1 . Tea is currently the world's most popular drink, only after water. However, there was a time when tea was known only to the Chinese.
While we know that tea drink started in China, its true origin remains something of a mystery. Legend has it that about 5,000 years ago, Shennong came across tea when dried leaves blew into a pot of boiling water. Following his discovery, tea was used as medicine, included in meals and later offered as a refreshing drink to officials and noblemen.
It is then not surprising that the beauty of tea was eventually revealed to a wider world.
| A．So, how did tea originate in China? |
| B．But how was tea introduced overseas? |
| C．Tea became the main theme in ancient poems, |
| D．The love of tea inspired many people to write about it, |
| E．Over time, the gift of tea was further delivered to Western Asia and Eastern Africa. |
| F．Eventually, it became a common drink enjoyed and embraced by all Chinese people. |
| G．Tang and Song Dynasties needed strong Tibetan horses, the Tea Horse Road was born. |
Columbus was born in a port city of Italy in 1451. As a teenager, he loved sailing and showed great interest in geography,
Columbus insisted on searching for a direct sea route to the East Indies
Between 1493 and 1504, Columbus found more land later. His major
3 . A fresh and gentle wind on your face, soft sand under your feet and blue waters as far as the eye can see. Is there any other Olympic sport that is played in such pleasant conditions as beach volleyball？
“I’ve gone to a lot of beautiful places, and met a lot of beautiful people. That wouldn’t have happened if I had been playing another sport.” said Randy Stoklos, America’s most famous beach volleyball player.
The sport began as a four-a-side game on beaches in Southern California in the 1920s. The first recorded two-man game took place there in 1930, and the first tournament (锦标赛) was held in Los Angeles 18 years later. The winners were awarded a case of Pepsi. In the 1950s, women started playing and the sport soon spread to Europe and South America. Yet at that time, beach volleyball was more an entertainment show than a sport, with beauty contests included. The Association of Volleyball Professionals was founded in 1983 and beach volleyball developed into a fast, athletic sport. Its world-wide popularity won beach volleyball a place at the 1996 Olympics in Atalanta, where 24 male teams and 16 female teams took part. At present, the US and Brazil are the best in the world at beach volleyball.
The game came to China in the early 1990s and there have been national tournaments since 1994. It became an official event at the Eighth National Games in 1997. China’s You Wenhui and Wang Lu finished ninth in the women’s beach volleyball world championships in Brazil.
1. The passage is mainly about ______.| A．the history of beach volleyball |
| B．how to play beach volleyball |
| C．the importance of beach volleyball |
| D．women’s beach volleyball in China |
| A．Beach volleyball was first played like other Olympic: sports. |
| B．Beach volleyball has always been an entertainment show rather than a sport. |
| C．Beach volleyball began on beaches in Souther California. |
| D．Women started playing beach volleyball in South America in 1945. |
| A．In 1948, | B．In 1996. | C．In 1950. | D．In 1997. |
| A．in 1996, beach volleyball became an official event in China |
| B．China’s beach volleyball team is the best in the world |
| C．China’s beach volleyball players won the first place in Brazil |
| D．beach volleyball came to China in the early 1990s |
The discovery of the Yangshao village site in Sanmenxia, Henan province, in 1921, marked
On October 18, the National Cultural Heritage Administration announced the top 100 archacological discoveries in China in the past 100 years
In addition to the Yangshao site, many names familiar to the general public
“It provides great
“The last 100 years’ archacological research in China has
5 . Maaseik, a city in Belgium, has opened an exhibition of about 200 relics and treasures of the Tang Dynasty(618 AD - 907 AD), showing China’s golden age of ancient civilisation (文明) .
The exhibition, which opened on May 11 and will continue until Oct. 20, is part of the city’s effort to create a centre of Chinese culture. Belgian Princess Mathilde formally announced the beginning of the exhibition, titled: China’s Golden Age: Treasures from the Tang Dynasty”.
The items, including gold plates and silver wares for royal families, Tang Dynasty tri-colour glazed figurines (小雕像) of women and paintings, have recently been on exhibit in the Dutch city of Assen.
All of the exhibited items are from Shaanxi Province, China. Its provincial capital Xi’an was the most populous (人口众多的) city in the world and once the capital of the Tang Dynasty.
The Tang period is generally regarded as a high point in Chinese civilisation-requal to, or better than that of the earlier Han Dynasty(202 BC-220 AD), a golden age of Chinese culture.
Several years ago, said Dirk Verlaak, vice-mayor of Maaseik, his city and Assen teamed up to host history and culture exhibitions of China’s first two imperial dynasties, the Qin (221 BC-207 BC) and the Han. The Chinese relics and treasures attracted 350, 000 visitors in Assen and 190, 000 in Maaseik.
“Westerners don’t know much about China’s ancient civilisation and history, and we hope the new exhibition in Maaseik can attract more visitors,” said Verlaak.
1. Maaseik held the exhibition in order to ________.| A．make money | B．educate people |
| C．attract foreign visitors | D．spread Chinese culture |
| A．Dirk Verlaak is interested in Chinese history |
| B．All the items in the exhibition are from China |
| C．Assen attracted more visitors than Maaseik several years ago |
| D．This is the first time that Maaseik has held such an exhibition |
| A．Doubtful | B．Content | C．Worried | D．Disappointed |
| A．Tang Dynasty Treasures Exhibited in Belgium |
| B．Tang Dynasty Treasures Discovered in Belgium |
| C．Chinese Culture Goes around the World |
| D．Chinese Civilisation Attracts Foreigners |
6 . Most of the people who appear most often and most gloriously in the history books are great conquerors and generals, while the people who really helped civilization forward are often never mentioned. We do not know who first set a broken leg, or launched a seaworthy boat, or calculated the length of the year, but we know all about the killers and destroyers. People think so much of them that on all the highest pillars in the great cities of the world you will find the figure of a conqueror or a general.
It is possible they are, but they are not the most civilized. Animals fight, so do savages; so to be good at fighting is to be good in the way in which an animal or a savage is good, but it is not to be civilized.
This is what the story of mankind has on the whole been like. But we must not expect too much. After all, the race of men has only just started. From the point of view of evolution, human beings are very young indeed, babies of a few months old. Scientists assume that there has been life of some sort on the earth for about twelve hundred million years; but there have been men for only one million years, and there has been civilized men for about eight thousand years.
| A．Even being good at getting others to fight most efficiently is not being civilized. |
| B．Most people believe those who have conquered the most nations are the greatest. |
| C．However, every year conflicts between countries and nations still claim thousands of lives. |
| D．And not only has it won, buts also because it has won, it has been in the right. |
| E．So there has been little time to learn in, but there will be oceans of time in which to learn better. |
| F．People don’t fight and kill each other in the streets, but nations still behave like savages. |
7 . History has some very special and influential qualities about it. It is a
One of the
Take the story of Thomas Edison and how many times he
Or, think about the story of Abraham Lincoln who
These true history stories will make you stop to reconsider
| A．note | B．record | C．chance | D．belief |
| A．mistakes | B．jokes | C．agreements | D．challenges |
| A．events | B．periods | C．problems | D．advantages |
| A．studied | B．reacted | C．competed | D．explored |
| A．Although | B．Because | C．Unless | D．Whether |
| A．clear | B．subsequent | C．special | D．useful |
| A．failed | B．watched | C．escaped | D．travelled |
| A．also | B．often | C．still | D．never |
| A．shocked | B．beaten | C．discouraged | D．controlled |
| A．job | B．dream | C．duty | D．power |
| A．happened | B．prepared | C．pretended | D．managed |
| A．directions | B．improvements | C．permissions | D．difficulties |
| A．passing by | B．giving up | C．setting off | D．calming down |
| A．ability | B．habit | C．goal | D．choice |
| A．introductions | B．conversations | C．judgements | D．impressions |
People have been exploring the secrets of ancient Maya civilisation for
People are searching for the reason why Maya civilisation
The rise and fall of this civilisation not only give us the mysteries of the Maya but also leave us thinking about our own past, present and future.
The trade routes are of great importance. In march, the Suez Canal, one of the world's most important sea trade routes,
In early history, The Silk Road was the most important trade route,
Though the Silk Road was mainly a trading route, it was
10 . Some people call it a traveling museum.Others refer to it as a living or openair museum.Built in Brazil to honor Columbus’ first voyage to the New World, the Nina, a Columbusera replica(复制品) ship, provides visitors with an accurate visual of the size and sailing equipment of Columbus’ favorite ship from over 500 years ago.
I joined the crew of the Nina in Gulf Shores，Alabama，in February 2013.As part of a research project sponsored by my university，my goal was to document my days aboard the ship in a blog.I quickly realized that I gained the most valuable insights when I observed or gave tours to schoolage children.The fieldtrip tour of the Nina is handson learning at its best.In this setting，students could touch the line，pass around a ballast stone(压舱石)，and move the extremely large tiller that controlled the direction of the ships in Columbus’ days.They soon came to understand the labor involved in sailing the ship back in his time.I was pleased to see the students become active participants in their learning process.
The Nina is not the only traveling museum that provides such field trips. A visit to Jamestown Settlement, for example, allows visitors to board three recreations of the ships that brought the first settlers from England to Virginia in the early 1600s. Historical guides, dressed in period costumes, give tours of the Susan Constant, Godspeed, and Discovery. These guides often portray a character that would have lived and worked during that time period.Students touring these ships are encouraged to interact with the guides in order to better understand the daily life in the past.
My experience on the Nina helps testify(证实) my longheld belief that students stay interested, ask better questions, and engage(参与)in higherorder thinking tasks when they are actively engaged in the learning process. The students who boarded the Nina came as passive learners.They left as bold explorers.
1. What occupation is the author engaged in?| A．Shipping. |
| B．Education. |
| C．Ecological tourism. |
| D．Museum administration. |
| A．She is a replica of a ship that Columbus built in Brazil. |
| B．She is always crowded with foreign tourists during holidays. |
| C．She is the boat Columbus sailed in his voyage to the New World. |
| D．She displays what Columbus’ ship was like and how it operated. |
| A．Guidelines for visitors on the ships. |
| B．Life of the first settlers in Jamestown Settlement. |
| C．Duties of the guides in the British museums. |
| D．Introduction to another museum similar to the Nina. |
| A．The students are interested in becoming tour guides. |
| B．The experience has changed the students’ learning attitude. |
| C．The students become brave and are ready to sail the seas on their own. |
| D．The museums are successful in teaching the students survival skills at sea. |
