1 . Our planet is an amazing place, but it needs our help to survive! By taking part in activities like planting trees and saving energy, we can make our world a happier and healthier place.

Plant a tree

Researchers estimate roughly 15 billion trees in the world are cut down each year. So help make up that loss by planting a tree of your own. Trees absorb CO₂ and produce oxygen for us to breathe. They also provide shelter and food for animals. Depending on where trees are planted, their shade can even reduce the need for air-conditioning in hotter months.     1     ?

Turn off the lights

Electricity doesn’t just happen.     2    . Although more and more electricity is made from renewable sources like wind, water and the sun, it still comes at a cost. Wind farms, big dams and solar panels take up a lot of land. But a lot of times electricity comes from fossil fuels, such as coal, oil, or natural gas, that contribute to climate change.     3    .

Limit your water usage

It might seem like water is everywhere. But the fact is that less than one percent of the water on Earth can be used by humans.     4    . Turning off the faucet (水龙头) when you brush your teeth can save up to eight gallons of water a day. To help save even more water, challenge yourself to take a shorter shower but still get clean!

    5    

Start a collection campaign for recyclable items. Talk to your friends and family members about what you’re doing and ask them to help. The more people do, the better off our planet will be!

A．It is produced at a huge cost

B．Offer your time and spread the message

C．Can you share your wonderful ideas with us

D．How many more reasons do we need to go green

E．Get everyone together and reconnect with nature

F．The rest is either too salty or too difficult to access

G．Try to save energy by turning off the lights when you don’t need

2 . The following small European villages will provide you with a chance to experience the beauty of nature and a sense of adventure, from climbing a mountain to taking a dive in the ocean.

Deià, Spain

Hidden between the towering Tramuntana Mountain and the blue Mediterranean, the village’s natural beauty inspires not just writers and painters, but adventure-seekers, too. From this peaceful village, cyclists can ride across this mountainous but bike-friendly region. After working up a sweat, they can go to the best beach, Cala Deià, in Spain. Its waters are perfect for giving the tired muscles a break with a relaxing dive.

Mürren, Switzerland

In Mürren, the fun starts before you arrive. This beautiful Swiss village sits on a Bernese Oberland mountain shelf so high that travelers must arrive by cable car. Like many mountain resort towns these days, Mürren offers year-round activities. Besides downhill skiing in winter, brave climbers can enjoy themselves from June to October, with or without a guide.

San Gimignano, Italy

In the Middle Age, wealthy families of this hill town went on a tower-building competition. At one point there were more than 70 towers, some of which were nearly 200 feet in height. Initially built as defenses in wars with neighboring villages, the towers became symbols of wealth and fame. Today, the village draws both history and wine lovers. Visitors can enjoy the famous white wine, Vernaccia di San Gimignano, at the tasting centers which overlook the surrounding grape hills.

Chipping Campden, England

Arguably the loveliest village in England, Chipping Campden isn’t just a photographer’s dream. It is also known for the annual Olympic Games in summer, a 400-year tradition that copies the Greek Olympics. It includes horseracing, coursing, jumping, backswords and country dancing. But the highlight is the wrestling that thankfully has never caught on anywhere else.

1. What can visitors do in Mürren?

A．Ski and climb mountains.	B．Ride bikes and dive in the sea.
C．Enjoy the Olympic Games.	D．Learn from writers and painters.

2. Which place is most likely to be a wine lover’s top choice?

A．Deià.

B．Mürren.

C．San Gimignano.

D．Chipping Campden.

3. What is the unique game at the Olympic Games?

A．Horseracing.

B．Coursing.

C．Wrestling.

D．Jumping.

3 . There are things we all do, or don’t do, that lead us to waste far more time than we realize in the moment. The biggest time regret, I think, is dwelling on (沉湎于) mistakes and shortcomings.

    1     In a study, researchers asked subjects to spend money during an imaginary trip to the mall. Before “shopping”, some subjects were asked to recall a past financial mistake. They found those subjects were more likely to incur (招致) debt. Dwelling made them feel like a failure and told them there was no need to try, because they already sucked. So, they got further into debt when already feeling like an over spender. Of course, we don’t want to skip over our mistakes or ignore them either.     2    

I also missed too much for fear of my own shortcomings.     3     I wanted to travel after high school, but I went to university close to home instead, because I was too shy to meet new people and was afraid I couldn’t make it in another city. After university, I wanted to be a writer, but I decided to find a more stable, accessible job instead, because that’s easier.     4     I decided to find work I actually enjoyed, travel more and live somewhere else. I made a ton of mistakes along the way, but the bigger mistake was not trying sooner.

    5     So, never beat yourself up over your mistakes and shortcomings. The sooner you learn from them, the sooner you can free up your time and energy to live the life you want.

A．Eventually, I got tired of this.

B．Regret is another big waste of time.

C．I was doing it for the wrong reason that I was afraid to fail.

D．For years, I stayed in a comfortable place, doing things I disliked.

E．The goal is to learn something from them, and then release the failure.

F．When you finally relate it to your own past experiences, it probably becomes easier.

G．Dwelling on mistakes wastes time and, worse still, makes us more likely to repeat mistakes.

4 . Gardeners who use pesticides are contributing to the decline of British songbirds, a study suggests. Scientists have urged people to stop “spraying their gardens with poisons” in order to halt bird decline and adopt instead wildlife-friendly practices. The results of the University of Sussex study, which researchers call the first of its kind, were published in the journal Science of the Total Environment.

The experiment, which surveyed 615 gardens in Britain, found 25% fewer house sparrows when glyphosate (草甘膦) was used regularly. This is an ingredient found in commonly used herbicide (除草剂) brands such as Roundup or Gallup. Slug pellets (鼻涕虫杀虫剂) also seemed to have an impact on bird sightings; in gardens where Slug pellets were used, house sparrow numbers were down by almost 40%.

Prof. Dave Goulson, of the school of life sciences at the University of Sussex, said, “The UK has 22 million gardens, which collectively could be a fantastic refuge for wildlife, but not if they are overly tidy and sprayed with poisons. We just don’t need pesticides in our gardens. Many towns around the world are now pesticide free. We should simply ban the use of these poisons in urban areas, following the example of France.” The Royal Horticultural Society, the UK’s leading gardening charity, said the use of pesticides and herbicides should be avoided if possible and they should only be used, if ever, in small and targeted applications.

The research also found that those who adopted wildlife-friendly practices such as planting native shrubs and flowers, or digging a wildlife pond, saw more birds than those who did not. Cannelle Tassin de Montaigu, a PhD researcher within the school of life sciences and an author of the study, said, “It’s encouraging to find that simple measures, such as planting native shrubs and trees and creating a pond, together with avoiding the use of pesticides, really make a measurable difference to the number of birds you will see in your garden.”

1. What does the underlined word “halt” in paragraph 1 most probably mean?

A．Stop.

B．Attract.

C．Note.

D．Witness.

2. Why are the statistics mentioned in paragraph 2?

A．To reveal the severe influence of pesticides on birds.

B．To compare the effects of two kinds of pesticides.

C．To convince readers of the importance of house sparrows.

D．To help gardeners choose the proper pesticides.

3. What can be inferred from Prof. Dave Goulson’s words?

A．The ideal places for wildlife in the UK are extremely tidy gardens.

B．The gardens in the UK are so tidy that pesticides are not needed.

C．Pesticides should be prohibited from use throughout the UK.

D．Some countries like France have made urban areas pesticide free.

4. What is the last paragraph mainly about?

A．Alternative methods to keep gardens tidy.

B．Assistant ways to increase the number of birds.

C．Gardeners’ attitudes towards the experiment.

D．Other researchers’ interest in the experiment.

5 . Whom should you marry? Where should you live? How should you spend your time? For centuries, people have relied on their gut instincts (直觉) to figure out the answers to these life-changing questions. Now, though, there is a better way. We are living through a data explosion, as vast amounts of information about all aspects of human behavior have become more and more accessible. We can use this big data to help determine the best course to chart.

There has long been overwhelming- and often surprising- evidence that algorithms (算法) can be much better than people at making difficult decisions. Researchers have collected data on various kinds of choices people make, the information they base those choices on, and how things turn out. They have found, for example, that a simple data-driven algorithm would have been better than judges at deciding whether a defendant should stay in jail (监狱) or be released; better than doctors at deciding whether a patient should get a procedure; and better than school principals at deciding which teachers should be promoted.

The power of data analysis has been proved in the sports and business worlds, too. As made famous by the book and movie Moneyball, baseball teams found that algorithms were better than scouts (物色优秀运动员的人) at picking players, and better than managers at picking strategies. In finance, the hedge fund (避险基金) Renaissance Technologies dramatically defeated competitors by seeking out patterns in stock market data and using them to inform its investment strategy. Tech firms in Silicon Valley have found that data from experiments provides better insights into how to design their websites than designers could.

These are the early days of the data revolution in decision-making. I am not claiming that we can completely outsource (外包) our lifestyle choices to algorithms, though we might get to that point in the future. I am claiming instead that we can all dramatically improve our decision-making by consulting evidence mined from thousands or millions of people who faced dilemmas similar to ours. And we can do that now.

1. What makes people better at finding answers to life-changing questions?

A．People’s better gut instincts.	B．Changed human behavior.
C．The modern information era.	D．Various courses accessible.

2. According to paragraph 2, algorithms might NOT defeat people in ______.

A．court rulings	B．job promotions
C．operative estimation	D．teaching practices

3. What can we learn from paragraph 3?

A．The plot of the movie Moneyball is related to successful data analysis.

B．Scouts and managers are not needed in successful baseball teams.

C．The hedge fund Renaissance Technologies had some financial problems.

D．Tech firms in Silicon Valley mainly relied on data to design websites.

4. Which of the following will the author most probably agree with?

A．The modern information era is mature enough to take advantage of.

B．People should outsource all the lifestyle choices to algorithms.

C．With big data people can learn from countless similar examples.

D．Face-to-face consultation will be the major trend in the future.

6 . A new study finds that less than seven percent of the adult population in the US have what health experts consider good cardiometabolic (心脏代谢) health.

Using information on roughly 55,000 people over the age of 20, the results show just 6.8 percent of American adults reached optimal (最佳的) levels of health in 2018. Moreover, the study found American health has been in sharp decline over the last 20 years. In 1999, one in three adults had a healthy weight. By 2018, that number fell to just one in four Americans. At the same time, three in five people were free of diabetes in 1999. By 2018, however, more than six in ten adults had the condition!

“These numbers are striking. It’s deeply problematic that in the United States, fewer than 1 in 15 adults have optimal cardiometabolic health,” says Meghan O’Hearn, one of the researchers from Tufts University. “We need a complete overhaul (革新) of our healthcare system, food system, and living conditions, because this is a crisis for everyone.”

Instead of just looking for signs of disease, the team focused their study on the signs of good, moderate, and poor cardiometabolic health. “Disease is not the only problem,” O’Hearn explains. “We don’t just want to be free of disease. We want to achieve optimal health and well-being.”

Researchers also found large health gaps between US adults of different genders, ages, and education levels. Specifically, the study found Americans with less education were half as likely to be in peak cardiometabolic health.

O’Hearn adds, “Identifying these individuals and addressing their health conditions and lifestyle early is critical to reducing growing healthcare burdens. Its impacts on national healthcare spending and the financial health of the entire economy are enormous. And these conditions are largely preventable. We have the public health and clinical interventions and policies to be able to address these problems.”

1. What percentage of American adults had optimal cardiometabolic health in 2018?

A．Over 7 percent.	B．Just 6.8 percent.
C．Around 33 percent.	D．About 60 percent.

2. What does O’Hearn think of the results of the study?

A．They’re unreal.	B．They’re acceptable.
C．They’re expected.	D．They’re shocking.

3. What is the purpose of the team’s research?

A．To find the big age gap.	B．To help people keep fit.
C．To develop new drugs.	D．To earn lots of profits.

4. What can we infer from O’Hearn’s words in the last paragraph?

A．Joint effort is needed to improve public health.

B．Economic growth affects personal health condition.

C．America saw a slow decrease in healthcare costs.

D．Rich people tend to suffer from health problems.

7 . As we all know, insects can be remarkably agile (灵活的) in flight. This is really hard to build into flying robots, but MIT Assistant Professor Kevin Yufeng Chen has developed an insect-sized drone (无人机) that approaches insects’ agility.

Typically, drones require wide open spaces. “If we look at most drones today, they’re usually quite big,” says Chen. “Most of their applications involve flying outdoors. The question is: Can you create an insect-sized drone that can move around in very crowded and complex spaces?”

According to Chen, he overcame many problems when building the drone. The insect-sized drone requires a fundamentally different construction from a larger one. The large drone is usually powered by a motor, but the motor loses efficiency as you shrink it. So, Chen says, “For an insect-sized drone, you need to look for alternatives.” The principal alternative until now has been employing a small, rigid actuator (执行器) built from new materials. Chen designed a more agile tiny drone using soft actuators instead of hard ones.

Each actuator can beat nearly 500 times per second and weighs just 0.6 gram, approximately the mass of a large bee. It gives the drone insect-like agility. “You can hit it when it’s flying, and it can recover,” says Chen. “It can also turn over in the air.” The drone looks a bit like a tiny cassette tape with wings, though Chen is also working on a new one shaped like a dragonfly.

Chen says his drone can be useful in industry and agriculture. It can perform machinery inspections to ensure safety and function. Its potential applications include completing search-and-rescue missions following a disaster. “All those things can be very difficult for existing large-scale drones,” Chen explains.

1. What can we know about the actuator designed by Chen?

A．It weighs about six grams.

B．It drives the insect-sized drone.

C．It loses efficiency too much.

D．It employs conventional materials.

2. Which word can best describe Chen’s work?

A．Easy.

B．Costly.

C．Fruitless.

D．Challenging.

3. What does the last paragraph mainly tell us about the new drone?

A．Its safety standards.	B．Its flying range.
C．Its possible applications.	D．Its design principle.

4. Which is the most suitable title for the text?

A．An Insect-like Small Drone

B．The Future of Insect-sized Drones

C．How Drones Will Change the Agriculture

D．What Challenge Drone Development Faces

8 . I have always loved the Arthurian legend (传奇), as there is something quite special about King Arthur, and of course Merlin, my favourite character from the stories.

Death of an Empire is the second volume in MK Hume’s “Merlin” series which details Merlin’s life from birth. Merlin travels across the Roman Empire in search of his father, a voyage of discovery to understand just who he was. Eventually Merlin gets involved in the fight against the Hun’s invasion (入侵) of Europe at the Battle of the Catalaunian Plain.

Serving under the General Flavius Aetius, Merlin builds a reputation by saving the lives of thousands of soldiers. When he finally reaches Rome, he saves many more. But a far deadlier conflict between Emperor Valentinian and Senator Petronius Maximus is around the corner and Merlin must use all his strength to carry out his work.

If I had to choose just one word to describe this novel, there would be no other choice than “immersive (身临其境的)”. There has clearly been a serious amount of research carried out by the author. Combined with the descriptive prose and imaginative story, the book really does attract you from almost the very start. The story really does feel like you are a part of it as Merlin travels across the Roman Empire.

The author does a great job of mixing the rich history with established Arthurian legend. The battle scene is handled very effectively. The author employs a very effective form to show the main fight and this not only adds a degree of tension and a good level of excitement but almost makes you feel like you are right there hearing about what happened.

Death of an Empire is a very fine novel, a wonderfully rich tale and a rewarding story.

1. Why does Merlin travel across the Roman Empire?

A．To visit King Arthur.	B．To enjoy a nice view.
C．To get a well-paid job.	D．To find out his origin.

2. What can we learn about the novel?

A．It is a mixture of history and legend.

B．It features difficult language.

C．It speaks highly of an emperor.

D．It is a masterpiece of Merlin.

3. What does the underlined word “this” in paragraph 5 refer to?

A．An effective description.	B．A long-running battle.
C．A wonderful feeling.	D．A well-known legend.

4. What is the text?

A．A news report.	B．A history story.
C．A book review.	D．A science fiction.

9 . Wonderful trip around the Mediterranean

Days 1-2 Barcelona, Spain
Discover the interesting buildings, Catalan culture and Gothic Quarter in Gaudi’s city of Barcelona.
Day 3 Board Regal Princess
Day 4 Relaxing at sea
Day 5 Gibraltar

You’ve got a full day to get to know this British territory (领土), home to many cultures. Choose to ride the cable car (缆车) for great views of the Rock of Gibraltar or discover the beautiful lighthouse.

Day 6 Relaxing at sea
Day 7 Marseille, France

Enjoy a full day discovering all that Provence has to offer — flower fields, fishing boats or Roman ruins (遗迹). City or countryside, you decide.

Day 8 Genoa, Italy

Get to know this busy town by walking through the wonderful streets and piazzas (public squares, especially in an Italian town).

Day 9 Florence / Pisa

Choose to visit wonderful wineries (酒庄) in Tuscany or the famous Leaning Tower of Pisa on your last day in Italy.

Day 10 Disembark (下船) Regal Princess

Go to the airport for your flight home.

Your holiday includes
• Direct flights
• 2 nights 4 star Barcelona hotel incl breakfast
• 7 nights aboard Regal Princess
• Private guide
10 day holiday from
Single room £1,199
Mini double room £1,949
1. What can a visitor do on Day 5?

A．See a lighthouse.	B．Go rock climbing.
C．Enjoy Catalan food.	D．Visit the English countryside.

2. How long can a visitor stay in Italy?

A．One day.

B．Two days.

C．Three days.

D．Eight days.

3. Where is the text probably from?

A．A tour diary.	B．A business report.
C．A travel magazine.	D．A geography textbook.

10 . 阅读下面短文，在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。

Drinking two or more cups of black tea a day     1    (be) associated with lower risk of death from all causes, according to a new study     2    (publish) Monday in Annals of Internal Medicine.

The study looked at nearly 500,000 men and women aged 40 to 69 years old who participated     3     the UK Biobank, which houses in-depth genetic and health information, between 2006 and 2010. The database included information participants reported about     4    (they) own tea drinking habits, such as     5    (frequent) and what they added to their cup.

Some participants didn’t drink black tea a tall, but since the data came from the United Kingdom, there were plenty of people who drank it     6    (regular) and some who drank up to 10 cups a day, said lead study author Maki Inoue-Choi.

The Biobank followed up about 10 years after the     7    (origin) survey, and researchers found that people who drank two or more cups of tea daily in the interim(其间) were less likely     8    (die) from causes such as heart disease.

The research is     9     exciting look into tea drinking habits, but there is still more work     10     needs to be done before recommending dietary changes, said Howard Sesso, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, who was involved in the study.