In a world surrounded by bad news, it may feel like an unhappy place sometimes.1.
If you make even one person smile today, you can help make this world a better place. Here is list of ideas to help you.
2.In this day and age where everything is sent via the Internet, it's a shock to receive a letter through the post. Putting pen to paper and writing a few words to a friend can be an easy way to make a positive impact.
Requiring some time and research to find the perfect project, volunteering is one of the nicest things you can do. Whether you volunteer at your local youth group or take dogs from shelters for a walk, the simple fact that you are giving up your time to help someone else is incredible. There are so many opportunities.3.
Tell someone "I love you". It can be anyone. 4.Perhaps you can tell a friend that you appreciate all they are to you, or remind your mum that it's her birthday. Sometimes, in our busy lives we forget to take a moment to tell people what they mean to us.
5.Whether you're creative or not, taking time to make something for someone else shows how much you appreciate them. Even if you think you're not creative, the recipient will feel lucky to get such a unique gift that you put your precious time into. Some ideas could include a card, painting, drawing, song, poem or cake!
A. However, you can make a difference.
B. It's a surprise to send a handwritten letter.
C. And you don't even have to say "I love you"
D. So you are sure to find one that is right for you.
E. And it doesn’t necessarily have to take up all your life.
F. Making something for a special person is always unique.
G. Even a postcard with a couple of sentences could really make someone's day.
The Shiants, remote, cliff-edged islands off the coast of Scotland are home to 350,000 seabirds. This is the starting point for National Geographic contributor Adam Nicolson’s new book, The Seabirds Cry. Celebrating 10 species in detail, he describes the unbelievable recovery of seabirds and the many adaptations that have enabled them to survive and navigate the oceans, while sounding a loud call for their conservation among severely falling numbers.
Speaking from his home in Sussex, England, Nicolson explains why guillemot (海雀) colonies are information exchange centers: how new research is showing that those long-distance travelers. The shearwaters, "smell" their way across the globe; and what we can do to support seabird populations.
National Geographic has just kicked off Year of the Bird with a cover story by Jonathan Franzen titled "Why Birds Matter ". The beginning of Year of the Bird is beneficial to birds. Nicolson said, "Ill ask you the same question-why? For me, these seabirds are symbols of uniqueness. There is so much on the land where the rest of the living world seems to be controlled by us, but when you go to seabird colonies, there is this pumping, loud and raging uniqueness. It's a glance of the untouched world. ”
“The reason why it's untouched is that, until recently, we have not controlled the oceans that the seabirds depend on. More of them have survived in greater numbers than most other creatures in the developed world, where huge amounts of the animal kingdom have been removed by us. And so one reason these birds matter is that they are symbols of what the world might be if we hadn't done so much damage to it. "He added.
“Seabirds also tend to disappear; they’re not reliably of our world, due to their migration and habits of life. Very deep in our consciousness is a sense that they are ambassadors from another world. And witnessing and feeling that is, I think, one of the great enlargers of life.” Nicolson explained.
1.What is the book The Seabirds Cry mainly about?
A. Seabirds on an island. B. The extinction of seabirds.
C. The importance of seabird. D. Seabirds in the author's hometown.
2.What can we learn from Nicolson’s speech?
A. The wisdom of seabirds. B. Ways to protect seabird.
C. Migration routes of seabirds. D. The harder situation of seabirds.
3.What does the underlined phrase "kicked off" in paragraph 3 mean?
A. Watched out for B. Cut across
C. Expressed D. Started
4.Which is a lucky thing for seabirds in Nicolson’s view?
A. The sea is too large to be polluted.
B. The sea isn't entirely governed by humans.
C. The seabirds are able to fit the environment.
D. The seabirds are living in the developed world.
Angad Rekhi, a graduate student and an assistant professor of electrical engineering, has developed a wake-up receiver. This wake-up receiver has many potential applications, particularly in designing the next generation of net worked devices, including so called “smart” devices that can communicate directly with one another without human intervention (介入).
Once attached to a device, a wake-up receiver listens for a unique ultrasonic（超声波）pattern that tells it when to turn the device on. It needs only a very small amount of power to maintain this constant listening, so it still saves energy overall while extending the battery life of the larger device. A well-designed wake-up receiver also allows the device to be turned on from a significant distance.
Given the increased interest in networked devices, researchers and industry organizations are starting to define what features and techniques will become standard. Regardless of whether this ultrasound wake-up receiver is among these standard designs, it is likely wake-up receivers of some kind will be combined into commercial applications soon.
By comparison, the ultrasound wake-up receiver requires a battery but has much greater range than the wirelessly powered devices, while still maintaining a long lifetime due to extremely low power draw. These two technologies-wireless power and wake-up receivers-would likely serve different purposes but both indicate at a turning point in devices that make up the Internet of Things.
“In light of a long-promised future where interconnected, autonomous, widespread and unremarkable technologies make life easier, the networked devices available now, like video doorbells and app-enabled lights, seem like rather slight advances.” the researchers said. They believe technologies like theirs could help cross the gap between the Internet of Things as we know it and the Internet of Things at its best-whatever that may be.
1.Which of the following is an advantage of the wake-up receiver?
A. It requires no signal. B. It is very power saving.
C. It can make the battery larger. D. It must be fixed to another device.
2.What do we know about by comparing the wireless power with wake-up receivers?
A. One can replace the other. B. The wake-up receiver is better.
C. Both have their own advantages. D. The wirelessly powered device has more uses.
3.What do the researchers feel about their technologies mentioned in the last paragraph?
A. They make the Internet cheaper.
B. They make the Internet more popular.
C. They are not useful devices for the Internet.
D. They are beneficial to the use of the Internet.
4.What can be the best title for the text?
A. Wide Use of Advanced Equipment B. Development of the Internet Devices
C. New Technique for Waking Up Devices D. Difference between Two Wake-up Receives
I have a neighbor who is a capable, fashionable, seventy-year-old, single woman. Her name is Grace. Grace was laid off from her job a little over two years ago and has been living off her savings ever since but not officially "retired". Grace called me up one day about this time last year and asked if I had a ladder. She needed to clean out her gutters (水槽) on the roof and wanted me to hold the ladder.
She didn’t want me to climb up and clean the gutters. She just wanted me to hold the ladder. As it happened I did have a ladder. I said: “The leaves are going to fall off the trees in a month, why don’t we wait till they finish and do it then?” She agreed and naturally we didn’t talk about it again until spring. Spring in Tennessee is wild and we talked about it over the course of three weeks in which it rained nearly every day, then I got busy and Grace went into seclusion (隐居).
A couple of weeks ago, she told me she’d been spending too much money and decided to apply for a bar tending job at a local hotel. “Now I don’t know about you all but I’d never considered what it would be like to apply for and begin a new job at the age of seventy. I’m fifty-three and the older I get, the more I think about how great it’ll be if I can just get out of bed when I’m seventy.” Anyway, she got the job, serving the bar and tending banquets at the hotel.
The day when she left for her training at 6 am, I walked across the street with my ladder and cleaned out her gutters.
1.What did Grace want the author to do?
A. Make a ladder. B. Retire completely.
C. Lend her a ladder. D. Give her suggestions.
2.When did the author advise Grace to clean her gutters?
A. In early spring. B. In rainy season.
C. In time of leaves falling. D. In time of few leaves on trees.
3.What was the author’s neighbor doing when the author wrote the text?
A. Working at a hotel. B. Training for her job.
C. Cleaning out her house. D. Walking with the author.
4.What did the author think of her neighbor’s re-employment?
A. Valuable. B. Impossible.
C. Reasonable. D. Unbelievable.
Incredible Women You Didn't Learn About in History Class
Here are the stories of women you may not know about, but definitely should
◆Maria Sibylla Merian
Born in Germany in 1647, Merian was fascinated by insects, and she began collecting, studying, and drawing them when she was as young as 13. She was one of the few naturalists of her time to actually study live insects. It was through her study of caterpillars(毛毛虫) that she discovered the truth about their life cycles. Her work provided major contributions to the field of entomology（昆虫学）。
◆ Murasaki Shikibu
Murasaki Shikibu, a Japanese woman, was widely considered to be the world’s first novelist. She was a noble woman living in Japan around the year 1000 AD. She wrote a two-part novel called The Tale of Genji, which tells a riches-to-rags story about the son of a Japanese emperor forced to live as a common man. The Tale of Genji is widely considered to be a masterpiece of Japanese literature.
◆ Ada Lovelace
Ada was working to design early computing machines that she hoped would be able to quickly solve math problems. In addition to designing this early computer program, she also was first to suggest that these computers might be able to do more than, well, calculate. She imagined them doing everything, from producing images to composing music.
◆ Lucy Stone
Born in 1818, Stone married a fellow activist and changed her name, but decided to change it back a year later. She held the belief that "a wife should no more take her husband's name than hers." She became the first American married woman to keep her maiden name for her entire life. Stone was also one of the founding members of the American Equal Rights Association and fought for the ending of slavery.
1.What can readers learn about from The Tale of Genji?
A. Ancient Japanese culture.
B. Development of computer.
C. Research on living things.
D. Modern life of Japanese women.
2.What do Maria Sibylla Merian and Ada Lovelace have in common?
A. They were pioneers in computer.
B. They devoted themselves to science.
C. They created masterpieces of literature.
D. They made progress in studying Insects
3.Which of the following women fought for human rights?
A. Lucy Stone B. Ada Lovelace
C. Murasaki Shikibu D. Maria Sibylla Merlan
阅读下面短文，根据所给情节进行续写，使之构成一个完整的故事。
It had been some time since Jack had seen the old man. College, carrier, and life itself got in the way. In fact, Jack moved clear across the country in pursuit(追寻）of the dreams. There, in the rush of his busy life. Jack had little time to think about the past and often no time to spend with his wife and son. He was working on his future, and nothing could stop him.
Over the phone, his mother told him, “Mr. Belser died last night The funeral(葬礼）is Wednesday.” Memories flashed through his mind like an old newsreel(新闻短片）as he sat quietly remembering his childhood days.
“Jack, did you hear me?”
“Oh, sorry, Mom. Yes, I heard you. It’s been so long since I thought of him. I’m sorry, but I honestly thought he died years ago,” Jack said.
“Well, he didn’t forget you. Every time I saw him he’d ask how you were doing. He’d reminisce(回忆）about the many days you spent over ‘his side of the fence’ as he put it,” Mom told him.
“I loved that old house he lived in,” Jack said.
“You know, Jack, after your father died, Mr. Belser stepped in to make sure you had a man’s influence in your life," she said.
“He’s the one who taught me carpentry. I wouldn’t be in this business if it weren’t for him. He spent a lot of time teaching me things that he thought were important Mom, I’ll be there for the funeral.” Jack said.
Busy as he was, he kept his word. Jack caught the next flight to his hometown. Mr. Belser’s funeral was small and uneventful. He had no children of his own, and most of his relatives had passed away.
The night before he had to return home. Jack and his Mom stopped by to see the old house next door one more time, which was exactly as he remembered. Every step held memories. Every picture, every piece of furniture... Jack stopped suddenly.
“What’s wrong, Jack?” his Mom asked.
“The box is gone,” he said.
“What box?” Mom asked.
“There was a small gold box that he kept locked on top of his desk. I must have asked him a thousand times what was inside. All he’d ever tell me was ‘the thing I value most’,” Jack said.
It was gone. Everything about the house was exactly how Jack remembered it, except for the box. He figured someone from the Belser family had taken it.
“Now I’ll never know what was so valuable to him,” Jack said sadly.
注意：
1.所续写短文的词数应为150左右；
2.应使用5个以上短文中标有下划线的关键词语；
3.续写部分分为两段，每段的开头语己为你写好；
4.续写完成后，请用下划线标出你所使用的关键词语。
Paragraph 1:
Returning to his office the next day, he found a package on his desk.
Paragraph 2:
Inside he found these words carved:
