1 . Billions of insects are moving together over the sky like a black cloud. It’s a swarm of locusts. Many insects move in huge swarms. They form swarms for different reasons. Some move together to look for food or to find new homes. Sometimes insects swarm for protection. These enormous swarms can destroy food crops and harm other living things.

When something disturbs a red fire ants’ nest, out they will come. Not just one or two, but thousands of them. The fire ants swarm all over their victim. Their stings burn like fire. Each ant in the swarm can sting over and over again. The fire ants hold onto their victim with their mouth parts. Then they inject their prey with poison. Most small animals cannot survive the stings from a swarm of fire ants.

When army ants are on the move, anything in their path is prey. Even snakes can’t escape a swarm of these stinging ants. Army ants move together to look for food. They can’t see their prey, but they use smells and sounds to find their way. If they come to a river, they make a bridge with their bodies. They cling together with their legs. Then the rest of the ants can cross the bridge. There is not much that can stop these fierce and cruel ants from chasing their prey.

Insects are not the only animals that swarm. There are many others that do. Most are not harmful to people. Being close to a huge swarm of animals can be scary and dangerous. Some scientists have studied animal swarms. They have found that many swarms follow simple rules. They work together to solve problems. When they work together they are a very strong team.

1. What does the underlined word “swarm” in Paragraph 1 mean?

A．To force a liquid into something.	B．To hold onto something tightly.
C．To move together in a large group.	D．To watch over something.

2. What can we learn about fire ants from the text?

A．Their stings contain a kind of poison and are deadly to most small animals.

B．They can destroy food crops and are harmful to other living things.

C．When they move together, they are called “a swarm of locusts”.

D．They move in swarms to make new nests in different places.

3. Which of the following can be the proper feature of army ants according to the text?

A．Blind and smelly.	B．Angry and violent.
C．Scary and dangerous.	D．Strong and fast.

4. What is the most suitable title for the text?

A．Moving Nests	B．Stinging Fire Ants
C．A Moving Army	D．Swarms of Animals

2 . Wealthy nations need to give as much as ten times current levels of funding to help developing countries adapt to climate change, the United Nations said in a report.

If developing nations can’t adjust to climate change, rich countries will also feel the consequences, says Inger Andersen, executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), which prepared the report. “The idea that you can have a wall around your state and somehow protect yourself is simply unrealistic,” Andersen says. The report comes as world leaders prepare to gather for a climate conference. Organizers hope to make people realize the growing gap between current levels of aid for climate adaptation and what they say is required as climate shocks get worse.

Climate adaptation refers to steps to better protect people against the consequences of climate change— for example, moving communities away from coastlines and other areas. But much of the climate focus from rich countries’ leaders has been on limiting global warming by encouraging countries to burn less coal, oil and gas to reduce the emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.

At the United Nations climate meeting in Glasgow, countries promised to double the amount of funding available for adaptation to developing countries by 2025. But even if nations succeed in that, it’d still be insufficient for the need. Besides, it’s often spent in ways that aren’t likely to be effective over time, the report said. Adaptation efforts tend to be narrow, focus on short-term needs and fail to take future risks into account, it said.

The risk is that countries will soon experience climate shocks to which they simply can’t adapt, Andersen says. Relocation (搬迁), arguably the most extreme and expensive form of adaptation, will soon become vital, according to Andersen. “In most low-lying coastal areas, planned relocation is the last strategy,” Andersen says. “The longer wealthy countries kick this can down the road, the higher the price in human lives.”

1. Why did the UNEP prepare the report?

A．To plan for the upcoming meeting.	B．To raise money for climate change.
C．To draw attention to climate adaptation.	D．To call on poor countries to build walls.

2. What is the main concern of rich countries about climate change?

A．Taking measures to reduce it.	B．Dealing with its consequences.
C．Funding developing countries.	D．Protecting people in poor countries.

3. What is the report’s attitude to the present use of the adaptation funding?

A．Positive.

B．Tolerant.

C．Indifferent.

D．Disapproving.

4. What do Andersen’s words mean in the last paragraph?

A．Rich countries will suffer more.	B．Humans will face a hard choice.
C．More people will have to relocate.	D．Living expenses will rise dramatically.

5 . 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。

Eli looked up at the sky. It was bright blue, his favorite color. As he lay on his back, the soft green grass brushed against his arms and legs. The cool wind kept him at the perfect temperature, and the weather was just right for playing outside. Every summer vacation, he and his family drove to the small city of Ithaca to visit his mother’s family.

Just as Eli was starting to fall asleep in the backyard, his stomach growled (饥肠辘辘). “Time for dinner” he thought. So he stood up and began to walk back to the house. Suddenly he noticed something move out of the corner of his eye. It was near the woods in the back yard. Then he heard some rustling (沙沙地响). So he went to check what it was. When he got closer, the object stopped moving. He walked over quietly until he could see something lying in the grass — it was a baby deer!

Even though Eli was standing very close to the animal, he found it strange that the baby deer didn’t try running away. Eli rushed into the house and told his mother what he had found. “Well, we should check if the deer is injured. If not, we shouldn’t do anything because its mother will come back and take care of it,” she told Eli. So the two of them walked to the baby animal. Eli’s mother walked very slowly and finally got close enough to the deer.

Eli watched his mother frow n as she examined the baby deer. She walked back to Eli. “I think its back le g is injured,” she said. “But we’ll wait for a few hours and see if the deer’s mother comes back for it. If we do anything now, we might scare it and hurt it more.” Eli wanted to help the baby, but he knew his mother was right. They went back into the house and had lunch. They both kept checking the clock.

注意：1.续写词数应为150个左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。

As the sky was getting dark, the little deer was still lying there.

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Twenty minutes later, a big rescue truck drove into their driveway.

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7 . In 2011, artist Grimanesa Amorós stepped off a boat made of totora reeds (芦苇) onto an island—also made of totora reeds — in the northwest portion of Lake Titicaca. It’s home to one of the world’s most innovative achievement of human engineering: the Uros Islands.

The man-made floating islands, which are home to the native Uros people, are created by putting layers upon layers of totora roots and reeds. This water-resistant plant grows in the lake and is the lifeblood of the Uros community. It is used to make boats, houses, roofs, mattresses (床垫) and more. The plant is also eaten and serves as medicine, and its flowers are used to make tea.

However, the Uros weren’t always dependent on the totora. More than 500 years ago, the growing Inca Empire began to invade the Uros’ mainland villages. To beat this threat, the Uros began to build the islands, which could be launched deep into Lake Titicaca, away from danger. Hundreds of years later, there are now about 120 of these constructed islands, with around 1,300 people living on them.

To build the islands, the Uros first gather large blocks of totora roots. Multiple blocks are pulled together, and the roots and reeds mix naturally to form a layer about 1 to 2m thick. The totora reed is laid on top of this floating base. The Uros use a long tool to reach deep down into the water and cut the plant above the base. Then, the reeds are dried in the sun for one to four weeks and bundled (捆绑) together using a rope. Once dried, totora reeds are placed in alternating directions on top of the root blocks and become the ground that the Uros walk and build their homes on.

Today, urban influences are evident on the islands: Solar panels power bedroom lights and small TVs; a radio station operates on the main island. It’s evident that these modern changes and tourism have changed the Uros’ life on the lake. One thing remains certain, though. As long as there is totora growing at Lake Titicaca, the islands’ rooted foundation will stay the same.

1. Which word can best describe the role totora reeds play in the Uro’s life?

A．Essential.

B．Symbolic.

C．Protective.

D．Sustainable.

2. What was the original purpose of building the floating island?

A．To develop tourism.	B．To maintain their lifestyle.
C．To escape from enemies’ attack.	D．To be separated from the world.

3. What does the fourth paragraph mainly focus on?

A．The key to selecting building materials.	B．The procedure of building the islands.
C．The difficulty of living on the island.	D．The method of spotting reeds.

4. What might be the best title for the text?

A．Fancy Lifestyles of the Uros	B．Innovative Building Materials
C．Floating Homes on Lake Titicaca	D．A Must-see Tourist Attraction of Lake Titicaca

8 . In the rich countries of the West, the electric vehicle revolution is well underway. Climate-conscious consumers drive Teslas or Polestars for reasons of morality and fashion. Poorer countries are also experiencing a wave of electrified trend. In Bangladesh, electric three-wheeler taxis, known as tuk-tuks, are rapidly replacing gas-powered ones on the streets. Such electric vehicles are climate friendly, cost effective, and help reduce air pollution.

Yet a glance under the hood (引擎盖) of these vehicles reveals a poisonous secret: each tuk-tuk runs on five massive lead-acid batteries, containing almost 300 pounds of lead in total. Every year and a half or so, when those batteries need to be replaced and recycled, about 60 pounds of lead leak into the environment. Battery recycling, often at small-scale unregulated factories, is a highly profitable but deadly business.

Lead is dangerous, and any exposure to it is harmful to human health. Lead that has entered the environment hurts people on an extraordinary scale. The numerous ways lead enters air, water, soil, and homes across the developing world — and the enormous damage it does to human health, wealth, and welfare — causes one of the biggest environmental crises in the world yet receives little attention.

The World Bank estimates that lead kills 5. 5 million people per year, which would make it a bigger global killer than AIDS, malaria, diabetes, and road traffic deaths combined. On top of the shocking deaths, the social burden of lead poisoning is extraordinary, as is its contribution to global inequality — our research on the cognitive effects of lead poisoning suggests that it may explain about one-fifth of the educational achievement gap between rich and poor countries.

But unlike many challenges faced by developing countries, lead poisoning is a problem that is fixable with some attention and a relatively modest financial investment. Better monitoring, research, and rules can help protect children all over the world from the dreadful effects of lead poisoning and reduce the massive global costs it brings.

1. How does the author describe the lead problem in paragraph 2?

A．By making a comparison.	B．By analyzing hidden causes.
C．By listing convincing numbers.	D．By explaining its working principle.

2. What can we learn from the text?

A．Lead enters rich countries in various ways.

B．Lead poisoning may make poor societies poorer.

C．Exposure to lead doesn’t necessarily harm someone.

D．Lead leaking has caused great panic in both countries.

3. What can be done to solve lead poisoning in developing countries?

A．Fixing these used batteries.	B．Putting certain effort and money.
C．Prohibiting the illegal use of lead.	D．Reducing the cost of recycling lead.

4. Which of the following is the best title for the text?

A．The Impacts of Lead Poisoning on Human Health

B．The Outcomes of Using Electric Vehicles

C．The Ways to Solve Lead Problem

D．The Global Lead Poisoning Crisis

9 . 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。

Food from the air

Everyone has seen plants growing, but have you ever thought     1     they get their food? In the seventeenth century, a European scientist     2     (call) Van Helmot asked this question. Like most people, he thought that plants must get their food from soil. However, Van Helmot decided       3     (test) the theory with experiments.

First, he dried some soil, put it into a pot and weighed it. Next, he weighed a small tree, planted it in the pot and added rain water. Then, he watered it     4     (regular) with rain water.

After five years, he removed the tree from the pot and weighed it again. He found that the tree had gained     5     huge amount of weight. When he weighed the soil, however, it was almost exactly the same as it had been five years    6    . So Van Helmot drew the    7    (conclude) that the tree grew by drinking water. Though it turned out to be wrong, he showed the importance of the use of scientific evidence to support ideas.

We now know that plants and trees make their own food. Their leaves, when exposed     8     the air and sun, are like factories    9     can change the energy from the sun into chemical energy. During this process (过程), oxygen and sugar     10     (produce). The oxygen is released back into the air, and the sugar is used by the plant as food.

10 . Finding a California condor in the wild would be the most unusual treat. perhaps even more unusual than finding a wolf in Yellowstone National Park. In fact, the wolf was what opened my eyes to the fact that humans could bring an animal back to the place where it had disappeared.

In 1987, there were only 27 California condors left, none of which were in the wild, only in captive breeding programs, It was those breeding programs that contributed to their population rise, enough that by 1991 some of them could be freed into the wild.

Still, the hope of seeing a California condor, which remains an endangered species, is very low, let alone getting a photo of one. California condor population dropped mostly due to human factors, such as poaching and living areas destruction-these are challenges California condors still face today.

Although this is just a bird’s-eye view of the challenges California condors face and there are many others, it is part of why the opportunity to work with the US Fish and Wildlife Service team and their partners helping their recovery is so special to me as a photographer. I am not only able to photograph the birds in their wild living areas, but also understand and record how difficult the work is of those people on the front lines of the protection.

I am grateful for the work of the team, and my hope is that California condor population will continue to rise allowing future generations an opportunity I never had when I first got here-to look to the sky and see one flying around.

1. What helped the increase of the California condor population in 1987?

A．Rules for hunters.	B．Captive breeding programs.
C．The improved natural environment.	D．The enlargement of wild living areas.

2. What does the author say about taking photos of a California condor in the wild?

A．It is difficult.

B．It is easy.

C．It is boring.

D．It is dangerous.

3. What did the author do when working with the US Fish and Wildlife Service team?

A．He guided ways for them.	B．He made records by photos.
C．He helped the birds to recover.	D．He rebuilt the birds’ living areas.

4. What is the best title for the text?

A．New Way, New Hope	B．Wolves and California Condors
C．A Photo of a California Condor	D．The California Condor’s Coming Back