Nancy and her husband were overnight in Atlanta as they waited to connect with a flight to South Africa. They are going there to meet her ______ and have a nice three-week vacation.
Unluckily, their luggage had already been ______. So they were wondering if they should get on that _______to South Africa. But their friends had put on a lot of efforts ______ their trip in South Africa including ______ for trips they would go on. So, Nancy ended up deciding to go without their ______ and hope for the best.
They were about to ______ in the hotel when the telephone rang. But it was not about their luggage. It was Nancy’s son ______ her that her 87-year-old mother was ______. She was in hospital. Her son said she’d better ______ immediately. But Nancy was ______. They had been planning this trip for a long time but she wanted to ______ her mother too. Nancy wished she could talk to someone that can give her some ______ advice. When her husband went to sleep, she lay awake wrestling with her ______. Suddenly, she heard her mother’s voice, “Go. ______ your trip!” Nancy wondered if she had ______ it. Nancy felt as if her mother were there with her. The voice and message were so ______ and strong.
The next morning, Nancy’s husband asked what she decided. Before she could ______, there came a telephone ring. It was Nancy’s sister. She told Nancy she would take good care of their mother. Meanwhile, their luggage has been eventually ______.
Deeply touched, Nancy felt extremely fortunate living in such a harmonious family. Nancy and her husband headed for South Africa with ______ in time.
1.A. mother B. friends C. son D. relatives
2.A. delivered B. checked C. lost D. weighed
3.A. ship B. coach C. train D. flight
4.A. planning B. changing C. delaying D. canceling
5.A. regulation B. trouble C. reservations D. excitement
6.A. passports B. luggage C. cellphones D. wallet
7.A. sleep B. wander C. instruct D. work
8.A. warning B. declaring C. predicting D. informing
9.A. nervous B. sick C. exhausted D. delighted
10.A. return B. respond C. escape D. mourn
11.A. calm B. torn C. relaxed D. encouraged
12.A. take in B. look for C. attend to D. leave alone
13.A. unreasonable B. selfish C. dishonest D. practical
14.A. decision B. imagination C. disease D. promise
15.A. Forget B. Abandon C. Record D. Enjoy
16.A. rewarded B. claimed C. imagined D. expressed
17.A. clear B. strange C. illegal D. rare
18.A. repeat B. reply C. regret D. request
19.A. signed B. wrapped C. opened D. found
20.A. disappointment B. embarrassment C. relief D. anxiety
A local high school teacher got a call from a mother protesting the “C” her son received on a paper. “The mother argued every point in the paper,” recalled the teacher, soon realizing why the mother was extremely disappointed about the grade. It could be judged by her loud voice.
1.. 95% of teachers agreed that involving parents in their children’s education is a significance. Only 12% described their experience working with parents as “satisfying” in the survey. 77% of new teachers said too many parents treat schools and teachers as sort of enemies.
At an age when competition is fierce, WeChat and e-mail speed up the information flow and all kinds of private opinions and public quarrels slip into the parent-teacher meeting. The relation between parents and teachers becomes really tough. 2..
Everyone believes the parent-teacher meeting should be a pleasant, polite and cooperative dialogue where parents and teachers build partnership. 3. , especially head teachers.
When a teacher asks parents to be partners, they need more cooperation. 4.. They mean what happens at home matters much more. There are four main areas where parents should take part in: home discussion, home supervision (监督), school communication, and school participation. 5.. Smart parents may have more discussion with their children at home.
A. But most teachers feel worried and panicked
B. The mother overcame the screen time problem on her own
C. That is why students lose control of themselves when using WeChat
D. The International Education conducted a professional survey in 2018
E. Among them home discussion is the most related to school achievement
F. The teachers don’t mean the parents should be staying in the schoolrooms
G. And it makes it harder for both sides to breathe deeply and look at the goals they share
For centuries, people have tried to invent a perfect universal written language and Chinese has actually been considered before. Francis Bacon used to assume that a language like Chinese and its writing system would have qualified. Chinese doesn’t use an alphabet based on sounds, but symbols indicating meaning.
Chinese character has its special relationship between the sign and what it symbolized. Each character represents a word or a concept and you pile them up together like Lego bricks, children’s plastic building toys, to build more words. Some of them also look like what they represent. For example, a mountain may look just like a mountain with a peak in the middle. And fire resembles some blazing (燃烧的) logs. When you put them together and you get volcano. Isn’t that amazing?
While some of them look like what they represent, most of them really don’t. In fact, some of them are incredibly complicated. For instance, “Biang” is the name of a kind of noodle, which has 57 strokes (笔画). It is very hard for people to pronounce or recognize this character, let alone writing it out correctly. Chinese is so complicated that since the 1950s, a simplified system of characters has been used in mainland China. But there is a problem. Chinese characters often represent whole works, and there are a lot of them. In the Chinese dictionary there are around sixty four thousand characters.
So Chinese characters might not become a universal writing system soon. The trouble is not just inventing one, but getting people to use it. It wouldn’t be easy for the whole world to agree on the same set of meanings. After all, language needs a cultural context. You cannot really just use a universal language as you like.
1.What can we learn from Francis Bacon?
A. He believed that Chinese writing system was perfect.
B. He managed to invent a universal written language.
C. He recommended Chinese to use alphabets based on sounds.
D. He thought written Chinese language could be used globally.
2.How does the author explain the characteristic of Chinese character?
A. By analyzing structures of toys. B. By comparing concepts.
C. By giving examples. D. By collecting data.
3.Why do Chinese people use a simplified system of Chinese characters?
A. It is hard to pronounce Chinese characters.
B. It is difficult to recognize or write Chinese characters.
C. It is fashionable to use simplified Chinese characters.
D. It is complicated to look up Chinese characters in the dictionaries.
4.What is the passage mainly about?
A. How to write simplified Chinese characters.
B. Why people need a universal written language.
C. Chinese is a perfect universal written language.
D. Whether Chinese are suitable to be a world language.
Plants on Earth have grown for hundreds of millions of years, yet President Donald Trump’s pick to lead his new climate team insists that they need more carbon dioxide (CO2) to boom.
Princeton physicist and carbon dioxide-advocate William Happer has been selected to head the brand new Presidential Committee on Climate Security. The atomic scientist, who achieved recognition for his work on atomic collisions (原子碰撞), not climate science, declared that the planet’s atmosphere needs significantly more CO2, which is reported to speed up climate change. Happer said plants use CO2 to live and more CO2 is actually a benefit to the Earth. He also stressed that Earth is experiencing a “CO2 starvation”, and concludes that “If plants could vote, they would vote for coal.”
Earth and plant scientists, however, find Happer’s insistence that the plant kingdom would benefit from increased CO2 wrong-headed and it lacks evidence. For example, Earth’s CO2 levels have increased sharply in the last century, and are now at their highest levels in at least 800,000 years—though other measurements show CO2 levels are higher than they’ve been in 15 million years. “The idea that increased CO2 is universally beneficial ‘to plants’ is very misguided,” Jill Anderson, an evolutionary ecologist specializing in plant populations, said in an interview. Data shows the evolution of global average temperature and CO2 concentration from 1850 to 2019. Though 2019 is a bit cooler than recent years, it still is one of the warmest years ever and lies close to the trend line of global warming.
Both independent academic organizations and government agencies around different parts of the world concluded more CO2 will bring many negative impacts to plant environments. And they added that “If someone is going to claim it is good, it’s necessary for them to show evidence.”
1.Why does Happer think plants need more CO2?
A. Plants vote for more CO2. B. CO2 speeds up climate change.
C. Plants need more CO2 to live. D. CO2 is actually a benefit to the Earth.
2.What can be inferred from paragraph 3?
A. 2019 is a bit warmer than recent years.
B. CO2 levels must be the highest in history.
C. The plant kingdom must benefit from increased CO2.
D. There are adequate evidence to support Happer’s insistence.
3.What does the underlined word “it” in the last paragraph probably refer to?
A. More CO2. B. The plant.
C. The world. D. The US government.
4.The author’s attitude in writing this passage can be described as ________.
A. critical B. objective
C. positive D. negative
It’s not common that a grandmother aged 89 is crowned Queen of Icebergs in north America, but when it does happen it’s quite the sight.
On a recent trip to Iceland, Judith Streng became that grandma after her son attempted to take a photograph of her sitting on an ice structure that looks like a throne (宝座) at Diamond Beach in Jokul. Shortly after Streng sat down to pose, the piece of ice broke off and floated into the water.
“I thought it was safe. One girl had been on it and then two girls at the same time, and it was very secure with them. When I got on it, it started to shake and a wave was coming in. A very large wave came in and made the throne kind of shake, and I could tell that I was slipping off,” Streng told ABC News.
Streng’s story went hot after her 24-year-old granddaughter Catherine tweeted a text message exchange she had with her father about the incident. “My grandmother almost got lost at sea in Iceland today!”
Catherine, who teaches English in Seoul, South Korea, explained via Twitter that her father described the scene vividly. He has a PhD in English, and described the event in the following words, “She climbed to the throne after a wave had pulled back and left it briefly exposed on the beach. Then a wave washed in and removed the ice throne, rocking it from side to side. When the wave left, it lifted the throne and carried her out into the sea with the tide.”
Luckily for the Streng family, Randy, a licensed boat captain from Florida with knowledge of water rescue strategies witnessed the whole thing, and was able to save the day.
1.Where was the grandma when her son was taking a picture for her?
A. On a crown. B. In an iceboat.
C. At a throne beach. D. On an iceberg.
2.How did Catherine spread this accident?
A. By drawing a vivid picture.
B. By exchanging tweeter account.
C. By talking with her father in Seoul.
D. By posting the text message exchange with her father.
3.Who saved the grandmother?
A. Catherine. B. Streng.
C. Randy. D. Judith.
4.What can be a suitable title for the text?
A. Taking Pictures Must be Very Dangerous
B. A Grandma Floated out to the Sea on an Iceberg
C. An Optimistic Family Who Love Iceberg
D. The Licensed Boat Captain Went Hot Slowly
Do you want to read some new books? Here are a few of Bill Gates’ favorites in 2018.
21 Lessons for the 21st Century
Author: Yuval Noah Harari
Price: $20.2
The author, who is a really strong thinker, makes it clear that big problems are not solvable by a single country. He finds that human mind wants to worry about the dilemmas we face today. The book is a better framework for all the problems that people are worrying about.
Meditation and Mindfulness
Author: Andy Puddicombe
Price: $18.5
When you meditate, they sometimes say you should empty your mind, but that really never happens. So the author’s analogy (比喻) is ideas that are like clouds coming across your head. You should just push away gently. If the book can get people doing 10 minutes daily meditation, that is fantastic for relaxing your mind.
Army of None
Author: Paul Scharre
Price: $46.1
It is about what armies are going to look like in the future. Should a drone (无人机) be able to go out and find enemies and attack them? Should the software be letting the humans make the decisions or not? The author is warning that we need to hold back and not go all the way to robotic warfare. The author thinks we should not give up human involvement in these weapons.
Bad Blood
Author: John Carreyrou
Price: $43.4
It is a story of secrets and lies in a Silicon Valley start-up. Theranos, the founders were doing diagnostics (诊断) that can be very cheap, not need as much blood, read out even your DNA. But when it all was revealed, they really didn’t have what they were talking about. In fact, they had been giving patients diagnoses, which were actually dangerous because they were so wrong. It is a thriller with a tragic ending.
1.Which book is suitable for a person who wants to find a way to get relaxed?
A. 21 Lessons for the 21st Century. B. Meditation and Mindfulness.
C. Army of None. D. Bad Blood.
2.Who wrote a thriller in 2018?
A. Yuval Noah Harari. B. Andy Puddicombe.
C. Paul Scharre. D. John Carreyrou.
3.How much will you pay for Army of None?
A. $20.2. B. $18.5.
C. $46.1. D. $43.4.
