I am astonished at the way God knows when to send a special gift of encouragement at just the right time! It might be in a dream, a lost letter, a memory, or something found that we’d forgotten about.

My grandmother was from a town in Michigan. And summer after summer I enjoyed staying with my grandparents as a young child. I was from the city and loved the small town where they lived. People knew everyone, their children, their pets, their ancestors.

Grandma was always using her hands for something exciting... she would make sandwiches and we’d have tea parties, plant flowers and carefully tend them. She loved knitting sweaters as well as making beautiful quilts for her grandchildren. I remember the small thimble (顶针) she would place on her finger while doing her needlework.

A few years ago, when Grandma left this earth for her new residence in Heaven, I bid farewell to my loving grandmother. How quickly our lives can change! We had just had tea together a couple of months earlier, on her 91st birthday. I missed her very much, but I noticed it mostly on my birthdays, because there was no card from Grandma. She’d never forgotten my birthday!

On one particular birthday when I was feeling a little low, something happened made me feel as if she was sharing that special day with me. I was arranging some colorful pillows that she had made, and suddenly I felt something inside one pillow; it was small and hard. I moved the object to a seam（缝）that I carefully opened, and, to my delight, out came a tiny silver thimble!

How happy I was to find something that had been a part of her! Not realizing it had fallen off her finger, I pictured her sewing it into that little pillow that I just happened to fluff（抖松）, to place on my bedspread（床罩）that day. I carefully laid the thimble alongside the others I’d collected over the years. What a precious memory of a very special lady who, somehow, I knew, was laughing in delight at sewing her thimble into my pillow. I heated the kettle and made some tea, using my best china, as Grandma always did, and then enjoyed my tea and Grandma’s thimble. What a wonderful birthday that was!

1.In the author’s memory, what would her grandmother do?

A. She would make sandwiches and hamburgers for her family.

B. She would wear a thimble for needlework every day.

C. She would make beautiful quilts for money.

D. She would look after the flowers in the garden.

2.What does the underlined word “it” in Paragraph 4 refer to?

A. The modern world’s fast-changing life.

B. The fact that the grandmother had passed away.

C. The author’s missing her grandmother.

D. The love the author got from her grandmother.

3.How did the author feel when she found the thimble?

A. Surprised and joyful.    B. Delighted but regretful.

C. Guilty and sad.    D. Joyful but lonely.

4.Which of the following might be the best title for the passage?

A. Grandma’s Thimble.

B. Grandma’s Life Story.

C. The Joy of Finding Something Lost.

D. The Importance of Putting Things Away.

Starting Cycling

We have two services designed to give people the confidence and knowledge to cycle successfully.

Lessons

All our instructors have been trained to National Standards level of “Bikeability”. This means you will be trained to a standard consistent across the whole country.

There are 3 levels of skills to progress through. Children would start with levels 1 & 2, progressing from the playground or park to cycle on less busy local roads. Teenager and adult beginners can also learn levels 1 & 2 in an off-road and quiet environment.

Confident teenagers and adults can broaden their skills by learning level 3, using multi-lane (多道) roads and larger roundabouts (环岛). We provide both a complete package of lessons for the beginner or individual lessons tailored to the client. You can ride a bike but don’t feel confident about right turns on multi-lane roads. Whatever the need

we can address and practice until perfect!

Everyone can be taught to ride a bike!

We train both adults and children.

We cover London Zones 1 & 2

The cost is ￡30 per hour.

Guided Ride

We know that riding on the roads in London can be scary, and if you have to navigate (确定行车路线) as well it can become a real hard task! The Guided Ride service takes all the stress out of it for you by providing the following:

Route planned in advance to suit your skill level. Route map provided to you.

Cycle and equipment checked. We will teach you a simple method to check basic roadworthiness (车辆性能) of your bike that you can perform on a weekly basis.

Route discussed and focus given to any areas requiring special attention.

Cycle along with the instructor close behind. Here the traffic can be controlled by the instructor and rider observed.

Occasionally stopping to discuss events.

We currently cover London Zones 1 & 2. Please contact us if your requirements are outside of these areas.

Cost ￡30

1.Where can Level 1 & 2 lessons for adult beginners be carried out？

A. Off road.

B. Near large roundabouts.

C. On busy local roads.

D. On multi-lane roads.

2.What service does the Guided Ride mainly provide?.

A. They help you to be familiar with London roads.

B. They check your cycle and equipment every week.

C. They let users experience the busiest road in London.

D. They ensure users ride safely in London Zones 1 & 2.

3.Who is the text probably intended for ?

A. Bike riding lovers.

B. Children and teenagers.

C. Travelers in London.

D. Parents loving cycling.

假定你是某一英文报纸的记者，请根据下列表格，以A Big Forest Fire为题,写一篇简单报道，词数100左右。

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

根据句意从方框中选出合适的动词短语，并用其适当的形式完成句子。

1.This is the first time that he _________ the right answer in class.We all feel happy with his progress.

2.The bad weather _________ the hardship of shooting the TV series last winter.

3.He _________ 20 years in prison, which nearly drove his family mad.

4.It is requested that all the personal belongings(个人物品) _________ before 8:30 pm.

5.The news,if _________ ,will lead to great trouble.

6.When I told my parents that it was I who _________ their room the night before,they laughed and gave me the key.

单句语法填空

注意：有给提示词的，可以填3个词以内；没给提示词的，只能填1个词。

1.With the __________ (determine) to improve my spoken English,i seize any opportunity to communicate with the native.

2.I’m sending you the book along with the material __________(concern).

3.__________(judge) from their speech，government leaders are increasing anxious about the air pollution issues.

4.The hospital，__________（found）in 2015，is aimed to give helping hands to the poor.

5.The cook who was found smoking in the kitchen is lucky to escape __________（fire）.

6.We’d like to know what use we can make __________ these waste materials.

7.He found himself fighting the big retail chains，__________（devote） his life to make the business work.

8.You must have witnessed cases __________ people are living in fear and depression.

9.It was on the morning of May 1st __________ I met LuHan at the airport.

10.Realizing he had wasted too much time and __________ he didn't live up to his parents’ expectations，the boy determined to stop playing games.

根据所给首字母写出正确的单词来完成句子。

注意：将首字母一起填写到答题卷上，即答题卷上要写出完整的单词。

1.The subway line，which was originally set to begin operation in early 2018，is opening ahead of s_________.

2.With the advanced medical treatment，the boy has r_________ from the terrible illness.

3.Nowadays every company would prefer to hire a man who has a good c_________ of English.

4.Being r_________ in public often brings the movie stars much trouble，so they always wear dark glasses to avoid it.

5.He seems to be doing nothing，but a_________ he is just waiting for a chance.

6.When travelling，please remember not to be p_________ into buying something useless but expensive by the guide.

7.He is not a r_________ person，for he never carries out his promises.

8.It was his optimistic（乐观的）a_________ to life and hard work that finally led him to his successful career.

9.The police will offer a r_________ of ＄1000 to anyone who provides useful information to catch the robber.

10.A h_________ is the title of a newspaper story，printed in large letters at the top of the story，especially on the front page.

In a small open courtyard, outside a school building, there were flowers here and there. In the sunshine，a ______ was lying on the grass，reading a book with ______ attention. Near her，another child was carefully watering the flowers, while a third was ______ with his back against a tree and had a ______ on his knees. He appeared to be drawing or writing something on it. He was ______ in his task, like the first child.

____ the building, there were pleasant carpeted areas. Many children were busy with their tasks in a variety of ways，______ teachers wandered among them, talking to them，______ them, and encouraging their efforts.

____ I watched this scene on a morning in May years ago, it ______ me that a visitor here ______ never have thought he had entered a formal school. He would have been even more ______ if he had been told that the children he was ______ came from different kinds of academic（学业） levels.

That ______ has been staying with me ever since. I have been ______ about some problems. Why in many schools are our children often asked to learn skills in a way ______ from a real-life context（情境）? Why does a lively        school child so ______ become a defeated school failure?

Developmental psychologist（心理学家）Margaret Donald once said, “Much of the intellectual framework (知识框架) on which we ______ our teaching is misleading.” In my opinion, a child learns everything in human ______. And if every child could learn in the same way as the children in the school ______ I visited years ago，they would develop better.

1.A. gardener    B. child    C. teacher    D. visitor

2.A. poor    B. little    C. full    D. slight

3.A. sitting    B. standing    C. Sleeping    D. listening

4.A. toy    B. pencil    C. flower    D. notebook

5.A. settled    B. set    C. defeated    D. lost

6.A. Over    B. Above    C. Inside    D. Outside

7.A. during    B. while    C. until    D. even if

8.A. referring to    B. pointing to    C. smiling at    D. staring at

9.A. As    B. Unless    C. Until    D. Before

10.A. came up with    B. thought about    C. attacked    D. hit

11.A. could    B. should    C. must    D. need

12.A. satisfied    B. surprised    C. pleased    D. disappointed

13.A. helping    B. spotting    C. seeking    D. watching

14.A. scene    B. sign    C. look    D. view

15.A. dreaming    B. regretting    C. wondering    D. joking

16.A. taken    B. prevented    C. learned    D. separated

17.A. often    B. hardly    C. seldom    D. badly

18.A. feed    B. base    C. turn    D. discover

19.A. race    B. position    C. situation    D. case

20.A. when    B. which    C. to which    D. in which

When you are a child, the whole world is like a big playground. I was living in Conyers, Georgia the summer when it all happened. I was a second grader, and my best friend Stephanie was only in the first grade.Both of our parents were at work and most of the time they let us go our own way.

It was a hot afternoon and we decided to have an adventure in Stephanie's basement. As I opened the basement door, I spotted a red steel can.It was paint. I looked beyond it and there lay even more paint in bright colors like purple, orange, blue and green.

"Stephanie, I just found us a project for the day. Get some paintbrushes. Let’s paint." She screamed with excitement as I told her of my plans and immediately we got to work. We gathered all the brushes we could find and moved all of our materials to my yard. There on the road in front of my house, we painted big stripes(条纹)of colors across the pavement (人行道). Stripe by stripe, our colors turned into a beautiful rainbow. It was fantastic!

The sun was starting to sink. I saw a car in the distance and jumped up as I recognized the car. It was my mother. I couldn't wait to show her my masterpiece. The car pulled slowly into the driveway and from the look on my mother's face, I could tell that I was in deep trouble.

My mother shut the car door and walked towards me. Her eyes glaring, she shouted, "What in the world were you thinking？I understood when you made castles out of leaves, and climbed the neighbors' trees, but this!Come inside right now!"I stood there glaring back at her for a minute, angry because she had insulted (侮辱) my art.

"Now go clean it up!"Mother and I began cleaning the road. Tears ran down my cheeks as I saw my beautiful rainbow turn into black cement（水泥）.

Though years have now passed, I still wonder where my rainbow has gone. I wonder if, maybe when I get older, I can find my rainbow and never have to brush it away. I guess we all need some sort of rainbow to brighten our lives from time to time and to keep our hopes and dreams colorful.

1.What did the writer want to do when his mother came home？

A. To introduce Stephanie to her.

B. To prevent her from seeing his painting.

C. To put the materials back in the yard.

D. To show his artwork to her.

2.In his mother's eyes, the writer_______.

A. was a born artist    B. always caused trouble

C. was a problem solver    D. worked very hard

3.The underlined word "rainbow" in the last paragraph refers to______.

A. the rainbow in the sky    B. the stripes on the pavement

C. something imaginative and fun    D. important lessons learned in childhood

4.It can be learned from the passage that parents should______.

A. encourage children to paint

B. value friendship among children

C. discover the hidden talent in children

D. protect rather than destroy children's dreams

The food chain is the order in which animals and plants eat each other in order to survive. Every living creature(生物) needs to eat other creatures below it. Every ecosystem（生态系统） has a different food chain, depending on which animals and plants live there.

The lowest part of the food chain are the plants. They are called producers because they produce their own food by using the sunlight's energy. This process is called photosynthesis(光合作用). Animals are the consumers（消费者） of the food chain.They eat other plants and animals.

Some animals only eat plants.Among this group of herbivores are rabbits,mice and cows. Carnivores are animals that eat other animals,like wolves,foxes and lions.

Each food chain has a predator,the strongest animal that is not eaten by others. Hawks or polar bears are such predators that dominate（支配）their habitats.

Many creatures belong to more than one food chain. Grass,for example,is eaten by many other animals. Food chains that are connected to each other are called food webs.

When an animal dies it is eaten up by worms,bacteria（细菌） and other organisms. These so-called decomposers break down dead animals and plants into small parts and enrich soil so that other plants can grow better. The nutrients of dead animals and plants are converted（转换） back to the soil so that plants can use them again.

The balance of plants and animals within a food chain is determined by nature. For example,if there are too many zebras in an area, many of them will die because they cannot get enough food to feed on. This also means that there is less food for predators, like lions, to eat. And when there are fewer lions the zebra population will grow again.

1.What does the food chain of a certain ecosystem depend on?

A. Which animals and plants live there.

B. Whether animals and plants eat each other.

C. How many kinds of plants are living there.

D. Whether a living creature needs to eat other creatures.

2.Which of the following statements can be called the process of photosynthesis?

A. Animals and plants eat each other in order to survive.

B. Every living creature needs to eat other creatures below it.

C. Plants make use of the sunlight's energy to produce their own food.

D. Animals are the consumers of other plants and animals in a food chain.

3.What does the underlined word “herbivores” in the third paragraph refer to?

A. Animals that eat other animals.

B. Animals that get on well with other animals.

C. Animals that only eat plants.

D. Animals that eat plants and other animals.

4.Which of the following shows the right order of a food chain?

A. bacteria→insects→mice    B. grass→insects→foxes

C. bacteria→grass→insects    D. grass→rabbits→lions

What can help you make a fortune in the future? Graduating from a top university might not be enough. A new study from the University of Essex in Britain has shown that the more friends you have in school, the more money you'll earn later.

The idea that popularity could have a serious effect on one's earning potentia（潜在性） shouldn't come as too much of a surprise. The researchers found that if you want to get ahead in life, social skills and networking are easily as powerful as talent and hard work..

“If a person has lots of friends, it means that he or she has the ability to get along with others in all kinds of different situations," said Xu Yanchun, 17, from Nantou High School in Shenzhen, who totally agreed with the recent finding. "Also, friends always help each other. They not only create wider social circles for you but lift your mood when you  feel bad," said Xu. She believed that all this helps you "earn a higher salary”.

Maybe that's why some people think the younger generations are in the age of Friendalholism (交友狂症). A woman even complained that the networking website Facebook's 5,000-friend limit was too low for her large number of social contacts.

But what does a friend mean? Should friends be regarded as a form of currency（货币）?

“Call me uncoil, but I think of a friend as an actual person with whom I have an actual history and whom I enjoy actually seeing. It seems, however, that this is no longer the definition (定义) of ‘friend',” said Meghan Daum, who works with The Los Angeles Times in the US.

Daum dislikes the idea that quantity trumps quality in the age of friendaholism. She thought the idea of friendship, at least among the growing population of Internet social networkers, was to get as many of not-really-friends as possible. For example, a friend might be someone you might know personally but who could just as easily be the friend of a friend of some other Facebook friend you don't actually know. Although she agreed that social ties grease (润滑) the wheels of life, she also wamed, "Too bad one thing money can't buy is a real friend."

1.What will be needed if you are to achieve success according to the researchers?

A. Social skills, friends, good mood and fortune.

B. Social skills, talent, hard work and facebook.

C. Social skills, networking, potential and fortune.

D. Social skills, networking, talent and hard work.

2.What can friends do in the eyes of Xu Yanchun?

A. They can help you with your schoolwork.

B. They teach you how to make more money.

C. They introduce their friends to you.

D. They help you to get rid of sadness and cheer up.

3.We learn that Meghan Daum's attitude towards friends is somewhat _____.

A. up-to-date    B. traditional

C. confused    D. optimistic

4.What does the word "trumps" in the last paragraph mean?

A. is worse than    B. is equal to

C. is better than    D. is similar to