purpose of Cisco Systems’ program?| A．To win financial support from British government. |
| B．To test the effects of 5G technology on animals |
| C．To promote its technological development in Britain |
| D．To expand the future use of 5G in rural communities. |
| A．The project. | B．The company. |
| C．The technology. | D．The group. |
| A．It is no worse than 4G in terms of speed. |
| B．It is already widely available in the world. |
| C．It enables cows to control their own milking. |
| D．It is based on sensors and machine learning. |
| A．Entertainment. | B．Lifestyle. |
| C．Education. | D．Technology. |
10 . I work as the reception manager at my hotel.
A booking came in a few weeks ago with a note attached that a guest would be travelling with her deaf father. This note helped us in preparing for their arrival. As they would be here for a number of days, his daughter wanted to make his trip to Ireland as smooth as possible.
Upon seeing this note and knowing I would be the one to check them in, I decided to learn some very basic sign language. I greeted the guest in my usual fashion, asking for the surname on the booking. Once I heard the name，I immediately realized who was standing in front of me.
I had been learning for two weeks how to say: “Welcome to Ireland. My sign language is terrible, but please, if you need anything during your stay, just let me know and we will help you.”
I smiled at the father and daughter in front of me. Turning to the father, I greeted him in ASL (American Sign Language) and began the bit I had learned for him. His daughter broke down crying and told me I was sweet. But the father just smiled and was so happy. Honestly, seeing his reaction was enough for me. It was absolutely worth the last few weeks of learning basic ASL.
Sadly, I wasn’t working the day they checked out, but they left a gift for me, a small box with some chocolates and a book on ASL. Inside was a note saying: “Thank you very much for what you did. My father has been in amazing spirits from the time you checked us in and insisted we get you a gift before we left. You have no idea how much this meant to my father and me, and we can’t thank you enough. You've made his trip very special with one simple gesture.”
I cried for a solid five minutes when I came into work the next day and found this gift in my locker.
1. The daughter left a note when booking the hotel in order to __________.| A．ask for special service for herself |
| B．give some useful advice to the hotel |
| C．express gratitude to the hotel manager |
| D．make her father’s trip more comfortable |
| A．the author’s sign language was really terrible |
| B．her father was unwilling to live in that hotel |
| C．she appreciated what the author had done for her father |
| D．the author wouldn’t be working when they checked out |
| A．thankful | B．satisfied |
| C．disappointed | D．regretful |
| A．the author made the daughter’s check-out smooth |
| B．the author was deeply moved by an unexpected gift |
| C．the daughter cried for five minutes before they left |
| D．the daughter asked the author to learn sign language |
