1 . Even our quietest corners are full of surprises. Yes, rural Britain is famous for its dazzlingly diverse national parks.
The Lake District
This is nature’s playground. From the tip of England’s tallest peak to the nation’s deepest lake, this national park is packed with super-sized scenery—and there are endless ways to get involved: wild swimming, rafting, canyoning, sailing…, not to mention some of Britain’s premier hiking trails.
The South Downs
The South Downs will take your breath away-in more ways than one. Yes, its views are magnificent, but there are also epic trails to hike, rivers to kayak, castles to conquer and wild woods to explore. And while its biodiversity is impressive, the area is also home to thriving towns and dynamic history, from the cathedral city of Winchester to the 2,000-year-old Roman villa at Bignor.
The Scottish Highlands
Located in the northern reaches of Scotland, the Highlands are about beauty and adventure. With islands for exploring, thick pine forests to wander and peaks to climb, it’s packed with picture-perfect scenery and exciting experiences. From the valleys of Loch Lomond to the heights of Ben Nevis, expect everything from folk festivals to off-roading.
Cornwall
Renowned for its glorious countryside, striking coastline and unique attractions, you’ll find an abundance of places to visit in Cornwall. From catching a performance at the open-air clifftop Minack Theatre to surfing the waves at Newquay’s Fistral Beach, Cornwall has something for everyone.
1. In which places can you find great hiking trails?| A．The Lake District and Cornwall. |
| B．The South Downs and the Scottish Highlands. |
| C．The South Downs and the Lake District. |
| D．The Scottish Highlands and Cornwall. |
| A．Exploring ancient castles and historical landmarks. |
| B．Attending folk festivals and religious events. |
| C．Watching performances and trying beach activities. |
| D．Mountaineering and Islands exploring. |
| A．Rich cultural history. | B．Abundant outdoor activities. |
| C．Impressive biodiversity. | D．Striking coastlines. |
2 . Listed below are some nice family-friendly museums in Chicago, pick one that interests your kids most and take your little ones there to have fun.
Shedd Aquarium (水族馆)
It was open to the public on May 30th, 1930. Visitors with limited movement can use easy slopes (斜坡) to reach the exhibits, which are also explained to children through an app.Families can spend the night in the aquarium during the special event called Asleep with the Fishes.
Elmhurst History Museum
It’s a museum about history that has won awards and was created in 1957. It shows different exhibits about many history-related subjects, has a fun interactive exhibit about its own history, and offers various public programs, tours of exhibits, and special events for the community. The museum is a fantastic place for families to visit for a day or two, and it even has places for picnics and holiday train journeys.
Chicago Children’s Museum
Founded in 1982, the museum displays impressive exhibits for children, featuring dinosaur bones, a play area only for babies and a famous and fun climbing area for children.Moreover, the museum offers various exhibitions and daily art classes for children, which are free of charge. Visiting the museum on the weekend is a good choice for economical family amusement.
Field Museum of Natural History
With millions of things in its store, it was established in 1893. Disco ver more than 4billion years of life on Earth through interesting displays and interactive events, and discover protection campaigns worldwide. It is now considered as famous as the Smithsonian Institution, established in 1846 in Washington, and the American Museum of Natural History, which originated in 1869 in New York.
1. What is special about the Shedd Aquarium for family visitors?| A．They can go on a picnic there. |
| B．They can sleep overnight there. |
| C．They can surf the Internet. |
| D．They can learn the history of Chicago. |
| A．Have discounts on holidays. | B．Watch dolphins’ exhibitions. |
| C．Take a fun climb. | D．Take free art classes on an app. |
| A．Shedd Aquarium. | B．ElmhurstHistoryMuseum. |
| C．Chicago Children’s Museum. | D．Field Museum of Natural History. |
3 . Singer Liu Genghong is enjoying great popularity recently after posting online fitness videos on TikTok. In the videos, he often works out to the fast-paced music of his friend JayChou. Now his TikTok account has rocketed to 55 million fans and 53 million likes, inspiring people’s interest in indoor exercise.
According to Pu Zhengning, a professor of Southeast University in Nanjing, the COVID-19 has limited access to gyms and fitness centers, so simple aerobic (有氧的) exercises that do not need equipment are perfect for people to perform at home. And that is exactly the demand that Liu has come up on his social media platforms.
Since the COVID-19 broke out, the increasing downloads of fitness apps indicates the growing popularity of online fitness. The number of fitness videos on the platform in 2021 increased by 134 percent, while followers of fitness trainers were up by 208 percent.
Wei Fang, a student at Shandong Normal University, is one of Liu’s fans. “My major requires me to sit for a long time,” she said. “So how could I refuse a star singer as a personal trainer? Besides, when watching the live stream, I feel like I’m taking exercise with friends, which encourages me to keep going,” added Wei, who claims to have lost 3.5 kilograms in just seven days and also have a more positive mood.
According to the 2022 Sports and Fitness Consumption Trend Report, the sales of yoga and dance products have achieved fast growth since March. Along with social media plat-forms, China’s sports governing body launched online games on April 28. Ding Dong, an official with the General Administration of Sport, said: “The aim of the games is to inspire the mass enthusiasm for fitness.”
Now it seems that “cloud fitness” offers a great choice to gym memberships. In the past, aerobic exercises on TV were popular, and now it’s even easier to follow along and learn from instructors on short-video platforms.
1. Why does Liu Genghong become popular online recently?| A．People love his online fitness videos. |
| B．He dances to the fast-paced music of Jay Chou. |
| C．The gyms and fitness centers are too expensive. |
| D．People are interested in taking exercise in the gym. |
| A．She dislikes a star singer as a personal trainer. |
| B．She often works out with Liu to lose weight. |
| C．She refuses to exercise together with friends. |
| D．She benefits physically and mentally from exercise. |
| A．The mass enthusiasm for fitness needs improving. |
| B．Online sports games have appeared on the market. |
| C．More and more people take part in aerobic exercises. |
| D．Yoga and dance on TikTok are developing together. |
| A．Come to Exercise with Trainer Liu |
| B．The Followers of Fitness Instructors |
| C．Downloads of Various Fitness Apps |
| D．Go to Post Cloud Fitness Short Videos |
A Hearty Welcome
Chase counted his new year gifts one more time as he put a robot-shaped eraser into each envelope. “Twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two.”
“Do you have one for everyone in your class?” Mom asked.
“Yep!” Chase said. “I’m ready for the party tomorrow!”
When Chase got to school the next day, he saw a new girl in his classroom. She stood near Ms. Robins and looked around shyly.
“This is Eva,” said Ms. Robins. “Will someone volunteer to show her around today? “Chase raised his hand since he liked showing the new kids around and helping them feel welcome.
“Thanks, Chase, “Ms. Robins said. “Now let’s get down to our work.”
That’s when Chase realized he didn’t have a new year gift for Eva. No one else would have one either. Chase pictured his classmates’ desks covered with gifts while Eva’s desk was empty. He felt sad about that.
At a break, he was careful not to mention the party as he showed Eva around the playground. At lunchtime, he walked Eva to the lunchroom, still worried about what would happen at the party. Eva had brought a packed lunch. so Chase showed her where she was supposed to sit and introduced her to some of the kids at her table.
While eating, Chase suddenly remembered that kids often included candy hearts with the new year gifts they exchanged. This won’t be a New Year’s Day for Eva with no gifts. But as he sat down at his table, an idea flooded into his head. He whispered it to the kids around him. Soon everyone at the table was nodding and whispering.
When they were back in the classroom after lunch, Chase told Ms. Robins about their plan. Ms. Robins smiled. “That’s very thoughtful, “she said. “Let’s go for it.”
It was math time, so Chase invited Eva to study with him. He made sure Eva sat with her back to the room so she wouldn’t notice.
1. 续写词数应为150左右：2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位登作答。
Meanwhile, her new classmates were busying working on something.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________“Here’s your new year gift, Eva. It’s from everyone,” said Chase.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________When my daughters reached the third and fourth grades, I occasionally allowed them to walk to and from school alone, if the weather permitted. One warm spring day, a small friend followed them home after school. This friend was different from any other friends they had brought home. With a yellowish coat and tiny brown spots dropped across her nose, she was the cutest puppy I had ever seen.
When my husband got home that evening, he recognized the breed——a beagle puppy (猎兔犬), not more than twelve weeks old, he guessed. She ran to him right away and after dinner climbed into his lap to watch TV. By now the girls were both begging me to keep her.
She had no collar or identifying marks of any sort. I didn’t know what to do. I thought about running an ad in the lost-and-found but I really didn’t want to. It would break the kids’ hearts if someone should show up. Besides, her owners should have watched her more closely. I tried to find seemingly logical reasons to explain my behavior.
By the end of the week, she was part of our family. We had named the puppy Molly. She was very intelligent and good with the girls. This was a good idea, I thought. It was time for the girls to take responsibility for another life, so they would learn the nurturing skills they’d need if they decided to become mommies when they grew up.
The following week, something told me to check the lost-and-found section in the local paper. One particular ad jumped out at me and my heart pounded with fear at what I read. Someone was asking for the return of a lost beagle puppy near our grade school. They sounded desperate. My hand shook.
注意：
1. 续写词数应为 150 左右;
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Paragraph 1: Instead, I pretended I hadn’t seen the ad.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Paragraph 2: I knew in my heart I had to call that number and see if our Molly was the puppy they were desperately seeking.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
6 . When the designer and typographer (排印工) Marcin Wichary chanced upon a tiny museum just outside Barcelona five years ago, the experience tipped his interest in the history of technology into an obsession (痴迷) with a very particular part of it: the keyboard.
“I have never seen so many typewriters under one roof. Not even close,” he shared on the Internet at the time. “At this point, I literally have tears in my eyes. I’m not kidding. This feels like a miracle.”
He’d had a discovery while wandering through the exhibit: Each key on a keyboard has its own stories. And these stories are not just about computing technology, but also about the people who designed, used, or otherwise interacted with the keyboards.
Take the backspace key for example, he explains, “I like that the concept of backspace was originally just that — a space going backward. We are used to it erasing now, but for a hundred years, erasing was its own incredibly complex effort. You needed to master a Comet eraser, or Wite-Out, or strange correction tapes, and possibly all of the above… or give up and start from scratch whenever you made a small mistake in typing.”
The deeper he researched, the more obsessive he became. Amazed that no comprehensive books existed on the history of keyboards, he decided to create his own. When not working at his day job as the design leader for the design software company Figma, he began producing Shift Happens, a two-volume, 1,216-page hardcover book — and raised over $750,000 for the project on Kickstarter in March of 2023. Wichary was only a bit surprised by the support and the keyboard’s wide appeal. As he points out. “It’s such a crucial device that occupies a lot of our waking life.”
1. After the museum experience, Wichary’s interest in technology ________.| A．took off | B．died out | C．grew stronger | D．became more concrete |
| A．The stories behind them. | B．The wisdom of human. |
| C．The secret of the keyboards. | D．The history of technology. |
| A．It is a simple but powerful key. |
| B．It can be used to move back one space. |
| C．It is the result of long-term improvement. |
| D．It allows people to make mistakes when typing. |
| A．To fill a gap. | B．To get famous. | C．To make money. | D．To record history. |
1. Why does the speaker get excited about the Screen Machine?
| A．It screens movies on a boat. |
| B．It always shows the latest movies. |
| C．It enables him to see movies easily. |
| A．30 minutes. | B．60 minutes. | C．80 minutes. |
| A．Selling tickets. | B．Showing the movies. | C．Fixing the motors. |
| A．The way of buying tickets. |
| B．The benefits of the Screen Machine. |
| C．The cost of building a mobile cinema. |
1. When can most children learn how to use the computer?
| A．At the age of 2. | B．At the age of 3.5. | C．In Grade3 or 4. |
| A．On his own. | B．Under Judy’s guidance. | C．With the help of the software. |
| A．They can avoid being at a disadvantage. |
| B．They can get online help from the teachers. |
| C．They’ll leave good impressions on their teachers. |
1. Why did the woman go to Bangkok?
| A．Her friend persuaded her. |
| B．Her company sent her there. |
| C．Her colleague invited her. |
| A．The temples. | B．The food. | C．The weather. |
| A．February. | B．April. | C．November. |
1. Why does the woman talk of a blackboard?
| A．To show the standard of choosing an object. |
| B．To explain the structure of the collection. |
| C．To emphasize the long history of the town. |
| A．A teapot. | B．A sports shirt. | C．A wedding photo. |
| A．On the museum website. | B．In a local newspaper. | C．On the noticeboard. |
