Paul Frederic Simon is a famous 1. (music), singer and songwriter. He was born on October 13, 1941 in the USA. It’s been more than half a century since he 2. (write)his famous song The Sound of silence with his partner Art Garfunkel. They also adapted 3. old English folk song Scarborough Fair, which is still popular all over the world now.
Recently Paul Simon released 4. (he) latest album Stranger to Stranger and received excellent reviews. And Wristband, which is one of the songs from the album, is often played on college radio.
5., Simon is ready to hang up his guitar and stop 6. (make)music. “Show business doesn’t hold any interest for me,” said the 74-year-old man.
Simon is planning 7. (begin) a month-long tour of Europe on October 17, shortly after his 75th birthday. After that, he’s going to travel for a year, perhaps 8. his wife. “It，s an act of courage to let go,” said Simon. “I am going to see 9. will happen if I let go. Then I’m going to see who I am.”
If he does quit music, Simon will bring a great career to a close, which has spanned sixty years. He has won more than a dozen Grammys and produced a lot of 10. (amaze)songs. Paul Fredric Simon has been named by Time Magazine one of the “100 People Who Shaped the World”.
A Leap（跳跃）to Honor
Leaping on a narrow balance beam(平衡木) is not easy. But Lola Walter, a 13-year-old gymnast, is an expert at it.
To perfect her skills, Lola ________ for four hours a day, five days a week. At the state championships in March, she finished seventh out of 16 girls. That’s especially impressive, ________ she is legally blind, born with a rare condition that causes her eyes to shift (转移) constantly. She often sees double and can’t ________ how far away things are.
When she was little, her mom _________ that even though she couldn’t see _________, she was fearless. So her mom signed her up for gymnastics when she was three. She loved the ______ right away and gymnastics became her favorite.
Though learning gymnastics has been more ______for her than for some of her tournaments(锦标赛), she has never quit(放弃). She doesn’t let her ______ stop her from doing anything that she wants to. She likes the determination(决心) it takes to do the sport. Her biggest ______is the balance beam. Because she has double vision, she often sees two beams. She must use her sense of touch to help her during her routine. Sometimes she even closes her eyes. “You have to ______your mind that it’ll take you where you want to go,” says Lola.
To be a top-level gymnast, one must be brave. The beam is probably the most ______ for anyone because it’s only four inches wide. At the state competition, Lola didn’t ______ the beam. In fact, she got an 8.1 out of 10 — her highest score yet.
Lola doesn’t want to be ______ differently from the other girls on her team. At the competitions, the judges don’t know about her vision ________. She doesn’t tell them, because she doesn’t think they need to know. Her mom is amazed by her ______ attitude.
Lola never thinks about______. She is presently at level 7 while the highest is level 10 in gymnastics. Her______ is to reach level 9. She says she wants to be a gymnastics coach to _________ what she’s learned to other kids when she grew up.
Lola is______of all her hard work and success. She says it has helped her overcome problems in her life outside gymnastics, too. Her ______ for others is “just believe yourself ”.
1.A. runs B. teaches C. trains D. dances
2.A. since B. unless C. after D. though
3.A. tell B. guess C. fancy D. predict
4.A. doubted B. remembered C. imagined D. noticed
5.A. deeply B. well C. ahead D. carefully
6.A. task B. sport C. event D. show
7.A. boring B. enjoyable C. difficult D. unsatisfying
8.A. talent B. quality C. nature D. condition
9.A. doubt B. advantage C. challenge D. program
10.A. examine B. express C. open D. trust
11.A. fearful B. harmful C. unfair D. inconvenient
12.A. fall down B. fall over C. fall off D. fall behind
13.A. greeted B. treated C. served D. paid
14.A. pains B. stresses C. injuries D. problems
15.A. positive B. friendly C. selfless D. devoted
16.A. defending B. quitting C. winning D. bargaining
17.A. standard B. range C. view D. goal
18.A. go through B. pass by C. hand down D. give out
19.A. proud B. tired C. ashamed D. confident
20.A. plan B. advice C. reward D. responsibility
根据短文内容，从短文后的选项中选出能填入空白处的最佳选项。选项中有两项为多余选项。
How to talk to your child about a future career
Thinking about a future career can bring a lot of stress. 1. This cuts up the question into workable issues that you and your child can enjoy dealing with throughout their childhood years. Here’s how:
●In your child’s life, there are times when they are given the opportunity to see and/or discuss a certain career. Schools have Career Day, an aunt or uncle talks about what they do for a living or your child’s youth group goes on a trip to a hospital and talks to the staff there. 2.
●When your child shows interest in a certain career, you should do some research. Then, you can offer your child some information on that job and related jobs. 3. It is a wonderful free online resource.
●Help your child weigh the pros and cons for his or her different career interests. Encourage your child to narrow(缩小) the choices down to five at the most.
●4. This is a good time to begin ordering in college and technical school lists. Use the lists and any other information you have found as an ice breaker for more conversations with your child.
●5. Make this a clear message. Teach your child that part of being independent is knowing when and who to lead on, trust and respect.
A. Do you feel you have open communication with your child?
B. The Occupational Outlook Handbook gives you what schooling is needed.
C. The final decision lies with your child, but you do have the right to have input.
D. Choosing the right career is one of the most important decisions your child will make in life.
E. Figure out the path your child would have to take to obtain the schooling for his career choices.
F. Each of these times is an opportunity for you to ask your child what he thought of those jobs or that field of work.
G. Parents need to learn to help their child conquer this great question by dropping seeds of conversation as time goes by and watch them grow into ideas.
Some people surveyed tasted the sweet, salty, and crunchy together with other tastes of food as they listen to different noises. It shows that louder noises reduced the reported sweetness or saltiness of food while increasing the measure of crunchiness(松脆).
It may go some way to explain why airline food is widely complained about by both the workers and passengers. Andy Woods, a researcher, said, “It’s a general opinion that plane foods aren’t fantastic, but I’m sure airlines do their best, so we wondered if there were other reasons. One thought was that perhaps the background noise may have an effect. NASA gives their space explorers very strong-tasting foods, because for some reason, they can’t taste food that strongly—again, it may have something to do with the background noise.”
In a study, 48 people were fed sweet foods or salty ones, while listening to nothing or noise through earphones. Meanwhile they rated(划分等级) the foods. In noisier settings, foods were rated less salty or sweet than they were when it was silent, but were rated crunchier. “The evidence shows that if the background noise is loud, your attention might be drawn to that, away from the food.” Dr. Woods said.
“We are still at an early stage of progressing and this is a rather small study to really draw definitive(最完整可靠的) conclusions from,” Dr Woods said, “but they suggest that restaurants could well adapt their choice of food for a given environment.”
Also in the group’s findings there is the suggestion that the overall satisfaction with the food is also related to the degree to which people like what they are hearing.
1.How does the food taste when it is eaten in a noisy environment?
A. Less salty but crunchier.B. Sweeter and saltier.
C. Sweeter but less crunchy.D. Less sweet and crunchy.
2.Why does NASA give their space explorers very strong-tasting foods?
A. Foods become less tasty in space.
B. The explorers lose their sense of taste in space.
C. Loud noises in space may weaken the explorers’ sense of taste.
D. The explorers need tastier foods to keep energetic in space.
3.We can infer from what Dr. Woods said in the 4th paragraph that ________.
A. the environment influences the food a restaurant sells
B. the researchers have made an effective conclusion
C. music will weaken people’s sense of taste while eating
D. listening to nothing while eating is the best choice
4. What would be the best title for the text?
A. The best dinner environment
B. How to change plane foods
C. Listening to music while eating
D. Background noise affects the taste of foods
What if you arrived home to find a delicious hot meal waiting for you, prepared by your very own kitchen robot? It might sound like science fiction, but professors at the university of Tokyo have taken the first steps toward making that scenario a reality. The team recently introduced a humanoid kitchen robot that can pour tea and other drinks into cups and serve them to guests. When teatime is over, the robot can also wash the dishes and put them away.
In California, another interesting kitchen robot has been developed, called Readybot. It can pick up objects and either store them in cabinets (橱柜) or put them in the trash. It also carries a separate floor-cleaning robot that can operate by itself. Unlike the Japanese robot, Readybot just looks more like a large box with arms and wheels.
Readybot was created by engineers and designers who established a club called the Readybot Challenge. They believe that in the future millions of robots will be needed in homes to perform ordinary household tasks. Readybot is just the first step in their plan to create a robot that can do jobs not only in kitchens but in other rooms of homes and in offices as well.
Clearly there are technological difficulties to solve before robots can cook a complete there are also many safety concerns (忧虑). Not everyone (especially parents) would be comfortable with the idea of robots in their house, manipulating hot pans and sharp knives. The European Commission recently funded (资助) a project to study these concerns. According to lead researcher Professor Chris Melhuish, “Enabling robots to work safely with humans is a key need for the future development of robotics.”
1.Compared with Readybot, which of the following is true about the Japanese robot?
A. It is more popular. B. It performs more jobs.
C. It moves more quickly. D. It looks more like a person.
2.What can Readybot be used to do?
A. Drive you afround. B. Clean your kitchen.
C. Prepare food for you. D. Work for office workers.
3.What’s the meaning of the underlined word “manipulating” in the last paragraph?
A. Inventing. B. Avoiding.
C. Controlling. D. Making.
Unlike most other holidays,the history of April Fools’ Day.Sometimes called All Fools’ Day,is not totally clear.The only point in time that can be agreed on as the beginning of this tradition was 1582,in France.Before that year,the New Year was celebrated for eight days,beginning on March 25.The celebration reached the highest point on April 1.With the reform of the calendar under Charles 1X,the the Gregorian calendar(公历，阳历）was introduced,and New Year’s Day was moved to January 1.
However,because in those days communications were not as developed as they are today,many people did not receive the news for several years.Some people refused to accept the new calendar and continued to celebrate the New Year on April 1.These backward people were considered”fools” by other people.They were often sent on “fools” errands（徒劳无益的工作）or were made the targets of jokes.
This developed,over time,into a tradition of playing a trick on someone on the first day of April.The tradition eventually spread to England and Scotland in the eighteenth century.It was later introduced to the American colonies of both the Britain and France.April Fools’ Day thus developed into an international fun feast,so to speak,with different nationalities specializing in their own kind of humor at the expense of their friends and families.
1.According to an earlier calendar,New Year’s Day in France was .
A. March25 B. January 1 C. April 1 D. April3
2.Which of the following first had the tradition of celebrating the April Fools’ Day?
A. France. B. England. C. Scotland. D. America.
3.What was people’s attitude towards the new calendar?
A. They accepted it happily. B. They refused it immediately. C. Some recognized it. D. Some laughed at it.
4.The passage mainly tells us .
A. what the French did on April Fools’ Day B. How April Fools’ Day come into being
C. when was the new calendar introduced D. why some people were fooled in France
