It seems that every day we read about at least one of these (earthquakes, floods and hurricanes) somewhere in the world. 1.It's something much smaller and not so wellknown as an earthquake—it's an insect called the locust.
The locust usually does things alone. It lives on its own and eats on its own.2. When the number of locusts increases somewhere and there are lots of plants to eat, the locusts get together in swarms.
3.It is found in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia—in about 60 countries altogether. When desert locusts swarm, they bring problems to onetenth of all the humans in the world.
4.A swarm of desert locusts can be 1,200 km2 in size. And there can be 50 million locusts in each square kilometer. Each locust eats its own weight in plants every day—so a swarm of desert locusts can eat more than 150 million kilos of food in one day. They can also fly very long distances.5.
Farmers fear the desert locust because it destroys the harvest and brings hunger to people all over the world.
Word Bank
hurricane飓风 locust 蝗虫 swarm一大群;云集
A.The numbers are huge and frightening.
B.Perhaps the most dangerous locust is the desert locust.
C.But, sometimes, something changes the way nature works.
D.But every year, somewhere, another kind of disaster causes great damage to plants and people.
E.In 1954, a swarm of locusts from northwest Africa flew thousands of miles to finally land in Great Britain!
Have you ever posted a photo on a social networking site? How would you feel if your photo ended up on an advertisement in a foreign country? This is what happened to the Smiths of Missouri.
The Smiths, an allAmerican family with two children, posted the photo during their holiday. The picture showed the husband and wife, Jeff and Danielle, and their two smiling children. Later Danielle, who lives in St Louis posted the picture on her blog and other social networking sites. Then, she forgot about it until a few months later when she received an email from a friend, Brian.
Brian was traveling around Europe. One day, he noticed a big advertisement with some familiar faces on it: Jeff, Danielle and their two children. Brian took a photo of the ad and emailed it to his friend back in the USA. When Danielle saw that her photo had been used for the ad, she described it as, “Interesting, I suppose. But quite terrible.”
The shop owner Mario Bertuccio was shocked, too. He said he found the image on the Internet. He explained, “As soon as I realized it was a real family, I took it down and said sorry to the Smiths by email. I also told them that if they lived nearer, I would send a bottle of good wine to them.”
In her blog, Danielle wrote, “So, this is the way we pay for indulging in social media, I guess.” She said that next time when she posted a picture online, she was going to put a watermark on it.
1.When did Brian find his friend's photo was used as an ad?
A.When he was taking a trip in Europe.
B.When he was taking photos in Missouri.
C.When he was making advertisements in Europe.
D.When he was buying things in Europe.
2.Which word can best describe Danielle's feeling when she saw the ad of her photo?
A.Interested. B.Excited.
C.Terrible. D.Satisfied.
3.What did the shop owner do when he realized it was a photo of a real family?
A.He bought the photo online.
B.He ran a grocery store in the USA.
C.He sent a bottle of good wine to show his sorry.
D.He took down the ad and emailed the Smiths to say sorry.
4.What does the underlined word “indulging” mean in Chinese?
A.沉溺 B.珍视 C.专注 D.着眼
5.What's the best title for the text?
A.A good place—the Internet B.Be careful to post photos online
C.Posting photos online becomes popular D.Danielle became famous in a strange way
People in Uganda usually invite guests to enjoy bananashake and dishes. When the guests come, they usually give each of them 1. cup of delicious banana juice. After that they have the banana dishes2. spoons for dinner. The most traditional banana dish is matoke.
The delicious matoke is one of the oldest dishes in the world for celebrating important events. A legend says that Kintu served matoke for the earth first. Ugandans think that Kintu was the first man3. the earth.
4. do they cook matoke? First, people peel some bananas and place them in banana leaves.5., they steam them for about one hour. And then mash them. Finally, they add some sauce, fresh fish or meat. Do you want to enjoy this delicious food?
Word Bank
matoke乌干达蕉饭 legend 传说 steam 蒸 mash捣碎
My mom works hard. She takes care of me and my young ________. Every day when she gets home from work, she makes supper for us.
One day, I _______to help my mom. She's always taking care of us and feeding us, so I thought, “It's about time I do_________for her too. I'm nine years old.”
I decided to cook supper for her. I don't know a lot about _______. But it doesn't look that difficult, right? Noodles are easy to cook. All you do is to boil water in a pot, then add the noodles and continue boiling. This was how I saw my mom doing it many_______.
I was really_______. “Today, when Mom comes home, supper will be cooked. We will sit down and eat some delicious noodles,” I said to myself.
After school I couldn't wait to _______ home and started cooking. I boiled the water on the stove and ______ the noodles. I was very careful. I cooked the noodles a long time.
Just before Mom got home, I _____ the stove. The noodles were not like the kind my mom _______ makes. They were very mushy. They were more like a soup.
Mom was_______ when she came home. She put the noodles in the bowls _______ sat with me and ate her noodles. “Mmm! These are very _______ noodles,” she said, “These are the best noodles in the world. You make a very good _______ soup, my son.”
I knew that I had overcooked the noodles. They were terrible. But that's not the point. Mom knew that I was trying to help out. Later, she told ________ that she would give me a cooking lesson if I wanted.
Word Bank
mushy糊状的
1.A.sister B.father C.teacher D.friend
2.A.disagreed B.decided C.disliked D.failed
3.A.anything B.nothing C.something D.everything
4.A.teaching B.swimming C.drawing D.cooking
5.A.times B.minutes C.weeks D.days
6.A.relaxed B.excited C.interested D.worried
7.A.run B.walk C.drive D.ride
8.A.poured B.threw C.added D.watched
9.A.turned on B.turned off C.turned up D.turned down
10.A.hardly B.never C.seldom D.usually
11.A.surprised B.bored C.sorry D.tired
12.A.but B.or C.and D.so
13.A.bad B.sour C.sweet D.good
14.A.potato B.noodle C.vegetable D.fruit
15.A.me B.you C.her D.us
Food expressions are popular with language learners.1. Today we are going to talk about the expressions that use the word “potato”．
The potato is a kind of common food. We have an expression that uses “potato” to describe a person like that: simple and common. If someone is a meatandpotatoes kind of person, he prefers simple and common things, such as potatoes and blue jeans. 2. It can also describe the most important part of an activity. For example, we might say that trying our best is the meatandpotatoes of taking part in an racing competition.
You may know that “hot potato” is a party game. In the game, players form a circle and pass on a small object quickly to each other when music plays. Everyone wants to pass on the object to the next person as fast as possible.3.
However, “hot potato” is more than a game. It can also mean a difficult issue(事情). And if an issue is too difficult to deal with, it might be a good idea to “drop it like a hot potato”.
4. They are unimportant matters. If someone describes an issue as a “small potato”， he means the issue is not worth his time. For example, if the police in a big city do not have enough resources, they probably won't waste much time on “small potatoes”， like bicycle thieves. 5. But please note. We may say “small potatoes” for unimportant matters. But, we do not say “big potatoes” for important ones. English is funny that way!
根据材料内容，从下面五个选项中选出能填入文中空缺处的最佳选项，使文章意思通顺、内容完整。
A.They have tasks that are more important.
B.Besides describing people, there is another way to use meatandpotatoes.
C.The expressions combine two important things of culture: food and language.
D.“Hot potatoes” might be important issues but “small potatoes” are just the opposite.
E.It's because when the music stops, the player holding the object must leave the game.
Tomatoes are one of the world's oldest foods. They were discovered by the Indians of South America thousands of years ago. The first tomatoes were very small. By the time the Europeans brought them to Europe in the 1500s, they were larger. They looked more like the tomatoes we eat today.
When tomatoes first arrived in Italy, they were known as “love apples”. Italians believed that if you ate a tomato, you would easily fall in love.
In the United States, people believed that tomatoes were poisonous, and that you would die immediately after eating one. It wasn't easy to persuade people otherwise.
That was, until 1820, Robert Johnson decided to prove people wrong. He announced that he would publicly eat one bushel of tomatoes—about 50. A huge crowd showed up to watch. They were sure that Mr. Johnson was going to die. Of course, he survived. And the tomato went on to gain a big place in the American diet.
In the beginning, people argued whether a tomato was a fruit or a vegetable. From a purely scientific point of view it is a fruit. A fruit is the ripened ovary of any plant that makes seeds. However, this didn't stop most people from calling it a vegetable. They reasoned that tomatoes are eaten with the main meal—just like vegetables.
They are not eaten as dessert, like other fruits such as apples or bananas. Therefore, they thought the tomato must surely be a vegetable.
Fruit or vegetable, tomatoes have survived for a long time. They are not likely to disappear any time soon. They are just too good to eat.
Word Bank
poisonous有毒的 bushel蒲式耳 survive活下来,幸存 ripened ovary成熟的子房
1.What did Italians think of tomatoes?
A.They thought tomatoes were harmful to humans.
B.They regarded tomatoes as “love apples”.
C.They didn't know tomatoes were fruit or vegetables.
D.They thought tomatoes were fruit.
2.Which paragraph proved tomatoes were safe?
A.Paragraph 2. B.Paragraph 3.
C.Paragraph 4. D.Paragraph 5.
3.Tomatoes were fruit ________.
A.because we looked from a purely scientific opinion
B.because they were discovered thousands of years ago
C.because tomatoes were eaten with the main meal just like vegetables
D.because tomatoes were not eaten as dessert
4.What does the underlined word “ persuade ” mean in Chinese?
A.打败 B.注意 C.放弃 D.劝说
5.What's the best title for the text?
A.The history of tomatoes B.The value of tomatoes
C.The benefits of eating tomatoes D.The difference between fruit and vegetables
