1 . The Thanksgiving Day has been alive for hundreds of years. The customs we see in our homes today remind us of ancient celebrations of harvest, thankfulness for peace, and the hard work of native Americans. It is made up of stories of those who believe that thanks for blessings is what people must own     1     Have you wanted to make special gifts?

Custom of Praying

For centuries, “Thanksgiving Day” is associated with prayers in church and in homes.     2     It is a time, when mankind thanks God for all his blessings and mercy. It is also a day to show gratitude to their friends and relatives for all the good deeds.

    3    

Everyone follows the custom of family dinner and reunion every year. Distances don’t really matter as relatives can drive down to be with their family. Feasts are usually held at home. It is a time to enjoy their favorite Turkey the family.

Custom of Decoration

    4     People beautify their homes, give the interiors a whole new look and feel. They light lamps to brighten the environment. Tables are adorned with best china and antique silver cutlery to mark the occasion.

Custom of sending messages

Thanksgiving is a day when people send loving messages and warm wishes to their relatives, colleagues at work place, superiors and subordinates, near and dear ones.     5    

A．People present gifts to friends.

B．Custom of Family Dinner

C．People like to get together and have turkey.

D．People offer various meal time prayers during the day.

E．Like Christmas, millions of cards are sent every year.

F．Thanksgiving is a time to decorate homes with wreaths, fresh and dried flowers.

G．It is a day of expressing their feelings through Thanksgiving cards.

2 . The popular TV program Readers has prompted more people in China to practice reading aloud in booths (小间) set up in big cities across the country.

As the latest TV show to help people’s love for literature recover, the CCTV program Readers invites people from all walks of life to read aloud their favorite poems, essays and books, or even personal letters they wrote to their loved ones. Just as the weekly show has been well­received, its reading booths, equipped with professional recording devices and cameras, have become instant hits.

A crowd of more than 200 people were pictured lining up outside the Shanghai Library at 11 am on March 4—the first day of the booth’s opening to the public in Shanghai. The deadline for registrations was brought forward to 2 pm instead of the scheduled 5:30 pm, as the number of waiting readers continued to grow. Some waited more than nine hours for a tryout in the booth, according to library management.

“There is an old photo in the late 1970s capturing people lining up outside the Shanghai Library before it opens. If that was a spring of reading in Shanghai, now I think another spring has arrived again,” library manager Zhou Deming, told The Paper.

The reading booth is the only one of its kind in the city of economic center at the moment, but more are expected to be put into use in the coming months, according to the library’s website.

The program has also led to booths in other cities including Beijing, Hangzhou, Guangzhou and Xi’an to appeal to more people to read and share their life stories.

With the recent boom of culture­themed TV shows such as Readers and Chinese Poetry Congress, some are optimistic that this will help the country love literature and reading again in general.

1. The CCTV program Readers aims to________.

A．teach people what to read

B．attract people’s attention to CCTV

C．invite people to read aloud in the booth

D．arouse people’s enthusiasm for reading

2. We can learn from Paragraph 3 that________.

A．some people waited for a long time to read in the booth

B．March 4 was the first day of the opening of Shanghai Library

C．on March 4, 200 people read in the booth

D．the time for registrations was lengthened for three and a half hours

3. The passage mainly tells that________.

A．many people line up to read aloud in reading booths

B．more reading booths will be set up in the future

C．Readers has become popular all over China

D．Readers has inspired more people to read aloud in reading booths

3 . 阅读下面材料，在空白处填入适当的内容（1个单词）或括号内单词的正确形式。

Also    1    (know) as “paper paintings” and “painted pictures”, New Year paintings are     2    unique art form in Chinese folk culture. The paintings are called “New Year paintings” because they are    3    (most) posted during the Chinese New Year holiday    4    decoration and they are also a symbol of New Year’s greetings.

New Year paintings    5    (appear) around the Tang dynasty, replacing the previous door pictures     6    (feature) the gods believed to be able to protect the residents and drive away ghosts. In the Song dynasty, New Year paintings were created on a large scale. With the advancement of printing technology, the content and forms of New Year paintings became    7    (diversity). The development of the paintings matured in the Ming and Qing dynasties,     8    the art hit its heyday(全盛期).

Traditional printing    9    (method) of New Year paintings include woodlock printing, stone-block printing, offset (胶印) printing, traditional Chinese painting, watercolor painting and sketches etc. Woodblock printed New Year paintings    10    (be) the most popular and interesting ones.

4 . A characteristic of American culture that has become almost a tradition is to respect the self-made man—the man who has risen to the top through his own efforts, usually beginning by working with his hands. While the leader in business or industry or the college professor occupies a higher social position and wins greater respect in the community than the common laborer or even the skilled factory worker, he may take pains to point out that his father started life in America as a farmer or laborer of some kind.
This attitude toward manual (体力的) labor is now still seen in many aspects of American life. One is invited to dinner at a home that is not only comfortably but even expensively furnished and in which there is every evidence of the fact that the family has been able to afford foreign travel, expensive hobbies, and college education for the children; yet the hostess probably will cook the dinner herself, will serve it herself and will wash dishes afterward; furthermore, the dinner will not consist just of something quickly and easily mixed from contents of various cans and a cake or a pie bought at the nearby bakery. Instead, the hostess usually takes pride in careful preparation of special dishes. A professional man may talk about washing the car, digging in his flowerbeds, painting the house. His wife may even help with these things, just as he often helps her with the dishwashing. The son who is away at college may wait on table and wash dishes for his living, or during the summer he may work with a group of workers on the highway in order to pay for his education.
1. From Paragraph 1, we know that in America ________.

A．people feel painful to mention their fathers as laborers

B．people tend to have a high opinion of the self-made man

C．people can always rise to the top through their own efforts

D．college professors win great respect from common workers

2. According to the passage, the hostess cooks dinner herself mainly because ________.

A．she can hardly afford servants

B．servants in America are hard to get

C．she takes pride in what she can do herself

D．it is easy to prepare a meal with canned food

3. The expression “wait on table” in the second paragraph means “________”.

A．wait to place the table

B．keep accounts for a bar

C．work in a furniture shop

D．serve customers in a restaurant

4. Which of the following may serve as the best title of the passage?

A．A Respectable Self-made Family.

B．The Development of Manual Labor.

C．Characteristics of American Culture.

D．American Attitude Toward Manual Labor.

5 . You get on an almost-empty bus, but the next passenger decides to ignore all the empty seats to sit right next to you. While you are waiting in line at the supermarket, the next
customer stands just behind you shouting into his phone.
These are attacks of the personal space invaders(侵略者). Though preferences for personal space differ from culture to culture, we Britons do love our independence and personal space.
As the British customs website Debrett has said, as a British person, somebody standing too close may make you “focus less on what somebody is saying than on how close they are to you”. Simple acts like putting an arm around someone you don’t know that well may seem friendly in China, but they can make us very uncomfortable. The ediplomat.com website explains: “The British are not back slappers (拍打者) or touchers and generally do not show affection (喜欢) in public.”
Being a British person around people from other countries can therefore be full of problems. People from many European countries such as France and Spain kiss each other on the cheek when they meet, yet to us this seems too friendly and “touchy-feely”.
Simple matters like how close others stand can be problems to Britons who want to keep their own personal space. Giving advice on how to behave around a British person, Debrett’s says that “if you can feel the warmth of their worried breath upon your face, then you’re standing too close”.
So, are British people unfriendly? No. The ediplomat.com website explains that we are not as “indifferent” as we may seem, but “very friendly and helpful to foreigners”. However, we do have different ideas about our own space to many people from other countries. Just let us know if you’re going to come any closer than arm’s length, and you’ll be fine!
1. What is the article mainly about?

A．How to make friends with British people.

B．Some tips on British table manners.

C．Ways in which British people show affection.

D．British people’s preference for personal space.

2. If you were meeting a British person for the first time, it would be polite of you to ______, according to the article.

A．kiss him/her on the cheek

B．put an arm around him/her

C．keep an arm’s length away from him/her

D．slap his/her back or shake his/her hands

3. The underlined word “indifferent” in the last paragraph is closest in meaning to “_____”.

A．cold	B．modest
C．gentlemanlike	D．independent

4. What can we conclude from the article?

A．British people like to sit next to others on empty buses.

B．British people are helpful, although they may not appear to be.

C．British people do not like staying with other Europeans.

D．British people are happy to show affection in public.

6 . Square dancing is a form of entertainment and physical exercise, which is a good thing. However, a group of senior Chinese ladies dancing in New York’s Sunset Park were recently faced with noise complaints from nearby residents. The local court even served a summons (传票) related to a certain Ms. Wang.
The news soon caused heated discussion across China, with many believing the incident to involve a cultural conflict between the East and West,while others view it as a form of discrimination against Chinese in the United States.
The United States is a diverse society, and in many cases, Chinese dancers are tolerated and even appreciated. Meanwhile, the United States is a society based on the rule of law, and due to cultural differences, local regulations seem to be very different from those in China. As a result, some old Chinese ladies dancing in New York’s Sunset Park found themselves caught in an embarrassing situation. Locals and immigrants from other nations view such noise as a violation of their right to enjoy tranquility. Calling the police is regarded as the most efficient way to solve such a problem.
Before, these ladies probably did not understand local customs and rules. However, since the incident took place, they should perhaps know a little better next time and keep the noise to a minimum. People from different nations are often supposed to reach compromises, respecting and tolerating each other.
Whatever your choice of entertainment, it is important not to affect other people’s lives. Square dancing is only one of many activities during which people should mind their behavior.
As for U.S. police practice, there might still be some room for improvement. Some were said to be rather rude, leading to the so-called “racial discrimination,” which is a sensitive topic in U.S. society.
If the involved parties could be more tolerant, and solve such problems without involving the court, perhaps immigrants would mix more.
1. The writer mentions the incident in Paragraph 1 to __________.

A．show his opinion	B．make complaints
C．bring up the topic	D．criticize the local police

2. The underlined word “tranquility” in Paragraph 3 can be replaced by ________.

A．entertainment	B．quietness
C．freedom	D．quality

3. What will the senior Chinese ladies most probably do after the incident?

A．Go back to China.

B．Fight for their right.

C．Ask America to change its law.

D．Keep the noise lower.

4. What’s the writer’s attitude towards senior Chinese ladies dancing in New York’s Sunset Park?

A．He thinks all parties involved should be more tolerant.

B．He strongly supports the action of the local police.

C．He considers it a shame for senior Chinese ladies to do so.

D．He suggests such kind of problem should be solved in the court.

7 . Singles’ Day, also called Double Eleven, began as a day for unmarried or uncoupled people to celebrate their lives on November 11, 1993. In China, however, Singles’ Day has become the biggest online shopping day in the world, which was created in 2009 by Alibaba’s CEO Daniel Zhang to increase online sales. Since then, it has grown into a cultural phenomenon.
China Singles’ Day, as a shopping day, takes place on November 11 each year. There are sharp discounts and other promotions (促销) designed by Alibaba to attract online customers. In 2015, E-commerce giant Alibaba broke records with sales of $14.3 billion on China Singles’ Day, with online sales increasing 60 percent from last year, according to Alibaba. “Most people shop on mobile phones or ipads and online shopping has become a comfortable channel for most consumers”, said Kitty Fok, China manager for market research. “China is a big market with close to one billion smart, connected device users. It is good news for both Alibaba and their competitors,” she said.
The company is focusing on international e-commerce for future Singles’ Days, reported Reuters. “Within the next five years, we expect China will become the world's largest e-commerce market for imported products,” President Michael Evans told reporters on Wednesday. Alibaba Chief Executive Daniel Zhang said in a statement that Singles’ Day would mean that “the whole world will see the power of Chinese consumption.” Over 130 million users visited Alibaba’s marketplace app, Taobao, reported the BBC.
1. What does Alibaba expect to do on Singles’ Day?

A．Celebrate single lives	B．Defeat competitors
C．Develop firm cultures	D．Increase online sales

2. What is the meaning of the underlined word discount in the second paragraph?

A．Smart products	B．Crazy buying
C．Low prices	D．More advertisements

3. What will make Singles' Days more popular according to Kitty Fok?

A．The popularity of smart, connected device users.

B．The potential power of Chinese consumption.

C．The cooperation with the international e-commerce.

D．The promotions on Alibaba's marketplace app, Taobao.

4. What attitude does President Michael Evans hold toward the future of China Singles’ Day?

A．doubtful	B．optimistic
C．negative	D．uncertain

8 . Look to many of history’s cultural symbols, and there you’ll find an ancestor of Frosty, the snowman in the movie Frozen. It appeared on some of the first postcards, starred in some of the earliest silent movies, and was the subject of a couple of the earliest photos, dating all the way back to the 1800s. I discovered even more about one of humanity’s earliest forms of life art during several years of research around the world.
For example, snowmen were a phenomenon in the Middle Ages, built with great skill and thought. At a time of limited means of expression, snow was like free art supplies dropped from the sky. It was a popular activity for couples to leisurely walk through town to view the temporary works of chilly art. Some were created by famous artists, including a 19-year-old Michelangelo, who in 1494 was appointed by the ruler of Florence, Italy, to build a snowman in his mansion’s courtyard.
The Miracle of 1511 took place during six freezing works called the Winter of Death. The city of Brussels was covered in snowmen—an impressive scene that told stories on every street corner. Some were political in nature, criticizing the church and government. Some were a reflection of people’s imagination. For the people of Brussels, this was a defining moment of defining freedom. At least until spring arrived, by which time they were dealing with damaging floods.
If you fear the heyday of the snowman has passed, don’t worry: I’ve learned that some explosive snowman history is still being made today. Every year since 1818, the people of Zurich, Switzerland, celebrate the beginning of spring by blowing up a snowman. On the third Monday of April, the holiday Sechselauten is kicked off when a cotton snowman called the Boogg is stuffed with explosive and paraded through town by bakers and other tradesmen who throw bread to the crowds. The parade ends with the Boogg being placed on a 40-foot pile of firewood. After the bells of the Church of St. Peter have rung six times, representing the passing of winter, the pile is lit. When the snowman explodes, winter is considered officially over—the quicker it is burnt down, the longer summer is said to be.
1. According to the passage, why did snowmen become a phenomenon in the Middle Ages?

A．People thought of snow as holy art supplies.

B．People longed to see masterpieces of snow.

C．Building snowmen was a way for people to express themselves.

D．Building snowmen helped people develop their skill and thought.

2. “The heyday of the snowman” （paragraph 4） means the time when___________.

A．snowmen were made mainly by artists

B．snowmen enjoyed great popularity

C．snowmen were politically criticized

D．snowmen caused damaging floods

3. In Zurich, the blowing up of the Boogg symbolizes__________________.

A．the start of the parade

B．the coming of a longer summer

C．the passing of the winter

D．the success of tradesmen

4. What can be concluded about snowmen from the passage?

A．They were appreciated in history

B．They have lost their value

C．They were related to movies

D．They vary in shape and size

9 . Food serves as a form of communication in two fundamental ways. Sharing bread or other foods is a common human tradition that can promote unity and trust. Food can also have a specific meaning, and play a significant role in a family or culture's celebrations or traditions. The foods we eat—and when and how we eat them—are often unique to a particular culture or may even differ between rural (农村的) and urban areas within one country.
Sharing bread, whether during a special occasion (时刻) or at the family dinner table, is a common symbol of togetherness. Many cultures also celebrate birthdays and marriages with cakes that are cut and shared among the guests. Early forms of cake were simply a kind of bread, so this tradition hits its roots in the custom of sharing bread.
Food also plays an important role in many New Year celebrations. In the southern United States, pieces of corn bread represent blocks of gold for prosperity (兴旺) in the New Year. In Greece, people share a special cake called vasilopita. A coin is put into the cake, which signifies (预示) success in the New Year for the person who receives it.
Many cultures have ceremonies to celebrate the birth of a child, and food can play a significant role. In China, when a baby is one month old, families name and welcome their child in a celebration that includes giving red-colored eggs to guests. In many cultures, round foods such as grapes, bread, and moon cakes are eaten at welcome celebrations to represent family unity.
Nutrition is necessary for life, so it is not surprising that food is such an important part of different cultures around the world.
1. According to the passage, sharing bread______.

A．indicates a lack of food

B．can help to develop unity

C．is a custom unique to rural areas

D．has its roots in birthday celebrations

2. What does the coin in vasilopita signify for its receiver in the New Year?

A．Trust.	B．Success.
C．Health.	D．Togetherness.

3. The author explains the role of food in celebrations by______.

A．using examples	B．making comparisons
C．analyzing causes	D．describing processes

4. What is the passage mainly about?

A．The custom of sharing food.

B．The specific meaning of food.

C．The role of food in ceremonies.

D．The importance of food in culture.

10 . Did anyone find the names of “Great Britain”, “the United Kingdom”, “England” and “the British commonwealth” which have the same meaning? Strictly speaking, these names all refer to something different. None of them are exactly the same as any of the others.
The British isles refer to the main islands and several thousand small ones as well, which you can see on the map. Great Britain, or Britain, refers to the larger of the two main islands. But the word “Britain” is often used as a short form for the United Kingdom or you call it the UK .
Now as for England, it refers simply to the largest of the three countries on the island of Great Britain. The United Kingdom is the name of the state and the official name of the country, which many people popularly refer to England.
Finally, the Britain commonwealth is the usual name for what is left of the British Empire. This change shows the weakening of British Empire and the rising of the national liberation movements throughout the world today.
1. According to the passage, we know that ____ .

A．Great Britain has the same meaning as Britain

B．the United Kingdom has the same meaning as Britain or England

C．all the names in the first paragraph have the same meaning

D．all the names refer to England

2. It is clear that the British isles refer to ____ .

A．Britain, England and the UK.

B．the two main islands and thousands of small ones

C．three countries and several islands

D．Great Britain or the United Kingdom

3. Which of the following shows the right relationship (关系) between the British isles (BI), Britain (B) and England (E)?

A．B>BI>E

B．BI>E>B

C．E>B>BI

D．BI>B>E

4. If you want to write to someone in Edinburgh that lies in Scotland, you should write the address as ____.

A．Edinburgh, England

B．Edinburgh, Great Britain

C．Scotland, Edinburgh, England

D．Great Britain, Scotland, Edinburgh