I was sitting at my desk surrounded by New Year gifts, feeling happy that I had managed to buy some hard — to — find items. These were for Kids Need More, a charitable organization offering services to socially disadvantaged children. One of its most popular events is the Holiday Cheer Bus. The organization always fills the buses with donated gifts for the families on the Cheer Bus routes. Each bus is manned by a team of volunteers. My family had been volunteers for years. I had a list of the families on our route.
Just as I was packing up the items with my husband and my son, I received a call from the director of the organization. She asked if I could add a family to my route— here was a young mother, Leanne, and her son.
I called Leanne and told her that a Holiday Cheer Bus would be visiting her family. Leanne seemed really excited and began to cry. I comforted her, “The Holiday Cheer Bus is really going to come. Is there something special that your child would like?”
“My son is three. All he wants is a pair of Spider-Man snow boots so that he can play outside in the snow. ”
I asked about her son's shoe size. She told me the size and I promised I would have Spider-Man snow boots in size 9 for her son.
After I said goodbye and ended the call, panic set in. It was two days before the Holiday Cheer Bus was going on its run, less than a week before New Year. I was going to need a holiday miracle to find Spider-Man snow boots in size 9.
“We have to go shopping!" I called out to my husband and son. They were surprised but still we set off. We went to a few department stores and the shoe departments, without success. We were tired and hungry. We were becoming disheartened. My son suggested giving Leanne a gift card so she could get the boots herself. But I didn't want to give up. I promised we would bring boots.
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。
At our final stop, expecting defeat, we entered the shoe department.
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Two days later, we arrived at the young mom's home.
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2 . A Japanese start-up called Ashirase is stepping into the global market with a new navigation (导航) assistance product intended to help people with low vision.
Its new product will feature flexible vibrating (震动) bases around each foot and are put into each shoe, and a small pack that can be removed for charging (充电). Once fitted, the vibrating parts are set along the sensitive nerves on the foot and can send coded walking instructions to the user.
Its present form navigates a route that comes from a smartphone app. It can help clear up distractions by freeing up the attention that is normally needed to either listen to voice directions or check the phone. Visual-damaged users can use their hearing to listen to traffic sounds and signals, like warning beeps at crossings or sidewalks, and use their hands to carry walking sticks or other belongings.
The device is paired with an app through a Bluetooth connection. The app uses information from Google Maps or similar vendors to draw up a walking route to the destination. Based on the destination and how the user is walking, it will send signals to the device that will cause a vibration on the foot.
The device will vibrate at a regular frequency at the front of the foot to let the users know they’re on the right track and should keep going straight. It will speed up the vibrations once the user is approaching a turn and needs to stop, and it will vibrate in either the left or right shoe to signal the direction the user needs to turn.
Ashirase’s new tech is waterproof and washable. It can be charged at the end of the week to power through seven days of walking, accounting for three active hours each day. And it can be fitted in two types of shoes: sneakers and leather lace-up shoes.
1. Who can benefit most from this device?| A．Deaf people. | B．Blind people. | C．Normal people. | D．Poor people. |
| A．A computer. | B．Nothing else. | C．A mobile phone. | D．Both A and C. |
| A．By how often the device vibrates. | B．By the sound sent by the device. |
| C．By the signals from their mobile phones. | D．By how long the device vibrates. |
| A．The device can be used for 21 hours a week. |
| B．The device can’t be washed or charged. |
| C．The device can only be fitted into sneakers. |
| D．People wearing the device can’t hear traffic warnings. |
“Mom！” I screamed as I looked through the window, “Why is my Ink Spot sitting in Mrs. Cleary’s window？”
Mom pushed past me to confirm it. Sure enough, across the street was Ink Spot cleaning himself in the window of Mrs. Cleary’s sitting room. I couldn’t believe my eyes. He was my cat, not Mrs. Cleary’s. She had already adopted twelve cats. Why must she keep my cat？I could feel anger boiling up inside me. Meanwhile, Ink Spot’s leaving without any signs upset me. A sense of being left out hit me hard.
Ink Spot was special for me. After my baby sister’s birth, “my” parents’ time was taken by her. It seemed no one in the family cared about or even noticed me. Worse still, I was packed off to a kindergarten. I hated being left out from the bottom of my heart.
It was when mom noticed me weeping in a corner one night that things began to change. After that, Ink Spot came into my life. Every night, he curled（卷曲）up beside me in bed and he was there for me after school when I raced home just to be with him.
I fell in love with Ink Spot the first time I saw its tiny black and white kitten, for which I called him Ink Spot. Mom and daddy beamed with pleasure as my eyes danced with joy again. It was the first time that I had smiled since my little baby sister came into the family. As for me, he was more than a cat. Actually, he was my life.
But today when I came home, Ink Spot was in Mrs. Cleary’s window. I wanted him back. But mom insisted that if Ink Spot stayed at Mrs. Cleary’s, that meant it was where he wanted to be. “No！Mom, Ink Spot is my cat”, I protested wildly but I had to admit the truth of mom’s words. Standing on the sidewalk, I was at a loss as to what to do. Staring at Ink Spot for a while, I couldn’t stand the anger any longer.
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。
I walked towards Mrs. Cleary’s house hurriedly and knocked at the door angrily.
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Upon seeing me, Ink Spot jumped off the window, running towards me in a flash.
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4 . I walked around to the side of a puddle along the path covered by water and mud. I was suddenly attacked! Yet I did
I took a step forward, and my attacker rushed me again. He pushed and
Sitting close beside her, he opened and closed his wings as if to fan her. I could only admire the love and courage of that butterfly in his
Since then, I’ve always tried to remember the courage of that butterfly
| A．nothing | B．something | C．everything | D．anything |
| A．missed | B．forgot | C．stopped | D．avoided |
| A．funny | B．surprising | C．shocking | D．exciting |
| A．grasped | B．hit | C．took | D．seized |
| A．admired | B．alarmed | C．attracted | D．attacked |
| A．reason | B．purpose | C．origin | D．direction |
| A．run | B．lie | C．stand | D．land |
| A．guiding | B．charging | C．biting | D．puzzling |
| A．curiosity | B．anxiety | C．concern | D．return |
| A．doubtfully | B．clearly | C．eventually | D．suddenly |
| A．previous | B．precise | C．precious | D．preferable |
| A．fighting for | B．looking for | C．longing for | D．providing for |
| A．goal | B．way | C．opinion | D．attitude |
| A．enjoyed | B．left | C．earned | D．remembered |
| A．whatever | B．however | C．whichever | D．whenever |
5 . Why don’t we have eyes in the back of our heads? There are at least two reasons. Eyes are biologically expensive things to make and rear view (后视) eyes don't fit well into the human evolution (进化).
Even animals, such as rabbits, whose main survival advantage is rear vision, have only the side eyes. Rear vision is not so important. There are other species that have evolved this ability by moving the position of their eyes relative to the rest of their head. Many birds have their eyes positioned towards the side of their head, allowing them a very wide angle of vision and, in the case of some birds such as the woodcock, they are positioned so they can actually achieve 360- degree vision. It is also obvious that spiders, which tend to have many eyes, only have them facing forwards.
Humans, and probably some other animals, do have another adapted sense to make it up. Many experiments showed that sounds behind the head were noticed by a listener more than sounds to the front, especially if a listener was in a dark room. So, our ears can make up for the lack of rear-facing vision. You can look at it another way. Rear vision is useful only if the potential threat is visible. During human evolution, that was most often not the case.
Finally, there is often more than one potential “solution” to a given problem. In many species, the answer to maintaining 360 degree awareness of surrounding danger is to rely on many eyes. Social behavior is common in the animal kingdom and one reason for this is that there is safety in numbers. You might be looking the wrong way when a tiger approaches, but if your teammates raise the alarm this is as effective as having eyes in the back of your head.
1. Why do humans have no rear view eyes?| A．They are bad for human survival. |
| B．They are replaced by other organs. |
| C．They are less likely to spot the danger. |
| D．They are abandoned by natural selection. |
| A．To explain why animals have other functions. |
| B．To state rear-view eyes aren’t a must for survival. |
| C．To prove rabbits, birds and spiders are very special. |
| D．To show rear view eyes are against the natural selection. |
| A．The visible threat behind the head. | B．Sensitive hearing. |
| C．The sounds behind the head. | D．Rear vision. |
| A．A travel brochure. | B．A fiction. |
| C．A science magazine. | D．A book review. |
6 . Does solving a math problem give you a headache?Do you feel nervous in a math exam? For most students, math can be tough but scientists have proved that math problems can actually cause physical pain.
Scientists came to this conclusion with an in-depth experiment, which was published in the Public Library of Science One journal. They began by finding out how much participants fear math. Those involved were asked a series of questions such as how they feel when they receive a math textbook or when they walk into a math lesson.
Based on their answers, participants were divided into groups. One group was made up of people who were particularly afraid of math and participants in the other group were more comfortable with the subject. Both groups were then given either math tasks or word tasks. When a math task was going to come next, a yellow circle would appear but when a word task was soon to come, a blue square would be shown
.
Using a brain-scan machine, scientists noticed that whenever people from Group One saw a yellow circle, their brain would respond in a way similar to when their body is feeling pain. It was like the pain they would feel, for example, if they burnt their hand on a hot stove. But they reacted less strongly when they knew that they would be faced with a word task. However, scientists saw no strong brain response from people in the second group.
Math can be difficult, and for those with high levels of mathematics-anxiety (HMA), math is associated with tension, and fear. “The higher a person’s anxiety of a math task, the more he activated brain regions associated with threat detection, and the experience of pain.” said Lyons, leader of the study.
More interestingly, the brain activity disappeared when participants actually started dealing with the math tasks. “This means that it’s not that math itself hurts; rather, the anticipation of math is painful,” Lyons said.
Based on the study, scientists suggested that things could be done to help students move past their fear of math, which might mean they perform better in tests.
1. In the first stage, scientists ask participants some questions to________ .| A．see whether math hurts |
| B．find out how much they fear math |
| C．observe how their brain response |
| D．test if they are good at math |
| A．Group One reacted more strongly when they saw a blue square. |
| B．Group Two showed no brain response during the whole experiment. |
| C．Effective solutions have been worked out to lower students’ anxiety of math. |
| D．Physical pain caused by HMA disappears in the process of doing math problem. |
| A．the attempt of learning math |
| B．the motivation to work out a math problem |
| C．the effort to understand math |
| D．the act of thinking about math |
| A．How to overcome math fear. |
| B．Physical pain affects math performance. |
| C．Math pain in your brain. |
| D．Unknown truth about pain. |
Whenever anyone asks me where my favorite place in China is, I say Dali without hesitation. Dali,
Last year I met a couple of young students I’d known
In about 20 minutes we witnessed in
The day finished with a brilliant sunset,
I’m a 34-year-old man, married, lived in a nice house, and have a successful career as an educational consultant. But my life was not always so great. I had a learning disability from an early age. I went to a special school where I got plenty of extra help. Still, I suffered the rest of my school days in public schools.
My life improved remarkably when I discovered art. The art world gave me a chance to express myself without words. I went to a workshop and gradually got good at making things with clay(黏土). Here I learned my first important lesson: disabled as I was in language. I could still be smart and well express myself with clay. And my confidence came along.
I got my next lesson from rock climbing. It was a fun thing but I was scared from the start. I soon noticed it wasn’t a talent thing; it was practice. So I did it more. After about five years of climbing, I found myself in Yosemite Valley on a big wall. I learned that if you fall in love with something and do it all the time, you will get better at it.
Later I decided to apply my previous experience to learning how to read and write. Every day I practiced reading and writing, which I used to avoid as much as possible. After two hard years, I was literate.
Having gone through the long process with art, rock climbing, and reading and writing, now I’ve got to a point in my life where I know I am smart enough to dive into an area that is totally unknown, hard, but interesting.
1. What made the author’s school days difficult? (No more than 5 words)
2. Why did art give the author confidence? (No more than 10 words)
3. What lesson did the author learn from rock climbing? (No more than 15 words)
4. What is the meaning of the underlined part in Paragraph 4? (No more than 5 words)
5. How does the author’s story inspire you to overcome difficulties in life? Put it in your own words. (No more than 20 words)
The new measures were released by the Australian Department of Tertiary Education, Skills, Jobs and Workplace Relations in September and will take effect in mid-2012.
As a result, the student visa application process for overseas students has been simplified, and the deposit (押金) required to study in Australia has been reduced. Language requirements for overseas students have also been eased.
Also, overseas students receiving a higher education in Australia will be granted a working visa lasting from two to four years after graduation, as long as they meet the basic IELTS requirement.
“This change will definitely make Australia a more attractive destination for Chinese students planning to study overseas,” says Wang Lan, a consultant from Education International Cooperation Group (EIC), a Beijing-based company that provides services to students wishing to study overseas.
However, in the past few years, many of Wang’s student clients (客户) could not start studies in Australia because they did not meet the language requirements, visa processing took a long time and deposit regulations were tough. The change in policy is good news for the parents of students wishing to study in Australia, Wang says.
A 22-year-old female student surnamed Li, in Beijing, who is planning to do her postgraduate studies in Australia, learned about the policy change several weeks ago.
“According to the previous deposit requirement for my student visa, my family was required to put down 550,000 yuan ($86,850). Now we only need to prepare 410,000 yuan. This is a relief for my parents,” Li says.
She also says that the two to four years working visa makes her feel much clearer about her study plans.
“I believe several years of working experience abroad will strengthen my competitiveness when I return to China,” she says.
Gaining a competitive advantage is the major reason for Chinese students to study abroad, according to the report by EIC.
1. What’s the main idea of the passage?| A．Language requirement for overseas students have been eased in Australia. |
| B．Australia is a most attractive place for students in China. |
| C．Australia widens window of opportunity for international students. |
| D．More students will work in Australia after their graduation. |
| A．The student visa application process for overseas students has been simplified. |
| B．The deposit required to study in Australia has been reduced. |
| C．Language requirements for overseas students have been more difficult. |
| D．After graduation, some overseas students can get a working visa in Australia. |
| A．more students will come to Australia to work |
| B．more Chinese students will choose to live in Australia. |
| C．the opportunities to work in Australia decrease for overseas students |
| D．more Chinese students will choose to further their education in Australia |
| A．550,000 yuan | B．140,000 yuan | C．410,000 yuan | D．86,850 yuan |
| A．The working experience abroad will strengthen their competitiveness. |
| B．They can earn more money in Australia. |
| C．Their working experience can make them stay in Australia forever. |
| D．They have to do so according to the new regulations. |
