Holidays
Holiday News
Vacancies(空位) now and in the school holidays at a country hotel in Devon. This comfortable, friendly home-from-home lies near the beautiful quiet countryside, but just a drive away from the sea. The food is simple but good. Children and pets are welcome. Reduced prices for low season.
The Snowdonia Centre
The Snowdonia Centre for young mountain climbers has a mountain climbing lesson. The beginners’ costs are ￡57 for a week, including food and rooms. Equipment is included except walking shoes, which can be hired at a low cost. You must be in good health and prepared to go through a period of body exercises. This could be the beginning of a lifetime of mountain climbing adventure.
The World Sea Trip of a Lifetime
Our World Sea Trip of 2008 will be unlike any holiday you have ever been on before. Instead of one hotel after another, with all its packing and unpacking, waiting and traveling, you just go to bed in one country and wake up in another. On board the ship, you will be well taken care of. Every meal will be first-class and every cabin like your home. During the trip, you can rest on deck(甲板), enjoy yourself in the games rooms and in the evening dance to our musical team and watch our wonderful play. You will visit all the places most people only dream about — from Acapulco and Hawaii to Tokyo and Hong Kong. For a few thousand pounds, all you’ve ever hoped for can be yours.
1.What can you do if you like to go on holidays with pets?
A. Go to the Snowdonia Centre.
B. Choose the holiday in Devon.
C. Join the World Sea Trip of 2008.
D. Visit Acapulco and Hawaii.
2.In what way is the Snowdonia Centre different from the other two holidays?
A. It provides chances of family gatherings.
B. It provides customers with good food.
C. It offers comfortable rooms.
D. It offers a sports lesson.
3. What is special about the World Sea Trip of 2008?
A. You can sleep on a ship and tour many places.
B. You can have free meals on deck every day.
C. You will have chances to watch and act in a play.
D. You have to do your own packing and unpacking.
It seems that people are gradually losing their smartness as smartphones become increasingly important assistants in their lives. As we rely too much on technology instead of our brains, many people have lost three basic abilities.
The first skill many people have lost is remembering phone numbers. Because phone numbers are stored in smartphone contacts, there's now no need to dial a number or look at it again. This is fine until you need to call someone for help, only to find your phone is not around.
And some people may also have lost their sense of direction because navigation apps can guide people anywhere they want. People get so dependent on them that when they can't use their smartphones, they get lost and anxious.
But the worst lost skills may be social ones, meaning that some people are becoming socially inept(无能的)People often bury themselves in their smartphones. As we're too absent-minded by what's happening in the virtual(虚拟的)world, some of us have lost conversational skills and sometimes can't even distinguish whether a person is happy or not.
Last August, researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, studied 51 students aged 11 and 12 who had over five hours' screen time every day. Their task was to tell the emotions of 48 pictures of faces that were happy, sad, angry or scared.
The children made an average of 14.02 mistakes at the beginning. But after a five-day camp without electronic products, they made only 9.41 mistakes on average.
Luckily, people still have a chance to get these abilities back. You should try to keep your parents' numbers in mind for emergencies. You should also pay more attention to street signs and stores , which will help you to draw a mind map and stop you from getting lost. And the easiest solution to social skill loss is to take a break from electronic products.
1. The underlined sentence in the second paragraph implies that__________.
A. you are unable to contact others without your smart phone
B. others are able to call you anytime and anywhere
C. others are unable to get in touch with you by smartphone
D. you are able to turn to others for help
2.Overusing smartphones, people will probably_______ according to the passage.
A. find their destination without difficulty
B. have no sense of numbers
C. weaken their senses of hearing and sight
D. lose face-to-face communication skills
3.The passage mainly tells us that many people are__________.
A. becoming no smarter than smartphones
B. benefiting from smartphones' intelligence
C. losing some basic abilities because of using samrtphones
D. trying hard to break away from smartphones’ intelligence
4.The writer’s attitude towards electronic products is__________.
A. supportive B. sympathetic
C. critical D. optimistic
You may not pay much attention to your daily elevator ride. Many of us use a lift several times during the day without really thinking about it. But Lee Gray, PhD, of the University of North Carolina, US, has made it his business to examine this overlooked form of public transport. He is known as the “Elevator Guy”.
“The lift becomes this interesting social space where etiquette (礼仪) is sort of odd,” Gray told the BBC. “They are socially very interesting but often very awkward places.”
We walk in and usually turn around to face the door. If someone else comes in, we may have to move. And here, according to Gray, lift users unthinkingly go through a set pattern of movements. He told the BBC what he had observed.
He explained that when you are the only one inside a lift, you can do whatever you want – it’s your own little box.
If there are two of you, you go into different corners, standing diagonally (对角线地) across from each other to create distance.
When a third person enters, you will unconsciously form a triangle. And when there is a fourth person it becomes a square, with someone in every corner. A fifth person is probably going to have to stand in the middle.
New entrants(新进入者) to the lift will need to size up the situation when the doors slide open and then act decisively. Once in, for most people the rule is simple – look down, or look at your phone.
Why are we so awkward in lifts?
“You don’t have enough space,” Professor Babette Renneberg, a clinical psychologist at the Free University of Berlin, told the BBC. “Usually when we meet other people we have about an arm’s length of distance between us. And that’s not possible in most elevators.”
In such a small, enclosed space it becomes very important to act in a way that cannot be construed (理解) as threatening or odd. “The easiest way to do this is to avoid eye contact,” she said.
1.According to Gray, when people enter an elevator, they usually _____.
A. try to keep a distance from other people
B. look around or examine their phone
C. make eye contact with those in the elevator
D. turn around and greet one another
2.Which of the following describes how people usually stand when there are at least two people in an elevator?
3.The underlined phrase “size up” in Paragraph 7 is closest in meaning to _____.
A. ignore B. make the best of
C. put up with D. judge
4.According to the article, people feel awkward in lifts because of _____.
A. someone’s odd behaviors
B. their unfamiliarity with one another
C. the lack of space
D. their eye contact with one another
过生日互赠礼物在中学生中似乎成为一种时尚，甚至有的学生还去饭店搞生日聚会。对此同学们有不同的看法。假设你是王平，请你根据下表提示，给某英语报社的编辑写一封信，并谈谈自己的观点。
赞成 | 为同学们提供交际机会；利于增进同学之间的友谊；学习之余可以放松心情。 |
反对 | 容易造成对时间和金钱的浪费；导致攀比；对青少年学习和成长造成不利影响。 |
你的观点 | ...... |
注意：1. 词数：100左右（信的开头和结尾已经给出，但不计入总词数。）
2. 短文须包括表中的全部内容，可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯。
3. 参考词汇：攀比：keep up with the Joneses
Dear Editor,
I'm a middle school student named Wang Ping. Recently, we often have to buy
presents for our
文中共有10处错误, 每句最多有两处。每处错误仅涉及一个单词的增加，删除或修改。
增加：在缺词处加一个漏字符号（^），并在其下面写出该加的词。
删除：把多余的词用斜线（\）划掉。
修改：在错的词下面划一横线，并在其下面写出修改后的词。
注意：1. 每处错误及修改均仅限一词。
2. 只允许修改10处，多者从第11处起不记分。
Dear Jim,
How is everything going? Today I'd like to tell you something about our school sports meeting. It was holding on Oct.6, when was a fine day. There were over 1,000 students and teachers attend it. Wang Lin, a student from my class won the 100-meter race. He finish the race in 12.6 seconds and broke in the school record. The sports meeting was really success. That was because we were all trying to do my best. Although I was not one of the winner, I was proud of that we had done. Looking forward to receive your letter.
Yours,
Li Ping
Li Daiyu and Lin Qian made 1._____ trip across Canada . First they flew to Vancouver, which is Canada’s most beautiful city with mountains and the Pacific Ocean 2._____ (surround) it. There are many tall trees , some of 3.____ measure over 90 meters
Then they chose to take a train rather than a plane to travel from east to west . During the journey they managed to admire many things . When crossing the Rocky Mountains , they 4.______ (catch ) sight of some mountain goats, a bear and an eagle . They were amazed to find Canada so empty . Such a big country only has a population of5._____ (slight ) over thirty million !
