This story happened in a small village in North America, where a disabled boy named Tom lived with his parents. When Tom was born, his right leg was a little twisted (变形的). When Tom could neither walk nor stand upright for two years, his parents took him to a doctor. After a careful examination, the doctor said complete recovery was impossible. So the doctor made a structure of iron rods (杆) that could be tied through Tom’s shoe to a belt over his knee. With the help of the structure, Tom could stand properly and walk at times, and his life became a little easier than before. But one thing always bothering him was that he could not play like other children, although he was still happy.
On the way to Tom’s school, there was a small flower shop. Its owner was a kind old man. In this shop, there lived his five small pet puppies. One of the puppies was lame (瘸的). It always dragged its leg and followed the rest of the puppies. Tom often stood in front of this flower shop after school and watched the puppies. Of the five, Tom liked that little lame puppy most.
One day, Tom saw a board hanging in front of the shop. It read “Puppies for Sale at $50” Tom went straight into the shop. Pointing at the lame puppy, he asked the old man to sell it to him. Tom took a $5 note out of his pocket and gave it to the old man. “I only have $5 now and you keep it. I’ll pay 50 cents a month for the rest,” Tom said. “But it is a puppy which will limp for the rest of its life. It will never be able to run with you or play with you in the park. Do you still want to buy it?” the old man asked in surprise.
Tom told the old man firmly, “Yes, I want this puppy.” Then the old man returned Tom’s $5 and said, “If you want this puppy, I’ll give it to you for free.”
Paragraph 1:
Tom got a little upset after hearing this from the old man.
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Paragraph 2:
Then, Tom approached the lame puppy with his twisted right leg.
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2 . The Mystery of Why Sunflowers Turn to Follow the Sun — Solved
Scientists have answered a burning question central to sunflowers: Why do young flowers always face the sun over the course of a day?
And also: Once sunflowers become full-grown, why do they stop tracking the sun and only face east?
In a newly-published article, researchers claim that a young plant’s sun-tracking (also called heliotropism) can be explained by circadian rhythms — the behavioural changes tied to an internal clock that humans also have, which generally follows a 24-hour cycle.
“Growth rates on the east side were high during the day and very low at night, whereas growth rates on the west side were low during the day and higher at night,” the journal article says.
The researchers tied plants up so they couldn’t move or turned them away from the sun — and they found those flowers eventually had “fewer organic materials and less leaf area” than flowers that could move with the sun.
Full-grown sunflowers respond differently to the sun. According to the article, “As overall growth slows down, the circadian clock ensures that the plant reacts more strongly to light early in the morning than in the afternoon or evening, so it gradually stops moving westward during the day.”
The researchers compared full-grown flowers facing east with those they turned to face west, and found that east-facing flowers attracted five times as many helpful pollinators. That’s because the east-facing flowers heat up faster and bees like warm flowers.
“Just like people, plants depend on the daily rhythms of day and night to function,” Anne Sylvester, director of the National Science Foundation’s Plant Genome (基因组). Research Programme said in a press release. “Sunflowers, like solar panels, follow the sun from east to west. These researchers explore information in the sunflower genome to understand how and why sunflowers track the sun.”
UC Berkeley professor and co-author of the study, Benjamin Blackman, believes that the connection between circadian rhythms and growth could be applicable to other researches. “The more general point, that one of the circadian clock’s adaptive functions is to regulate the timing and strength of growth responses to environmental signals, is one that I think will apply to a broad range of qualities and species.” he said.
1. What did the researchers discover when they tied the sunflowers up?________| A．They still tracked and faced towards the sun. |
| B．They grew faster during the daytime than they did at night. |
| C．Their growth rates were lower than those of flowers facing the sun. |
| D．The growth rates on the west side were higher than those on the east. |
| A．Because they will not be affected by light anymore. |
| B．Because they would stop growing up if they faced west. |
| C．Because they are not active at all during afternoons or evenings. |
| D．Because they are more sensitive to light in the early morning from the east. |
| A．Bees. | B．Plants. | C．Energy. | D．Researchers. |
| A．Exploring information in the sunflower genome. |
| B．Comparing human’s circadian rhythms with sunflowers’. |
| C．Comparing full-grown flowers facing east with those facing west. |
| D．Exploring how circadian rhythms affect the growth of other species. |
3 . Portugal’s white storks (鹳) were once a migratory bird (候鸟), known to leave the area each winter to travel to Africa’s warmer climate, but recently they have been staying put.
Surprisingly, though, the storks’ number has actually been on the rise. There are now thought to be more than 14,000 birds in Portugal in winter — a ten-time increase over the last 20 years. Any unusual change of an animal’s natural behavior often has negative influences.
It has been thought that their increase has a close relationship with a growing number of landfill sites (垃圾填埋场) in the area, providing the birds with a supply of fatty and dirty rubbish to eat, including junk food. Was it the junk food that stopped them migrating, or is Europe’s warming climate to criticize? Researchers sought to figure out exactly why their natural behavior had changed in this way. To understand, a team kept an eye on 48 white storks by equipping them with small GPS computers, which recorded their movements five times a day, checking how often they traveled to landfill sites as well as how fast they flew.
The conclusions were shocking. The birds also established more homes next to landfill sites — the team said that 80% of white storks were spending most of their time by the rubbish all year round, according to the results. The storks eat almost anything. “Every time after a truck with rubbish came, they collected what they could,” says Aldina Franco of the University of East Anglia in the UK. The storks have even been known to eat plastic, including old computer parts. “Really what they are trying to get at is rubbish that we throw away... like hamburgers, burnt meat and fish,” said Franco.
This rich and colorful supply of food will soon become hard to find, though, as new laws from European Union (EU) order that waste food be recycled. Open-air landfills will also be replaced by covered equipment, which birds will not be able to eat.
The white storks therefore face an uncertain future. Will they migrate to Africa as they had done for hundreds of years before, or will they stay put? No one knows. “I wonder what the Portuguese storks will do once the landfill sites are all closed, and we are going to continue to watch these storks and see how they will respond to the changes,” said Aldina Franco.
1. What do you know about the team’s research?| A．Researchers equipped 48 small computers on white storks. |
| B．The GPS computers were used to record white storks’ movements. |
| C．The conclusions the team got were the same as they predicted. |
| D．Researchers found Europe’s warming climate accounted for storks’ staying put. |
| A．The landfill made the storks lose their homes. |
| B．The landfill helped increase the number of storks. |
| C．Open-air landfills will be replaced and storks will die out. |
| D．The landfill gave the storks food and in turn, influenced where they lived. |
| A．He will continue to do research on white storks. |
| B．The Portuguese storks can eat whatever we throw away. |
| C．People should prepare more healthy food for white storks. |
| D．White storks will migrate to Africa if the landfill sites are closed. |
| A．White Stork Will Migrate Again After Rubbish Is Recycled |
| B．White Storks’ Staying Put Contributed to Rubbish Recycling |
| C．White Storks’ Staying Put in Winter Concerned Scientists |
| D．Climate Change will Be the Test for White Storks’ Migration |
1. What happened to Samantha last month?
| A．She lost her pet dog. | B．She wrote a warm story. | C．She began a new project. |
| A．Half a month ago. | B．One month ago. | C．One year ago. |
| A．Driving to a farm. | B．Visiting a pet shop. | C．Going to the studio. |
5 . More than one billion pounds of pumpkins are grown in the U.S. every year, and after they’ve been used for Halloween, millions of them will end up in a waste yard.
“Driving around after Halloween, you see so many pumpkins on top of their garbage cans. All of them will go to a waste yard and become methane gas(沼气),” says Kay McKeen, director of an environmental education organization based in Illinois.
Methane is a greenhouse gas. Compared to CO2, it warms the atmosphere in a shorter amount of time, which means it’s a most important cause of climate change. And waste yards—where we send as much as 40 percent of the food we produce—take up 14 percent of methane produced in the US every year.
That’s why, in 2014, McKeen began a collection event where local people can bring their waste pumpkins to 69 different locations to send them off to the bins, and—of course—smash them to pieces.
“It puts nutrients(营养) back in our soil, it saves water, it doesn’t make methane gas—it’s just a win-win,” says McKeen.
But not everyone has access to pumpkin smashing events, so we asked our newsletter readers how they reduce their pumpkin waste. The answers are various, ranging from baking sweet treats to bringing a pumpkin treat to farm animals.
1. What happens after Halloween?| A．A lot of pumpkins are thrown away. |
| B．People are busy cleaning up garbage. |
| C．It is the best time for pumpkin harvest. |
| D．People use pumpkins to make methane gas. |
| A．Pumpkins cause the climate change. |
| B．Illinois people waste half of their food. |
| C．Both methane and CO2 are greenhouse gases. |
| D．Methane is the only reason for climate change. |
| A．Burn. | B．Shake. | C．Break. | D．Press. |
| A．A letter. | B．A speech. | C．A news report. | D．A health report. |
6 . In 1960 Jane Goodall, a British primatologist (灵长类动物学家), observed chimpanzees in Gombe National Park in Tanzania. At that point, it was thought only humans had the capacity to create and use tools, but the chimpanzees were using thin leaves of grass to fish termites (白蚁) from their mounds (土堆).
Since then the distinction between animals and humans has become less obvious. In addition to tool making, chimpanzees — and many other animals besides — display emotion and self-awareness. Studies show that elephants feel sad and rats have empathy. In “The Creative Life of Animals” Carol Gigliotti, a professor in Vancouver, has compiled (汇编) research that examines such behaviour through the lens of creativity.
This requires a more generous definition of creativity. Ms Gigliotti suggests considering creativity from the animal’s point of view instead of human’s. “If animals in their own cultures can solve problems or create products of value to them, it seems accurate to consider these as creative,” she writes.
Beaver lodges (海狸窝) are a case in point: there is no single model for their construction. Each river or lake has its unique features and beavers create a custom-made structure to adapt to the given habitat — so, in Ms Gigliotti’s opinion, lodges deserve to be considered a creative activity.
Though seemingly a book about creativity, the author frequently turns to discuss animal emotion and intelligence. She argues that animal personality is not limited to primate, dogs or cats, but also many other animals including ants, fish and mice.
The book makes its strongest case when advocating a revision of how to think about, and act towards, animals. Ms Gigliotti points out that humans are only one of millions of species on Earth. She suggests that animals are individuals with complicated and creative lives of their own.
1. What did Jane Goodall find during her observation?| A．Chimpanzees liked to play with termites. |
| B．Only humans had the capacity to use tools. |
| C．The animal could use simple tools to get food. |
| D．There was no distinction between humans and animals. |
| A．It is a fiction book. |
| B．It is written by Jane Goodall. |
| C．It is about the life of chimpanzees. |
| D．It offers a new insight into animals. |
| A．Add some background information. |
| B．Summarize the previous paragraphs. |
| C．Provide an example to support ideas. |
| D．Introduce a new topic for discussion. |
| A．Creativity is unique to human beings. |
| B．Animals deserve human’s recognition. |
| C．Humans are the master of the universe. |
| D．Small animals don’t possess personalities. |
There are many scenic spots in the world. Some are the best form of architecture ever built and seen. The Great Wall, Taj Mahal, the Pyramids of Egypt and Petra
Not many people know the only piece of construction that can
Taj Mahal is a beautiful piece of architecture of all times, which was constructed by
One of the best
Petra is another place
8 . When the monthly electricity bill came home, parents always couldn’t believe their eyes, as the amount was much more than needed.
Switch off the lights. Assign one day in a week for a “turn off” practice, for a few hours. Tell the kids the significance of using less electricity and how it impacts the environment.
Use energy-efficient transportation. When parents and their children are out on vacation, have a cycling outing. When the whole family rides bicycles together, it not only serves as a great bonding exercise, but it also teaches the children about eco-friendly transportation options.
Play a game.
| A．Watch an environmental film. |
| B．Talk with children about their opinions. |
| C．Play some games related to environmental protection. |
| D．Lecturing kids about environmental issues won’t help. |
| E．It makes them aware of the environmental effect of cars. |
| F．Light up some candles and play a board game to keep the children occupied. |
| G．So parents should urge their children to take up environment -friendly projects. |
9 . The number of birds coming through your neighborhood is changing, and so is the timing of their migrations (迁徙). Birdwatchers noticing these differences are playing a big part in understanding how climate change and severe weather events are affecting bird population.
John Rowden is director of community conservation at the National Audubon Society, which aims to protect birds and their environment. He said, “Birders have to be much more alert (警觉的) to when birds are coming through than they used to be, since birds may be coming through much earlier or much later.”
Rowden said, “Birdwatchers are increasingly seeing birds in their areas that are usually found elsewhere. And they are seeing fewer of the birds that usually travel through. Although we have seen these birds, it doesn’t mean they’ll always be there. They are declining in numbers because we’re throwing so many things at them, so we need to do what we can to help them.”
“At least 314 species of American birds are expected to lose 50 percent or more of their range by the end of the century. Those species are listed by the Audubon Society as climate-threatened or endangered,” Rowden added.
Environmentalists say there are a few easy steps people can take to help struggling bird populations. These include planting native species, which leads to more native insects for the birds to eat. During spring and fall migration seasons, people can help migrating birds by keeping outdoor lights turned off and covering reflective surfaces like large windows. People also should make indoor plants less visible to passing birds.
Geoff LeBaron, director of the Christmas Bird Count at the National Audubon Society, says he has seen the effects of climate change firsthand. “I’ve been a birder since I was a little kid,” he said. “It’s clear that climate change is affecting and will continue to affect birds on a global scale, and it’s a question of whether or not they can adapt to what the climate is throwing at them.”
1. What do the birdwatchers find?| A．Local birds are increasing in their areas. | B．50 percent of American birds have disappeared. |
| C．Climate change affects animal population greatly. | D．The number and timing of migrating birds are changing. |
| A．To deal with climate change. | B．To do research on bird population. |
| C．To watch the migrating birds in time. | D．To help birds migrate successfully. |
| A．Paragraph 5. | B．Paragraph 4. | C．Paragraph 3. | D．Paragraph 2. |
| A．It’s hopeless. | B．It’s normal. | C．It’s worrying. | D．It’s promising. |
10 . Bird-watching, the observation of live birds in their natural habitat, a popular pastime and scientific sport that developed almost entirely in the 20th century. In the 19th century almost all students of birds used guns and could identify an unfamiliar species only when its dead body was in their hands. Modern bird-watching was made possible largely by the development of equipment like binoculars (双筒望远镜), which enabled people to see and study wild birds, without harming them, better than ever before.
A great increase of interest in wild birds occurred from about the 1880s onward. Bird-watching first became popular in Great Britain, with the United States not far behind. Eventually, it became almost equally popular in Scandinavia, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, and the older countries of the British Commonwealth.
Journals and magazines, such as the Audubon Magazine (United States), British Birds (England), and La Terre et la vie (France), have also contributed to the growth of interest, as have the broadcasting media.
One of the great appeals of bird-watching is that it is an inexpensive activity. Basic equipment includes binoculars, a field book to aid identification, and a notebook for recording time and place of sightings; it is not necessary to travel. Many bird-watchers set up feeding stations to attract birds. The lists of bird observations collected by members of local bird-watching societies are very useful to scientists in determining dispersal (分布), habitat, and migration patterns of the various species.
From about 1930 there was a great increase in fieldwork, including photography, by amateur (业余的) bird-watchers. The wildfowl (野禽) counts of the International Wildfowl Research Bureau are run by a cooperative international effort throughout western Europe.
1. When did bird-watching become a popular pastime and scientific sport?| A．In the 18th century. | B．In the 19th century. |
| C．In the 20th century. | D．In the 21th century. |
| A．Students of birds preferred eating dead birds. |
| B．People used to kill birds on purpose for studying. |
| C．People used to study birds only when they were dead. |
| D．Students of birds would free the birds after studying them. |
| A．Journals and magazines. | B．The broadcasting media. |
| C．Inexpensive equipment. | D．Necessary travel. |
| A．How to protect wild birds. |
| B．Bird-watching, a popular sport. |
| C．The history of the observation of wild birds. |
| D．How to watch birds without harming them. |
