1 . “May 17, 2157

Dear diary,

Today, Tommy found a real book!...”

“What’s it about?” Margie asked.

“School.” replied Tommy, turning the yellow pages.

“Why would anyone write about school? I hope they can take my geography teacher away.”

“It’s not our school. This is the old sort that they had centuries ago.”

“Anyway, they had a teacher.” Margie said, reading the book over his shoulder.

“Sure, they had a teacher, but it wasn’t a regular teacher. It was a man.”

“A man? How could a man be a teacher?”

“Well, he just told the boys and girls things and gave them assignments and asked them questions.”

“A man isn’t smart enough.”

“Sure, he is. My father knows as much as my teacher.”

Margie wasn’t prepared to argue about that. She said, “I wouldn’t want a strange man in my house to teach me.”

Tommy laughed. “The teachers didn’t live in the house. They had a special building and all the kids went there.”

“And all the kids learned the same thing?”

“Sure, if they were the same age.”

“But my mother says a teacher has to be adjusted to fit the mind of each boy and girl it teaches and that each kid has to be taught differently.”

“If you don’t like it, you don’t have to read the book.”

“I didn’t say I didn’t like it,” Margie said quickly.

They weren’t even half-finished when Margie’s mother called, “Margie! School!”

“Not yet, Mamma.”

“Now!” said Mrs. Jones.

Margie said to Tommy, “Can I read the book some more with you after school?”

“Maybe,” Tommy said.

Margie went into the schoolroom, right next to her bedroom, and the mechanical teacher was on waiting for her.

The screen was lit up, and it said, “Please insert yesterday’s assignments in the proper slot.”

Margie was still thinking about the old schools they had when her grandfather’s grandfather was a little boy. All the kids from the whole neighborhood came, laughing and shouting in the schoolyard, sitting together in the schoolroom, going home together at the end of the day. They learned the same things, so they could help one another on the assignments and discussed them.

And the teachers were people…

1. Which of the following can be inferred from the passage?

A．Margie doesn’t like her school.

B．It’s common to read paper books in 2157.

C．Online learning is what Margie wants.

D．Tommy feels his father is smarter than his teacher.

2. Which of the following is TRUE about a school in 2157?

A．There are only female teachers at school.

B．Teachers give no assignments to students.

C．A special building is constructed for teachers.

D．Students learn different things at their own pace.

3. What does the underlined word “slot” probably mean?

A．Envelope.	B．Opening.
C．Screen.	D．Schoolroom.

4. What can we learn about Margie’s feelings about old schools?

A．Longing.	B．Objection.
C．Suspicion.	D．Tolerance.

3 . There was a time, Wang Fuchun remembered, when all the people on Chinese trains looked more or less the same. In the late 1970s, when he started taking his photographs, everyone seemed to wear green suits and caps. The “green-skinned” trains crept between China’s main towns and cities. On board, all was chaos. Life seemed to explode on the train as if it were a stage. He did not care what seat he had, for he was on the move.

China, too, was on the move. China was rushing to the modern world, and the trains, showed it. Steam was fading; the green-skinned trains acquired fans, then air-conditioning. Then came express trains, then high-speed rail. And the passengers, too, changed. They began to wear jeans; by the 1980s they let their hair grow. The 1990s brought in a fashion for T-shirts with favourite stars. People wanted a look that was unique; they became individuals. His book Chinese on the Train, published in 2001, caught the brief span when old and new crashed.

Many slow trains had been replaced by high-speed models, as comfortable and quiet as hotels. The aisles were clear, the windows sealed. In the ordinary seats, everyone’s nose was buried in their tablets and their phones.

Over 40 years he reckoned he had ridden on 1,000 trains and covered more than 100,000 kilometres, on every line in China. He found he could not sleep properly without the clank of rails beneath him. He took about 200,000 pictures. He liked to place two of his photographs side by side. One was of a green-skinned train in 1998, with a merry line of passengers grinning out of the window. The second picture showed a pair of newly-weds (新婚夫妇) in 2015 in front of a Harmony high-speed train, holding the character for “double happiness”. He liked the message of hope. He was proud of what China had achieved.

1. What does the second paragraph mainly talk about?

A．The development of trains in China.

B．The changes that took place in China.

C．The publication of an influential book.

D．Chinese people’s habits of dressing in the past.

2. What can we learn about Wang Fuchun according to the text?

A．He set about photographing in 1970.

B．His book featured green-skinned trains.

C．His photos focused on ordinary people.

D．He suffered from sleep disorder on the train.

3. What did Wang Fuchun want to show by mentioning “double happiness”?

A．The great changes of trains.	B．The pride in rapid development.
C．The happy life of train passengers.	D．The breakthrough in his photographing

4. Which of the following best describes Wang Fuchun as a photographer?

A．Ambitious.

B．Outgoing.

C．Determined.

D．Talented.

4 . By 2050 we’ll be able to send memories, emotions and feelings across the Internet.     1     Teenagers will love it. Instead of putting an emoticon (表情符号) at the end of every sentence, they will use an emotion: anger, happiness, or excitement.

I’m talking about telepathy (心灵感应), really. We’ll still communicate the traditional way.     2     Our children will wonder, What is a keyboard? We will enter the age of the “brain net”.

Medicine will develop fast, too. We will have cured certain forms of cancer, and we will have begun to treat the disease like the common cold. We’ll live with it. It will no longer be deadly.     3     Technology will help in this respect.     4     Smart toilets will perform liquid biopsies (液体活检) to discover cancer cells. Smart objects like phones will check us over automatically.

    5     By 2050 I think we’ll be able to grow many of the important organs (器官) of the body and, rather than allow the organs we’re born with to become old and weak, we’ll replace them. That’s all coming. And it doesn’t take much imagination to realise it.

A．We will do a few tests.

B．People will live an easy life.

C．We won’t fear it like we used to.

D．Brain science will have changed communication.

E．We can already use human cells to grow skin, noses, ears, etc.

F．But communicating telepathically will avoid misunderstandings between people.

G．Our clothes will discover the beginnings of a heart disease, and advise us to get treatment.

5 . By mid-century there will likely be 9 billion people on the planet, using ever more resources and leading ever more technologically complex lives. What will our cities be like? How much will artificial intelligence (AI) advance? Will global warming cause disastrous changes, or will we be able to engineer our way out of the climate change issues? Recently, the magazine Big Think asked top minds from a variety of fields to weigh in on what the future holds 40 years from now. The result is as follows.

It's likely that by 2050 the majority of the people in the world will live in urban areas and will have a much higher average age than people today. Cities theorist Richard thinks urbanization will transform the education system of, making our economy less houses driven and removing the divisions between home and work.

And rapidly advancing technology will continue ever more rapidly. Cities of the future won't look like “some sort of science-fiction fantasy”, but it's likely that technological advances and information overlays (VR and AR) will greatly change how we live. Self- driving cars will make the roads safer and provide faster transports. A larger version of driverless cars-driverless trucks — may make long-distance drivers out of date.

Some long view predictions are completely dire. Environmentalist Bill says that if we don't make great progress in fighting global warming, it's likely we could see out-of- control rises in sea levels, huge crop shortfalls and wars over limited freshwater resources.

In terms of how we will eat, green markets founder and “real food" supporter Nina believes that there will be more small milk processing plants and more regional food operations and we'll be healthier as a result. New York Times writer Mark thinks that people will eat fewer processed foods and eat foods grown closer to where they live. And more people will be aware of the ethical responsibility" to grow foods.

1. What may happen by 2050 based on the magazine Big Think ?

A．Education will be driven by economy.	B．The majority of people will be taller.
C．AI will cause disastrous changes.	D．Most people will live in big cities.

2. What do we know about technology in the future according to Paragraph 3?

A．It will make people live in science-fiction fantasy.

B．It will ensure safer transports due to faster cars.

C．It will greatly change the way in which people live.

D．It will increase the number of long-distance drivers.

3. What does the underlined word "dire" in Paragraph 4 mean?

A．Magical.

B．Terrible.

C．Ridiculous.

D．Meaningful.

4. What does Nina think of foods in the future?

A．People will eat healthier and fresher foods.

B．Land-raised farm systems will be improved.

C．There will be smaller regional food operations,

D．Food supplies will become much more limited.