Northern Kenya is a vast, varied and breathtakingly beautiful landscape     1     you can find the “Towers of the Savanna”-reticulated (网纹的) giraffes. They are one of Africans most impressive and popular animals, and yet the     2     (adore) creatures are still little studied and not well understood. However, before we could begin to research into these giraffes, they are facing     3     (disappear).

Across Africa, all giraffe populations     4     (decline) by over 70 percent in the past 20 years. Main reasons are illegal hunting, land degradation (恶化) and lack     5     living places. The decrease led the IUCN Red List, an authoritative indicator of the health of the worlds biodiversity, to     6     (official) list giraffes as one of the endangered species in December 2016.     7     is now clear that they need conservation efforts.

To better understand the wildlife found here, Wildwatch Kenya seeks     8     (identify) and track the giraffes in conservation field sites. It’s also high time that citizen scientists     9     (invite) to help researchers look through the tens of thousands of photos taken by cameras     10     (place) in strategic spots throughout the sites.

My Mind-Shifting Qomolangma Swim

Lewis Pugh is a famous swimmer, who swam across the North Pole in 2007. The water there was so cold his fingers were    1    (freeze). Why did Pugh do this? Well, he wants people    2    (pay) attention to global warming.

As a boy, Lewis visited national parks and he learned how fragile and    3    (amaze) the Earth is. Now he    4    (intend) to protect the Earth. He decided to swim in water near the North Pole to bring attention to the melting glaciers. Lewis said that the swim was so painful that    5    would be his last time swimming in freezing water.    6    when he heard about Lake Imja, near Mt. Qomolangma, high in the Himalayas, he decided to swim in cold water again.

Mt. Qomolangma is the    7    (tall) mountain in the world and swimming there is very difficult. Because of global warming, glaciers on Mt. Qonolangma are melting and leaving lake behind,    8    Lake Imja.

Lewis says he learned two    9    (lesson) from swimming at Mount Qomolangma. First, he learned that people can unintentionally do a lot of damage. We do things which hunt the Earth because we know no other way to live. Second, We can all do    10    we can to protect our environment if we change the way we think and think more about our future.

On April 16, a fire     1     (destroy) the spire (尖塔) and roof of the 580-year-old cathedral Notre Dame (巴黎圣母院). Citizens of Paris gathered around the giant church,     2     (sing) hymns (圣诗) and praying. The church,     3     was built in 1163, is a historical and     4     (art) treasure. It combined Gothic art with Christian architecture     5     it led to taller and     6     (awesome) churches throughout Europe. Notre Dame is also home     7     many religious artifacts (手工艺品), paintings and sculptures.     8     (fortune), its world-famous stained glass rose windows survived the fire. Victor Hugo’s 1831 novel, the Hunchback of Notre-Dame, brought the church to the world’s attention. French President Emmanuel Macron promised     9     (reconstruct) the building. “ Notre Dame is our history, it’s our literature, it’s our imagery,” he said in     10     public speech.

In a small village，there lived a potter (陶工) who had a donkey．Every day his donkey would carry soil     1     the field to his house．As the field was quite far off，the potter forgot     2     (take) the rope with which he tied the donkey every day，so he decided to lie down holding the donkey′s ears while sleeping．But this way，neither the donkey     3     the potter was able to take a good rest．A saint (圣人)，    4     happened to be passing by，saw them．When the potter told the saint       5       the problem was，the saint said，"Take the donkey to the place where you tie him every day．Pretend to tie him using an imaginary rope．I promise you he won′t run away．"The potter did so．

He       6     （leave） the donkey and went to take a rest．When he woke up，he was       7    (surprise) to find the donkey       8     (stand) at the same place．Soon the potter prepared to leave for home．But the donkey did not move．    9     (lucky), the potter saw the wise saint again and told him about the problem．The saint said，"You tied up the donkey，but did you untie （松开） him？Go and pretend to untie the rope." The potter followed the saint′s advice with     10     （please）．

Now the donkey was ready to leave for home．The potter went home happily with his donkey．

Stephanie Jenouvrier at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution found the future of emperor penguins (帝企鹅)depended on international efforts to manage climate change rather than on their     1     (able)to adapt to new environment. Climate change, if     2    (leave)unchecked, could drive emperor penguins to extinction (灭绝)by the end of the century as sea ice disappears.

Disappearing sea ice affects these penguins     3     (direct) because they rely on it for their living. Sea ice changes are already affecting emperor penguins, with breeding failures for three years in a row at their second     4     (big) living place in the Antarctic.

    5     (examine )the future of emperor penguins, Jenouvirer and her team       6    (model)their population under three scenarios (设想)：global temperature increases by 1.5°C; global temperature increases by 2°C; no action     7     (take) to reduce emissions(排放物). They wanted to see     8     would happen if emissions kept rising. They found that global warming of 1.5°C would cause a 31 percent fall,     9    2°C a 44 percent fall. "The result was     10     81 to 86 per cent fall in population by 2100 under the third scenario, "said Jenouvrier.

    1    （locate）in Nanping County, Aba Tibetan-Qiang Autonomous Prefecture, Jiuzhaigou Ravine extends 80 kilometers in one direction and takes up     2    area of more than 60,000 hectares（公顷）. The area    3     (consist) of six scenic spots——Changhai, Jianyan, Nuorilang, Shuzheng, Zharu     4     Heihai. The mountains, lakes, natural primeval（原始的） forest, beautiful flowers all make Jiuzhaigou a fairyland. Mountains ranging 1,980 to about 3,100 meters     5     height are covered by a variety of trees and plants.

Scenes change according to the season and the area is particularly colorful in autumn when the wind makes    6     (kilometer) of tree belt along the lake wave like a sea. The Shuzheng Scenic Spot is one of the central point of Jiuzhaigou's landscape. The spot,     7    covers an area of three square kilometers, is made up of 40 lakes extending five kilometers along a valley. The lakes vary in color according to     8    (they) depths and scenery around them.     9    (obvious), the magnificent view in Jiuzhaigou will make you reluctant to leave, and don't forget that the autumn is the     10    (good) season to visit it.

Jingdezhen porcelain(瓷器)is Chinese porcelain produced in or near Jingdezhen in southern China. Jingdezhen has produced porcelain     1     (century)ago. And the town     2    was named Jingdezhen by Emperor Zhenzong of the Northern Song Dynasty became a major kiln(窑)site around 1004.During the period, the     3    (produce)of porcelain in this area first became     4    (know).By the 14th century it had become the largest centre of producing Chinese porcelain, which remained in the following times. In the Ming Dynasty, official kilns in Jingdezhen     5    (control)by the emperor, making quality porcelain in large quantities for the emperor to give abroad as gifts. As a result, the town was     6    (close)linked to the world.

Although being a remote town in a hilly area, Jingdezhen is near the quality porcelain stone and forests which can provide plenty of wood for the kilns. It also has     7    river flowing from north to south,     8    (benefit)the transport of the fragile objects.

Jingdezhen has produced a great variety of     9     (value) porcelain. As a result, the town is famous     10     the “Porcelain Capital”. One type of its well-known high quality porcelain object is the blue and white porcelain from the 1330s.

While thousands of college students headed for warm climate to enjoy sun and fun during their week off from classes, seven local students had other plans.

The Northern Essex Community College (NECC) students and one of their teachers spent part of their spring break in New York City, helping repair an area     1     (destroy) by the hurricane. “I wanted to see for myself what happened,” said Terry. “I couldn’t imagine    2    it is like to lose your home and everything that you know and the    3    (power) effect the hurricane had on those people. I wanted to do something, to understand their feeling of helplessness.” The group headed into Brooklyn’s Red Hook district, which was hit hard by the hurricane. There they met people from other parts of the country,     4    had also volunteered to help. Together, those volunteers and the NECC students worked     5     (clear) rubbish out of a three-story building. They put on protective suits and gloves    6    they entered the building.

Inside the building, the students saw nothing but broken walls and doors and pieces of the building     7    (lie) all over the place.

The students returned to school with     8    sense of achievement, a feeling     9    they helped people in need. I was remarkable how a community lost so much and was still able to recover, and this left the deepest impression    10    the students.

In August 2014, paleoanthropologist (古人类学家)Yingqi Zhang and his team went down into a sinkhole on the hunt for Gigantopithecus, the largest known primate(灵长类动物)to ever live. They came back out with a mix of bones from the unfortunate     1     (creature) that had fallen into the natural "death trap". None of those bones belonged to the extinct ape, but the team was in for a surprise: The mix included a 22,000-year-old lower jaw from     2    ancient panda. And within its worn edges, the jaw contained     3     is now the world’s oldest sample of panda DNA. Moreover, the genetic evidence     4    (show) that the bone comes from a     5    (previous) unknown lineage of giant panda. This animal may have been specifically adapted to    6    (live) in its subtropical home, suggesting that the black-and-white beasts were once much     7    (diverse) than they are today, the authors argue in a paper     8     (publish) in the journal Current Biology. While the     9     (conclude) about panda diversity is probably not revolutionary, the team's work collecting ancient DNA from the degraded fossils is     10     great significance.

Beijing embraces second snow this winter. The second snowfall of Beijing hit the capital Sunday evening,     1     (affect) traffic routes and scenic areas on Monday.

Starting at about 7 pm on Sunday, the snow fell from the city’s south,     2     (gradual) covering the entire capital     3     turning to moderate snow Monday morning, according to the Beijing Meteorological Bureau. The snowfall ended at noon and the blue alert     4     (issue) for a blizzard (暴风雪) was removed in the afternoon.

More than 50,000 workers and over 6,500 snow removal     5     (vehicle) were set up     6     (ensure) road safety. Flights and subway lines, as well as bus routes, have been affected when     7     snow hit the capital.

On Sunday Beijing issued a blue alert for a blizzard, the first blizzard alert this winter. A yellow alert for     8     (ice) roads was issued as well. China has a four-tier color-coded weather warning system, with red representing the most severe, followed     9     orange, yellow and blue.

In late November, the capital     10     (experience) its first snow of the winter.