In many countries, schools have long summer holidays, with shorter holidays in between. However, a new report suggests shortening school holidays to stop children forgetting what they have learnt during the long summer break. Instead of three school terms, it says, there should be five eight-week terms. And there should be just four weeks off in the summer, with a two-week break between the other terms.
Sonia Montero has two children at primary school and works full-time. She supports the idea. “The kids,” she says, “have much longer holidays than me and I can’t afford to take several weeks off work, so I need someone to take care of them. But nobody wants the work in the summer months — they all have holidays of their own.”
Not surprisingly, some young people disagree. Student Jason Panos says “It’s a stupid idea. I would hate staying at school in the summer. It’s unfair, too. The people who suggest this had long school holidays when they were young, but now they want to stop us enjoying the summer. The kids in Spain and America have much longer holidays than here, but they don’t forget everything they’ve learnt in a few months.”
Nadia Salib agrees. “Sure,” she says, “the first week at school after the summer is never easy, but you soon get back into it. The real problem round here is that kids get bored after so many weeks out of school, and then some of them start causing trouble. But the answer is to give them something to do, not make everyone stay in school longer.”
1.Why is Sonia in support of shorter school holidays?
A. She doesn’t get any summer holidays in her job.
B. She is worried that her children will forget what they’ve learnt.
C. She can’t afford to pay someone to look after her children.
D. She can’t get anyone to look after her children in summer.
2.What does Jason say about long summer holidays?
A. They can help children forget about school.
B. Schools in other countries don’t have them.
C. These days many older people have them too.
D. They have little influence on children’s education.
3.What does Nadia say about young people on summer holidays?
A. They would like to spend more time at school.
B. Long holidays are very bad for their education.
C. They need something to do to enrich themselves.
D. Long holidays should be shortened to stop them causing trouble.
4.Which of the following statements best explains the text?
A. It has been decided that summer holidays should be shortened.
B. Students are angry that school holidays have been changed.
C. Some people want to change school holidays but not everyone agrees.
D. Teenagers are worried that they will be busy during summer holidays.
What’s your opinion on spicy food? Some people cannot handle even the smallest amount of chili(辣椒) in their dinner while others can’t get enough of it.
Scientists have long been puzzled by why some people love chili and others loathe it. Plenty of research has been done on the subject, dating as far back as the 1970s. Previous results showed that a love of chili is related to childhood experiences, and cultural influences affect our taste buds, too. But the latest study has found that a person’s love of spicy food may be linked to his or her personality more than anything else, CBC News reported.
“We have always assumed that liking drives intake---we eat what we like and we like what we eat. But no one has actually directly bothered to connect these personality traits with intake of chili peppers,” said Professor John Hayes from Pennsylvania State University, who led the study.
But before you look at the study, you should first know that “spicy” is not a taste, unlike sour, sweet, bitter and salty. It is, in fact, a burning sensation that you feel on the surface of your tongue. This got scientists thinking that maybe a love of spicy food is brought about by people’s longing for thrill, something they usually get from watching action movies or riding a roller coaster.
In the study, 97 participants, both male and female, were asked to fill out questionnaires about certain traits of their personality, for example. Whether they like new experiences or tend to avoid risks. They were then given cups of water with capsaicin(辣椒素), the plant chemical that makes chili burn, mixed into them.
By comparing the answers to questionnaires and what participants said they felt about the spicy water. Researchers found that those who most tended to enjoy action movies or take risks were about six times more likely to enjoy the spicy water.
Interestingly, we used to believe that the reason some people can withstand spicy food is that their tongue have become less sensitive to it. However, this latest study has found otherwise. It’s not that it doesn’t burn as badly, it’s that you actually learn to like the burn,” Hayes explained.
1.What’s the meaning of the underlined word “loathe” in the second paragraph?
A. dislike B. fear
C. put up with D. adapt to
2.What did Professor John Hayes and his team discover from their study?
A. what we eat actually helps to develop our personalities.
B. Males are more likely to enjoy spicy food than females.
C. Those trying to avoid risks tend to be less interested in spicy food.
D. People are wrong to treat spicy as a kind of taste rather than a feeling.
3.Why do some people like spicy food according to the recent study?
A. Because their taste buds have become less sensitive.
B. Because they love the burning sensation.
C. Because they want to challenge themselves.
D. Because the more they try spicy food, the less it burns.
4.What’s the main idea of the passage?
A. What he or she likes to eat mainly decides on his or her personality.
B. That a person enjoys spicy food depends largely on the personality.
C. His or her childhood experiences decide on his or her personality.
D. His or her cultural background decides on his or her personality.
Jeremy was born with a twisted body, and terminal illness slowly killing him throughout his young life. Still, his parents had tried to give him as normal a life as possible and had sent him to St. Theresa's Elementary School.
At the age of 12, Jeremy was only in second grade, seemingly unable to learn. His teacher, Doris Miller, often became angry with him. He would often disturb the class by squirming（扭动） in his seat, drooling（流口水） and making grunting（呼噜声）noises. Doris had 18 other youngsters to teach and she didn’t want to waste time on Jeremy.
Spring came, and the children talked excitedly about the coming of Easter. Doris told them of the story of Jesus, and stressed the idea of new life springing forth, she gave each of them a large plastic egg. "Now," she said to them, "I want you to take this home and bring it back tomorrow with something inside that shows new life. Do you understand?" "Yes, Miss Miller!" All the children responded except Jeremy. He just listened, his eyes never left her face. He did not even make his usual noises.
The next morning, the children came to school and placed their eggs in a large basket on Doris' desk. After they completed their Math lesson, it was time to open the eggs.
In the first egg, Doris found a flower. "Oh yes, a flower is certainly a sign of new life," she said. The next egg had a plastic beautiful butterfly in it. Then Doris opened the fourth egg. It was empty! Surely it must be Jeremy's she thought, and he did not understand the instructions.
She put that egg down so she wouldn’t embarrass him. Suddenly Jeremy spoke up and said "Aren't you going to talk about my egg?" Doris replied, "But Jeremy - your egg is empty!" He looked into her eyes and said softly, "Yes, but Jesus' tomb was empty too!"
Doris asked him, "Do you know why the tomb was empty?" "Oh yes!" Jeremy exclaimed. "Jesus was killed and put there. Then His Father raised Him up!"
After class the children excitedly ran out, but Doris cried. The cold inside her melted completely away.
Three months later, Jeremy died. Those who paid their respects at the funeral were surprised to see 19 eggs on top of Jeremy’s casket, all of them empty.
1.What can we learn from the first paragraph?
A. Jeremy’s parents sent him to school.
B. Jeremy was badly ill.
C. Jeremy liked to go to school.
D. Jeremy lived a normal life.
2.From the third paragraph, we can infer that Jeremy _____________.
A. was absent-minded in class
B. slept in class as usual
C. made noises uncontrollably
D. listened to the teacher attentively
3.Which of the following is NOT TRUE according to the text?
A. In one of the eggs is a flower.
B. Jeremy didn’t understand his teacher’s instructions.
C. In one of the eggs is a butterfly.
D. There was nothing in Jeremy’s egg.
4.What’s the best title of the passage?
A. Disabled Jeremy
B. A special class
C. Doris and her students
D. Jeremy’s empty egg
书面表达
假设你是李华，你所在的学校英文报刊向全体高二学生征稿，主题是“环境保护”，你有意参加此次活动。请根据下列要点完成一篇英语作文。
1．低碳(low-carbon)生活对我们的好处。
2．日常生活，我们可以做些什么(如居家，出行，在校或购物等时候)。
注意：
1．词数100左右.
2．可以适当增减细节，以使行文连贯。
短文改错
假定英语课上老师要求同桌之问交换修改作文，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：在错的词下画一横线，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。
Baymax(大白) is a health care robot in film Big Hero 6. He becomes popular with people around the world when the film was first shown. He is high intelligent, but he never harms human beings. He is devoted, sweet but extremely considerate towards all patient.
Baymax is created by Hiro. Baymax is an inflatable white robot, that can detect vital statistics about a person’s health. He is such fat that he looks very cute. His structure is like the appearance of a big marshmallow(棉花糖). Baymax is famous for its warm hug. Equipping with a heating system, his body warms anyone lying on him. When his battery is dying, he is like a drunken man, which makes the audience to laugh.
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。将答案填写在答题卡的相应位置。
We all look up __1.___ heroes: men or women of outstanding courage or talent. They have performed __2.___（hero）acts such as rescuing a person from a burning building or landing on the moon. Instead of talking about “human heroes”, the examples _3.__ (share) here are other types of heroes.
A dog saved ___4.__ owner’s life when she was choking on an apple. The dog suddenly jumped on her back, __5.___(force) the apple out of her windpipe.
Some dolphins and whales saved a fisherman __6.__boat was overturned by awful winds. __7.___ (save) the fisherman, thirty dolphins and a pair of whales appeared and started to push both sides of his lifeboat to the land. He later woke up on the beach and got __8.___（assist）of the local residents.
___9.__ 8-year-old gorilla rescued a boy who fell into the gorilla habitat at a zoo. The boy fell 18 feet onto the cement floor but the gorilla, carrying her own baby on her back, ___10.__ (hold) the boy in her arms, managing to take him to the zoo keepers.
So, let’s open our minds to our animals and mammal fellows. They are heroes, too!
