1 . Books That Celebrate Diverse Holidays and Traditions
It’s important to remember there are a diverse set of holidays available to explore. Below are a few books that help introduce children to different holiday cultures and traditions.
Too Many Tamales by Gary Soto, illustrated by Ed Martinez
While helping her mother with Christmas celebration, Maria is tempted to try on her mother’s diamond ring. After getting caught up in the joy of the holiday and playing with her cousins, Maria realizes the ring is missing! That’s when she and her cousins come up with a plan to eat all of the tamales, in hopes of finding the ring.
Together for Kwanzaa by Juwanda G. Ford, illustrated by Shelly Hehenberger
This is a story about a little girl named Kayla who wants to see her older brother Khari come home so they can celebrate Kwanzaa together as a family. Khari is stuck at college when a snowstorm hits and his car breaks down. Will he make it home in time for Kwanzaa?
A Child’s Christmas in Wales by Dylan Thomas, illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman
This book is a funny, nostalgic tale of Christmas Eve afternoon through Christmas night in Wales, and is full of unique imagery and poetic prose. It will arouse a sense of familiarity for some young readers while introducing them to different aspects of Christmas traditions.
We Are Grateful: Otsaliheliga by Traci Sorell, illustrated by Frane Lessac
The word otsaliheliga is used by members of the Cherokee Nation to express gratitude. This is an amazing story that describes a journey through the seasons with a modern-day Cherokee family. Cherokee history and traditions are also woven into the story in a very kid-friendly way.
1. What makes it difficult for Khari to return home in time for Kwanzaa?A.A car crash. | B.Delayed flights. | C.Extreme weather. | D.Academic pressure. |
A.Traci Sorell. | B.Ed Martinez. | C.Dylan Thomas. | D.Trina Schart Hyman. |
A.how to find hidden treasures at home | B.how to strengthen bonds with friends |
C.the lifestyles of different ethnic groups | D.different holiday celebrations and customs |
2 . The Music Educator Award, this year, went to Annie Ray, an orchestra(管弦乐队)director at Annandale High School.She was recognized for her efforts to make music accessible to all students, particularly those with disabilities.Ray got to attend the awards ceremony in Los Angeles and bring home a $10,000 prize.
Ray created the Crescendo Orchestra for students with severe intellectual and developmental disabilities, as well as a parent orchestra that teaches nearly 200 caregivers a year to play the same instrument as their child.Ray also works with a local charity to give damaged instruments a second life in her classroom.
The orchestra is about much more than just making music.The most important is to give students a chance to develop their cooperation skills, make mistakes and learn the art of refining something.Ray pushes her students to be brave, go outside their comfort zone and realize they have to learn how to make bad sounds before learning how to make good sounds.And they teach her a lot in return.” They changed my educational philosophy.I understand what it truly means to meet a student where they’re at and apply that elsewhere,” she said.
The warm reception on the ceremony was meaningful.Actually, not many people understand what exactly music educators do or how much their work matters.While her administration is supportive, that lack of understanding is a problem facing the profession in general.Another is resources.She says her school “desperately” needs new instruments.She will use some of her prize money to buy more.
Ray also plans to put some of the money towards an ongoing scholarship for students who want to pursue music when they graduate.She knows of several, those particularly interested in music, and aims to offer financial support needed to realize their musical dreams” It is hard but truly satisfying,” Ray said.“And there’s nothing else like it for them.”
1. What can we learn about Ray from the first two paragraphs?A.She hosted the award ceremony. | B.She brought music to more people. |
C.She gave away instruments to the poor. | D.She founded a local charity for children. |
A.They acquire in-depth musical knowledge. | B.They make friends with the like-minded. |
C.They gain personal growth from playing music. | D.They improve their connections with educators. |
A.The reception on the ceremony. | B.Importance of music education. |
C.Challenges for music educators. | D.Plans to obtain resources. |
A.Winning a scholarship. | B.Developing interest in music. |
C.Making musical achievements. | D.Transforming dreams into reality. |
3 . Have you ever imagined an insect-inspired robot, which weighs less than a gram, could one day help out in surgery (外科手术)?
Scientists have designed this small, “insect-bot” called mCLARI that can control and even change its body shape as it travels in different environments to fit through gaps. It’s 2 centimeters long, weighs less than 0.97 grams and can travel at a speed of 6 centimeters per second.It’s the smaller, faster replacement to CLARI, which was designed by the same team.
“Because of the robot’s small size and ability to change shape, we expect usage of this technology in four important areas,” the lead author Kaushik Jayaram said. These include disaster (灾害) response , check on high-value objects, environmental monitoring and medical treatment.
“In the long term, we hope such robots will be used more widely in moving through human bodies and performing surgeries that can’t be easily done at present,” Jayaram said. With mCLARI, Jayaram’s team is moving closer to creating robots that can fit in different environments—just like the insects they’re inspired by.
The mCLARI robot has four legs and can move in narrow spaces by changing between running forward and side-to-side and can use different speeds in human bodies. Its legs are joined to its body through joints (关节), which enables mCLARI to change its body shape based on the environment it is in. For example, its legs can be lengthened up to 50% in certain spaces.
As follow-up work, the scientists want to give mCLARI more power and sensing ability while helping the surgeries. “We are also excited about understanding the effect of shape change on improving functions of robots,” Jayaram said. “And this is sure a great one-step forward of the technology. The robot will have entered the market by 2025 and will bring greater benefits to mankind, especially in medical treatment.”
1. What is paragraph 3 mainly about?A.Possible application fields of the robot. | B.Different types of the robot. |
C.Several important features of the robot. | D.Working process of the robot. |
A.Valuable but uncontrollable. | B.Modern but high-cost. |
C.Heavy and time-consuming. | D.Advanced and effective. |
A.Worried. | B.Positive. | C.Doubtful. | D.Uninterested. |
A.Jayaram: A Scientist Studying Robot Intelligence |
B.mCLARI Is Already Widely Available in the Market |
C.CLARI: A Robot Invented by Inspiration from the Insects |
D.A Tiny Shape-changing Robot Will Help Perform Surgeries |
4 . Music is one of the most powerful forces in our lives. It can bring us joy, sorrow, or even inspiration. It can evoke emotions and memories that we didn’t even know we had.
Music can be a source of comfort. It can provide a refuge(避难所)from the troubles of the world and provide a sense of peace and solace.
Finally, music can be a source of joy and celebration.
Music has the power to change our lives in ways we may never have imagined. It can provide us with strength, courage, comfort, and joy. It can help us to find our inner voice and express ourselves in unique and creative ways.
A.Poor people can live a happy life with music. |
B.Music can also give us strength and courage. |
C.Music can associate people with each other around the world. |
D.Music can change a person’s life in ways that nothing else can. |
E.Listening to music can help to reduce stress, anxiety, and depression. |
F.It can bring us closer together, helping us to appreciate and celebrate the beauty of life. |
G.Music can truly be a life-changing force, and one that should never be underestimated. |
5 . The summer vacation is drawing near. Here we have prepared a visual feast for our boys and girls. Let’s feast our eyes first.
Jurassic World Dominion
It is the final film in the second trilogy of dino-movies, and it’s the first one which really deserves to be called “Jurassic World” rather than “Jurassic Park”. Yes, prehistoric dinosaurs are out and about in the wild this time, rather than being stuck in a theme park.
Director: Colin Trevorrow
Official Competition
Cruz and Banderas have been two of Spanish cinema’s famous superstars for decades, and yet have only rarely acted on the screen together. Now, once again, that wrong has been righted by Official Competition. Cruz is an art-house director who is adapting a Nobel-Prize-winning novel in the film. Banderas plays a dull Hollywood action hero who is hired to star in it.
Director: Mariano Cohn & Gaston Duprat
Brian and Charles
Not a typical science-fiction movie, Brian and Charles is a low-budget, low-key British comedy starring and co-written by David Earl, a regular in Ricky Gervais’s sitcoms. “Brian and Charles is this year’s sweetest film by a country mile,” says Cory. “It’s like Edgar Wright’s The Mighty Boosh project thrown into a cotton-candy machine, and it is also one of the most surprising films about being a parent, even when your son is a 7-feet-tall robot who loves cabbages.”
Director: Jim Archer
Lightyear
After four Toy Story films, everyone’s favourite space ranger action figure, Buzz Lightyear, gets to leave Woody and friends behind, and go off on an adventure on his own. Or so you might assume so. In fact, the latest Pixar cartoon isn’t about the toy.
Director: Angus MacLane
1. Which of the following is right about Jurassic World Dominion?A.It is the same with other ones about “Jurassic Park”. |
B.Dinosaurs in the film live in the nature. |
C.Dinosaurs are in danger in the film. |
D.It is the last film of the series films. |
A.A famous superstar. | B.An action hero. | C.A director. | D.A novelist. |
A.Jurassic World Dominion. | B.Official Competition. |
C.Brian and Charles. | D.Lightyear. |
6 . My first visit to Angkor Wat (吴哥窟) was in 1980. The country had been at war for many years and the temple was deserted and falling to pieces. Plants were growing out of the roofs, and trees were growing in the yards.
Today, the temple is the scene of a busy repair program. A team of 15 Indian experts are organizing a workforce of 400 Cambodians, most of them women, who are cleaning, repairing and rebuilding parts of this temple.
As I walked through the yards, I noticed the Cambodian women devote hours to cleaning carefully a tiny area of stone. Boards are laid down to protect the precious painted stones while the repair work is going on. There are very few machines and little heavy equipment. Workers carry building materials in buckets at the end of long poles. Piles of stones lie in a corner of the yard, waiting to be replaced.
The work of cleaning the stones is watched over by three Indian chemists. It is a very slow task. First they clean the stones with brushes using buckets of a weak chemical. Then gaps between the stones are filled in. Finally another material is painted onto the stones which will protect them from water forever.
Work starts every day at 7 am and goes on until late afternoon six days a week, with a break at midday.
Evening is the best time to visit the temple, after the tour groups have left. As the sun sinks lower, shadows spread across the yard. After sunset, the sky turns pink. The grey stone towers take on a golden color before turning pink. Nowhere else in the world can there be such a quiet, beautiful place.
1. According to the author, which of the following plays the LEAST important role in the repair work?A.The women workers. |
B.The Indian workers. |
C.Machines. |
D.Skilled workers. |
A.there was no one in the temple and it was in a poor state |
B.the temple was built on a desert and nobody noticed it |
C.the temple was very old with a long history |
D.the temple was repaired by the Cambodians, most of whom were women |
A.Two. | B.Three. | C.Four. | D.Five. |
A.To get rid of certain types of plants. |
B.To carry the building materials. |
C.To replace the stones. |
D.To clean the stones. |
7 . Smartwatches and fitness trackers (健身追踪器) have gained popularity recently. These tools can record your daily steps, heart rates, etc.
It’s a struggle to overcome the addiction to fitness trackers.
Of course, failing to meet your daily goal can be discouraging. You might focus on your shortcoming rather than your progress. Another problem is that you might find yourself paying too much attention to the step number rather than how your body feels.
Therefore, if you’re spending too much time looking at your smartwatch, limit your daily step count to a comfortable level.
A.How can you tell whether you’re addicted to your fitness tracker? |
B.Actually this addiction to step count can be risky, mentally and physically. |
C.Don’t overuse your smartwatch. |
D.However, do you find yourself checking your steps and heart rates too often? |
E.After all, reaching a daily step count can be so appealing. |
F.Besides, you can find other things to do that don’t involve checking your fitness tracker. |
G.It doesn’t covey what you’re really feeling. |
8 . It’s no secret that sleep is important to your overall health, but a lack of sleep could have great effects on your heart, a new study shows. The researchers said people with insomnia(失眠症)are more likely to have a heart attack.
Insomnia is the most common sleep disorder in the US, the researchers wrote in their report, noting that 10% to 15% of people in the US struggle with it. The meta-analysis of previously published research suggests that the potential association between insomnia and heart attack risk is strongest in women.
Dr. Martha Gulati, director of prevention at the Cedars-Sinai Smidt Heart Institute, said that most of her patients are women and that insomnia is a noted risk factor for women who have had any form of ischemic heart disease. “We see it probably in 1 in 10 patients in the United States,” said Gulati, who was not involved in the new research. “It is my impression that almost everyone experiences insomnia at some point in their life. The estimate is that 1 in 2 adults experience it at some point in their life, maybe in the short term because of stressful moments.”
For their analysis, the researchers defined insomnia as a sleep disorder with three main symptoms(症状): Difficulty falling asleep, difficulty staying asleep and waking early and being unable to fall back asleep.
The study also found an association between increased heart attack risk and how long a participant slept each night. Those who slept five hours or less had the highest association with heart attack risk and were 1.56 times more likely to have a heart attack than people who slept seven or eight hours. Longer sleep duration wasn’t always more protective. The study found that people who slept six hours a night had a lower risk of a heart attack than those who slept nine hours or more. “A lot of studies have pointed somewhere between seven and eight hours of sleep being the magic number for us,” another researcher said. “There is obviously variability for everyone, but too much sleep is rarely the issue.”
1. What’s the function of the first paragraph?A.To list a fact. | B.To warn the readers. |
C.To introduce the topic. | D.To draw the readers’ interest. |
A.Insomnia is unavoidable in the short term. |
B.Insomnia is a common phenomenon in life. |
C.Heart attack often happens during insomnia. |
D.Women are less experienced in dealing with insomnia. |
A.Put quality before quantity. | B.Too much is as bad as too little. |
C.Bite off more than one can chew. | D.Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst. |
A.Pessimistic. | B.Indifferent. | C.Objective. | D.Positive. |
9 . A solar tree is a structure like a tree that generates solar energy using photovoltaic panels (太阳能光伏板). It helps solve an urgent global challenge: Replacing greenhouse gas-emitting energy sources like oil and gas with renewable energy. But the power generation potential of solar trees is relatively limited, and their primary purpose is to raise public awareness about renewable energy by getting people to notice and interact with solar energy in new ways.
Solar trees generally have a firm metal, plastic, or stone base that extends up and out into “branches” on which solar panels are mounted. Beyond this basic structure, there is great diversity in the design of solar tree units. The solar tree’s photovoltaic “leaves” absorb sunlight, converting it into electricity that is conducted down through the trunk-like central pillar of the structure to an inside battery. Many designs feature rotating (旋转的) panels that can move throughout the day in order to obtain the greatest amount of sunlight.
Solar trees help power homes, businesses, and public services. They can create shade to help reduce the urban heat island effect and provide shelter in severe weather such as rainstorms and heatwaves, creating greater urban adapting ability in the face of climate change. They also enhance public spaces, providing charging stations, and powering streetlights.
In comparison to other kinds of ground-mounted solar panel devices, solar trees don’t require much land. They make solar energy generation possible in areas with little land that can’t support vast solar arrays, as well as places that lack sufficient rooftop space for panels. However, solar panels are much cheaper than solar trees at present and have far greater energy generation capacity. Therefore, present solar tree designs often serve as a extra source rather than as a primary energy source.
At present, solar trees aren’t designed as large-scale solar projects, which limits their ability to contribute to the low-carbon energy transition. Still, their varied designs are appealing. This makes solar trees effective at displaying and thereby educating people about solar energy, and promoting a business or organization’s commitment to renewable energy.
1. What is the main purpose of building solar trees?A.To beautify the urban environment. | B.To draw public attention to solar energy. |
C.To replace non-renewable energy resources. | D.To provide charging services in emergencies. |
A.It stores energy in its own battery. |
B.It can adjust its height automatically. |
C.It is made of environmentally friendly materials. |
D.It transforms sunlight into electricity by its metal base. |
A.The design features of solar trees. | B.The ways of saving energy in cities. |
C.The benefits of solar trees to humans. | D.The difficulties of promoting solar trees. |
A.They occupy much less land. | B.They are cheaper to manufacture. |
C.They are more effective in generating energy. | D.They can work in various weather conditions. |
10 . The summer vacation is drawing near. Here we have prepared a visual feast for our boys and girls. Let’s feast our eyes first.
Jurassic World Dominion
It is the final film in the second trilogy of dino-movies, and it’s the first one which really deserves to be called “Jurassic World” rather than “Jurassic Park”. Yes, prehistoric dinosaurs are out and about in the wild this time, rather than being stuck in a theme park.
Director: Colin Trevorrow
Official Competition
Cruz and Banderas have been two of Spanish cinema’s famous superstars for decades, and yet have only rarely acted on the screen together. Now, once again, that wrong has been righted by Official Competition. Cruz is an art-house director who is adapting a Nobel-Prize-winning novel in the film. Banderas plays a dull Hollywood action hero who is hired to star in it.
Director: Mariano Cohn & Gaston Duprat
Brian and Charles
Not a typical science-fiction movie, Brian and Charles is a low-budget, low-key British comedy starring and co-written by David Earl, a regular in Ricky Gervais’s sitcoms. “Brian and Charles is this year’s sweetest film by a country mile,” says Cory. “It’s like Edgar Wright’s The Mighty Boosh project thrown into a cotton-candy machine, and it is also one of the most surprising films about being a parent, even when your son is a 7-feet-tall robot who loves cabbages.”
Director: Jim Archer
Lightyear
After four Toy Story films, everyone’s favourite space ranger action figure, Buzz Lightyear, gets to leave Woody and friends behind, and go off on an adventure on his own. Or so you might assume so. In fact, the latest Pixar cartoon isn’t about the toy.
Director: Angus MacLane
1. Which of the following is right about Jurassic World Dominion?A.It is the same with other ones about “Jurassic Park”. |
B.Dinosaurs in the film live in the nature. |
C.Dinosaurs are in danger in the film. |
D.It is the last film of the series films. |
A.A famous superstar. | B.An action hero. | C.A director. | D.A novelist. |
A.Jurassic World Dominion. | B.Official Competition. |
C.Brian and Charles. | D.Lightyear. |