3 . 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。

The end of the year had finally arrived. The first year of my teaching career would be over in a matter of days, but I hated Awards Day. Although I had a class of outstanding students, I feared one student wouldn’t have an award.

Brent just didn’t have the high averages as some of his classmates. As I sat down and began looking over my grade book, I filled in the blanks on the award sheet for the highest grade in each subject. Then, I proceeded to “A Honor Roll” and on through the list. When I began checking averages for the “AB Honor Roll”, I knew Brent hadn’t made it yet now. But while the first honor roll was determined by the average of all grades of the first three months, the yearly honor roll was the average of the final grade in each class for the whole year. Maybe there was a chance.

Brent’s grades may have been considered average, but he was far from it. He was no quitter. That boy was very persistent. If he failed a spelling test midweek, by Friday, he would pass. If his math grade slipped a bit, he’d work to get it higher. Unlike the other students who would often attempt to “one up” one another, Brent’s only competitor was himself, and his goal for the entire year was the AB Honor Roll.

With each report card, his face had fallen when he had missed that elusive (难以达到的) B average, and although he had never made any honor roll, he had never stopped trying to reach   that goal. Now, he had one last opportunity. I entered his final grades into the computer and averaged. It was a B! I checked again. Yes, it was a B. His grades had gone up and down. When he focused harder on one subject, another slipped a bit. Overall, he had a B average.

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。

Awards Day came!

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While everyone who got an award made me proud, I knew what it took Brent to achieve it.

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5 . 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。

This year marks the 15th anniversary of China’s Double 11 online shopping festival.

The first Double 11 event     1     (initiate) by Alibaba on November 11 in 2009 and has become the largest e-commerce shopping gala in the world today. Every year people usually look forward to this online shopping festival at     2     many merchants will do promotional activities. The     3     (innovation) marketing model has profoundly transformed China’s     4     (consume) market and injected enormous power into the country’s economic development.

This year’s Double 11 shopping festival witnessed     5     increase in consumers’ demand and enthusiasm     6     quality products.

According to Tmall, a leading online retail platform affiliated with Alibaba, 155 brands achieved sales of over 100 million yuan ($13.72 million) as soon as the event     7     (official) started at 8 pm on October 31. 71,900 brands broke the first-day     8     (sale) record of last year in the first hour     9     business volume of 29 livestreammg rooms hit 100 million yuan at the start.

Over the past 15 years, the Double 11 festival has become the most important platform     10     (satisfy) the needs of consumers as well as promote economic development in China.

6 . Kitchen remodeling (改造) is not easy or fun, but sometimes it produces the most surprising benefits.

When having our kitchen remodeled, I emptied all the drawers and cabinets. I was surrounded by boxes filled with dishes, cups and cooking tools, not knowing where many of the things even came from, or even what they were supposed to be used for.     1     I took a break and watched some television — one of the channels that dealt with home and garden issues.

    2     Her advice was to throw away all but the seven basic tools that are really needed for cooking the majority of our meals. The idea made me sit up straight and bring out the boxes of tools.     3     I was shocked by what were still in the boxes. I closed up the boxes of tools and put them in the basement.

As I fit my seven surviving “essential” tools into just one of my beautiful new kitchen drawers, I instantly felt lighter and freer. In the next month, my experiment produced some very surprising and interesting results.     4     Next, it was much more interesting to cook without searching in the drawers to get what I needed! And because it was more interesting to cook, I was cooking more!

Looking back over the whole thing, there is not much I would do differently. Occasionally I stand at the stove and miss a specific tool, but I only have to look at my orderly drawers and do some creative thinking to put the smile back on my face.     5    

A．First, I rarely faced a cooking project that couldn’t be done with what I had saved.

B．I dug out the seven items and set them aside.

C．My kitchen had become quite the storage space.

D．The host talked about our craze for cooking tools.

E．I took the opportunity to lighten lots of my other drawers.

F．First of all, I simply put back what I used on a regular basis.

G．It was the kitchen remodeling that produced the most amazing results ever!

7 . Theoretically some trees could live forever, according to a recent essay that reviews growing evidence on long-lived trees.

Across the board, trees do not die so much as they are killed, write the authors of the review essay. Their killers are outer factors rather than old age alone. That is, there is no evidence that harmful genetic mutations (基因突变) occur over time or that trees lose their ability to continue to grow.

“Trees might live forever, but this does not happen,” says co-author Franco Biondi. “Tree killers include environmental risks such as droughts , wildfires, terrible weather and human behaviors such as woodcutting and fires set to clear forests for hunting or grassland.”

Tree longevity (长寿) interests researchers in part because trees and other plants remove carbon from the atmosphere, and older trees are thought to store more carbon than younger ones. The rings of old trees can also serve as an invaluable record of climate history, with wider rings indicating better years.

David Stahle, a geographer and tree longevity researcher at the University of Arkansas, takes issue with the belief that trees can possibly live forever. “The likelihood, all things being equal, that trees can live forever seems unlikely to me,” he says.

This hypothesis (假设) has become popular in the past 20 years as researchers continue to report having found little genetic evidence of aging in extremely old trees. And this is one of the review essay’s most important points. But evidence of aging could be out there and just not yet found.

1. What does the recent review essay mainly indicate?

A．There are a great variety of tree killers.	B．Trees could keep on surviving forever.
C．More trees die naturally than being killed.	D．Genetic mutations stop trees from growing.

2. Why does tree longevity interest researchers?

A．Because the way trees grow rings is more interesting.

B．Because trees make clearer climate records than other plants.

C．Because older trees contribute more to the environment.

D．Because younger trees are less likely to have genetic mutations.

3. What is Stahle’s attitude to the finding of the review essay?

A．Doubtful.

B．Uninterested.

C．Reserved.

D．Favorable.

4. What does the last paragraph suggest?

A．The assumption has been proved true.	B．Evidence of aging trees might exist.
C．Tree research has grown in the past 20 years.	D．Some key points disappear in the review essay.

8 . A recent study found that temperature can be an important factor in getting a good night’s sleep. Researchers tracked 50 participants aged 65 and older for 18 months. The participants were given wearable sleep monitors and environmental sensors to determine sleep duration, efficiency and restlessness.

Given the results of the study, researchers don’t recommend keeping your bedroom warmer than 25℃. The team found a 5-10 percent drop in sleep efficiency as the nighttime temperature increased to 30℃, with participants being the most turbulent at this level. Sleep efficiency also reduced when temperatures dropped below 20℃, though not as dramatically. So what is the ideal range? Researchers suggest the thermostat (恒温器) be set to between 20℃ and 25℃.

“Sleep tends to come easier and is often deeper and more restful in a cooler environment,” lead researcher Amir Baniassadi wrote in a blog post. “This isn’t unexpected; it’s rooted in our biology. Our body temperature naturally drops at night, which helps to maintain sleep. When our sleep environment is too warm, it can interfere with this temperature drop, disturbing our sleep.”

According to the study, poor sleep can lead to health issues for older adults. These include an inability to think clearly, mood swings, and higher levels of stress. Other problems include an increased chance of getting diabetes and cardiovascular diseases.

The study collected data from nearly 11,000 nights of sleep for a year and a half. But the data only came from 50 seniors, mostly white and female, and all living in the same Boston-area senior living community. This suggested that more studies with more diverse age groups and locations may be helpful for more persuasive conclusions.

1. What was the main purpose of the study for old adults?

A．To explore the risks of poor sleep.

B．To encourage seniors to sleep earlier.

C．To introduce a new wearable sleep monitor.

D．To find a more ideal sleep temperature.

2. What does the underlined word “turbulent” in Paragraph 2 probably mean?

A．Nervous.

B．Energetic.

C．Uneasy.

D．Comfortable.

3. What did the study find?

A．People sleep longer in a cooler environment.

B．Poor sleep tends to affect females’ health more.

C．Sleep environment causes the drop in body temperature.

D．Seniors enjoy a sound sleep in a room at most 25℃.

4. What does the last paragraph mainly talk about?

A．The methods used in the study.	B．The limitations of the study.
C．The valuable data of the study.	D．The further study for researchers.

9 . Karen Sturges was knitting a sweater for her daughter’s future baby. Bad news came — she was diagnosed with cancer.

“What she was most concerned about was finishing the sweater,” said her daughter Annie Gatewood. “She was just distraught when thinking she wasn’t going to be able to finish it.” Sturges worked on the sweater until four days before she died in 2021, with it unfinished. No member of the family knew how to knit.

Then in 2022, Gatewood was matched with a “finisher” Sarah in Portland, — one of the over 1,000 volunteers who complete unfinished arts projects for grieving loved ones through a group called Loose Ends. Finishing knitting the sweater, Sarah handed it off to Gatewood. “I saw her and burst into tears, because she looks like my mom,” said Gatewood. “We know for sure my mom would have been just delighted.”

Kaplan and Simonic started Loose Ends. Both are expert knitters knowing what it is like to have a loved one leave behind an unfinished project. The finisher doesn’t charge any money. The only cost is for mailing.

Opuda signed up as a finisher. She is crocheting (用钩针编织) a blue blanket for someone whose mother passed away. The blanket was one of three the mother was working on throughout her cancer treatments, and although they are not perfect, the children wanted to keep everything their mother made. “People just don’t really know how much time something takes, especially a blanket. Yet even through her illness and all her pain and challenges, she still managed to make so much progress. I didn’t want her kids to lose that,” said Opuda.

“We all experience pain,” said Simonic. “You don’t know what someone’s going through on a day-to-day basis that’s going to make them give up, but I do know these little acts of kindness make people realize there are people out there willing to help.”

1. What can be learned about Loose Ends?

A．It charges receivers lot.	B．It meets patients’ unreal wishes.
C．It consists of generous helpers.	D．It recycles valuable unfinished pieces.

2. What did Opuda want the blanket receivers to know about their mother?

A．She was a well-trained crafter.	B．She suffered a lot from cancer.
C．She hoped to keep the family tradition.	D．She had a great affection for them.

3. What does Simonic intend to tell us?

A．A small act of kindness can mean a lot.	B．Actions speak louder than words.
C．A patient’s work should be respected.	D．Love begins with a little smile.

4. What might be a suitable title for the text?

A．Loose Ends to Help Finish Undone Handicrafts	B．Artworks to Make up for Family Regrets
C．Finishers to Help Restore Family Treasures	D．Remains to Convey Love to the Beloved

10 . Four Future Technologies to Change the World in the Next Decade

Underwater gloves

Researchers have developed “octa gloves” that copy the suction (吸力) properties of an octopus (章鱼). Using a network of microsensors, the suction cups on the gloves can tighten and relax to grab underwater items without breaking them.

This technology could potentially be employed by underwater archaeologists, rescue divers, bridge architects, and other similar professionals.

Health-monitoring “Digital Twins”

A scanner has been developed, which can test hundreds of indicators within an hour. The information about these indicators can be used to create a 3D digital twin of a patient’s body, which can be monitored over time and changed with each new examination.

It is predicted that with this new technology, we will enter a new era of preventative and individualized medicine.

3D-printed bones

One of the most interesting applications of 3D printing technology is the creation of 3D-printed bones. A substance similar to human bones’ can be used to create a 3D model of the required patient-specific implantation (移植) according to the images and be used in an operation.

Due to the use of the special substance, the muscle will change these 3D-printed implants into real bones, allowing for the complete healing of bones’ functions.

Hydrogen planes

A team has put forward a proposal for a mid-sized plane powered by liquid hydrogen. It would be capable of carrying about 279 persons around the globe nonstop.

If this innovation could occur, a nonstop , zero-carbon flight connecting any two places in the world would be possible.

1. Which innovation is inspired by the feature of an animal?

A．Digital Twins.	B．3D-printed bones.
C．Octa gloves.	D．Hydrogen planes.

2. Who might be most interested in 3D-printed bones?

A．A frogman in search of sunken treasures.

B．An athlete in need of ankle replacement.

C．A student majoring in preventative medicine.

D．A navigator promoting environmental protection.

3. How will the four technologies impact us?

A．They will improve our life and work.

B．They will better our environment.

C．They will boost our work efficiency.

D．They will help prolong our life.