1 . I’m a seventeen-year-old boy preparing for my A Level exams at the end of the year. In the society where my peers (同龄人) and I live, we tend to accept the rat race values. As students, we want to get good grades so that we can get good jobs. I enjoy studying and have consistently received A’s in my classes. There was a year when I finished first in my class in the final exams. It was a great accomplishment.

Another one I am pleased with is that I managed to improve the relationship between Mum and Dad. Dad was a successful businessman who was rarely at home. Mum was a housewife who always felt bored and constantly nagged (唠叨) him to let her go to work. Their constant arguing bothered me, so I advised Dad that Mum would be better off with a part-time job. He agreed, and their relationship has improved since then.

My most proud achievement, however, is my successful work in the local old folks’ home. My grandparents had raised me since I was a child. I wept (哭泣) bitterly when they died. Unlike many of my classmates, I do not take part in my school’s community service to earn points. I enjoy my voluntary work and believe I’m contributing to a worthwhile cause. This is where I can help. I talk to the elderly, assist them with their daily life, and listen to their problems, glory days and the hardships they experienced.

Last year, I hosted a successful New Year party for the elderly and they enjoyed a great time. Many expressed a desire to attend another party the following year. When I reflect on my accomplishments, I’m especially proud of my service at the old folks’ home, so I hope to study social work at university and work as a social worker in the future. I wish to be more skilled in attending to the less fortunate and find great satisfaction in it, after all.

1. What can be inferred about the author from the first paragraph?

A．He is content with his learning achievements.	B．His good grades got him a good job.
C．He refuses to compete with his peers fiercely.	D．His views on social values are well known.

2. Which role does the author play in his parents’ relationship?

A．A bystander (旁观者).

B．A judge.

C．A helper.

D．A destroyer.

3. What is the greatest achievement for the author?

A．The contribution to volunteering.	B．The success in exams.
C．The recovery of confidence in life.	D．The work in school’s service.

4. Why does the author want to study social work at university?

A．To gain a well-paid job.	B．To give his life a purpose.
C．To better help the disadvantaged.	D．To meet his grandparents’ expectations.

2 . 阅读下面短文，根据所给情节进行续写，使之构成一个完整的短文。

A Little Boy

A little boy selling magazines for school walked up to a house that people rarely visited. The house was very old and shabby and the owner hardly ever came out. When he did come out, he would not say hello to his neighbors or passers-by but simply just glared at them.

The boy knocked on the door and waited, sweating from fear of the old man. The boy’s parents told him to stay away from the house, and a lot of other neighborhood children were told the same thing from their parents.

Dusk found the boy lingering on and hesitating what to do. As he was ready to walk away, the door slowly opened. “What do you want?” the old man said impatiently. The little boy was very afraid but he had a quota (定额) to meet for school with selling the magazines. So he got up the courage and said, “Uh, Sir, I am selling these magazines and, uh, I was wondering if you would like to buy one from me.”

The old man just stared at the boy without a word. The boy could see inside the old man’s house and saw that he had dog figurines (小雕像) on the fireplace mantle. “Do you collect dogs?” The little boy asked. “Yes, I have many collections in my house. They are my family here and they are all I have.” The boy then felt sorry for the man, as it seemed that he was a very lonely soul.

“Well, I do have a magazine here for collectors. It is perfect for you. I also have one about dogs since you like dogs so much.” The old man was ready to close the door on the boy and said, “No, boy. I don’t need any magazines of any kind, now goodbye.”

The little boy was sad that he was not going to make his quota with the sale. He was also sad for the old man being so alone in the house that he owned. The boy went home and then had an idea. He had a little dog figurine that he got some years ago from an aunt. The figurine did not mean nearly as much to him since he had a real live dog and a large family.

注意:
1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式作答。

The little boy headed back down to the old man’s house.

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From that day on something changed inside the old man.

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3 . Life will probably be very different in 2050. First of all, it seems that TV channels will have vanished by 2050. Instead, people will choose a programme from a “menu” and a computer will send the programme directly to the television. By 2050, music, films, programmes, newspapers and books will come to us in the similar way.

In many places, agriculture is developing quickly and people are growing fruit and vegetables for export. This uses a lot of water. Therefore, there could be serious shortages of water. Some scientist predict that water could be the cause of wars if we don’t act now.

In the future, cars will run on new, clean fuels (燃料) and they will go very fast. Cars will have computers to control the speed and there won’t be any accidents. Today, many cars have computers that tell drivers exactly where they are. By 2050, the computer will control the car and drive it to your destination. Also, by 2050, space planes will fly people from Los Angeles to Tokyo in just two hours.

Some big companies now prefer to use robots that do not ask for pay rises or go on strike, and work 24 hours a day. They are also easy to control. And they never argue with people. They can be easily used in a variety of places — factories, schools, offices, hospitals, shops and homes.

Scientists will have discovered how to control genes (基因). Scientists have already produced clones (克隆) of animals. By 2050, scientists will be able to produce clones of people and decide how they look and how they behave. Scientists will be able to do these things, but should they?

1. Which of the following best explains “vanished” underlined in paragraph 1?

A．Settled.

B．Spread.

C．Disappeared.

D．Decreased.

2. What does paragraph 4 intend to show?

A．Robots can work in different places.

B．Robots have much to be improved.

C．Robots work for humans for free.

D．Robots have many advantages.

3. What does the author want to express in the last paragraph?

A．He probably disagrees with the idea of human cloning.

B．He is looking forward to using of cloning technology.

C．The scientists have already discovered how to control genes.

D．The scientists will face many difficulties of controlling genes.

4. What is the best title for the text?

A．High-tech Cars	B．Life in the Future
C．Is Cloning Really Good?	D．Are You Ready for the Future?

4 . Quietly sitting there reading, I found myself suddenly listening to the train guard’s announcements (通知). Train travelers will surely agree that when the guard (列车长) makes an announcement, whether it’s the recorded message or the guard’s message, few people listen to it, because it’s often quite dull or hard to understand. This one was different. I noticed that other passengers appeared to be listening, too. Not only that, everyone was smiling!

Why was so much attention being paid to this message? As best I can recall the guard said something along these lines, “Good Morning Ladies, Gentlemen and Children, this is the 7: 35 a.m. from Penrith to Central and you’ll be pleased to know that we are right on time. And what a lovely morning it is in Sydney today. The sun is shining, birds are singing, and all’s right with the world. I trust you have a great day wherever you’re going. Thanks for catching my train this morning and I hope to see you again soon.”

Quite a few people (obviously previous strangers) started talking to one another about the guards excellent message and how good it had made everyone feel. I started thinking about this, and then I found the young guard and said “Were you the guard on the 7: 35 a.m. from Penrith?” The guard seemed a bit stunned at first, replying, “Yes, yes.” “Well, I really appreciate your announcement. Thank you for your extremely good message, which gave me and the other passengers such a good start to the day. Please keep doing it.” I said.

There are two messages for me in what happened that day. Firstly, when people are happy in their work, it shows in what they do and say. Secondly, the story attaches much importance to the benefits that accumulate (积累) from thanking people for something they’ve done, particularly when it’s not expected. Can you imagine the conversation that guard would have when he got home?

1. Why do few train travelers listen to the announcements?

A．The messages are unattractive.

B．The guard’s voice is not clear.

C．They usually feel sleepy.

D．They are absorbed in books.

2. What does the underlined word “stunned” in Paragraph 3 mean?

A．Patient.	B．Frightened.
C．Surprised.	D．Excited.

3. What might the guard talk about with his family when he got home?

A．The beautiful weather.	B．The recorded message.
C．The train from Penrith.	D．The unexpected appreciation.

4. Which of the following can be the best title for the text?

A．An Intelligent Guard.

B．A Boring Train Story.

C．A Different Train Announcement.

D．A Lovely Morning in Sydney.

5 . Born in California and representing the United States before switching to China, teenager Gu Ailing will be most likely to be one of the faces of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.

The 17-year-old is a freeskier (自由式滑雪运动员) and grade-A student with an American father and Chinese mother. She grew up and still lives in the United States, but in June 2019 she made the “quite difficult” decision to compete for China. She wrote on Instagram that she was “proud of my heritage and equally proud of my American upbringings (培养)”.

As for the decision to compete on behalf of China, she said it is a “valuable opportunity to help inspire millions of young people in China where my mom was born”.

Gu graduated from a San Francisco high school last year and is focusing on her Beijing 2022 training. It is reported that she scored 1,580 points out of a maximum 1,600 in the SAT (美国大学入学考试), and has been offered a place at Stanford.

Gu started on the snow at the age of 3, was competing in national competitions at 9 and won her first World Cup event at 15. She won two gold medals and a silver for China at the 2020 Youth Olympic Games in Lausanne, Switzerland. On Jan. 30th, 2021, Gu made her debut (首次亮相) at the X Games in Aspen, Colorado and won two golds and a bronze.

“My goal is to win Olympic gold,” she told the official Olympic website. “It’s the top achievement. And that would be rewarding for all the work that I’ve done to achieve greatness in the sport.”

1. In the first paragraph, the underlined part “switching to” means in Chinese ________ .

A．打开	B．关闭
C．突变	D．转变

2. What do we know about Gu Ailing?

A．She grew up in China.	B．She is an average student.
C．She will graduate from a high school.	D．She decided to compete for China.

3. Which of the following words can best describe Gu Ailing?

A．Helpful and knowledgeable.	B．Modest and hard-working.
C．Clever and ambitious.	D．Creative and confident.

4. What’s the best title of the passage?

A．Gu Ailing—An American Freeskier	B．Gu Ailing—A Stanford Graduate
C．Gu Ailing—A talented Chinese Freeskier	D．Gu Ailing—An Olympic Champion

6 . 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。

On February 16, 1861, a big earthquake struck Sumatra, an Indonesian island. The earthquake shook the     1    (west)side of the island, causing a tsunami (海啸). That wall of water crashed into the shore,     2     (destroy) towns and taking thousands of     3    (life).

Recently, though, a team of scientists discovered that another earthquake occurred before this deadly event. According to the record, that earthquake     4    (start) in 1829 and lasted for 32 years but no one felt even one shake. This kind of slow-moving earthquake     5    (call) “silent earthquakes” because no instrument can find them. Scientists have only begun discovering them because    6     the advances in GPS technology in the last twenty years.

To figure out what is going on under the ground, scientists need to study earthquakes. Every earthquake, either small     7     big, can teach scientists something about how much the ground will shake in the future. Unluckily, no one can predict (预测) when an earthquake will hit. Scientists just have to prepare to study all earthquakes     8     strike.

But silent earthquakes like the one in Sumatra change the game for scientists. These silent earthquakes happen all over     9    world. Sometimes, a silent earthquake happens just before a regular one, both of which might be related. By studying silent earthquakes, scientists hope to     10     (well) understand regular earthquakes than before and possibly predict them.

7 . 读后续写

I always wondered how people would react if I tried to approach a stranger for help in a busy place like a street corner or in a bustling mall. I personally have hurried past a stranger who tried to catch my attention in a busy place.

Yesterday I had a taste of being stuck in such a desperate situation where your only hope of help would have to come from a total stranger.

I was in a busy shopping mall buying a large piece of luggage. After the purchase in one of the large and expensive shops, I picked up my phone from my pocket to call my driver waiting in the parking lot and my phone was dead.

I then requested the shop assistant selling me the luggage, which was not cheap at all, if she could ring the number of my driver for me. She replied, still all smiles, “I’m sorry Sir, but it is the shop policy that we cannot use mobile phones while working in the shop.”

As I was wondering what kind of policy that was, I saw a nice-looking teenage boy coming toward me. Remember my wife’s interesting theory that beautiful people are more likely to give you a hand when you’re in trouble, I thought I might have a chance. But before I could say a word, he walked past me. It turned out he simply didn’t see me.

I waited in the mall but it seemed nobody bothered to look at me. Disappointed and tired, I got out of the shop on to the busy street in front. I stood there with people rushing by, looking at their faces to see if they will show kindness to me. I began wondering how many times I had reacted to strangers like the shop girl and the teenager.

注意：1. 续写的短文词数应为100左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。

That was when I saw a young mother with her two kids.

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Finally a man wearing a cheap T-shirt and dirty jeans seemed to notice me.

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8 . 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.

9 . In an ideal world, we would be able to devote as much time to sports as we feel we need. But in reality, with growing demands in both work and family, we can only jump at the chance for our physical exercise when we can. Making the most of that time to practice Yin Yang yoga, which mixes the dynamic and slow-paced elements of yoga, helps keep you active and relaxed.

Yin and Yang are the Taoist concepts representing a balance of opposite forces which are also interconnected. Yin is inactive, cooling, and negative, associated with the female force. Yang is   active, warming, and positive, associated with action and movement. They are complementary to one another, as one cannot exist without the other.

Yin Yang yoga is a combination (结合体) of high-energy movement which builds energy, increases strength and promotes stamina (耐力), followed by the more restful practice of Yin to give us a deeper stretch (拉伸) and calm the nervous system.

If you have a busy and active life you may feel more in Yang, so taking some cooler, slower Yin yoga practice into your routine may help you feel calmer and more balanced.

If you are practicing for an hour, divide the time in half. Warm up with sun salutations (拜日式瑜伽), continue into a dynamic flow and then move on to some standing postures. After half an hour your heart will be pumping, muscles tighten up and you are hopefully feeling energetic, but ready for a rest. Then pick five Yin postures to hold for 3-5 minutes, or even longer if you are enjoying them!

As ever with yoga, if you are a beginner or have health issues, always attend a class with a trained instructor first to guide you safely through the yoga practice and avoid injury.

1. What can be inferred from paragraph 1?

A．Most of our sports time should be spent on Yin Yang yoga.

B．We’d better devote as much time to physical exercise as we can.

C．Busy schedule makes it impossible for us to do any form of sports.

D．Yin Yang yoga can be a choice of physical exercise when we are busy.

2. What does the underlined word “complementary” probably mean in the second paragraph?

A．Independent from one another.

B．Competitive against one another.

C．Similar to each other but unable to work together as a whole.

D．Different from each other but together making a good combination.

3. Which of the following might be the advantage of Yin postures?

A．Relaxing muscles.	B．Building stamina.
C．Strengthening the body.	D．Quickening the heartbeat.

4. What suggestion does the writer give in the last two paragraphs?

A．Hold each Yin posture for longer than 5 minutes.

B．Do not practice yoga when you are not in good health.

C．Start your yoga practice with an expert trainer.

D．Spare half an hour for five Yin postures in every yoga practice.

10 . 阅读下面短文，在空白处填入 1 个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。   

When you read a book, you’ve probably noticed that a brand new book has a rather special smell,     1     differs from that of an older book. Where does     2    come from? Three source -the paper, the ink and the glue.

Around 200 AD, the Chinese first came up with paper, one of the greatest     3     (invent) in the world. It is made     4     wood. The wood must be processed with various chemicals     5     (add) to change its structure, to remove acid and to whiten the paper. Then comes the ink—there are many kinds. Some fade with time, while others get     6    (dark) than years ago. Finally, different glues     7     (use) to join the sheets together and attach the covers, whether hardcover or paperback. Therefore, you can smell different chemicals     8     (come) out of your new book.

Today, the forms of books     9     (change) dramatically since the birth of eBooks. They might be     10     (convenience), but you can’t give your copy to others as a present, and they don’t smell as nice.