1 . Customers would feel right at home as Chili recently applied Rita the robot to 51 restaurants, in addition to the 10 in which the technology was already being tested. Rita, created by Bear Robotics, can act as a sort of server, guiding guests to their tables, carrying food, even singing “Happy Birthday”.
While this type of automation is quickly expanding (扩展) throughout the restaurant industry due to historic labor shortages (劳动力短缺), Wade Allen, Senior Vice President of Innovation, said Rita’s pilot wasn’t performed because of the “economic situation”.
Chili’s growth shows the restaurant industry is confident in Rita’s early performance, particularly in utilization (使用) and error rates. Allen said Rita produced “great utilization rates”, based on whether employees (员工) were using and communicating with the technology. Even seemingly unuseful functions such as “singing” provide more opportunities and higher utilization rates that are above 30%. On the error side, Allen said Rita functions without a problem over 99% of the time.
However, such technology could be seen as bells and whistles to customers. And, indeed, there is a risk here as most customers have said they prefer to communicate with human workers even as this type of guest-facing technology increases.
Allen said the company hasn’t looked deep to see if Rita translates to labor savings. They also don’t know whether Rita’s presence has affected servers’ tips, stating, “We hope to learn more as Rita expands.”
“My goal is not to take people out of the service industry; people are what make this industry. My goal is to make our employees’jobs easier, and I absolutely think robotics is a service progress. The future is a world where we still have amazing service, but we can simplify and automate some of the difficult and unnecessary tasks,” Allen said, “We know Rita adds value. We’re not toying with this. Our intention is to go broader.”
1. What do we know about Rita the robot according to the passage?| A．It reduces servers’ tips. | B．It shakes up the job market. |
| C．It increases labor costs in restaurants. | D．It is skilled in the restaurant industry. |
| A．It made a big profit for owners. | B．It expanded rapidly worldwide. |
| C．It won the support of employees. | D．It was equipped with unique functions. |
| A．Practical ideas. | B．Strategic plans. |
| C．Attractive but unnecessary things. | D．Small but important tools. |
| A．It will hit the service industry. | B．It will help speed up robotic research. |
| C．It will become more customer-friendly. | D．It will promote the service quality with employees. |
2 . It took a wave of water full of plastic crashing over Babacar Thiaw as he went out to sea for him to decide to act. By the time his surfboard had carried him back to Virage beach on the north shore (岸) of Senegal’s capital, Dakar, Thiaw had a plan to make use of the surfing community he had built there.
Within a year he had turned Copacabana Surf Village, which he founded with his father two decades ago, into a center for young Senegalese eco-surfers, where he organizes beach cleans, environmental courses for children and runs Senegal’s first zero-waste restaurant.
Thiaw grew up in a fishing village near the beach, and the Copacabana Surf Village’s foundations (地基) were laid by his fisher father, who after a day’s work would head to Virage beach to surf on a wooden board. They worked hard to turn the Village into a business by renting out surfboards and later offering lessons with the help of visiting overseas surfers.
It is now a popular surfing location, attracting tourists. It’s also a place where Thiaw teaches young Senegalese how to surf and care for the ocean they spend so much time in.
“When we come to the water to surf, we can see how much plastic is ending up here and it disturbs (使烦恼) us,” says Mohammed Sarr, 17, who Thiaw taught to surf. Sarr says he has become more aware of how he uses and deals with plastic because he and his family, who live near the sea, are directly affected.
Thiaw says there was doubt about the plastic-free initiative (倡议), with diners questioning whether it was healthy for him to be serving water in reusable glass bottles. But he stresses that everyone needs to understand the requirement to change .“ Once the environment is getting worse, you and your family and friends will surely suffer,” he says.
1. What caused Thiaw to decide to make a change?| A．The attack of seawater. | B．The sight of plastic in the sea. |
| C．The dirty Virage beach. | D．The needy surfing community. |
| A．He is very good at running a business. | B．He founded the Village to save the sea. |
| C．He was the first to develop Village beach. | D．He tried hard to get support from the public. |
| A．To show Thiaw’s influence on him. | B．To describe his relationship with Thiaw. |
| C．To share his worries about Thiaw’s efforts. | D．To praise his surfing skills taught by Thiaw. |
| A．They’ll have a healthy diet. | B．They’ll donate to locals in need. |
| C．They’ll do their part for the environment. | D．They’ll contribute to running the restaurant. |
A Move to a New Life
I was shocked when my parents told me we were moving from Baton Rouge, Louisana, to New York. First, I complained about not being able to make new friends and not knowing anything about New York.
My mom said, “You’ll make new friends, and it’s not like you know anything about Baton Rouge anyway.
I protested, “But I don’t want to leave Louisiana. The weather is perfect here!”
My mom shot me a disapproving look and said, “You’ll get used to the weather in New York.”
I remember thinking about running away and joining a circus somewhere, but then I remembered that circus animals smell really bad, and I would miss my parents. So I wandered around the house pick picking up random things, like my baseball and glove, and throwing them into a cardboard box. I felt like a big, heavy rain cloud I was hanging over my head.
Within three days, all the furniture we were taking e taking with us was packed into a moving van (小型货车). Oder things were ready to be sold for nowhere near what we paid for them. Little by little our yard sale decreased until no one even looked at the well-worn coffee table, chewed-up plastic toys, and slightly damaged coffee cups—all of which I had my teeth on at one time or another
The next day was Monday, and we got up early to beat the traffic. I’ll spare you the details of how boring it was to sit in a van and watch each tree as it passed by only to see another tree getting closer until it a so passed by. Halfway there, we stopped at a motel (汽车旅馆) to spend the night. This time, no one could sleep because of the smell coming from the heater in the room. By the time we finally made it to New York, it was the middle of the night, and my head was already drooping (低垂) on to my shoulder.
注意：1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
When I woke up, I didn’t find a smog-filled city as expected.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________As I got used to this new setting, I realized that I didn’t have to be afraid of change
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Gu Kaizhi was an outstanding painter and painting theorist in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, whose painting and paining theories laid a found at in for the development of
Gu was especially gifted at painting figures, beasts and landscapes. He paid considerable
5 . What is stopping you from getting what you want in life? Your friends? Your family? Essentially, the big wall in the middle of the road that keeps you from getting what you want is fear
Taking small steps
This is good for fear that c can seem overwhelming at first. A solution is to take small steps. Steps like first just saying hi to people.
Getting some cone rete, positive motivation
One way to get moving is to replace some of your negative thoughts with positive reasons to get going. Take out a piece of paper and a pen. And write down all the wonderful ways you can come up with to make changes that will improve your life.
Seeing failure and rejection in a new light
What this means is not letting your thoughts and emotions run away to the future or the past. Instead, focus on the present and what needs to be done now. The future will be the now soon enough. And when you’re arriving there it will be much easier to get things done when you have created a minimal amount of stress and fear within your mind.
| A．Building your courage |
| B．Living in the present moment |
| C．Then, how can you overcome the fear? |
| D．How should you identify the fear yourself? |
| E．And then try to get more involved in conversations. |
| F．We may fear failure when starting on a new career path. |
| G．Focus on those positive things to get motivated and inspired |
6 . Poetry and science seem like opposites. Yet, if we look through our history, we’ll see that navigating (理解) science through poetry is not a new concept. In fact, records of scientific poetry can date back to the late 1700s. English physician and naturalist Erasmus Darwin (Charles Darwin’s grandfather) used poetry to celebrate scientific discoveries and inventions in The Botanic Garden, which he published in 1791. His book was well-received in Britain and the United States. In the next few decades, many European and North American poets y followed his lead.
This relationship unfortunately became weak as literature and the natural sciences gradually grew apart by the end of the 19th century. While scientific research expanded rapidly, the topics being studied also became more specialized Experts believe that poetry — a relatively time-consuming art form — simply couldn’t keep up with the demand for more efficient science communication. All of this has led to scientific literature being gas we know it today: articles written in complicated, academic language that is not easily understood by non-scientists.
In recent years, there’ve been calls to explore the intersections between science and the creative arts. For example, in 2014, Dr. Sam Illingworth, a senior lecturer at the University We stem Australia, started a weekly blog called The Poetry of Science where he reads a piece of scientific research and translates the findings into an original piece of poetry. His blog reached tens of thousands of readers, and he has since extended his work to research publications.
Like many other experts, Dr. Illingworth believes that poetry can help facilitate dialogue between scientists and non-scientists, and this view is supported by studies from around the world!
As we continue to make advances in science and technology, perhaps we can also turn to poetry to help us navigate the ever-growing fountain of knowledge reported by scientists each day.
1. Why does the author mention The Botanic Garden?| A．To propose new means to combine poetry and science. |
| B．To explain the historical concepts of poetry and science |
| C．To prove poetry and science have long been integrated. |
| D．To show poetry and science functioned differently in history. |
| A．It is written in poetic language. | B．It is unfriendly to non-scientists |
| C．It becomes a time-consuming art form. | D．It contributes to the scientific research. |
| A．Summarize research findings in a poem. | B．Stress the influence of science on poetry. |
| C．Encourage scientists to share their research. | D．Offer readers a platform to create poems. |
| A．Science gives new life to poetry. | B．Poetry and science change our life. |
| C．Communicating science through poetry. | D．Firing our enthusiasm for science education. |
7 . As Earth’s climate has been warming, the risk of urban flooding g has grown, too. Building ponds to collect extra rainwater can restrain that flooding. But those ponds may actually add to global warming, according to a new study.
Recently, Audrey Goeckner, lead author of the new study, and her team compared the uptake and later release of carbon-based gases at five ponds, which were all in Manatee County Fla.
Along with a lab technician, Goeckner collected samples from samples from the bottoms of the ponds. The samples had mud above sandy material. Older ponds had deeper mud. Back at the lab, the research team measured the carbon-based chemicals in the samples.
In general, older ponds released less of these carbon-based chemicals into the air than younger ponds did. At the same time, “The rate that older ponds we restoring carbon in the sediment (沉积物) increased, “Goeckner says. In contrast, younger ponds seem to send out more carbon than they stored away.
“Sediment layers tend to be deeper in older ponds. They often have less oxygen available to fuel the breakdown of cells and tissues by microbes. This could slow the release of carbon-rich gases. It’s just really important to take into account how these human-made ecosystems are playing apart in the environment,” Goeckner explains. Her team shared its findings in Communication Earth Environment.
This isn’t the first study to show that ponds can release greenhouse gases, notes Trisha Moore, an ecological engineer at Kansas; State University. What sets the new study apart is that it is one of the first “looking at both parts of the system” —how much carbon the ponds store and how much they release. As such, she finds, “It was just a nice example of how we need to look at a system. However, she warns, this study sampled only a small number of ponds in one state. “Future research should look at what happens in ponds where the climate and vegetation are different,” Moore says.
1. What does the underlined word “restrain” in paragraph 11 probably mean?| A．Predict. | B．Explain. | C．Cause | D．Limit. |
| A．How long the ponds could be formed |
| B．How carbon-based gases affected humans. |
| C．How much carbon the ponds stored and sent out |
| D．How human made ecosystems benefited the environment. |
| A．They had deeper mud. | B．They added to global warming. |
| C．They stored less oxygen | D．They could be used to control floods. |
| A．Objective. | B．Disappointed | C．Favourable. | D．Opposite. |
8 . DREAM CAR ART CONTEST 2025
Flying cars, zero-emission hover boards (零排放悬浮滑板), space buggies for moons and planes. Who knows what the future of mobility will look like? So, the Company is inviting children across the China to share their wildest and most imaginative car design
WHO CAN ENTER?Anyone who is under 15 years old, who lives in China, can enter the Dream Car Art Contest.
WHEN CAN I ENTER?The opening date for competition entries is 11th October 2024 and the last date for submission is 31st December 2024. The winners will be announced on 11th February 2025.
HOW CAN I ENTER?Digital Entries
This year, for the first time ever, we will be accepting digital submissions as well as the usual postal entries. This includes computer-generated pictures made using a computer, tablet or phone, as well as scans of artwork created by hand. Designs put together by lots of people won’t be accepted.
Postal Entries
Postal entries can be created using all forms of colored pencils, markers, crayons and water paints. Entries also need to beonA3orA 4paper to be accepted. Designs put together by lots of people won’t be accepted.
WHAT’S THE PRIZE?The top three best artworks will be selected, with the Gold winner receiving an iPad, Silver and Bronze winners receiving a tablet and all winners’ receiving a gift pack. Winners will be announced in February through an online ceremony.
1. What is the closing date for entries?| A．31st December 2024. | B．11th October 2024. |
| C．15th December 2025 | D．11th February 2025. |
| A．Sending in a digital entry. |
| B．Creating an entry on A3 paper. |
| C．Scanning an artwork created by hand. |
| D．Submitting an entry designed by many people. |
| A．An iPad. | B．A gift pack. | C．A sum of money. | D．A tablet. |
In second grade, while other kids played outside, I stayed behind at my desk and created books from construction paper. Using the limited vocabulary of an eight-year-old, I wrote stories and dreamed of one day becoming an author. My second-grade teacher urged my parents to nurture (培养) this desire, but they didn’t take my dream seriously.
Through adulthood, the desire to write remained. The dream never died but there were more certain ways to generate income, so I was controled in different directions. None of the jobs I held afforded me the opportunity to write, and raising two daughters gave me little free time to pursue becoming an author. However, I held onto the dream that had flickered (闪烁) in me as a child.
At the age of fifty-eight, I continued to manage the office of my husband’s construction company, but I was looking for something that would fill the void (空虚感) of our now empty nest. Writing stories and sharing them on social media filled some of that void, and the stories got quite a few likes, but it never crossed my mind as I approached my senior years that writing could be a career for me.
One day, I met a friend from high school who was also my friend on social media. We hadn’t seen each other in several years, so I walked over to greet her. Anticipating that her first words would consist of how long it had been since we’d seen each other, I was shocked at what she spoke out. “You want to write. You need to write.”
She had been reading the stories I shared on social media and had always commented with encouraging words. But no one had ever spoken these words to me. I had never even spoken these words out loud to myself. Those simple words she uttered lit a flame that had only been a flicker for a long time. Deep inside, I knew I still wanted to be an author. I wanted to follow my friend’s advice. I wanted to write. I needed to write.
注意：1.续写词数应为150左右;
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
I went home that day and set out to write a story.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________One day after a year, I received an e-mail from the magazine.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________10 . Imagine suddenly waking up at midnight,
I guess it may have been in part the
After much
However, life
In conclusion, this is what I would like to say —when in trouble, reach out for help, talk to family and friends, your doctor or a counsellor. Take time to take care of yourself, you are worth the
| A．struggling | B．searching | C．begging | D．waiting |
| A．cause | B．result | C．price | D．condition |
| A．anxious | B．practical | C．temporary | D．urgent |
| A．pressure | B．emphasis | C．effect | D．limit |
| A．found | B．displayed | C．occupied | D．enjoyed |
| A．concern | B．surprise | C．puzzle | D．guilt |
| A．suggested | B．recognized | C．claimed | D．guaranteed |
| A．complaint | B．debate | C．preparation | D．resistance |
| A．went | B．worked | C．behaved | D．reacted |
| A．slid | B．threw | C．rolled | D．sank |
| A．ignored | B．ensured | C．robbed | D．disturbed |
| A．left out | B．pointed out | C．reached out | D．passed out |
| A．approaches | B．disciplines | C．assumptions | D．patterns |
| A．permanently | B．potentially | C．smoothly | D．thoroughly |
| A．passion | B．freedom | C．strength | D．effort |
