On a stormy day last August, Tim heard some shouting. Looking out to the sea carefully, he saw a couple of kids in a rowboat were being pulled out to sea.
Two 12-year-old boys, Christian and Jack, rowed out a boat to search a football. Once they’d rowed beyond the calm waters, a beach umbrella tied to the boat caught the wind and pulled the boat into open water. The pair panicked and tried to row back to shore. But they were no match for it and the boat was out of control.
Tim knew it would soon be swallowed by the waves.
“Everything went quiet in my head,” Tim recalls（回忆）. “I’m trying to figure out how to swim to the boys in a straight line.”
Tim took off his clothes and jumped into the water. Every 500 yards or so, he raised his head to judge his progress. “At one point, I considered turning back,” he says. “I wondered if I was putting my life at risk.” After 30 minutes of struggling, he was close enough to yell to the boys, “Take down the umbrella!”
Christian made much effort to take down the umbrella. Then Tim was able to catch up and climb aboard the boat. He took over rowing, but the waves were almost too strong for him.
“Let’s aim for the pier（码头）,” Jack said. Tim turned the boat toward it. Soon afterward, waves crashed over the boat, and it began to sink. “Can you guys swim?” he cried. “A little bit,” the boys said.
Once they were in the water, Tim decided it would be safer and faster for him to pull the boys toward the pier. Christian and Jack were wearing life jackets and floated on their backs. Tim swam toward land as water washed over the boys’ faces.
“Are we almost there?” they asked again and again. “Yes,” Tim told them each time.
After 30 minutes, they reached the pier.
1.Why did the two boys go to the sea?
A. To go boat rowing.
B. To get back their football.
C. To swim in the open water.
D. To test the umbrella as a sail.
2.What does “it” in Paragraph 2 refer to?
A. The beach B. The water
C. The boat D. The wind
3.Why did Tim raise his head regularly?
A. To take in enough fresh air.
B. To consider turning back or not.
C. To check his distance from the boys.
D. To ask the boys to take down the umbrella.
4.How can the two boys finally reach the pier?
A. They were dragged to the pier by Tim.
B. They swam to the pier all by themselves.
C. They were washed to the pier by the waves.
D. They were carried to the pier by Tim on his back.
Technology is making life easier for some dairy farmers. They use robotic systems to milk their cows. Cows are trained to follow a series of paths that lead to milking stations. Only one cow at a time can enter a station.
Once inside，the cow is rewarded with food. As the cow eats，a robotic arm cleans and connects the animal to the milking machine. A few minutes later，milking is complete. The gate is opened，the cow is released and the next cow enters.
The robotic systems are designed to operate 24 hours a day. The cows get to decide when they want to be milked. Cows are milked an average of about three times a day. Some are milked four to six times a day.
The cows wear collars around their necks that identify them to the system. A computer keeps records on their eating and milking. A cow is released from the station if the computer decides it should not be milked.
The automated system also measures the temperature and color of freshly produced milk. Milk is thrown away if it does not pass the tests.
Professor Plaut believes the systems will appeal especially to the next generation of farmers. She means young people who are more interested in technology and less interested in working all the time on the farm. Still，she says the price of robotic milking systems will continue to limit their use.
Doug and Tina Suhr have more than 100 cows on their family farm. Last year it became the fourth farm in southeast Minnesota to get a robotic milking system. A recent story in a local agricultural newspaper said the first robot costs 175,000 dollars. The second costs 150,000 dollars.
Doug told AgriNews that wages that would have been paid for one employee in five years will pay for one robot. He says the increase in milk production reaches a high of more than six kilograms per cow per day.
1.According to Doug，what is the wage of an employee per year?
A．$150,000～$175,000. B．$150,000～$30,000.
C．$30,000～$35,000. D．over $75,000.
2.Besides milking cows，the robotic system also can ________.
A．judge the quality of fresh milk
B．keep fresh milk for two weeks
C．adjust the temperature of milking stations
D．improve the appetite of cows
3.Why is the robotic system not popular now?
A．Because it usually causes the waste of milk.
B．Because it is difficult to learn how to use it.
C．Because young people have no interest in it.
D．Because people can't afford to buy it.
4.From the first paragraph，we can infer ________.
A．cows can be raised by robots in the future
B．robots direct cows into milking stations
C．the robotic system is designed to reduce labor
D．cows are kept clean by robots on some farms
I always experienced guilt when I passed by without giving a coin or two to a beggar.
My conscience was pricked again on a tour of Venice in 2010. I had taken refuge from the crowds in a quiet canal-side café. Outside the café was an old woman kneeling on the ancient cobbled stones, begging. Steady streams of tourists were walking past her. A lone young back-packer stood away from the crowds drinking something, but I noticed he was also observing the woman.
A tourist group glanced at the woman and walked on. Another group of tourists arrived and, again, walked past her. The backpacker watched. Then, as I prepared to leave, I stopped at the sight of the backpacker stepping forward and placing some money in the woman’s cup. He did this rather ostentatiously（炫耀地）, just before the arrival of another tourist group. I watched as the leader of the group stopped and put some money in the cup. Having been shown the way, other tourists followed suit and added more coins to the woman’s cup.
The young backpacker repeated this process in front of the next tour party going past. Once again, the subtle peer （同伴）pressure worked on the tourists, who all added coins to the cup. His work done, the young man walked over to the old beggar woman, patted her shoulder and said, “I hope that helps a bit.”
I don’t know if the woman understood his English or realized what had just happened, but I did. I placed some money in the woman’s cup and continued my travels, light-hearted after witnessing such an act of caring.
1.The backpacker placed some money in the woman’s cup rather ostentatiously because______.
A. he wanted to stop the tourists by doing this
B. he wanted people to know that he was rich and kind
C. he wanted to help the woman by himself
D. he wanted the tourist group to follow him
2.The author went to a quiet canal-side cafe to_______ .
A. avoid meeting the beggar
B. get away from the crowds
C. take a rest
D. watch the woman beggar
3.We can infer from the passage that ________ .
A. tourists can be cheated by beggars
B. people usually have pity on an old beggar
C. tourists are willing to help beggars
D. people can do kind acts due to peer pressure
4.Before the backpacker dropped some money in the woman’s cup, the tourists ______ .
A. all showed pity for the woman
B. didn’t notice the woman
C. walked by without giving any money
D. gave a little money to the woman
书面表达
假如你是李夏。你看到美国留学生Sharon在网上发帖，希望有人能帮助她提高普通话(Mandarin)水平，她可以教英文作为回报。请根据以下提示用英语给她写一封电子邮件。
1．表达给她提供帮助的意愿；
2．说明你能胜任辅导的理由；
注意：
1．词数100词左右；
2．信中不能出现与本人相关的信息；
3．信的开头与结尾已为你拟好,不计入总词数。
Hi, Sharon,
This is Li Xia. I learned from your post that you want to improve your Mandarin.
.
.
.
Yours,
Li Xia
短文改错
假定英语课上老师要求同桌之间交换修改作文,请你修改你同桌写的以下作文。文中共有10处语言错误,每句中最多有两处。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:在错的词下划一横线,并在该词下面写出修改后的词。
注意: 1.每处错误及其修改均仅限一词;
2.只允许修改10处,多者(从第11处起)不计分。
Mr. Smith, our English teacher, works hard. Every day, he spends too much time with his work. With little sleep and hardly any break, so he works from morning till night. Hard work have made him very ill. “He has ruined his healthy. We are worried about him.” That is which other teachers say. Yesterday afternoon, I paid visit to Mr. Smith. I was eager to see him, but outside her room I stopped. I had to calm myself down. Quietly I step into the room. I saw him lying in bed, looking at some of the picture we had taken together. I understood that he missed us just as many as we missed him.
阅读下面材料,在空白处填入适当的内容（1个单词）或括号内单词的正确形式
The Amber Room 1. (put) up in 1709. It used to belong 2. Frederick William I, the first King of Prussia. Peter the Great fell in love with the room on a visit, and in 1716 the King of Prussia sent it to Peter the Great as a gift.
The Amber Room was shipped to Russia in 18 large boxes and put in the Winter Palace in St Petersburg as a part of a European art collection. It was first open in 1746 in the Winter Palace, 3. it was housed till 1755. In 1755, Czarina Elizabeth ordered the room 4. (move) to the Catherine Palace in Pushkin. An Italian 5. (art) Bartolomeo Francesco Rastrelli redesigned the room to fit into its new larger space, 6. (use) extra amber from Berlin.
7. seems hard to believe that boxes of several tons of amber could go missing, and many historians have tried to solve the mystery. Most of them believe 8. the boxes were destroyed in the Second World War. One of the more extreme theories is that Stalin 9. (actual) had a second Amber Room and the Germans stole a fake (赝品).
The history of the new Amber Room, at least, is known for sure. The reconstruction (重建), 10. was based largely on black and white photographs of the original Amber Room, began in 1979 at Tsarskoye Selo and was completed 25 years later.
