1 . China is one of the world’s ancient civilizations and has the earliest outstanding bronze casting technology. Here we’ve created a list of 4 museums where you can gain an in-depth understanding of Chinese bronze.

Sanxingdui Museum

Address: Sanxingdui Ruin Site, 133 Xian Road, Guanghan, Deyang, Sichuan province

Hours: Comprehensive Gallery (the first exhibition hall): 8:30-18:00; Bronze Gallery (the second exhibition hall): 8:30-18:30. Last tickets sold at 17:00. Closed on the morning of Chinese New Year’s Eve

Ticket booking: 0838-5651526

General admission: Gallery ticket 80 yuan

Note: Children shorter than 1.2m (including 1.2m) can visit the gallery free of charge. The ticket must be used on the day it is sold and authorizes one visit to each gallery.

National Museum of China

Address: East side of Tian’anmen Square, Dongcheng district, Beijing

Hours: 8:30-17:00 (no entry after 16:30)

General admission: Free (passport required for entry), Closed Mondays (except for national holidays)

E-mail: webmaster@chnmuseum.cn

Shanghai Museum

Address: 201 Renmin Avenue, Huangpu district, Shanghai

Hours: 9:00-17:00 (no entry after 16:00), Closed Mondays (except for national holidays)

E-mail: webmaster@shanghai-museum.org

General admission: free (a max of 8, 000 admitted daily)

Hunan Museum

Address: 50 Dongfeng Road, Changsha, Hunan province

Hours:   9:00-17:00 (no entry after 16:00), Closed Mondays (except for national holidays) and the eve of Chinese New Year

Tel: (+86-731) 8415833, 84475933

E-mail: web@hnmuseum.com

General admission: Free (passport required for entry)

1. Which museum should you choose for your family to visit next Monday?

A．Sanxingdui Museum	B．Hunan Museum
C．Shanghai Museum	D．National Museum of China

2. What do these museums in this passage have in common?

A．They are all free of charge.	B．They all set a deadline for entry.
C．They all lie in the south of China.	D．They can all be available through E-mail.

3. In which part of a newspaper can you most probably read this passage?

A．Science

B．Today’s News

C．Entertainment

D．History and Culture

2 . 阅读下面材料，在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。

Cheering, dancing and singing, local people and tourists gathered around the fire during the Torch Festival of the Yi People in Bijie, Guizhou, on Aug 12. The festival     1     (list) as a national intangible cultural heritage(非物质文化遗产) in 2011.

There are different stories about how the festival started. But     2     (probable) it was because of the natural worship(崇拜) of fire by the Yi people. Fire was important since their ancestors could use it to bring light as well as     3     (warm) and cook food. One Yi ethnic proverb says, “Everything you eat must’see’ fire.” This is due to     4     old practice. Before bringing meat into the home from the outside, a small fire must first be lit outside and the meat should be smoked on the fire. In farming, fire was used     5     (light) piles of branches and leaves,     6     were later buried in the ground.

The Yi people used to celebrate the harvest, as a way to pray for a good harvest and drive away evil from their homes and farmland. Today it has become a     7     (society) event where people come together to light torches and join in various     8     (activity) such as building bonfires, horse racing, wrestling, bullfighting and beauty contests. The festival also provides people     9     a chance to expand their circle of friends. Through the festival, the Yi people not only share their joy and thanks for their good life,     10     get more people to understand their lifestyle and traditions.

4 . Had she been a singer, she might have been an American star. But Clora Bryant played the trumpet, and reputation came slowly. Bryant, a barrier breaker who stood firm in her determination to be a respected jazz trumpet player despite the open sexism (性别歧视) that shadowed her, died on August 25, in 2019, in Los Angeles, when she was 92. Life as a jazz trumpeter was an uphill battle, said her son Darrin. “It was a man’s world, and that made it hard for her. But that only fueled her fire, and made her more resolved.”

Bryant played the trumpet with such passion and she became a mainstay in the growing jazz scene in the 1940s. Dizzy Gillespie once told Times jazz critic Leonard Feather that Bryant was the most underrated (低估) trumpet player in L.A.

But by 1992, she was living on Social Security, staying at a son’s Long Beach, in California, apartment, and two of her trumpets were in the pawnshop (典当铺). “A lot of clubs have closed.” she told the Times. “And how many female trumpet players do you see working?”

Bryant and her brothers were raised by their father, a patient man who encouraged his children to think big. She wanted to be in the high school marching band, but Charles Bryant warned his daughter she’d likely face resistance. “But anything you want to do, I’m behind you,” she recalled. It was her father who encouraged her to do whatever she wanted to do that made her stronger and stronger.

1. What does the underlined word “resolved” in paragraph 1 probably mean?

A．Adventurous.

B．Unique.

C．Emotional.

D．Determined.

2. Why is “Social Security” mentioned in paragraph 3?

A．To show people’s acts of kindness.

B．To prove Bryant’s struggle through life.

C．To explain how Bryant earned his living.

D．To stress the importance of the pawnshop.

3. What’s the key reason for Bryant’s being underrated?

A．The open sexism from society.

B．The poor family background.

C．The terrible financial situation.

D．The mental pressure from colleagues.

4. What played an important role for Bryant to stick to her dream?

A．Her son’s support.	B．Her brothers’ company.
C．Her strict family education.	D．Her father’s encouragement.

6 . There are many podcasts (播客) that teach English and you can listen to them anytime. Here is a list of some of the best podcasts that you must see.

Learn English Podcast

This podcast has three levels.The first is for beginners, the second is for intermediates (中级学生) and the third is for upper intermediates. If a person wants to learn Business English,then episodes are also made for him.Every podcast is short but very informative. Worksheets and vocabulary tasks are also included.

Speaking Broadly

This podcast is made for advanced learners. Explained through discussion and interviews, each episode has non-native English speakers and every recording also has expert feedback. You will see some common mistakes made by English learners and you can improve your English by learning from those mistakes.

The English We Speak

This podcast airs one episode daily and every episode is only three to four minutes, which talks about phrases and idioms.There are two people in each episode who communicate with each other. Whatever level you are,you will find it rewarding

Elementary Podcast

This podcast is mainly for beginners and intermediate level learners. The length of a podcast is around 25 minutes but you can pause it anytime and continue whenever you want. The hosts of each episode are different.

1. Which podcast provides exercises going with it?

A．Learn English Podcast.	B．Speaking Broadly.
C．The English We Speak	D．Elementary Podcast.

2. What do we know about Speaking Broadly?

A．It records just expert speakers.	B．It aims at beginners.
C．It presents some typical mistakes.	D．It provides feedback from listeners.

3. What do The English We Speak and Elementary Podcast have in common?

A．They have the same length.	B．They are both interactive.
C．They share the same contents.	D．They are suitable for beginners.

7 . It is generally assumed that one can’t have too many friends. But it seems that there is a natural limit to the number of people we stay in touch with. A study found that when we make new friends, by starting a new job or going to university, we downgrade or even drop old ones. And while the friends may change, the number stays almost the same.

Oxford University researcher Felix Reed-Tsochas asked 24 students in the final months of school to list all their friends and relatives and say how close to them they were. The pupils filled in the questionnaire (问卷) twice more after starting work or going to university. They were also given free mobile phones and agreed that researchers could use their bills to work out who they called, when and for how long.

Putting the two pieces of information together showed, unsurprisingly, that most people have a small circle of close friends, who they spend most of their time talking to. This inner circle is surrounded by group after group of ever more distant friends. As the volunteers’ lives changed, this overall pattern, including the number of best friends, remained almost the same, meaning that some close friends from childhood were dropped or downgraded as new friendships were built.

Dr Reed-Tsochas said, “Maybe my best friend is no longer the same person but the amount of time I allocate (分配) to my best friend is still the same.” He added that this finding suggests that even with the coming of modern technology we are only capable of forming a limited number of true friendships.

Chester University researcher Dr Sam Roberts said, “Our results are likely to reflect limitations in the ability of humans to keep emotionally close relationships both because of limited time and because the emotional capital (情绪资本) that individuals can allocate between family members and friends is limited.”

1. According to Paragraph 1, what is a popular belief about making friends?

A．A friend in need is a friend indeed.	B．We should treat friends as our family.
C．The more friends we make, the better.	D．A friend to everybody is a friend to nobody.

2. Which is a method Dr Reed-Tsochas used in his study?

A．Checking the volunteers’ call records.	B．Learning about the volunteers’ hobbies.
C．Tracking the volunteers’ job performance.	D．Interviewing the volunteers’ schoolmates.

3. What did the researchers find from the study?

A．One’s attitude to friendship remains the same.

B．People attach great importance to friendships.

C．People rarely drop their old friends to make new ones.

D．The number of one’s best friends doesn’t change much.

4. What is the function of the last paragraph?

A．To add background information.	B．To give a possible explanation.
C．To offer some suggestions.	D．To introduce a new topic.

8 . 假定你是李华，你的英国朋友Mike对中国传统艺术很感兴趣，你想邀请他和你一起去参观你们当地的一个剪纸艺术展览。请你给他发一封邮件，告知具体事项，内容包括：
1. 时间和地点；
2. 剪纸艺术展览的目的和意义等。
注意：1. 写作词数应为80左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Dear Mike,
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Yours,

Li Hua

9 . With a relatively small population, pandas are not out of the woods or the bamboo forest just yet. The biggest threat to the wild panda population is habitat loss. And while around 34%0f its wild habitat is protected, these areas are still vulnerable to natural disasters, such as wildfires. To protect panda habitat, the Digital Panda System, developed by the Sichuan Forest and Grassland Administration and Chinese technology giant Huawei, was used effectively across forest and grasslands in Sichuan Province

The instant reporting system helps to detect wildfires in hard-to-reach areas, alerting fire departments so they can react quickly, as well as monitoring wildlife. Meanwhile, another smart technology-facial recognition could help identify individual pandas more accurately. Each panda has a unique facial structure and hair pattern. To the human eye, their fur-covered faces all look the same, but computer programs are able to distinguish the differences.

The system collects data from over 600 cameras, drones (无人机) and satellites, which it stores in the cloud. Researchers use this data to monitor, track and study wildlife as well as detect wildfire hotspots. Because the cameras are used in remote areas where there is little or no electricity, the system is solar-powered and uses microwave transmission (传送), which doesn’t require cables (电缆).

The system assists 140,000 forest rangers, grassland managers, conservationists and researchers in Sichuan. In its first five months of operations, it detected 651 wildfire hotspots, reducing forest fires by 71.6% compared to the same period the previous year.

Despite its name, the Digital Panda System offers protection to more than just pandas. The system covers the Sichuan section of the newly established Giant Panda National Park. The park is home to most of China’s 1800 wild pandas along with a further 8,000 animal and plant species. In the future, the digital panda system could be extended across the sections of the national park that lie in Shanxi and Gansu provinces, creating more success stories for other endangered species.

1. Why was the Digital Panda System built?

A．To record wildlife population.

B．To protect wild pandas from losing habitat.

C．To increase forest and grassland coverage.

D．To provide pandas with more bamboos as food.

2. What do we know about the system?

A．Computer programs identify pandas by size.

B．The data collected is mainly stored in cameras.

C．Smart technology plays an important role in its operation.

D．The system fails to collect data in areas without access to electricity.

3. What is the purpose of listing figures in paragraph 4?

A．To prove the effectiveness of the system.

B．To show the various functions of system.

C．To illustrate the data collection process of the program.

D．To compare the advantages and disadvantages of the system.

4. What can we infer from the last paragraph?

A．The system aims at saving pandas only.

B．The system has already gone into service nationwide.

C．The system is likely to benefit other animals facing extinction.

D．The system offers protection to all the species in Sichuan Province.

10 . As a young child, I was painfully shy. I’d watch other children play in the park, wishing I could join them, but I was too scared to approach. Eventually, my mother would come to the rescue. She’d ask the other kids if I could play, too. Today, I feel comfortable giving public lectures in large halls and having conversations in small groups, but I still tend to avoid situations in which I’m expected to spend time with a roomful of strangers.

There could be many reasons. For one thing, I might be carrying some childhood fear of rejection (拒绝). But beyond that possibility, one likely element is that I tend to underestimate(低估)how much people like me after I meet them, as most of us do.

A new research paper reports that the common concern that new people may not like us, or that they may not enjoy our company, is largely arbitrary.

Erica Boothby of Cornell University and her colleagues conducted a series of studies to find out what our conversation partners really think of us. In doing so, they discovered a new cognitive illusion (认知错觉) they call “the liking gap”: our failure to realize how much strangers appreciate our company after a bit of conversation.

The researchers observed the gap in a variety of situations: strangers getting to know each other in the research laboratory, first-year college students getting to know their dormitory mates over the course of many months, and community members meeting others in personal development workshops. In each circumstance, people consistently underestimated how much others liked them. For much of the academic year, as dormitory mates got to know each other and even started to develop enduring friendships, the liking gap continued to exist.

The data also showed some of the potential reasons for the illusion: we are often more severe with ourselves than with others, and our inner critic prevents us from appreciating how positively other people evaluate us. Not knowing what our conversation partners really think of us, we use our own thoughts as a proxy (代理人). This is a mistake, because our thoughts tend to be more negative than reality.

1. Why does the author mention his childhood experience?

A．To show how his character changed.

B．To explain what he was like when he was young.

C．To show an example of why people are shy of communication.

D．To emphasize the important role of a mother in one’s childhood.

2. What does the underlined word “arbitrary” probably mean?

A．various.

B．unreasonable.

C．unsuccessful.

D．serious

3. What do we know about the liking gap from the text?

A．It indicates what strangers really think of us.

B．It begins and ends quickly among strangers.

C．It disappears when strangers get to know each other.

D．It states our misunderstanding of how much others like us.

4. Which of the following is the best title for this text?

A．People Like You More than You Know

B．How to Get Along Well with Strangers

C．The Way to Know What Others Think of Us

D．Having Conversations with Strangers Benefits Us