1 . Fu Cong, a Chinese-born pianist, died on Monday at a hospital in London, where he had lived for many years.

A lover of classical music from a young age, Mr. Fu began taking piano lessons when he was 7. He made his first stage appearance in 1952. The concert caught the attention of officials in Beijing, who selected him to compete and tour in Eastern Europe. Mr. Fu soon moved to Poland, where he studied at the Warsaw Conservatory (音乐学校) on a scholarship. To prepare for the fifth Chopin Competition in Warsaw in 1955, he practiced so hard that he hurt his fingers and was nearly cut from the first round of the competition.

Mr. Fu was one of the first Chinese pianists to achieve global fame when he took third place in the International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw in 1955. He also won a special prize for his performance of Chopin's mazurkas. Almost overnight, he became a national hero. To China, Mr. Fu's recognition in a well-known international competition was evidence that the country could stand on its own artistically in the West. Chinese reporters came to interview Mr. Fu, while many others went to his father, Fu Lei, for advice on child-raising.

In 1981, a volume of letters written by his father, was published in China. Full of advice, encouragement, life teachings and strict paternal love, the book Fu Lei's Family Letters became a best-seller in China. Besides influencing a generation of Chinese, Mr. Fu's words resonated (引起共鸣) long after his death with the person for whom they were intended.

“My father had a saying that 'First you must be a person, then an artist, and then a musician, and only then can you be a pianist,'" Mr. Fu Cong once recalled in an interview. "Even now, I believe in this order-that it should be this way and that I am this way.”

1. What is paragraph 2 mainly about?

A．Fu Cong's achievements in music.	B．Fu Cong's stage performances.
C．Fu Cong's experiences of learning music.	D．Fu Cong’s efforts for competitions.

2. Why does Fu Cong's global recognition mean a lot to China?

A．It earns Chinese arts a place in the West.

B．It promotes the spread of Chinese culture.

C．It proves Chinese people's love for music.

D．It enables Chinese art education to be recognized.

3. What does the underlined word "they" in paragraph 4 refer to?

A．Fu Lei's Family Letters.	B．Young people of China.
C．Fu Cong and his family.	D．Readers of Fu Lei's Family Letters.

4. Which of the following agrees with Fu Lei's ideas in the last paragraph?

A．It's easy to be an artist.

B．It requires various qualities to be a pianist.

C．Everyone should develop an interest in art.

D．Talent is of greatest importance for a pianist.

2 . On Monday, I stopped my car in front of my daughter Juliet’s middle school. She jumped in the front seat, feeling down. She asked me to help her study for her science test.

“Dad, I need to memorise a unit about the Reproductive Cycle of Plants. And I can hardly make it.”

“You know memorising seems like the best way to study, but in fact you can do better in tests if you work on trying to understand the material.”

Juliet was open to my advice. It was Monday afternoon and we had two nights to study before the test on Wednesday. I suggested a plan. “Tomorrow night, you are going to teach the material to me. Tonight, read the unit. Prepare to teach.”

Asking her to teach me was an unusual idea but I was determined to do it. Studies show teaching somebody else is a very useful way to learn. Even if you don’t do the teaching, the act of preparing to teach leads to more learning than just trying your best to memorise the material.

On Tuesday afternoon, Juliet sat down with her science book facing me and said, “Okay Dad, let’s study.” I wanted her to teach me. But false starts happened. I couldn’t be too hard on her. So instead we started with me asking her some simple questions. She knew some but not others. When she didn’t know the answers, I encouraged her to check the book.

She started checking things that didn’t make sense. And she was actively seeking to test her understanding. I was happy to see it. She wasn’t memorising; she was trying to make sense of things, which was exactly what I had hoped she would do.

1. Why did Juliet feel down?

A．Because she failed her science test.

B．Because she had trouble memorising a unit.

C．Because she knew nothing about planting.

D．Because she couldn’t follow her teacher.

2. In the writer’s opinion, which was the key to best learning?

A．Memorising.	B．Testing.
C．Questioning.	D．Understanding.

3. What does the underlined word “it” in Paragraph 5 refer to?

A．Making her check the book.

B．Using simple questions to test her.

C．Encouraging her to read the unit.

D．Asking her to teach me the unit.

4. Which can be the best title for the passage?

A．A Creative Father

B．An Unexpected Test

C．Learning from Teaching

D．Preparing for Teaching

3 . Folk tales have saddled the moon with major responsibilities: moods, increases in crime and even mental disorders are blamed on the Earth's only constant natural satellite. But could the "lunar effect" disturb sleep?

Scientists have long understood that human activity is facilitated by light, be it sunlight, moonlight or artificial light. But a recent study suggests our ability to sleep is distinctly affected by the lunar cycle, even when taking into account artificial sources of light.

Using wrist monitors, researchers tracked sleep patterns in 98 individuals living in three local communities in Argentina over the course of one to two months. One rural community had no electricity access, a second rural community had limited access to electricity, while a third community was located in an urban setting and had full access to electricity.

Participants in all three communities showed the same pattern of sleep oscillations as the moon progressed through its 29.5-day cycle, with sleep duration changing by between 20 and more than 90 minutes, and bedtimes varying by 30 to 80 minutes.

In each community, the peak of participants sleeping less and staying up later occurred in the three-to-five-day period prior to full moon nights, and the opposite occurred on the nights before the new moon, the authors found.

Unsurprisingly, data showed the "lunar phase effect" on sleep appeared to be stronger the more limited access to electricity was.

“The result strongly suggests that human sleep is synchronized with lunar phases regardless of ethnic and socio-cultural background and of the level of urbanisation," the researchers wrote in the journal Science Advances.

De la Iglesia added: “We humans tend to believe that we managed to somehow control nature, and the use of artificial light is a great example of that. But it turns out that there are some forces of nature that we cannot get away from.”

Derk-Jan Dijk, a professor of sleep and physiology and the director of a sleep research centre at the University of Surrey, described the study as exciting but noted that the researchers had not addressed internal influences such as body clocks that could affect sleep patterns.

1. What is the recent study mainly about?

A．The harm of lunar effect.	B．The reliability of folk tales.
C．The function of artificial light.	D．The effect of the lunar cycle on sleep.

2. When did the participants in the experiment sleep least?

A．On the full moon night.	B．On the new moon night.
C．On the night after the new moon.	D．On the night before the full moon.

3. What does the underlined word "that" in the last paragraph but one refer to?

A．Controlling nature.	B．The level of urbanisation.
C．The escape from forces of nature.	D．Synchronizing with lunar phases.

4. What did Derk-Jan Dijk think of the research findings?

A．Groundless.

B．Persuasive.

C．Incomplete.

D．Impressive.

4 . On Saturday 24 August 1918, it was raining cats and dogs and thundering over a city called Sunderland on the northeast coast of England. The storm lasted for only about ten minutes. People were surprised to see that it was not just rainwater falling from the sky. There were fish falling down, too! People came out to find out what was happening. They could not believe their own eyes. There were thousands of fish — sand eels— lying on the ground. They were about seven centimeters long, and all were frozen solid.

Sand eels swim together in large groups, often in sandy water, and are often found in large numbers in the North Sea, which reaches out to the east of Sunderland. How was it possible for these sand eels to fall from the sky and land on Sunderland?

Scientists believed the heavy thunderstorm that afternoon may have caused a waterspout. Waterspouts can be formed when strong winds move quickly in a circle over water. They are so powerful; anything less than one meter in length can be taken into them and forced into the clouds. The clouds carry whatever has been taken into them for long distances — sometimes over 150 kilometers. It’s very cold up there and everything soon freezes solid.

For hundreds of years there have been reports of small animals being taken into the sky through waterspouts. In 2009, dead tadpoles rained down on the city of Nanao in Japan. In 2012, fifty kilos of prawns fell from the sky over Sri Lanka. In 2017, fish fell on the coastal city of Tampico In Mexico.

It must be a very strange experience to see fish raining down on you. It would probably hurt if one fell on your head! With climate change, global warming and many reports of terrible natural disasters, will the time ever come when it may really begin to rain cats and dogs?

1. What was the rain like on 24 August 1918?

A．It was very heavy.	B．It fell around England.
C．It lasted quite a long time.	D．It caused many human deaths.

2. What do we know about the sand eels that landed on Sunderland?

A．They were few in number.	B．They came in different sizes.
C．They were still alive when landing.	D．They probably came from the North Sea.

3. What does the underlined word “them” in Paragraph 3 refer to?

A．Clouds.

B．Waterspouts.

C．Strong winds.

D．The waters of the sea.

4. In the end, what does the author probably care most about?

A．Our health.	B．Our environment.
C．The wild animals.	D．The news reports.

5 . Six weeks before his birthday, Giuseppe Paternò achieved the dream of a lifetime: He got a university degree.

Mr. Paternò's graduation has inspired news coverage around the world, partly because of his age. But he has mainly drawn attention because his life story speaks of commitment, a theme that has encouraged as millions of schoolchildren in Italy and elsewhere faces extraordinary uncertainty during the coronavirus pandemic.

Born in Palermo in 1923, the first of seven children in a “very poor family,” Mr. Paternò began working soon after finishing elementary school. “The family was large, there was only one paycheck, we were under fascism, and times were tough,” he said.

Eventually, he ended up at a publishing house where an enlightened boss persuaded his father to send him back to school for a three-year vocational degree. Mr. Paternò then worked for an insurance agency while he took private classes to become a telegraph operator. He used skills from the operator job when he was drafted into the navy in World War II. The job also opened doors to the State Railways Company, where he worked for more than four decades.

It was only after he retired, in the mid-1980s, that he returned to his books, taking theology courses through the Archdiocese of Palermo after a chance meeting with a philosophy professor who urged him to follow his love.

Mr. Paterno's son, Ninni Paternò, said that the family had not expected all the attention. “It's unbelievable!” the vounger Paternò said of his father. “He achieved his goal, but he didn't mean to be famous in newspapers around the world.”

University officials are hoping that Mr. Paternò will continue his studies on waster's course. But he isn't so sure. “I have to admit that in this moment, I don't know whether I would do it with the same spirit,” he said on Wednesday. Still, Mr. Paternò said he would probably continue anyway.

1. What's the main reason for the world to report Mr. Paternò's graduation?

A．His experience shows the spirit of commitment.

B．Mr. Paternò achieved his dream at an old age.

C．His graduation ceremony was during the coronavirus pandemic.

D．His achievement is extraordinary.

2. What does the underline word “this job” in paragraph 4 refer to?

A．Working for an insurance company.

B．Severing in the navy in World War II.

C．A telegraph operator.

D．The job in the State Railway Company.

3. What can we learn about Mr. Paternò's son's words?

A．The family had not agreed Mr. Paternò's decision.

B．Mr. Paternò didn't want to gain the world's attention.

C．Mr. Paternò suffered a lot to achieve his goal.

D．Mr. Paternò's achievement is not worth mentioning.

4. What can we learn from the passage?

A．It's never too late to achieve a dream.	B．No pains, no gains.
C．Young at heart.	D．Practice makes perfect.

6 . When newspapers and radios report the damage caused by a hurricane (飓风)called Hazel,girls named Hazel are probably played a joke on by others.To keep out of trouble,the Weather Bureau says,“Any resemblance(相似)between hurricane names and the names of particular girls is only accidental.”

Some women became angry because hurricanes are given their names,but many other women are proud to see their names make headlines.They don’t even care that they are the names of destructive storms.Because more women seem to like it than dislike it,the Weather Bureau has decided to continue using girls’ names for hurricanes.

In some ways a hurricane is like a person.After it is born,it grows and develops,then becomes old and dies.Each hurricane has a character of its own.Each follows its own way through the world,and people remember it long after it has gone.So it is natural to give hurricanes names,and to talk about them almost as if they were alive.

1. What happens to the girls named Hazel when hurricane Hazel is reported?

A．They suffer from hurricanes.

B．The Weather Bureau looks for them.

C．Others often make fun of them.

D．They can’t find boyfriends.

2. The underlined word “They” in the second paragraph refers to _______.

A．the reporters

B．the headlines

C．some women who become angry

D．some women who are proud

3. Public opinions make the Weather Bureau ______.

A．stop naming hurricanes after women

B．go on naming hurricanes after women

C．name hurricanes after men

D．look for a new method to name hurricanes

4. According to the passage,which is more reasonable?

A．Some women feel unhappy because hurricanes are given their names.

B．All the hurricanes are caused by women.

C．Many women want to be reported by TV and newspapers.

D．A hurricane grows and develops in the same way as a person.

7 . Becoming a real runner

I would never use the word “athletic” to describe myself. To me, athletes are people who really enjoy working out. I remember crying in middle school when I had to run a mile during gym class. I huffed and puffed as I jogged. As I grew up, I would go to the gym, but I never enjoyed working out. That, I thought, was for real runners.

In June 2017, my friend sent me an email that would forever change my attitude towards running. He was training for a 200-mile relay (接力赛) and wanted me to be on his team. I would run three legs between four and six miles each over the course of two days. Figuring that I would never again have the chance to work with some top runners, I immediately agreed, and started running outside to prepare.

That first run was hard. I purposefully avoided Central Park in order to stay away from real runners. After a few blocks, I was already winded, and ran the rest of the way home. I called my mom, choked up, to say I had no hope at all of running this relay. But she encouraged me to keep at it, so I didn't quit. I went from running four miles a week to eight within one month before my advanced training began.

I was frightened going into the first training session with the team as everyone else was super “athletic”. We ran for five miles, and I was significantly slower. However, my teammates were so supportive that I felt the runner’s high, which I had never believed existed.

One day, about two weeks into training, my ankle gave out while I was running in Central Park. I was diagnosed with a stress fracture (应力性骨折). The doctor told me to stop running for two months. It took me a while to face the fact that I was out of the race. My doctor told me that he too had once been struck down with a stress fracture, and the following year, he beat his best running time in a half-marathon. That brought me hope.

I made it through the next two months by picturing myself running again. Just yesterday, for the first time since that fateful day, I took my outdoor run with my physical therapist. I mentioned that I might run a half-marathon the next year. Now I wake up excited for the days I get to run. Maybe I am a “real runner” after all.

1. According to the article, when did the author start to feel passion for running?

A．After she got into the habit of working out.

B．After she got the courage to run outdoors on her own.

C．After she ran with some top runners and got their encouragement.

D．After she broke her ankle in training and stayed in bed for two months.

2. The underlined word in the passage refers to her doctor’s _________.

A．helpful advice.

B．immediate treatment.

C．experience in the marathon.

D．personal experience with an injury.

3. What can we infer from the article about the author?

A．She didn’t take the relay seriously.

B．She had a strict and overprotective mother.

C．She felt disappointed about withdrawing from the race.

D．She would have expected to run a half-marathon if she had won the race.

4. The author’s purpose of writing the article was to _________.

A．urge readers to exercise regularly.

B．share with readers the fun of running.

C．warn readers to be careful about running.

D．encourage readers to pursue their hobbies.

8 . My fifteen-year-old son has just returned from abroad with rolls of exposed film and a hundred dollars in uncashed traveler’s checks, and is asleep at the moment. His blue duffel bag lies on the floor where he dropped it. Obviously, he postponed as much sleep as he could: when he walked in and we hugged, his electrical system suddenly switched off, and he headed directly for the bed, where I imagine he beat his old record of sixteen hours.

It was his first trip overseas, so weeks before it, I pressed travel books on him, and a tape cassette of useful French phrases; drew up a list of people to visit; advised him on clothing and other things. At the luggage store where we went to buy him a suitcase, he headed for the duffels, saying that suitcases were more for old people.

During the trip, he called home three times: from London, Paris, and a village named Ullapool. Near Ullapool, he climbed a mountain in a rainstorm that almost blew him off. In the village, a man spoke to him in Gaelic, and, too polite to interrupt, my son listened to him for ten or fifteen minutes, trying to nod in the right places. The French he learned from the cassette didn’t hold water in Paris. The French he talked to shrugged and walked on.

When my son called, I sat down at the kitchen table and leaned forward and hung on every word. His voice came through clearly, though two of the calls were like ship-to-shore communication. When I interrupted him with a “Great!” or a “Really?”, I knocked a little hole in his communication. So I just sat and listened. I have never listened to a telephone so attentively and with so much pleasure. It was wonderful to hear news from him that was so new to me. In my book, he was the first man to land on the moon, and I knew that I had no advice to give him and that what I had already given was probably not much help.

The unused checks are certainly evidence of that. Youth travels light. No suitcase, not much luggage and a slim expense account, and yet he went to the scene, and came back safely. I sit here amazed. The night when your child returns with dust on his shoes from a country you’ve never seen is a night you would gladly turn into a week.

1. During the trip, the author’s son ______.

A．ran out of money	B．forgot to call his mother
C．had inadequate sleep	D．failed to take good pictures

2. Which of the following could best describe the author’s son?

A．Polite and careless.	B．Creative and stubborn.
C．Considerate and independent.	D．Self-centered and adventurous.

3. What does the underlined word “that” in the last paragraph refer to?

A．It is important to listen to your child’s story.

B．It’s easy to interrupt the chat with your child.

C．The author is proud of her son landing on the moon.

D．The son no longer needs much help from his mother.

4. What can we infer from the passage?

A．Good parents should protect their children from potential dangers.

B．The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.

C．It’s a win-win choice to give a child space to experience and explore.

D．Communication between parents and children is extremely important.

9 . For many years doctors have warned us about the dangers of stress (压力) and have given us advice about how to cut down our stress levels. Everyone agrees that long-term stress, for example having to look after someone who has a chronic (慢性的) illness, or stressful situations where there is nothing we can do, for example being stuck in a traffic jam, should be avoided whenever possible. However, some medical experts now believe that certain kinds of stress may actually be good for us.

Dr Marios Kyriazis, an anti-ageing expert, points out that what he calls "good stress” is beneficial to our health and may, in fact, help us stay young and attractive and even live longer. Dr Kyriazis says that “good stress” can strengthen our natural defences which protect us from illnesses common among older people, such as Alzheimer's and heart problems.

According to Dr Kyriazis, running for a bus or having to work to meet a deadline are examples of “good stress”, that is situations with short-term or low stress. The stress usually makes us react quickly, and gives us a sense of achievement — we did it! However, in both situations, the stress damages the cells(细胞) in our body or brain and they start to break down. But then the cells own repair mechanism “switches on”and it produces proteins which repair the damaged cells and remove harmful chemicals that can gradually cause disease. In fact, the body's response is greater than is needed to repair the damage, so it actually makes the cells stronger than they were before.

“As the body gets older, this self-repair mechanism of the cells starts to slow down,” says Dr Kyriazis.“The best way to keep the process working efficiently is to ‘exercise’ it, in the same way you would exercise your muscles to keep them strong. This means having a certain amount of stress in our lives.”Other stressful activities that Kyriazis suggests as being good stress include redecorating a room in your house over the weekend, packing your suitcase in a hurry to reach the airport on time, or shopping for a dinner party during your lunch break.

So next time your boss tells you that she wants to see the report finished and on her desk in 45 minutes, don't worry; just think of it as “good stress” which will   benefit your long-term health!

1. What is Dr Kyriazis' opinion probably based on?

A．How to get a sense of achievement.

B．How to cut down our stress levels.

C．The benefits of doing physical exercise.

D．The relationship between stress and health.

2. What does the underlined word “it” in Paragraph 3 refer to?

A．The daily stress.	B．Long-term stress.
C．The increasing stress.	D．Short-term or low stress.

3. According to Dr Kyriazis, which of the following may be “good stress”?

A．Being stuck in a traffic jam.

B．Packing for a trip at the last minute.

C．Being late for work for several days.

D．Looking after a patient with heart trouble.

4. What would be the best title for the text?

A．Stress beats success	B．Stress attracts illness
C．Get stressed, stay young	D．Less stress, better health

10 . Our ability to collect data gets far ahead of our ability to fully use it, yet data may hold the key to solving some of the biggest global challenges facing us today.

Take, for instance, the frequent outbreaks of waterborne diseases as a consequence of war or natural disasters. The most recent example can be found in the country, where roughly 10,000 new suspected cases of cholera(霍乱) are reported each week — and history is filled with similar stories. What if we could better understand the environmental factors that contributed to the disease, predict which communities are at higher risk, and put in place protective measures to stop the spread? Answers to this question and others like it could potentially help us prevent a catastrophe.

As a big data scientist, I studied data from wide-ranging, public sources to identify patterns, hoping to predict trends that could be a threat to global security. Various data streams are important because the ground truth data (such as surveys) is often delayed, limited, incorrect or, sometimes, nonexistent.

For example, knowing the incidence(发生率) of mosquito-borne disease in communities would help us predict the risk of mosquito-spread disease such as dengue, the leading cause of illness and death in the tropics. However, mosquito data at a global (and even national) level is not accessible.

To address this gap, we’re using other sources such as satellite pictures, climate data and population information to forecast the risk of dengue. Specifically, we had success in predicting the spread of dengue in Brazil at the regional, state and city level using these data streams as well as clinical observation data and online searchers that used terms related to the disease. While our predictions aren’t perfect, they show promise.

Similarly, to forecast the flu season, we have found that online searches can complement(补充) clinical data. Because the rate of people searching the internet for flu symptoms often increases during their beginning, we can predict a sharp increase in cases where clinical data delays. All of this shows the potential of big data. The information is there; now it’s time to use it.

1. What do the examples in paragraphs 2 and 4 show?

A．Big data is still hard to get and use.

B．People aren’t skilled at dealing with big data.

C．Big data is not always an imagined method.

D．Catastrophes might be prevented with big data.

2. According to the text, survey data        .

A．is a main form of multiple data streams

B．is an effective way to collect information

C．is sometimes unreliable and unavailable

D．is a timely alternative to multiple data streams

3. What does the underlined part “this gap” in paragraph 5 refer to?

A．The lack of big data on mosquitoes.

B．The lack of different data streams.

C．The risk of an outbreak of a disease.

D．The ignorance of how a disease spreads.

4. What’s the best title of the text?

A．How do we collect and use data?

B．What are the challenges facing us now?

C．How can big data help save the world?

D．What is the answer to preventing catastrophes?