2 . “When we think of curiosity, we often think of the need for immediate answers,” said Abby Hsiung, Ph. D. , a postdoctoral researcher at the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences and lead author of a new research paper. “But we found that when people were more curious, they were actually more pleased to wait.”

“When we watch TV shows or football games, we’re watching that information develop over time, uncertain about how it’s all going to end,” said Hsiung. “I wanted to know if higher curiosity would push people to seek, or to avoid getting an immediate ‘spoiler’ (剧透).”

Hsiung drew inspiration from short cooking videos that are popular on social media. “These videos caught my attention because even though they’re so short, they manage to develop a description and suspense (悬念), so that you’re attracted and curious about how the pizza will all come together.” So Hsiung got out her digital paintbrush and made a lot of 30-second animated line drawing videos that, like the cooking videos, eventually ended up as something highly recognizable, like a hamburger or a dog.

More than 2,000 adults from across the U. S. then watched 25 of these short line drawing videos online. Participants in Hsiung’s study were asked along the way how curious they were, how they felt, and to guess what the drawing would become. Viewers also had a spoiler button to skip ahead to see the final drawing. Hsiung and her team were surprised to find that when people were curious, they refused to hit the spoiler button and kept watching the drawings unfold. It was when people were less curious that they tended to go for an instant answer.

The study also found that curiosity increased at different stages of watching these videos. “We saw higher curiosity during moments when it seemed like the drawing could turn into anything and also when participants were starting to really home in on a single answer,” said co-author Jia-Hou Poh, Ph. D. , a postdoctoral researcher at the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences.

1. What is the popular belief concerning curiosity?

A．It fuels the urge for answers.	B．It leads to endless patience.
C．It stresses the need to wait.	D．It brings the pleasure of waiting.

2. What inspired Hsiung to use her research approach?

A．The evolution the TV shows displayed.	B．The fantasy the short cooking videos shared.
C．The way the short cooking videos developed.	D．The popularity the short cooking videos achieved.

3. What were participants required to do?

A．Make drawings to take a shortcut.	B．Answer some questions while watching.
C．Press the spoiler button to finish the task.	D．Hunt for an answer as quickly as possible.

4. Which can be a suitable title for the text?

A．The influence of patience on curiosity	B．Curiosity delays eagerness for the answer
C．Curiosity arises from the patience of waiting	D．The way to hold back the urge for an answer

3 . 阅读下面材料，根据其内容和所给段落开头语续写两段，使之构成一篇完整的短文。

In my childhood, under the influence of my el der brother and my peers in the neighborhood, I tried a number of outdoor activities. Of course, I was not so taken by all of them. whether I was doing them for the first time or continuously. However, fate had its own plans in store. You never know when an outdoor activity will change my life.

The name of this activity is “fishing”. About ten years ago, I didn't really like the idea of sitting on the bank of a lake or river, spending long hours under the sun's ultraviolet rays, which can cause sunburns and skin damage, and anxiously anticipating some fish to be kind to take my bait(诱饵). In fact, I used to think of this outdoor activity as some kind of “hide-and-seek-game” that is popular with most young kids, except that it was much harder because I could see my “prey (猎物)” only after catching it.

However, all that changed when I paid a visit to my aunt in the countryside during a summer holiday. I was finally convinced by one of my cousins to accompany him to a nearby lake in order to do some fishing practice with him. In fact, he even assured me that fish would eat my baits. So I agreed and went to the lake expecting to catch some fish. Before throwing my fishing line into the water, my cousin did some tricks attaching some sort of food to my fishing pole.

Learning to fish in a river or lake can be challenging for the beginners like me. The act of dropping a line is easy, but being a successful fisher is hard. That's why they call it fishing but not catching But with practice and patience, it can become easier over time. Patience is essential in lake fishing. It may take some time to find the right spot or lure (鱼饵) that will attract fish.

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。

My cousin had to repeatedly remind me to keep patient.

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When we finally left the lake, I had caught three fish!

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4 . 读后续写

Crab Lessons

My son Geordi was a rather spirited boy. Very little held his attention for long. He spent most of his spare time thinking up new ways to scare me half to death. Like the time he decided to “surf” on a tiny plastic table that was meant to hold a few drinks rather than a six-year-old boy. Geordi had just begun learning about the ocean in school and was surprisingly fascinated by it. We lived in Delaware, so any discussion about the ocean usually included horseshoe crabs, which crowded our coasts to mate in the late spring.

As part of the lesson, Geordi’s teacher brought horseshoe crab shells (壳) to school for the children to touch and examine. Hearing that horseshoe crabs had been around for over 300 million years, even before the dinosaurs, Geordi thought that was officially the coolest thing he had ever heard. He could not stop talking about it for days, and I decided it was time for us to take a drive to the Delaware Bay.

As we stepped out from the car, strong wind nearly blew my poor forty-five-pound child to the ground. Being a six-year-old mischievous (调皮的) boy, Geordi saw this as an opportunity to showcase his amazing talents, which included falling down, getting up, falling down and, yes, getting up again. This, of course, was always complete with giggles (咯咯笑). The drama came to a sudden stop as Geordi spied the dozens of army-truck-looking creatures in the sand. The next sound effect was “Wow!” as his body froze and his eyes widened with wonder.

Geordi ran around excitedly, not knowing which one to check out first. He settled on a horseshoe crab that was on its back, legs waving wildly in the air, desperate for water. “Mom, look at this one!” he screamed. “He’s cool!” I pointed out the different body parts of the crab for him, and he listened quietly and absorbed the information. He said, “I really liked him. I think I will name him Spike because he had all those really cool, spiky (尖的) things on his back.” Then I picked up the crab, turned it over to its proper position and placed it at the edge of the water.

注意：
1.续写词数应为150 左右;
2.请按如下格式作答。

Geordi asked what I was doing.

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Geordi spotted many more horseshoe crabs on their backs.

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5 . Who can imagine life today without an Automated Teller Machine (ATM)? They are available in considerable numbers throughout the world.

The first ATM was the brainchild of an enterprising Turkish-American inventor Luther George Simjian. When the idea of an automated banking machine struck him, he registered 20 patents before any bank agreed to give it a trial run. It is easy to assume that the inventor of such a popular machine was laughing all the way to the bank.     1     Within six months of its operation in New York in 1939, the device was removed due to lack of customer acceptance.

It was not until 1967, nearly 30 years later, that Barclays Bank, in a careful launch, rolled out a self-service machine in London, England, which proved successful.     2     The first cash machine relied on customers’ use of prepaid tokens (代币) to get envelopes with a fixed amount of cash inside.

    3     The banks’ principle was seemingly customer service. But it would be foolish to minimize the many advantages that cash machines provided to the banks themselves. By the late 1970s, the highest fixed cost for the average large bank was its branches. The greatest variable cost and loss to profits were its staff. Bank accounts swiftly recognized that self-service operations could reduce bank branch staff cost by70 percent.

Experts quickly determined that public acceptance of ATMs counted on convenience, simplicity, speed, security and trust.     4     For maximum efficiency, ATMs had to be located near public transport or in a shopping mall, not at a branch. The busier and more crowded the location, obviously, the better. Now, roughly 75 percent of all cash provided by banks to their customers comes from cash machines.     5    .

Public acceptance of deposits (存款) by machine was significantly slower than customers’ usage of ATMs for withdrawals. In general, it seems that customers sometimes still prefer and trust an over-the-counter transaction (交易) for deposits.

A．Location, in particular, was a key factor.

B．His cash machine, however, didn’t prove durable.

C．The device was relatively primitive, at least by today’s standards.

D．However, cash machines posed some interesting, unanswered questions.

E．An interesting factor was the issue of bio-statistics for customer identification.

F．Devices originally dismissed by the public are now recognized as essential institutions.

G．Soon afterwards, many other banks became admittedly champions of the cash machine.

6 . 阅读下面材料，根据其内容和所给段落开头语续写两段，使之构成一篇完整的短文。

Ten miles away stood a house with shiny red walls, a green garden and an apple tree. A young girl’s face would be seen reflecting from one of the large glassy windows. Her name is Maggie. Her eyes were sparkling and on her face there was a smile which could light a million candles. She seemed to be longing for a chance to play like a young child, but she had no strength in her legs because she and her family met with an accident, in which she lost both her legs.

But her spirit was strong. She would be inspired by seeing birds fly. The flying eagle would make her want to fly. She was lonely. She longed for a true friend who would talk to her and teach her to fly or at least tell her stories about soaring into the blue sky.

One evening, Maggie slowly rolled her wheelchair to the giant window and looked out to the many houses that lay across the road. Suddenly she heard someone singing and then could see an old man in a pilot suit singing in glory. The beautiful sound and the melody made the little girl happy. Suddenly he stopped and gazed up toward her. “What are you staring at?” he said angrily. “You think I’m a circus clown? (马戏团小丑)” “No, Sir. I was just listening to you. You sing very well,” she said. “I don’t need your praises. I don’t need anyone!” he shouted. He started to walk to his house and shut the door. Tears rolled down from her apple-red cheeks as the man shouted at her. She was lonely.

Next morning, Maggie pushed her wheelchair across the garden to the stone road as little children played hide-and-seek around her. Suddenly out of nowhere a loading truck came rumbling across toward her. Terrified, she tried to move away from its path but the wheels of her chair were stuck. “Oh my,” she thought as the truck came in her direction fast, with the driver unaware of the obstruction in front of him. She screamed loudly but in a split second she was pulled out of her wheelchair by someone and fell on the ground. She closed her eyes and shivered as the truck passed her whistling. As she opened her eyes, she could see a man standing beside her.

注意：
1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在相应位置作答。

She gazed up to him and immediately recognized him as the man she saw singing last night.

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Maggie got to know his name was Ken and that he was a retired pilot.

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7 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。
1. How many presidents are there before Lincoln?

A．15.

B．16.

C．17.

2. What do you think of Lincoln’s family when he was young?

A．Rich.

B．Poor.

C．Large.

3. What led to the American Civil War?

A．Lincoln was elected to the president of the U.S.

B．Some southern states wanted to break off.

C．Some slaves began to fight for their rights.

4. What did Lincoln contribute most to his country?

A．He was one of the greatest lawyers in the U.S.

B．He gave one of the most famous speeches.

C．He managed to keep his country together.

8 . 听下面一段较长对话，回答以下小题。
1. Why was the man in England?

A．He was on business there.

B．He was visiting there.

C．He moved there.

2. Where did the woman ever see the Queen?

A．In India.

B．In England.

C．In Canada.

3. Which of the following is hard for the king according to the man?

A．Being too old.

B．Living a full life.

C．Coming to power suddenly.

9 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。
1. What instrument did the speaker play when she was young?

A．The piano.

B．The guitar.

C．The violin.

2. Where is the theater located?

A．In London.

B．In Sydney.

C．In New York.

3. Why is winning this competition important to the listeners?

A．They’ll meet famous performers.

B．They’ll have a brighter future.

C．They’ll get a chance to travel the world.

4. How many hours will the performances last?

A．Three.

B．Four.

C．Seven.