1 . Trust me, you don’t want to get caught under a tsunami! Tsunamis are one of the world’s most powerful natural forces. They can cause huge amounts of damage.
But do you know exactly what a tsunami is? They are huge, powerful waves in the ocean that grow as they reach the shore. Most tsunamis are actually caused by earthquakes. An earthquake happens when a big piece of the Earth’s crust( 地 壳 ) suddenly moves. When the piece of ocean floor moves, it creates big holes. The water floods in to fill these holes. When the water moves that quickly, it creates a huge wave. This is how tsunamis are born!
Other natural disasters like landslides, volcanic eruptions, and glaciers breaking off can also cause tsunamis. Once the water starts moving because of the force of the disaster, large waves begin to spread. These waves can move very fast. They have been recorded at speeds from 400 up to 500 miles per hour! They can also move across very long distances.
At first, the waves of the tsunami may not seem that tall. That’s because when the waves travel through the deep parts of the ocean, the top of each wave is very short. But as that wave comes near to the coast, it grows in height. Remember, the tsunami travels quickly. If you are sitting on a beach, you may not see the wave coming at first. But when the wave arrives, it will be like a towering wall of water. Some waves are as tall as 100 feet high. The biggest tsunami ever recorded happened in 1958 in Lituya Bay, Alaska. The wave was over 1,720 feet tall, and it wiped out trees, vegetation, and everything else in its way.
As frightening as tsunamis can be, you don’t need to worry too much about them. They don’t happen that often. Only about two tsunamis happen every year. And it is said that serious, really damaging tsunamis only happen about every fifteen years. So don’t worry.
1. Based on the information in the article, which natural disaster is not responsible for causing a tsunami?| A．tornado | B．volcanic eruption | C．earthquake | D．landslides |
| A．2 hours | B．3 hours | C．4 hours | D．5 hours |
| A．The waves of the tsunami always move slowly over a long distance. |
| B．People on a ship in the deep ocean will notice a tsunami at once as soon as it forms. |
| C．When people on the beach first notice a tsunami, the waves are not tall. |
| D．People will not notice a tsunami until it gets close to the coast. |
| A．in a newspaper | B．in a science magazine | C．in a textbook | D．in a story book |
2 . Sudoku (数独) puzzles give your brain a hard time: Every number from 1 to 9 must appear in each of the nine horizontal (横向的) rows, in each of the nine vertical columns and in each of the nine boxes.
For many of us, this can be a reason for a headache, but in the very rare case of a German man, a Sudoku puzzle even caused seizures (痉挛).
In a new case study from the University of Munich, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Dr. Berend Feddersen introduces a student who was 25 years old when he was buried by a snow slide during a ski tour. For 15 minutes, he didn’t get enough oxygen, which severely damaged certain parts of his brain. “He had to receive treatment on the scene. Luckily he survived,” says Feddersen, the author of the study.
Weeks after the accident, when the young man was ready for recovery treatment, something bizarre happened: When the patient solved Sudoku puzzles, he suddenly had seizures of his left arm — something the medical world hadn’t seen before.
Feddersen explains: “In order to solve a Sudoku, the patient used parts of his brain which are responsible for vision-space tasks. But exactly those brain parts had been damaged in the accident and then caused the seizures once they were used.”
This particular case is an example of what doctors call reflex epilepsy (反射性癫痫), according to Dr. Jacqueline French, professor from NYU Langone School of Medicine.
“You have to have an injury of your brain first, and then seizures like that can happen,” she says.
In the meantime, the patient from the case study stopped solving Sudoku puzzles forever and has been seizure-free for more than five years. “Fortunately, he can do crossword puzzles. He never had problems with those,” Feddersen says.
1. In the accident, the student ______.| A．began to experience seizures in his left arm |
| B．got the vision-space part of his brain damaged |
| C．had to be sent to hospital as soon as possible |
| D．found his Sudoku ability seriously weakened |
| A．the man cannot complete crossword puzzles now |
| B．it is Sudoku playing that brings about his seizures |
| C．the man’s symptoms are common and widely observed |
| D．the seizures cause much trouble to the man’s daily life |
| A．a medical test | B．a warning to skiers |
| C．a news report | D．a research paper |
3 . Welcome to SummerCamps.com; find and book the very best summer camps. Your children are precious so we offer the highest quality of camps that will meet each child’s needs and interests.
Catalina Sea Camp
Sea Camp offers three one-week sessions to boys and girls aged 8-13 and two three-week sessions to teens aged 12-17. Our hand-picked instructors create an atmosphere of fun and excitement while leading campers to a host of ocean adventures, marine(海洋的) biology, and social summer camp activities.
Address: Toyon Way, San Bruno, California 94066
Phone: 800-645-1423
Camp Cayuga
Camp Cayuga is a private summer camp for children aged 6 to 16. The camp is on a 350-acre land in the Pocono Mountains of Northeast Pennsylvania, just outside the village of Honesdale. It’s a 3-hour drive from New York City to Philadelphia.
Address: 321 Niles Pond Road-Suite ISC, Honesdale, Pennsylvania 18431
Phone: 908-470-1224
Camp Rockmont
Camp Rockmont is a Christian summer camp for boys, aged 6-16, in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Rockmont’s duty of developing boys into healthy young men is accomplished through age-appropriate skills, activities, and challenges that help campers to know themselves better.
Address: 375 Lake Eden Road, Black Mountain, North Carolina 28711
Phone: 828-686-3885
Primitive Pursuits Overnight Camps
Primitive Pursuits Overnight Camps offer week-long Summer Adventure Overnight Camps in New York’s Finger Lakes to your children aged 11-15. Campers experience a week of nature-based skills training, inspiring challenges, and fun activities under the guidance of skilled instructors.
Address: 611 County Rd 13, Van Etten, New York 14889
Phone: 607-272-2292
1. If a boy is curious about sea creatures, which camp should he go to?| A．Catalina Sea Camp |
| B．Camp Cayuga |
| C．Camp Rockmont |
| D．Primitive Pursuits Overnight Camps |
| A．Toyon Way, San Bruno. |
| B．611 County Rd 13, Van Etten. |
| C．375 Lake Eden Road, Black Mountain. |
| D．321 Niles Pond Road- Suite ISC, Honesdale. |
| A．a magazine | B．the Internet |
| C．a textbook | D．a newspaper |
4 . People may set an alarm on the phone or clock that sounds like this: beep beep beep. That hard, unpleasant sound may be making it harder to shake off the sleepy feeling in the morning known as grogginess. So, is there a better way to wake up? A recent study says yes. The answer is music.
The study, carried out by researchers in Australia, involved 50 people. The researchers found that people who wake up to musical alarms reported feeling more awake and alert. Stuart McFarlane, a lead writer of the study stated, “We are very surprised by these findings as one might expect a harsh beeping sound to be more successful,” at waking up a person.
Sleep inertia is another term for grogginess. It means a person has a heavy feeling when waking up, and has trouble getting moving again after sleeping. McFarlane said people need to better understand sleep inertia’s harmful effects on human performance later in the day.
Not everyone will experience the full effect. But for those who do, “care should be taken” when performing duties that require a top performance within this period, he said. This includes “dangerous tasks like driving or riding our bikes” shortly after waking up. The same is true for people who work in dangerous situations shortly after they wake, including firefighters and pilots.
So, what makes musical alarms better for waking up? The researchers think the music may be more successful in reducing sleep inertia because it has several tones, compared to the single tone of a “beeping” alarm. McFarlane said that the changes over time between the music tones may help increase a person’s attention when waking from sleep.
And is there a kind of music that is best to wake up to? There may be, McFarlane said. “We could suggest alarm sounds that are tune full and easy to hum or sing along with. The current sounds I have been using include ‘Close to me’ by the Cure and ‘Borderline’ by Madonna.”
No matter how you wake up, experts say, the amount of sleep you get also matters a lot.
1. Which of the following might be the best title for the text?| A．What is grogginess? | B．Why are musical alarms better? |
| C．Which music is the best? | D．How can we overcome grogginess? |
| A．Sleep inertia is another cause for grogginess. |
| B．How long a person sleeps is of great importance. |
| C．The ‘beeping’ alarm is not effective mainly because of its noisy tone. |
| D．It is dangerous for everyone to effective mainly because of its noisy tone. |
| A．example of good musical alarms |
| B．more finding of the application of music |
| C．explanations about why music is more helpful |
| D．suggestions on how to sleep well and feel fresh each morning |
| A．Health. | B．Fiction. | C．Technology. | D．Entertainment. |
5 . NOT that long ago, the world wondered whether clean energy could survive without government support. Now the question is how far it can spread. The number of electric vehicles. which was about 1 million in 2015, last year reached 2 million. In electricity generation, too, trend is with the greens. In the first half of this year wind, solar and hydro generated a record 35% of Germany's power.
Greater success is breeding greater ambition. California is proposing to reach 60% renewable energy by 2030: 176 countries have clean-energy goals. Hawaii, America's most oil-dependent state, has promised to be 100% renewable by the middle of the century. So have 48 poor countries vulnerable to climate change. This week the number of multinationals making a commitment to running their operations on 100% renewable energy rose to 100.
But not every target is helpful. To see why, consider that goal of 100% renewable energy. It makes solving climate change seem easy. In fact, though wind and solar can generate the whole country's electricity some day, renewables still account for less than 8% of the world's total power output. Moreover, cleaning up electricity is only part of the battle. Even though gas-fired heating and cooking can be at least as big a source of greenhouse-gas emissions, renewable heating gets little attention. Transport policy is unpredictable, too. Carmakers may hit their goal of annual sales of 10 million electric vehicles in a decade, but battery-powered road transport, shipping and aviation are dreams. A much-quoted claim that America could rely on wind, solar and hydro alone for its electricity has recently been bitterly criticized by a group of respected academics.
Most importantly, a 100% renewables target confuses means with ends. The priority for the planet is to stop net emissions（净排放量）of greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide. Putting too much emphasis on wind, solar and other renewables may block off better carbon-reduction paths. After decades of investment, it is wrong to leave nuclear power off the table. Carbon emissions in Germany actually rose because it chose to phase out nuclear power gradually and so burned more coal. New technologies, such as "direct air capture" systems designed to separate carbon dioxide from the air, may in time prove vital. Likewise, greater energy efficiency could reduce emissions by even more than using renewables would.
1. It can be inferred from the passage that .| A．the problem of climate change will be solved by using 100% renewable energy |
| B．with new technologies, Germany successfully cut down carbon emissions |
| C．it is probable that ships will one day be powered by battery |
| D．America is not likely to completely rely on wind, solar and hydro energy one day |
| A．promoting energy efficiency |
| B．blocking off carbon-reduction paths |
| C．using non-renewable heating |
| D．abandoning electric vehicles |
| A．ignore | B．reduce | C．use | D．invent |
| A．Fashion | B．Politics | C．Economy | D．Education |
6 . Isabel Allende was born on August 2, 1942, in Lima, Peru. Her parents were both from Chile, where their families had held a great deal of political influence. Not only was Isabel’s godfather once the president of Chile, but her father and her stepfather were both important diplomats. Despite her connection to political power, Isabel’s childhood was not easy. At the age of two, Isabel’s biological father abandoned her family, which forced them to live with her grandparents in Chile. During this time, she was exposed to her grandmothers love for astrology (占星术) and storytelling, which influenced her writing in the future.
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Isabel Allende worked as a journalist, writing for both magazines and television. After her godfather, President Salvador Allende, lost power and was murdered in 1973, Isabel and her family left Chile because they felt it was too dangerous to remain under the rule of Augusto Pinochet, the new, cruel leader of Chile. For thirteen years, Isabel and her family lived in Venezuela, where she began to write fiction.
She used personal experiences to inspire her writing throughout her career. In fact, many of her novels are based on personal life events. In 1985, Isabel Allende published her first novel called The House of the Spirits. This bestselling novel was inspired by a letter Isabel wrote in 1981 to her ill grandfather. The novel turned out to be a story about two Chilean families whose lives are changed because of a military coup. One of her later novels, Paula (1994), is about her daughter, who passed away from a rare disease at a young age.
Isabel Allende has won many awards for her bold and creative writing. Not only has she won the Chilean National Prize for Literature in 2010, but she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2014.
1. Who should be responsible for Isabel’s hard childhood life?| A．Her stepfather. | B．Her father. |
| C．Her grandfather. | D．Her godfather. |
| A．her own personality | B．her family background |
| C．her grandmothers passion | D．her personal life experiences |
| A．A news report. | B．A guidebook. | C．A biography. | D．A book review. |
7 . Drinking tea at least three times a week could reduce the risk of dying from cardiovascular disease(心管疾病) and is linked with a longer and healthier life, at least in China, a new study suggests. Chinese researchers found the health benefits associated with tea were more obvious for drinkers of green, rather than black tea, and for those who had been drinking tea regularly over a longer period of time. The benefits were also clearer among men, the study indicated.
Researchers looked at data from 100 902 Chinese people with no history of heart attack or cancer and divided them into two groups: habitual drinkers who drank tea three or more times a week,those who never drank tea, and those who drank it less regularly. They followed up with them after a seven-year period.
Their analysis found that regular tea drinkers had a 20%lower risk of having heart disease and stroke,and a 22%lower risk of dying from heart disease and stroke. Specifically, they found that regular tea drinkers could expect to live 1.26 years longer at age 50 than those who did not regularly enjoy a cup of tea.
“We found that the protective effects of habitual tea consumption were very obvious and robust across different outcomes for men, but only mild for women,”Dr.Dongfeng Gu from China’s National Center for Cardiovascular Disease.
“One reason might be that the proportion of habitual tea consumers among men was approximately two and a half times as high as that among women,” Gu said. Some 48%of the men in the study were regular tea drinkers, compared with 20%of women.
1. What can be learned about the research from Paragraph 1?| A．Drinking tea regularly benefits people’s health. |
| B．Drinking black tea brings more health benefits. |
| C．Men always live longer than women by drinking tea. |
| D．People can prevent all diseases by drinking tea. |
| A．Protective. | B．Strong. | C．Gentle. | D．Beneficial |
| A．Fewer men like drinking tea. | B．Men spend more money on tea. |
| C．Men drink more tea than women. | D．Fewer women may live no more than 50. |
| A．An advertisement. | B．A poster. | C．A guidebook. | D．A magazine. |
8 . Wherever we humans go, we leave behind a mess. That goes for space, too. An estimated 500,000 pieces of debris (碎片) litter the Earth’s orbit as a result of man’s explorations of space. Some satellites have been hit by fast-moving pieces of junk. The remains of old rockets can be the size of a bus, while other debris pieces are simply tiny spots of paint.
Today, our species is responsible for the junk dashing around Earth at high speeds, and if we don’t start actively removing the largest pieces, the risk of collisions will only grow worse. “Imagine how dangerous sailing the high seas would be, if all the ships ever lost in history were still floating on top of the water,” says Jan Wörner, ESA director general. “That is the current situation in orbit, and it cannot be allowed to continue.”
It’s almost as if we need a truck to remove all of failed satellites from our orbit. By 2025, the agency plans on launching the world’s first orbiting junk collector, a four-armed robot that tracks down space waste. The first-of-its-kind task, known as ClearSpace-1, will start collecting only a single piece of space junk to prove the concept works. The target in this case is called Vespa, a leftover from ESA’s Vega rocket launch in 2013. This piece of junk weighs roughly the same as a small satellitle and has a simple shape that should make it easy to grab with four robotic arms. Once it’s safely in the arms of the garbage collector, it will then be dragged out of orbit and allowed to burn up in the atmosphere.
In addition, an Australian company, Electro Optic Systems, has received a $ 3.5 million government fund to develop the world’s first laser tracking (激光跟踪) technology. It would replace existing radar (雷达) networks that currently monitor that part of space. The goal is to track small objects with great accuracy.
1. Why does Jan Wörner refer to ships on the high seas?| A．To explain the danger of space debris. | B．To describe the universe’s huge space. |
| C．To praise man’s explorations of space. | D．To compare the oceans with the universe. |
| A．ClearSpace-1 and Vespa |
| B．ESA’s Vega rocket launch and radar networks |
| C．the orbiting junk collector and the first laser tracking technology |
| D．truck to remove all of failed satellites and track small objects |
| A．Dangerous Space Exploration | B．Cleaning up Space Junk Pieces |
| C．Developing Space Technology | D．Launching A Four-armed Robot |
| A．An astronomy report. | B．A travel guidebook. |
| C．A science fiction. | D．An environmental magazine. |
9 . For much of the 20th century, milk was a simple part of daily life in the U.S, as farmers raised cows, milkmen delivered bottles and children drank it at school. But those days are fading.
America has fallen out of love with drinking milk, as lower-calorie options have increased and people are replacing water bottles with milk cartons. Americans each drink an estimated 146 lb. of fluid milk in 2018, according to the USDA’s Economic Research Service. That may sound like a lot, but it’s down by 26% just since 2000.
The downturn has been tough on dairy processors like Borden and Dean, which buy fresh milk from farms and use techniques like pasteurization (巴氏杀菌) to create a consumer-safe drink with a longer shelf life. For the past five years, thanks to technology that increased milk production, fresh-milk prices were relatively low, which meant processors could still earn some money even despite the decreasing demand. But prices began going up again last year, squeezing the processors’ already tight profits. “Declining sales in a thin-profit business is not a good recipe for success,” says Mark Stephenson, director of dairy policy analysis at the University of Wisconsin.
Milk processors are also facing competition from big retailers, which have set up their own processing plants. In 2018, Walmart opened a milk-processing plant in Indiana to serve hundreds of stores in the Midwest, taking away approximately 95 million gal of milk-processing business from Dean Foods.
On the other end of the supply chain, dairy farms are facing trouble of their own. The low prices left small farmers struggling across the industry. The number of farm bankruptcies (破产) in 2019 was up by 4% from the previous year. “We’re trying our best to hang on,” says Mary Rieckmann, a dairy farmer in Wisconsin whose family has turned to GoFundMe to keep their century-old farm running.
1. What’s the main idea of the passage?| A．Why some dairy farmers turn to GoFundMe. |
| B．Why America’s milk industry get into much trouble. |
| C．Why Americans consume less milk than before. |
| D．Why big retailers set up their own processing plants. |
| A．An American consumes 146 lb fluid milk every year |
| B．Technology in milk industry improves the production |
| C．Walmart is probably not a target customer of Dean Foods now |
| D．2019 witnessed 4% more farm bankruptcies than the previous year |
| A．Health | B．Technology | C．Life | D．Economy |
10 . International Volunteering in New Zealand
If you’re visiting New Zealand and would like to volunteer, DOC (Department of Concentration) welcomes you to get involved.
Before you come to New Zealand
You do not need a work visa to volunteer with DOC. You can volunteer on entry to New Zealand as long as you do not receive payment or benefits.
You may need a police certificate
Depending on the volunteer work you do with us, you may be required to provide a police certificate to DOC. Your police certificate would need to be written and certified in English. It’s easier for you if you get a police certificate before you leave your country.
How to get a new police certificate if you’re already in New Zealand. (Click here)
International students
Volunteering with DOC is an option to gain experience. However, DOC does not offer opportunities to students who study at universities outside New Zealand, or other education providers outside New Zealand.
Insurance
For all volunteers with DOC, we strongly advise you gel comprehensive (综合的) travel insurance and unlimited medical cover. DOC does not accept responsibility for any:
● personal medical or accident events.
● loss or damage to personal items of equipment, or other associated costs while you're volunteering with DOC.
1. What may you offer to DOC if you want to volunteer as a foreigner in New Zealand?| A．A police certificate | B．A work visa. |
| C．A university diploma. | D．A driver license. |
| A．An American official who is travelling in New Zealand. |
| B．An English college student who has just been visiting his uncle in New Zealand. |
| C．A Chinese exchange student in the University of Auckland in New Zealand. |
| D．A Chinese businessman with some volunteering experiences. |
| A．A story book. | B．A newspaper. |
| C．A travel guide book. | D．A website. |
