1 . 50岁时，她发觉自己失业了，困在家里，只有电脑相伴。（company）
At age 50, she found herself out of work and stuck at home with only her computer to ________ ________ ________.

4 . 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。

I spent most of my teenage years in an old farmhouse in the Durham County countryside. That was more than 30 years ago, but life there dated back to an even earlier era. I spent my summer days doing stoop labor in tobacco fields and my summer evenings shelling (脱粒) peas in the backyard. My fall weekends were often spent cutting wood and splitting logs. Some of my neighbors still had outhouses. We had an indoor antenna (室内天线) which helped us tune into the few television stations we could receive.

Living where we did, we could see three or four other houses from our own, none of them within shouting distance. But we knew our neighbors, some of them elderly, and — mostly because my father wouldn’t let other folks do without when he had enough — we helped them out when they needed it.

Jimmy lived across the street, on the far side of a tobacco field. He was seventy years old and lived alone. He lost his wife two years ago. He had barely supported himself these last couple of years since his body condition was getting even worse. We went to visit him at his home. It was a small wooden cabin with stained windows and a curtain that had been mended countless times. The poor old man would sit in an armchair by the window, holding a faded photo, and with tears in his eyes, recall happy memories of his wife.

One weekend, my father went to check on Jimmy. But a rare heavy snow happened to fall. It was so heavy that he couldn’t get his old truck up Jimmy’s rutted, snow-covered driveway. Nobody could understand what prompted him to slog (跋涉) the 400 yards or so to Jimmy’s house. My brother and I were waiting anxiously at home. After a long time, he came home hastily and told us that Jimmy was sick and out of firewood.

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

My father asked us if we would like to help.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

We knocked on Jimmy’s door, and he greeted us.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

5 . 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。

Taking a gap year before you move into further education is not a new concept, which now focuses on making the most of this break from academic life. Long gone are the days of just hanging out on a beach or    1     (backpack) round the world. While that is still an option, a gap year is now more about gaining skills that     2     (help) you in later life.

Doing something productive is exactly what students     3    (encourage) to do because doing more purposeful things like work experience or charity work helps them acquire skills to use when     4     (compete) for a place at university. It looks good on their CV and eventually makes them more employable.

    5     the benefits of taking a gap year, some students worry they can’t afford it. A student, Tom, told the BBC that to him, a gap year was     6     ‘alien concept’. He said “it would have been far too expensive and it’s not something that I would have been able to rely on my parents or family members for.” But some experts say that it needn’t burn a hole in your pocket; you don’t need to travel far and you can even earn money by doing     7    (pay) work.

For those who do have the funds, a     8     (combine) of working, volunteering and travelling is     9    (doubt) an amazing opportunity. It increases confidence and independence, offers you a chance to learn new crafts, and gives you time to reflect on     10     university is right for you.

6 . Have you ever lost something in a hard-to-reach space, like behind a couch or a cupboard? Wouldn’t it be nice to just be able to squeeze in and out? New innovations in the field of robotics will soon be able to make this nice idea into a reality.

In a study published on Jan 25 in the science journal Matter, engineers from The Chinese University of Hong Kong and Carnegie Mellon University in the US have developed small robots that can quickly change back and forth from liquid to solid states.

According to the website Mashable, the scientists were inspired by sea cucumbers (海参). They are able to change the stiffness (僵硬度) of their body or reduce the potential for physical damage. The robots in the study were made from gallium (镓), a soft metal with a low melting point of 30 ℃. The scientists then used changes in the magnetic field to manipulate the magnetic particles (粒子) inside the gallium material to provide heat. This heat then allowed the robots to change between solid and liquid states as well as to move around.

As the website Tech Xplore pointed out, other similar materials require external heat sources such as heat guns and electrical currents to induce (触发) a change of states; but now, the robots can use a heat source inside itself to change states independently.

During the robots’ experimental trials, the scientists conducted a number of tests. These tests included having the robots melt into liquid and re-form to escape a prison like cage. It can remove a foreign object from and deliver medicinal drugs to a model stomach. The robot is also able to build and repair hard-to-reach circuits. The robot’s ability to switch between states of matter allows for a number of possible uses and advancements in different fields, such as the biomedical and circuit assembly industries.

Still, in the words of senior author Carmel Majidi at Carnegie Mellon University, for now these are all just “proofs of concept” which show the abilities of these new kinds of robots.

1. What can we learn about the small robots?

A．Chinese and British scientists co-produced them.

B．They were made from a newly invented.

C．Sea cucumbers provided inspiration for them material.

D．They can switch between three states of matter.

2. How did scientists change the state of the robots?

A．By controlling the magnetic particles.

B．By employing a heat source.

C．By using electrical currents.

D．By using heat guns.

3. What can be inferred about the robots from Majidi’s words?

A．They have great market potential.

B．It will take more time for them to be widely used.

C．More proof is needed for their abilities.

D．Their abilities are overstated.

4. What is a suitable title for the passage?

A．New innovations of robotics

B．Liquid robots revealed

C．Proofs of concept robots

D．The limitations of the robots

7 . Smart phones are dramatically changing the way we walk down the street. Office workers and young people are walking like pensioners as they check emails and messages.

Scientists have found mobile phones make us walk more slowly, with modest steps, to avoid obstacles. The lead author of the study said the walk is similar to that of someone in their eighties. Researchers found people writing a text message walk more than twice as slowly as those without a phone, finding it harder to stay in a straight line and lift their feet 18 per cent higher above a pavement edge. Their steps are more than a third shorter, as they rely on their restricted vision to avoid falling over while distracted by their phone.

The scientists examined 252 separate participants walking while reading a text message, writing one, speaking on their phone or without their phone at all. Writing a text is the most demanding activity, causing people to look down at their phone 46 per cent more, and 45 per cent longer, than when reading a message. This led people to walk 118 per cent more slowly than when they were without their phone. People walked almost a third more slowly while reading a text and 19 per cent while talking on the phone.

Smart phones were found to prevent people from walking in a straight line, putting them at greater risk of colliding (碰撞) with other people, cars or street lamps. This increased the need to slow down and take more careful steps.

John Timmis said, “The idea for this study came from following someone walking down the street in the afternoon, who was walking as if he had had several drinks. I thought it was a bit early for that, then walked up alongside him and saw that he was on his phone. Simply being on the phone changes the way people walk.”

1. What does the underlined word “modest” mean in the second paragraph?

A．Young.

B．Straight.

C．Small.

D．Low.

2. Which of the following people walk the most slowly?

A．Those not carrying phones.	B．Those writing a text message.
C．Those reading a text message.	D．Those speaking on their phones.

3. What made people with phones take more careful steps?

A．The chance of possible accidents.	B．The need to walk straight.
C．The traffic jams during rush hours.	D．The desire for using their phones.

4. Where did John Timmis get the idea for the research?

A．From many people who liked to walk in the afternoon.

B．From a lot of people who loved to walk along with him.

C．From young people who were walking like the workers.

D．From a person who was walking in the street very strangely.