1 . It is likely that on American TV shows you at times will be attracted by rubber balls on people’s desks.     1     People can squeeze them when feeling stressed out. It’s believed that by concentrating on the act of squeezing, they can let go of the negative energy in their bodies.

Indeed, stress is a big problem for many people.     2     In fact, the rubber stress relief balls that are so popular today in the US are believed to date back to ancient China. Back in the Han Dynasty (206 BC–AD 220), soldiers used walnuts to get rid of stress. By squeezing them during moments of anxiety, soldiers were able to calm themselves down before going into battle. And in the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644), ordinary citizens—not just soldiers—developed the habit of rolling two walnuts, or balls made from iron or stone, around in their hands.     3     And today, we have many gadgets (器具) and toys that are designed to reduce stress in addition to stress relief balls. One example is the popular fidget spinner (指尖陀螺).     4     You have to spin the gadget around. There’s also the fidget cube, which features different “gimmicks (机关)” on each side of the cube. You can click, spin, pull, push and rotate different parts of the cube.

    5     But perhaps we should take them more seriously. “After all, the history of stress balls is a history of modern-day coping (应对),” reporter Nadia Berenstein wrote for Woolly magazine.

A．This helped them relax as well.

B．These gadgets may look like simple toys.

C．It keeps your hand busy with an easy task.

D．These balls are known as “stress relief balls”.

E．Fortunately, we have many ways to deal with it.

F．This was the perfect way to ease away your tension.

G．A focused activity helps take your mind off the problems of your day.

2 . Scientists from the University of Texas at Austin have finally solved the mystery of a huge fossil that has been unlabeled and unidentified sitting at a Chilean museum for almost a decade. The relic, which looks like a deflated football, is the largest known soft-shelled egg from a marine reptile that lived on the earth over 66 million years ago. Measuring more than 11 by 7 inches, it is also the second-largest egg belonging to any known animal, only behind the now-extinct elephant bird.

The rare fossil named “The Thing” was discovered inside a rock formation in Seymour Island off the coast of Antarctica in 2011 by a team of researchers including David Rubilar-Rogers. Over the years, the paleontologist at Chile's National Museum of Natural History has showed the strange fossil to every geologist that came to the museum. However, no one was able to identify “The Thing's” origin until Julia Clarke, a professor at UT-Austin's Jackson School of Geosciences, visited in 2018.

“I showed it to her, and, after a few minutes, Julia told me it could be an egg!” Rubilar-Rogers said.

To confirm Clarke's suspect, Lucas Legendre, a student at UT-Austin who led the study, examined the fossil under a microscope. Sure enough, he found several layers of membrane, confirming that the fossil was indeed a soft-shelled egg, similar to the obvious, quick-hatching eggs laid by some modern-day snakes. “The shell is very thin,” said Clarke.

The fossil's identification led to an even bigger mystery — what animal could have laid an egg this size? After considering several potential parents, the researchers concluded that the egg was laid by an ancient marine reptile like a mosasaur. The fact that the rock formation where the egg had been found had fossil evidence of baby mosasaurs and the offspring of other marine animals further strengthened their theory.

1. What can we know from the first paragraph?

A．"The Thing" is the largest egg laid by animals.

B．"The Thing" has been discovered for a century.

C．"The Thing" looks like a football not having enough gas.

D．“The Thing” belongs to an elephant bird.

2. What is Clarke's guess about "The Thing"?

A．It may be laid by a snake.	B．It could be an egg.
C．It has a very thick shell.	D．It has existed for 66 thousand years.

3. What did Legendre do to test Clarke's guess ?

A．Use a microscope to examine "The Thing".

B．Analyze a lot of data collected by researchers.

C．Do as many as experiments with his colleagues.

D．Compare the fossil with the eggs of various animals,

4. What does "their theory" in the last paragraph refer to?

A．An ancient marine reptile laid the egg.

B．The egg's potential parents are snakes.

C．The way of rock formation affects the egg.

D．The size of the eggs lies in the weight of the animals.

3 . Ancient Chinese folk paintings and many other art styles have been passed down from generation to generation, and are still practiced in different parts of China. Here's a look at four unique Chinese folk-art forms.

Chinese Opera is the traditional form of Chinese drama. According to incomplete statistics, in China's various ethnic regions there are about more than 360 kinds of operas. The most famous ones include Peking Opera, Kunqu Opera, Yueju Opera, Yuju Opera, Sichuan Opera, Fujian Opera, Hebei opera, Huangmei Opera arid so on, in total more than 50, among which Peking Opera is the most popular in China.

Shadow Play (皮影戏) dates back to Western Han Dynasty in Shaanxi more than 1,000 years ago. The moving figures, usually carved out from leather, are operated by folk artists, accompanied by music and singing. It is the world's first dubbed (配音的) motion picture art form, thus considered the “ancestor” of modern film. Today this art form is still popular in northern China.

Paper-cutting is one of the most popular traditional decorative arts in China with a long history. Paper-cutting can be seen across China and it has even developed into different local genres (流派). They are usually used to decorate gates and windows during festivals.

The Kite was invented by Chinese people. According to legend the earliest kite in China was a wooden bird by Mo Di in the Eastern Zhou Dynasty. Later his student Lu Ban improved the tech and used bamboo as material to make a kite. Today, various kite-flying activities can be found in different regions of China. Shandong Weifang Kite Festival is held every year and attracts lots of kite lovers and travelers.

1. Which Chinese Opera is the most popular in China?

A．Peking Opera	B．Kunqu Opera
C．Yueju Opera	D．Yuju Opera

2. Why is Shadow Play considered the ancestor of modern film?

A．It has a history of more than 1,000 years.

B．It was operated by ancient folk artists.

C．It is accompanied by music and dances on the stage.

D．It is the world's first dubbed motion picture art form.

3. What was the earliest kite made of in China?

A．Paper	B．Wood
C．Bamboo	D．Leather

4. What is the main topic of this article?

A．Chinese folk art	B．Chinese folk paintings
C．Chinese operas	D．Chinese folk plays

4 . Why should I teach my children history? That sounds like a stupid question to even ask. But, as I hear different home schooling teachers discuss history, I get the idea that there may be different reasons for teaching history. Let me briefly explain the three good reasons for studying history and two bad reasons for studying history.

The major reason I see for studying history is that we can learn from the past. I am convinced that the world would be a much better place if more people understood the successes and failures of the past and the things that made these successes and failures. However, as the unfortunately true statement goes “the one thing we seem to learn from history is that we don’t seem to learn from history.” Perhaps at least in teaching history, to my children I can do a small part in changing this.

A second major reason for studying history is that it is hard to understand the current political climate in the absence of an understanding of its historical context. We can not even understand why we are and where we are without history, much less (更不必说) try to figure out where we are going or how we should get where we want to be.

I teach my children history, for one more reason. I purchased a set of historical audio (录音机) tapes for our children. My seven-year-old son listened to them over and over. It was my hope that he would become inspired by the accomplishments of people like the Wright brothers to accomplish things by himself. I think that it is good that we celebrate the accomplishments of people like Martin Luther King Jr. In doing so, young people are called on to stand for the principles that he stood for and accomplish what he accomplished. I also think that by studying people like Adolph Hitler, people can learn to stand against the things that he stood for.

1. What’s the meaning of the underlined sentence in Paragraph 2?

A．Many people aren’t clever enough to learn well from the past.

B．Many people fail to make good use of history and make the same mistakes.

C．Many people feel it hard to understand history.

D．Many people have no interest in studying history.

2. In Paragraph 3, the auther shows that history is useful because ________.

A．it makes the current political situation go smoothly.

B．it helps us realize the importance of historical events.

C．it helps us understand why things are the way they are.

D．it helps people accept the present situation where they live.

3. Some positive historical figures are mentioned in the last paragraph to show ________.

A．people can be inspired to do good, while also learning to fight against evil

B．people may also learn from bad historical figures

C．more celebrations should be held to honor their achievements

D．today’s people can also achieve what they achieved

4. What would be talked about in the following paragraph?

A．How to teach history effectively.

B．Some negative reasons for studying history.

C．How to get more people to study history.

D．Some bad historical figures.

5 . To take the apple as a forbidden fruit is the most unlikely story the Christians ever cooked up. For them, the forbidden fruit from Eden is evil (邪恶的). So when Columbus brought the tomato back from South America, a land mistakenly considered to be Eden, everyone jumped to the too obvious conclusion. Wrongly taken as the apple of Eden, the tomato was shut out of the door of Europeans.

What made it particularly terrifying was its similarity to the mandrake, a plant that was thought to have come from Hell (地狱). What earned the plant its awful reputation was its roots which looked like a dried-up human body occupied by evil spirits. Though the tomato and the mandrake were quite different except that both had bright red or yellow fruit, the general population considered them one and the same, too terrible to touch.

Cautious Europeans long ignored the tomato, and until the early 1700s most of the Western people continued to drag their feet. In the 1880s, the daughter of a well-known farmer wrote that the most interesting part of an afternoon tea at her father’s house had been the “introduction of this wonderful new fruit---or is it a vegetable?” As late as the twentieth century, some writers still classed tomatoes with mandrakes as an “evil fruit”.

But in the end tomatoes carried the day. The hero of the tomato was an American named Robert Johnson, and when he was publicly going to eat the tomato in 1820, people journeyed for hundreds of miles to watch him drop dead. “What are you afraid of ?” he shouted. “I’ll show you fools that these things are good to eat!” Then he bit into the tomato. Some people fainted. But he survived and, according to a local story, set up a tomato-canning factory.

1. The tomato was shut out of the door of early Europeans mainly because ________.

A．it was religiously unacceptable	B．it was the apple of Eden
C．it came from a forbidden land	D．it made Christian evil

2. What can we infer from the underlined part in Paragraph 3?

A．The process of ignoring the tomato slowed down.

B．The tomato was still refused in most western countries.

C．There was little progress in the study of the tomato.

D．Most western people continued to get rid of the tomato.

3. What is the main reason for Robert Johnson to eat the tomato publicly?

A．To make himself a hero.

B．To persuade people to buy products from his factory.

C．To speed up the popularity of the tomato.

D．To remove people’s fear of the tomato.

4. What is the main purpose of the passage?

A．To present the change of people’s attitudes to the tomato.

B．To give an explanation to people’s dislike of the tomato.

C．To challenge people’s fixed concepts of the tomato.

D．To show the popularity of the tomato in Europe

7 . Entering a university is an important part of a person’s life. Today, many people go to a university to study and train for a future job in subjects like law, medicine or education.     1    . An important one started in Egypt over one thousand years ago.

The world’s oldest surviving university, AL-Azhar, is in Cario, Egypt. It was first built as a mosque for religion (宗教寺院) in A.D. 972. A few years later, learners and teachers began meeting in the mosque. They read and talked about the subject of religion and law.     2    . Leaders in the city of Cario decided to create a school for higher learning and soon after that, AL-Azhar University was founded.

    3    . For these teachers at AL-Azhar, they needed to think about what courses to teach and how to teach them. The earliest courses were in law and religion. In a course, students read and studied with the teachers, but there was also free discussion. Often, students and teachers had interesting discussions, and there was no “right” answer. In the years that followed, the new university interested scholars from around the world.       4    . At AL-Azhar, people studied the past, but it was also a place for sharing new ideas.

Over a thousand years later, AL-Azhar is still an important university in the world.       5    .Today, many of the world’s most important universities such as Oxford and Harvard still follow the same traditions as they do at AL-Azhar.

A．A university was a new idea at that time

B．They came here to teach and do research

C．There are many reasons to study in Egypt

D．Around the year 988, a new decision was made

E．However, the university is not a modern invention

F．The cost of university education is increasing year by year

G．Its library contains many of the world's oldest and most valuable books

8 . The Maya city of Tikal is famous for its amazing palaces and temples. But something far more ordinary kept Tikal functioning: its water-purifying(净化) system, the earliest known of its kind.

Researchers recently discovered a volcanic mineral that traps microbes(微生物) and heavy metals in Tikal's largest reservoir(水库). Because the material is not found nearby, the finding suggests the presence of a man-made water-purifying device.

The finding denies the long-standing idea that the ancient worlds technological achievements belonged to the Eastern world, like Egypt, and China. The leading scientist of this research, Kenneth Tankersley says, “When talking about purifying water, the Maya were thousands of years ahead.”

Located in the forests of Central America, Tikal, is thought to have been home to more than 45,000 people. They had to struggle against a dry season lasting from November through April. Storing water in reservoirs was a solution, but that water had to be fit to drink, said Kenneth, “Keeping water clean was of great importance.”

A few years ago, the researchers were surprised to find that the largest reservoir, Corriental, had significantly fewer harmful chemicals than the others. “The water quality at Corriental was much higher.”

Somehow the Maya must have been purifying Corriental’s water, the team assumed. “The Maya used gardens as their bathrooms.” Kenneth said, “The water coming into the reservoir would not have been very clean.”

At the bottom of Corriental, scientists found four separate layers(层), each a few centimeters thick, of millimeter-scale “zeolites(沸石)”. This type of volcanic mineral can purify water and is still in widespread use today, Kenneth says, “Just about everything we drink, from bottled water to wine, runs through a zeolite purifying device.”

The Maya wouldn’t have known about the zeolite in rock, but they would have recognized the purifying effects, the researchers suggest. A zeolite-rich rock formation about 30 kilometers northeast of Tikal is the likely source of the material in Corriental reservoir, the team said last month in Scientific Reports. Water at this site “was clear and tasted good.”

1. What did the researchers find?

A．A new material called zeolites.	B．The purifying effects of zeolites.
C．An old water-purifying system.	D．High-quality water in Corriental.

2. How did the Maya purify water?

A．By building the largest reservoir.	B．By using gardens as their bathrooms.
C．By getting rid of heavy metals.	D．By spreading four layers of zeolites.

3. What can we learn from the research?

A．The Maya drank bottled water.	B．The ancient Maya were very bright.
C．The system was created by accident.	D．The zeolites were found in Corriental.

4. According to Kenneth,________.

A．the original water in Corriental was not clean enough

B．water supply in Tikal lasted from November to April

C．all ancient technological achievements belonged to the East

D．the Maya had a good understanding of the zeolite in rocks

9 . A valuable sketch (素描) from World WarⅠhas turned up in a garage sale in Perth. It’s a sketch of soldiers playing soccer with a tin can during an unofficial truce (停战) between German and Allied soldiers on the Western Front in 1914. The artwork was drawn by an unnamed German soldier during the war on the Western Front.

The artwork was given to Private Jack Shelley, a British soldier, when he was defending the town of Frelinghien, France. The sketch is an important historical document, as it provides evidence that the tales of enemy soldiers socializing together are true. But for Private Shelley’s descendants(后代) it has even greater value, since it was his prized possession. Jessie Shelley, Jack’s great-granddaughter, has fond memories of the old man sharing stories about his experiences in the war when he came to live permanently in Australia in 1930. the family lost track of the artwork after Jack’s possessions were moved during the sale of his house when he died in 1984.

‘Great-grandpa had a tobacco tin with a dozen or so buttons from the uniforms of men from both sides. He told us all the details of every one of those buttons. To Great-grandpa they represented real people he had known, some of whom hadn’t come home from the war. He had at least two buttons from German uniforms that he told us were exchanged between the men involved in the Christmas Day Truce.’

On Christmas Day of 1914, the soldiers came out of their trenches(战壕) into no-man’s-land and shared food, drinks and cigarettes. Some even exchanged small gifts. The men even played football games together. Later, this spirit of cooperation continued in unofficial agreements between the sides to stop shooting at mealtimes and even at times when soldiers were working in the open.

This fascinating image of peace and humanity during the war has continued through the years. The sketch is a symbol of the potential for humanity, hope and kindness to exist in even the most violent circumstances.

1. In what situation was the sketch done?

A．It was done in a garage

B．It was done on the front line.

C．It was done during a formal soccer match.

D．It was done by a soldier fighting in Germany.

2. Why is this sketch an important historical document?

A．It explains the specific reason for the war.

B．It shows the war on the Western Front came to an end.

C．It proves enemy soldiers could live in peace sometimes.

D．It is evidence that soldiers could adapt quickly to society.

3. What did Private Shelly say about the buttons in the tobacco tin?

A．They were from German uniforms.

B．Some of them represented his honor.

C．Some of their owners didn’t survive the war.

D．They were collected during Christmas Day in 1914.

4. What impact did the Christmas Day Truce have?

A．It brought about more truces.

B．It started wide information exchanges.

C．It led to no agreement between the sides.

D．It resulted in more celebrations between the sides.

10 . The Origins of Famous Brands

Our lives are full of brand names and trademarked products that we use every day. Although many brand names are simple acronyms(首字母缩略词) or versions of their founders names, some of the companies we trust every day actually have fascinating and surprising back stories.

Starbucks

It seems fitting that the most famous coffee brand in the world would take its name from one of the world’s greatest works of literature. The inspiration for the name of the coffeehouse came from Herman Melville’s Moby Dick. The founders’ original idea was to name the company after the Captain Ahab’s ship, but they eventually decided that Pequot wasn’t a great name for coffee, so they chose Ahab’s first mate, Starbucks, as the name instead.

Google

Google was originally called Backrub, for it searched for links in every corner of the Web. In 1997, when the founders of the company were searching for a new name showing a huge amount of data for their rapidly improving search technology, a friend suggested the word “googol”. When a friend tried to register the new domain (域) name, he misspelled “googol” as “google”.

Nike

Originally founded as a distributor for Japanese running shoes, the company was originally named BRS, or Blue Ribbon Sports. In 1971, BRS introduced its own soccer shoe, a model called Nike, which is also the name for the Greek goddess of victory. In 1978, the company officially renamed itself as Nike, Inc.

The right name is essential to a company’s success, and a great origin story is just as important as a great product. An attractive origin story is one more thing that keeps customers guessing, wondering, and buying its products.

1. What is the name of the Captain Ahab’s ship?

A．Moby Dick.	B．Starbucks.
C．Pequot.	D．Herman Melville.

2. Why did the founders of the Google want to change its name?

A．They mistook their name.

B．They wanted new customers.

C．The company’s original name was too long.

D．The company’s search technology was improving rapidly.

3. Where does the importance of the origin story of one company lie in?

A．It can change the company’s image.

B．It can add myth to the company.

C．It explains the development of the company to customers.

D．It makes customers imagine and purchase its goods.