1 . I was catching a flight from Calcutta to Madras and had arrived at the airport rather early. I had always thought of airports as _________ places until I saw a young couple sitting a few seats away from me, and _________ the woman was crying. I realized that though airports were places of delightful _________, they could also be about difficult departure.

The young man who looked obviously connected to the woman didn’t even try to _________ her. After a certain amount of _________, I walked over with a Smile Stone—a small marble with a smile _________ on it—in my hand and said, “Excuse me, can I give this to you?” And I held out one of the sky-blue Smile Stones. Tears filled _________ eyes. “Why?” she wanted to know. “To make you smile.” She took it quickly and _________ a quick, grateful smile.

Later as my bag was going through the security _________, a uniformed, unsmiling young lady pulled my backpack onto a side table and started unceremoniously (毫不客气地) unzipping (拉开拉链) its various sections and ____________ the contents in the mildly aggressive ____________ that airport security staff sometimes have. When she put her ____________ quickly into the front pocket, she came up with a handful of smile stones—they smiled at her ____________ and her face gently broke into a smile. The whole ____________ of her interaction with my backpack and with me shifted in that second. I pulled out one of the smile stones and said, “This is for you, to ____________ you to keep smiling.”

1.

A．public

B．painful

C．happy

D．social

2.

A．noticed

B．knew

C．learned

D．imagined

3.

A．travel

B．arrival

C．work

D．relaxation

4.

A．accompany

B．consult

C．convince

D．comfort

5.

A．delay

B．effort

C．caution

D．hesitation

6.

A．pinned

B．drawn

C．fastened

D．fixed

7.

A．puzzled

B．excited

C．scared

D．embarrassed

8.

A．flashed

B．forced

C．hid

D．kept

9.

A．challenge

B．protection

C．check

D．service

10.

A．packing up

B．referring to

C．looking through

D．sorting out

11.

A．form

B．manner

C．spirit

D．voice

12.

A．uniform

B．hand

C．head

D．wallet

13.

A．shyly

B．eagerly

C．bravely

D．cheerfully

14.

A．situation

B．climate

C．environment

D．atmosphere

15.

A．urge

B．warn

C．remind

D．persuade

2 . 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。续写的词数应为150左右。

Married for almost 30 years, Paula was living a happy life. One day, Paula was in the bathroom cleaning everything up, from the sink to the floor and the shower. She had a ring that her husband, Michael, bought for their 20th wedding anniversary on her finger. The golden ring with the couple 's names engraved on it was something she would cherish.

As soon as Paula finished washing the bathtub, she moved on to the most unpleasant part—the toilet. Wanting to get it out of the way, she quickly cleaned the inside of the toilet with a brush, and washed the toilet bowl cleaner away.

After finishing, she felt something lost. Paula's heart skipped a beat as soon as she looked down at her ring hand. She was horrified to find that her treasured anniversary gift was gone! Paula couldn't believe that she just let several thousand dollars go down the drain. She searched the rest of the bathroom and even the whole house, hoping that she just dropped it somewhere and forgot about it. She even took the toilet apart and searched inside the pipes with a flashlight, but in vain.

Paula was desperate at the thought that the ring could have been washed away and buried under waste and sewage in a dark pipeline. Even the most experienced sewer worker was unlikely to find it, she thought.

Paula had no idea how she was going to tell her husband about it. Michael worked extra hard for years to save money, so to tell him the incident was unimaginable to her. When Michael came home from work, Paula knew that there was no going back now. Visibly sweaty and nervous, she said that she had bad news to tell him. Michael became worried, but listened. Paula cried and told everything that had happened. Michael was quiet in the whole process, and his face didn't show any anger, which made Paula worried. She thought he was so angry that he couldn't even say anything.

Suddenly, Michael interrupted the silence.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Several days later, Ted, Director of the Public Works Department, visited Paula unexpectedly.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3 . Robots have rolled into retail(零售), from free-moving machines in Giant Foods Stores to autonomous shelf-scanners in Walmart. They free up workers from routine tasks, but that's only the beginning.

The real benefit of retail robots is the opportunity to capture more data about the products on the shelves and customer buying patterns, which can increase efficiency and accuracy in stock management. The key is using retail robots as data-collectors within an internet-of-things (IoT), which creates an intelligent digital ecosystem by combining a complex network of connected devices, objects, and sensors gathering data. With robots in stores, retailers already have the beginnings of IoT solution. For example, Auchan Retail Portugal is launching autonomous shelf-monitoring technology in its supermarkets. As the robots move around the stores, they capture photos of every shelf, which are then put into digital form and turned into analysis about out-of-stock goods.

Such detailed data is incredibly valuable in retail. For traditional retailers, however, merely tracking what consumers purchase does not paint the entire picture. The real competitive advantage for retailers comes in knowing what they couldn't purchase but wanted to. That's where robots come in.

In the not-too-distant future, robots may be able to do more than those. Consider a retail robot scanning grocery store and detecting that supplies of sugar-free peanut butter are decreasing at twice the rate of regular peanut butter. That real-time discovery then activates an automated(自动的) order for more sugar-free peanut butter to be sent to a specific store.

As product cycles speed up, retailers will need to become even faster in identifying micro-trends in consumer behavior to produce, distribute, and supply the goods and services that customers want right now. The key to it may be a robot walking around freely, bringing data from the consumer into the data management system in the cloud.

1. The retail robots are mainly used to________.

A．distribute tasks to workers	B．collect sales information
C．take pictures of customers	D．analyze digital signals

2. How do the retail robots help improve stock managing?

A．By tracking purchasing trends.	B．By monitoring the workers.
C．By changing information into analysis.	D．By creating an intelligent ecosystem.

3. What does the underlined words “paint the entire picture” in paragraph 3 mean?

A．Draw the whole picture.	B．Capture all data needed.
C．Provide all necessary information.	D．Imagine everything might happen.

4. What might be like after using retail robots in the future?

A．The product circles will speed up.	B．Companies will produce more goods.
C．Customers can access data in the cloud.	D．Stock management will become automatic.

4 . Are you learning another language? Maybe you're trying to study it for work, or maybe you're trying to master it just for the _______ of it? Language learning is nothing new, of course, but technology has made it _______ than ever to grasp.

The popularity of language-learning apps in particular has _______ around the world, especially as more people are working or studying at home. They are usually easy and _______ to use because you can _______ them on your smart phone. And apps can offer languages not popular enough to be _______ at evening classes or schools or universities.

Many of us are aiming to learn a foreign language to _______ us to communicate with people around the world. But, maybe _______, it's the British, who are not well-known for their enthusiasm for language learning, who are leading the way in the _______ of these apps.

________ ,for anyone trying their hand at a new language, what ________ them to carry on learning when there isn't a teacher around to manage their ________ ? Colin Watkins from Duolingo said that for UK learners at least, “People are learning because of ________ ,brain training, family, and relationships, along with school and travel. We want a ________ use of our time, and to do something productive on our phones.”Certainly, mastering more than one ________ is a good thing, and it helps us to bring the world a little closer together.

1.

A．luck

B．fun

C．effort

D．game

2.

A．worse

B．faster

C．better

D．easier

3.

A．boomed

B．declined

C．identified

D．crashed

4.

A．natural

B．essential

C．convenient

D．worthwhile

5.

A．connect

B．access

C．recognize

D．remember

6.

A．questioned

B．written

C．directed

D．taught

7.

A．permit

B．engage

C．enable

D．enhance

8.

A．surprisingly

B．fortunately

C．seriously

D．normally

9.

A．strength

B．growth

C．faith

D．recovery

10.

A．Instead

B．Moreover

C．Nevertheless

D．Otherwise

11.

A．commits

B．forces

C．persuades

D．motivates

12.

A．experience

B．opinion

C．progress

D．competence

13.

A．culture

B．pronunciation

C．vocabulary

D．grammar

14.

A．negative

B．positive

C．private

D．actual

15.

A．attitude

B．manner

C．language

D．fashion

5 . Sleep disorders and insufficient sleeping hours have become more distinct in recent years. Previous reports released last month showed that more than 38 percent of adults suffer from insomnia (失眠), with the rate climbing each year.    1    .

A new study surveyed more than 14,000 people across the country on their sleep and exercise habits.     2    While one in five people in the world have signs of a sleep disorder, only one in ten who exercise regularly reports problems of sleeping.

People who own long-sitting lifestyles are more likely to suffer insomnia.     3     A key step toward returning to normal lives should be going outdoors more often and working out more regularly.

    4     Exercising for at least half an hour daily is a factor that can contribute to high-quality sleep at night. The study also found that some exercises such as swimming, boxing and working out more in the morning are some of the key factors that contribute to high-quality sleep at night. People who prefer playing balls and sit-ups report longer periods of slow-wave sleep, or deep sleep.

Long-term sleeping less than seven hours for most adults will increase the risk of sudden death by 26 percent.     5     Therefore, more time spent on sport everyday matters much to your health.

A．Sound sleep at night is also closely linked to enough sport time.

B．The reason is that their inactivity disturbs the biological clock.

C．And the number of people who can't sleep well is increasing sharply.

D．It indicated the obvious link between sleeping hours and the exercise habits.

E．They also warned that more than 80 percent of teenagers do not get enough sleep.

F．The teenagers who have sleeping problems perform worse than those who have good sleep.

G．Enough good sleep at night is also closely linked to stronger immunity (免疫) against disease.

6 . This semester, our university will invite distinguished experts for a series of free musical discussions, performance and lectures, subjects covering historical musicology, music theory, music business and sociology of music. You, from any major, have access to the following four in March and April.

Harmonic Schemata and Hypermeter

● March 19,        1:30 PM - 3:30 PM

●Virtual lecture presented through Zoom

It is a presentation by Michael Haas, a multiple Grammy Award-winning recording producer. This talk is open to the entire university community, but registration is required. .

Travelogue

●March 20,       7:30 PM- 9:00 PM

●CCM's website, YouTube channel or Facebook page

Travelogue is a 90-minute long virtual performance by the CCM Ballet Ensemble. It can let us visit people, communities, myths, legends and memorial moments in the city's history, allowing the audience to travel without moving.

COVID Etudes

●March 26- 28,       5:30 PM-6:30 PM

●CCM's website, YouTube channel or Facebook page

Presented in combination with the concert streams, the COVID Etudes shows three complete sets of compositions by Franz Liszt, Claude Debussy and William Bolcom, performed by CCM students. It aims to cheer up students as well as citizens to battle the pandemic(疫情).

Conversations in Music

●April 3rd-4th,       6:00 PM-8:30 PM

●Held virtually via Zoom

The conference will include pre-recorded video presentations and live interactive sessions held virtually by performers Daniel Goldmark and Jennifer Beavers. It is designed to engage all students in the university.

1. When can you enjoy the city's historical culture online?

A．On March 1 9th.	B．On March 20th.
C．On March 26th.	D．On April 3rd.

2. What is special about COVID Etudes Project?

A．It is open to all students.	B．It is held in a concert hall.
C．It invites three artists to perform.	D．It inspires people to fight Coronavirus.

3. Which allows the audience to communicate with performers?

A．COVID Etudes.	B．Travelogue.
C．Conversations in Music.	D．Harmonic Schemata and Hypermeter.

7 . Dr. Chien-Shiung Wu, also known as “the First Lady of Physics,” fundamentally transformed modern physical theory and changed our accepted view of the structure of the universe.

Born in a small town near Shanghai, Wu attended a school started by her father, who believed in education for girls, despite it being an uncommon belief at that time. She went on to study physics at Nanjing University, where she first pursued mathematics but quickly switched her major to physics, inspired by Marie Curie. And in 1936, she moved to the United States, where she pursued doctor's degree in physics from the University of California, Berkeley in 1940. Then, she taught briefly at Smith College before being hired as Princeton University's first female instructor.

A year later, Dr. Wu accepted a post at Columbia University, where she became involved in the Manhattan Project, designing and building the world's first atomic bombs. She held various positions with the university until her retirement in 1981, but is best known for her experiments on beta decay in 1957. Dr. Wu's groundbreaking experiments proved Drs. Tsung-Dao Lee and Chen Ning Yang's theory right. This resulted in Lee and Yang receiving the 1957 Nobel Prize in Physics for their theory, while Dr. Wu's experimental proof of the theory was overlooked.

In her later life, Dr. Wu devoted much of her time to educational programs, promoting girls in the STEM fields both in the US and in China. Her motivational story made her a hero for many young women scientists, just as her name “Chien-Shiung” implies. She was so great that she was elected as a member of the National Academy of Sciences in 1958, and in 1990, Dr. Wu became the first living scientist with an asteroid named after her. Her book Beta Decay, published in 1965, is still a standard reference for nuclear physicists.

1. What can we infer about Dr. Wu's father?

A．He advocated gender equality.	B．He founded Nanjing University.
C．He forced her to switch her major.	D．He challenged the view of the universe.

2. What made Dr. Wu most famous in the world?

A．Building the world's first atomic bombs.	B．Various positions at Columbia University.
C．Being awarded the Nobel Prize in physics.	D．Contributions in experiments on beta decay.

3. What is the last paragraph mainly about?

A．Dr. Wu's book Beta Decay.	B．Dr. Wu's finding of the asteroid.
C．Dr. Wu's academic and social status.	D．Dr. Wu's name and her motivational story.

4. Which words can best describe Dr. Wu?

A．Enthusiastic and considerate.	B．Pioneering and inspiring.
C．Creative but controversial.	D．Well-educated but uninfluential.

8 . What Are the Roots of Your Self-Esteem?

Self-esteem is a person's subjective assessment of his or her worth to himself or herself. Self- esteem covers various beliefs about oneself (such as 'Tm a failure" and "I'm beautiful") as well as physiological states, including sadness, joy, and shame. The more we believe that we are worthy of happiness and good things in life, the more self-fulfilled we will be. When we don't believe that we are worthy of these things, our ability to enjoy them can suffer.     1    

Healthy self-esteem as an adult can be a gift given in your childhood. It is a blessing that most people overlook. There are so many ways adults with high self-esteem were supported as children that resulted in them having high self-esteem. For instance, they were praised for what they had achieved.

    2    They likely experienced affection and were given enough attention. It is also possible that they excelled in studies or in sports and were admired for it by peers.

    3    As children, many of these people were criticized, yelled at, or abused in one way or another. There is also a high chance that they were given no attention by the adults who were supposed to care for them. In some cases, adults with poor self-esteem were often ridiculed for their shortcomings or bullied by peers.

It is common that these adults also believe that in order to be appreciated they need to be perfect.

    4    There are people who are obsessed with their careers or hobbies because in their mind they need to tie their worthiness to something concrete. Oftentimes these people have to pretend to be something they are not just to get approval.

How you feel about yourself impacts how you live your life. People with high self-esteem tend to have better relationships than those with low self-esteem.     5     So if you struggle to reach out for assistance, it could be rooted in your low self-esteem.

A．There is also a good chance that they were spoken to respectfully.

B．When we start to doubt what's important in life, we tend to do less of it.

C．Since self-esteem is connected to how we perform, it is important to work on it.

D．People with poor self-esteem, on the other hand, often experienced the opposite.

E．This creates an image in their mind that without accomplishment they are worthless.

F．They face failure too, but they understand that failure or success doesn't define them.

G．High self-esteem enables you to ask for help and support from the people around you when you need it.