Here is some information from a tourist guide to Patapsco Valley state Park Maryland, USA.
Wildlife and Nature Appreciation
While visiting Patapsco Valley State Park, you will see a variety of natural habitats. Throughout spring and fall, dogwoods, maples, redbuds, and many varieties of wildflowers color the forest. This park is also home to many small mammals and birds. If you pause during your journey through tile forest, you are likely to see rabbits, grey squirrels, and red foxes. Along the banks of tile river, birdwatchers will spot Canada geese and wood ducks all year round
Fishing
The Patapsco River meanders through the park and is a popular attraction for anglers (钓鱼者). The Department of Natural Resources' Fisheries Service assigns the river as a put-and-take fishery(渔场) with adult rainbow and brown trout in spring and fall. Anglers also enjoy catching naturally reproducing smallmouth and largemouth bass, bluegill, redbreast sunfish and yellow perch.
Fishing opportunities have been specially set aside at Lost Lake for youth under 16 and seniors 62 years of age and older. This area is also designed for anglers with disabilities.
Trails
Adventure seekers will enjoy hiking, mountain biking and horseback riding on the park's popular trail system. More than 17 miles of challenging and rough single track trails follow the ridges, steep hillsides and stream valleys in the park. These trails are also excellent gateways for wildlife viewing, bird watching and general nature appreciation. Please respect the rights of nearby private property owners by using only blazed (有路标的) trails. Remember that the park is a natural area with certain dangers, such as poison ivy, slippery trail surfaces, insects, etc. You are responsible for having the necessary skills, knowledge and equipment for a safe visit.
Discover History Along the Trail
Enter another time as you explore Patapsco’s trails. Layer upon layer of history tells the story of man’s interaction with nature. Native American hunted, gathered and fished here for centuries. In the 1700s, the valley became one of the earliest sites for America’s Industrial Revolution. Early settlers cut down trees for charcoal used to fire iron furnaces(熔炉). The river’s current was dammed and channeled to power iron, paper, grain and textile mills (纺织厂). Towns and tobacco farms were established throughout the valley.
1.Which of the following is forbidden to fish at Lost Lake?
A. A pupil in grade six
B. A 30 - year - old woman without disability
C. An old man in his seventies
D. A person in a wheelchair
2.While walking along the trails, tourists are reminded to _________.
A. feed the birds they meet
B. visit some private buildings
C. pay attention to self- protection
D. protect the natural environment
3.The passage is mainly about the park's _________.
A. long history B. beautiful scenery
C. main attractions D. official rules
难度: 中等查看答案及解析
The adolescent girl from Tennessee was standing on the stage of a drama summer camp in New York. It was a beautiful day. But the girl didn’t feel beautiful. She was not the leggy, attractive Hollywood type. In fact, she described herself as stupid.
Her name is Reese Witherspoon. Since Reese Witherspoon was six years old, she had admired and respected Dolly Patton, who was a famous country singer. For three years she had gone all out to act, dance and sing, fancying that she could be another dolly Patton.
However, at the end of the camp her coaches told her to forget about singing. They suggested she think about another career. She took their words to heart. After all. why shouldn’t she believe the professionals?
But back at home in Nashville, her mother-a funny, happy, optimistic woman-wouldn’t let her feel depressed. Her father, a physician, encouraged her to achieve in school. So she worked hard at everything and was accepted at Stanford University.
And at 19, she got a part in a low-budget movie called Freeway, which prepared for her role in the movie Pleasantville. But her big break came with Legally Blonde.
“If you can’t sing and you aren’t charming, play to your strengths. If you’re going to make it in this business, better focus on what you’re good at,” she told the interviewer later.
And then came the offer that took her back to her Nashville-playing the wife of a country star Johnny Cash, a singing role. All of a sudden the old fears learned on that summer stage were back. She was so nervous on the stage. But she didn’t give up on the movie or herself. She spent 6 months taking singing lessons again. She learned to play the Autoharp. And the hard work built up her confidence.
Last March, Reese Witherspoon walked up on another stage, the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, and accepted the Oscar as Best Actress for her heartbreaking, heartwarming singing role as June Carter Cash in Walk the Line.
1.Why was Reese Witherspoon sad at the end of the camp?
A. She was described foolish
B. She was told to give up singing
C .She failed to be famous
D. She had to go back home
2.What was Reese’s parents’ response after her coaches suggested her giving up singing?
A. They agreed with her coaches
B. They only focused on her study
C. They ignored her frustration
D. They encouraged her
3.How did Reese succeed in playing the singing role?
A. By regaining her confidence through hard work
B. By practicing autoharp for over 6 months
C. By making herself leggy and attractive
D. By forgetting that summer stage
4.Which is the best title for the passage?
A. A successful actress B. Reese Witherspoon
C. Never give up D. Fortune is important
难度: 中等查看答案及解析
“A Long Walk Home”-----life as Eli Reed saw it
American photographer and photojournalist Eli Reed has been documenting “life as I saw it” for more than 40 years. His career retrospective(回顾), “Eli Reed: A Long Walk Home”, is an extraordinary search of beauty while recording hardship. With a heart of love, Reed uses a style that uncovers humanity at every turn. According to Reed, “A Long Walk Home” is about what it means to be a human being. It all began with a photo he took of his mother and his memory of her smile.
Raised in New Jersey, reed was originally a painter. Primarily self-taught in photography, he became a freelance photographer in 1970. after producing some impressive photos that drew much attention, he joined the famous company Magnum Photos---the first black photographer invited to do so.
His photos are remarkable in their lack of judgment of the people or the situations he comes across. In Beirut, Lebanon, a man removes a tree branch from a car in a recently bombed parking lot. An old man wrapped in a sheet plays a drum in front of a sign reading “God Is the Way” while National Guardsmen lift their guns during a war in Miami. A young boy upside down with his legs in the air in a Kenyan refugee camp, his determined look faces the camera. In Harlem, New York, a group of laughing children take over an abandoned car, using it as a jungle gym.
Where another photographer might have focused on the sobriety of these situations. Reed’s camera smiles. His images show how humans cope, rise above, and carry on. This is what gives “ A Long Walk Home” its power. Considering the places Reed has been to, there are very few photos of guns or obvious violence. Instead, Reed focuses on the varied human responses to hardship.
We smile along with Reed in a gesture of compassion and solidarity. We recognize our fellow human beings.
1.Why did Eli Reed produce his work “A Long Walk Home”?
A. To search for the meaning of life
B. To keep memories of his mother
C. To help people who are suffering
D. To pursuer his love of photography
2.According to the passage, Magnum Photos_____________.
A. employed Reed in 1970
B. was located in New Jersey
C. taught Reed the art of photography
D. only had white employees originally
3.In his work “A Long Walk Home”. Reed’s photos_____________.
A. aim to draw others’ sympathy
B. were taken only in America
C. reflect the strength of humans
D. focus on war and violence
4.What does the underlined word “sobriety” in Paragraph 4 probably mean?
A. Warmth B. Cause C. Value D. Seriousness
难度: 困难查看答案及解析
IMAGINE if, to collect your salary each month, you had to walk to the nearest town, perhaps tens of miles away, to gather in a school or a football court or a church. There, you and your colleagues wait for a man to arrive from the capital, perhaps a thousand miles away, with a suitcase of cash.
Few countries are as corrupt as Congo(刚果). Mobutu Sese Seko, a former strongman, used state funds to charter a Concorde to take him on shopping trips to Paris. By the time of his overthrow in 1997, graft was endemic. Government employees were not paid but rather expected to use their positions to make a living. Among the most prized government jobs was that of accountant: the people responsible for transporting bags of cash to the provinces to hand out to employees.
In 2012, however, the Congolese government started helping civil servants to open bank accounts. Around three-quarters of them—some 670,000 people—now have one. In the process, the government has weeded out tens of thousands of ghost employees, since the embezzlers who invented them could not open accounts in their names without a matching ID.
Yet in a vast country with fewer roads than Luxembourg, hardly anyone lives anywhere near a bank branch. So Congolese banks must now do the work the government accountants used to: shipping money to the remote area. Cash has to be transported to branches in regional capitals, and thence to account-holders on the backs of motorbikes, in canoes or by foot. Bank staff with suitcases of cash make easy targets, just as they did in the west of America in the 19th century. Though they usually travel with armed policemen, there have been at least ten armed robberies of bank employees since January.
At the moment banks are little more than money-transfer companies, and not very sophisticated ones at that. The transfers tend to go only one way—out of Kinshasa—so cannot be netted against each other; instead cash almost always has to be moved physically. Therefore, most Congolese bankers hope that the new system will promote the growth of a proper banking system.
1.The underlined word “charter” (Paragraph 2) can be replaced by “_______________”.
A. drive B. rent C. write D. push
2.How did government employees use to earn a living?
A. By getting enough salaries
B. By talking to employees
C. By transporting bags of cash
D. By benefiting from their positions
3.What is not one of the challenges that bank staff have to face while transferring each?
A. The transfers are netted against one another
B. The cash may be robbed away
C. Most cash has to be moved physically
D. They sometimes have to walk to transfer cash
4.Which of the following can be the best title of the article?
A. Unavoidable robberies B. Frequent corruption
C. Cash on the way D. Best banking system
难度: 中等查看答案及解析
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。
More American Fathers Stay Home to Raise Kids
Families in the U. S. are changing. 1. This number is twice that of 25 years ago. In 2012, 16 percent of all parents in the U. S. were stay-at-home dads. Gretchen Livingston is with the Pew Research Center. She says in the last 25 years there have been changes as far as dads taking on more caregiving responsibilities and mothers taking on more bread-winner responsibilities. 2. That is a huge change. The study finds that disability, sickness and unemployment are among the reasons that fathers stay home. 3. For example, Blake Humphreys has also been a stay-at-home dad for the past ten years. Blake and his partner have two kids. Blake is a big, muscular man. He is well over six feet tall, with a beard and long hair tucked under his baseball cap. He looks like the kind of man that would be hard to frighten. 4. "I am a stay-at-home dad for ten years. And I know that just saying it sounds scary to me right now." Blake became a stay-at-home parent for the same reason many women do – he made less money than his partner. Even thought the number of stay-at-home fathers is growing in the U. S., such men can still face worries about their self-worth. 5. To help solve this problem, he volunteers at his children’s school partly to battle that isolation and to build up his sense of self-worth.
A. But, some fathers do so simply to spend more time with their children.
B. Blake shared his feeling of anxiety.
C. A new study finds that in the U. S. more than two million fathers are staying home to take care of the house and family.
D. A lot of men lost their jobs
E. However, he says he does feel fearful when he counts the years he has been out of the workforce.
F. She adds that the number of hours a day that dads spend caring for their kids has tripled in the past decades.
G. Black expressed his true feeling towards being a stay-at-home dad.
难度: 中等查看答案及解析
完型填空
阅读下面短文，从短文后各题所给的四个选项（ABCD）中选出可以填入空白处的最佳选项，并在答题卡上将该项涂黑。
I believe I had the perfect life. Because I was about to __ __ my high school, and on my way to college, I had great friends and a loving family. There was nothing ____ ____ . But I spoke too soon.
It was around 9:25 a. m. that I heard the news that would ___ _____ my life forever My brother Zach had been in a car accident. He fought for five days before he ___ ______. That day, I became an only child. I felt desperately ________.
After Zach’s death, I found __________ in food. I ate, then I slept, then I ate again. I couldn’t cry. I could barely feel anything, and I was _________ .I stopped building relationships for fear that they would end just as __________ as Zach’s life. Also, I became nervous about any potentially _______situations-driving late at night-but I couldn’t express this fear of life ________ I wanted to be strong for my parents. I saw my parents’ _________ worse than mine on account of the losing of their son. I didn’t want them to __________ me. I also experienced a lot of ___________, because I was angry about why the sadness had happened to me, and I never __________from this emotion.
Now, it has been nearly five years since Zach’s death. I don’t ________life anymore: I face it bravely. I ________ my friendships and began socializing more. I even _______ Zach’s story with people around me. Although my new friends met him they know about Zach.
One lesson I learned from losing my brother was never to be _______ to say, “ I love you.” I loved my brother, but it was too late to ________ it loudly. The last time I remember telling my brother I loved him was when he was when he was dying. Don’t make this ________like me.
1.A. skip B. finish C. admit D. determine
2.A. earning B. reaching C. competing D. missing
3.A. slip B. alter C. simplify D. spoil
4.A. took away B. gave away C. passed away D. flew away
5.A. lonely B. deserted C. abandoned D. remote
6.A. nutrition B. benefit C. guidance D. relief
7.A. funny B. hopeless C. patient D. numb
8.A. finally B. suddenly C. appropriately D. violently
9.A. complicated B. particular C. risky D. tense
10.A. so B. if C. unless D. because
11.A. pain B. discouragement C. tolerance D. memory
12.A. think about B. dream about C. consider about D. care about
13.A. unpleasantness B. anger C. unhappiness D. power
14.A. escaped B. anger C. stopped D. measured
15.A. damage B. choose C. fear D. leave
16.A. produced B. rebuilt C. promoted D. insured
17.A. imitate B. advertise C. share D. perform
18.A. stubborn B. nervous C. bold D. afraid
19.A. explore B. express C. circulate D. spray
20.A. mistake B. explanation C. decision D. comment
难度: 中等查看答案及解析
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。
I always have my own ways to learn English. First, I always read the text in advance so that I can know what I must pay much attention to in class. 1._____ my delight, when my teacher raises a question, I know how to answer more often. And whenever I answer a question 2.______ (correct), I have a strong sense of achievement.
Besides, I always try to take notes in class. Important language points, grammar rules, useful 3._____ (express) and key words are4._____ we want to take down. After class, I organize the notes so that I can have a better 5.______ (understand) of them. Of course, I will certainly read aloud the notes in the morning.
To develop my interest in English, after class I 6._____ (wide) read English materials. By this means I can also develop my ability of reading.
7.____ (chat) with my teachers and classmates is also one of my ways to learn English. We often talk 8.____ English about different topics concerning friendship, sports, etc. Free expression in English always9.___ (give) me a sense of pride, 10.______ in turn inspires me to learn English better.
难度: 中等查看答案及解析
短文改错
假定英语课上老师要求同桌之间交换修改作文，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：在错的词下划一横线，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。
In order to strengthen our sense of social responsible, the students in our school launched an activity of donating books to the children in poor areas. We gather in front of the school library in the afternoon of Jan. 15th. Each of them gave away some books what we treasured. We even wrote our names and address on the front pages, hope to be contacted and make friends with the children who would receive the books. About two thousand books were collected in and sent away. An activity not only provided a good chance for us show love for others, but also helped us to make new friends.
难度: 中等查看答案及解析
书面表达
2016年5月至10月将在河北唐山举行世界园艺博览会。假设你是红星中学高三的学生李华，获悉唐山世界园艺博览会正在全国范围内招聘英语志愿者。请用英语写一封自荐信，申请成为唐山世界园艺博览会7月至8月的志愿者。信的内容包括：
1．表达愿望；
2．提供至少三条自荐理由（例如：扎实的英语功底）；
3．恳请获准。
注意：
1．词数100左右；
2．开头和结尾已给出，不计入总词数。
提示词：世界园艺博览会Would Horticultural exposition
Dear Sir or Madam,
I’ve read the news on the Internet that the World Horticultural Exposition will be held in Tangshan from May to October in 2016. __________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Sincerely,
Li Hua
难度: 中等查看答案及解析