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One of the most exciting and interesting international cities to visit is London, England. Here is a look at four free things to do during a vacation to London.
Visit the Trafalgar Square
Built more than 200 years ago, Trafalgar Square is a popular gathering place for locals and travelers, too. The area is close to good shopping and dining opportunities, and there are usually some sorts of public events or celebrations going on there during most weekends.
Wander Along the Thames
Visitors wanting to see some great architecture, attractions and views should spend an afternoon walking along the River Thames. The best place to start is at the world-famous London Bridge crossing over the river and you can walk all the way to Westminster Bridge a short distance away. Travelers doing this will find themselves passing by a great many historic buildings.
Explore the Local Markets
While purchasing items at any of the open markets in London is not necessarily free, walking through them to view the merchants, their products and the other shoppers is of great fun. Some of the popular open markets in London worth visiting include Spitafields Market, Portobello Road Market and Leadenhall Market.
Visit the British Museum
One of the top museums in the entire United Kingdom can be found in London, and it charges no admission for entry. This museum is so highly regarded that it is not only popular with locals and tourists, it is also seen as a major and valuable scholarly resource.
1.What can we know about the Trafalgar Square?
A. It borders the Thames.
B. It has a history of over three centuries.
C. There are many factories around it.
D. From here visitors can easily do some shopping.
2.What will attract visitors, attention while they’re walking along the Thames?
A. Famous buildings. B. Local products.
C. Great restaurants. D. Some old tree.
3.We learn from the text that .
A. London Bridge is fur from Westminster Bridge
B. Portobello Road Market is located in Manchester
C. visitors should pay some money to enter the British Museum
D. the British Museum is a major and valuable scholarly resource
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He was a poet known for the nostalgia he describes in his poems. Now, it’s time: for us to express our nostalgia for this great writer.
On Dec 14, 2017, the famous Chinese poet Yu Guangzhong passed away in Taiwan. Born in 1928 in Nanjing, Jiangsu, Yu studied in Sichuan when he was young. At that time, he had showed great interest in Chinese poems and spent a lot of his free time trying writing poems himself. Then he managed to publish his first poem at the age of 20. A year later, Yu and his family moved to Taiwan. He lived and worked there until his death.
Nostalgia is Yu’s masterpiece in which he expresses his homesickness for the Chinese mainland when he was in Taiwan.
Published in 1971, the poem remains highly popular among Chinese speakers worldwide. Even those who know little about literature are familiar with lines from the poem. The poem is included in Chinese high school textbooks.
Besides his achievements in poetry, Yu was also a successful essay writer, critic and translator. He once translated English poet Siegfried Sassoon’s poem In Me, Past, Present, Future Meet into Chinese. It is regarded as an accurate and powerful translation, in which the most famous line is “心有猛虎, 细嗅蔷薇” for “In me the tiger sniffs the rose”.
Yu spent his whole life writing. “The reason why I stick to writing till today comes down to my passion for the Chinese language,” he once said in a 2015 interview. He then added that this passion was strengthened by his love for his mother and His motherland.
Now, let’s appreciate the poem Nostalgia.
When I was young, But later on,
Nostalgia was a tiny, tiny stamp. Nostalgia was a low, low grave.
Me on this side, Me on this outside,
Mother on the other side. And my mother was inside.
When I grew up, And at present,
Nostalgia was a narrow boat ticket. Nostalgia becomes a shallow strait.
Me on this side, Me on this side,
Bride on the other side. Mainland on the other side.
1.What is Yu Guangzhong?
A. A poet, reporter and critic. B. A translator and publisher.
C. A critic, poet and translator. D. A translator and song writer.
2.Which of the following statements is THUK?
A. Yu lived with his family in Taiwan all his life.
B. Many Chinese people know the poem Nostalgia.
C. We can find Nostalgia in primary school textbooks.
D. Yu translated Siegfried Sassoon's poem into English.
3.Why did Yu spend all his life writing?
A. He made a lot of money from writing. B. He had great interest in English poems.
C. He loved his family and mainland a lot. D. He had a lot of free time and was bored.
4.What can we learn from the Poem Nostalgia?
A. He missed his family and homeland a lot.
B. He didn’t want to come to his homeland.
C. He lived with his mother on the riverside.
D. His mother had died when he got married.
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English teenagers will receive cooking lessons in schools. The idea is to encourage healthy eating to solve the problem that many people are overweight. Also, it worries people that basic cooking and food preparation skills are being lost because parents use too much pre-prepared fast food.
Cooking was once regarded as an important part of education in England---even if it was mainly for girls. In recent years cooking has become less important in schools. But the rising level of obesity has led to rethink about the food that children are given and the skills they should be taught.
“What we want is to teach young people how to do basic, simple meals, which they can use now at home and then in their life,” said Ed Balls, an education expert.
The new lessons will start in September, but some schools without kitchens will be given a longer time to prepare. Also, there may be a shortage of teachers with the right skills, since schools have been teaching food technology rather than practical cooking. Besides, the lessons for hand-on cooking will only be one hour a week for one term. But the well-known cookery writer, Pru Leith, believe it will be worth it.
“If we’d done this thirty years ago we might not have to face the problem about obesity and lack of knowledge about food and so on. Every child should know how to cook, not just so that they’ll be healthy, but because it’s a life skill which is a real pleasure.”
The renewed interest in cooking is an effort to reduce the obesity rate, which is almost the highest in Europe, and according to the government, half of all British people will be obese in 25 years if present trends are not halted.
1.The passage mainly talks about .
A. the reason for obesity B. the lost cooking skills
C. the healthy eating D. the cooking classes
2.Which of the following is NOT the aim of bringing back cooking lessons in Britain?
A. To encourage teenagers to eat healthy food.
B. To reduce the country’s increasing obesity rate.
C. To stop parents from turning to pre-prepared fast food.
D. To prevent basic cooking and food preparation skills from being lost.
3.How will cooking lessons do good to the students?
A. All of them will become good cooks in their later life.
B. Students will be healthy and enjoy the pleasure of such a life skill as well.
C. Students will be able to make food experiments with the knowledge and skills.
D. Students will be able to control the level of obesity in the whole country.
4.The underlined word “halted” in the last paragraph probably means “ ”.
A. continued B. stopped C. discussed D. kept
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Robot are about to enter our lives. From doing housework, entertaining and educating our children, to looking after the elderly, scientists say we will soon be welcoming robots into our homes and workplaces.
Researchers believe we are on the cusp (过渡点) of a robot revolution that will mirror the quick growth of the computer revolution. They are developing new laws for robot behavior, and designing new ways for humans and robots to communicate.
“I think robots will change who we are, just as eyeglasses and fire changed who we were before, says Rodney Brooks, a director of the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.
Some ideas and technologies may sound like science fiction, but they are fast becoming science fact. Robots scientists invented are already beginning to perform everyday tasks like cleaning our floors. The latest types from Japan are able to help the elderly to get out of bed or get up after a fall. They can also remind them when to take medication (药物), or even help wash their hair.
“Robot now are not human-like. For example they are things like automatic (自动的) beds and wheelchairs,” says Prof Hiroshi Ishiguro at Osaka University, Japan. He believes the time is coming when robots start looking less like machines, and more like us. “In the near future we are going to use more human-like robots. I really think so, says Prof Ishiguro.
Prof Maja Mataric at the University of Southern California agrees. “I’m very excited about the fact that today we are trying to make robots that look like human beings,” she says.
“I believe we love robots because they’re reflections (反映) of ourselves,” says Ken Goldberg, director of the Berkeley Center for New Media at the University of California at Berkeley.
“Robots could be used in education, learning, and healthcare, where social support is important,” says Dr. Cynthia Breazeal, director of the Personal Robots Group at MIT.
1.Who believes that robots will bring great changes to our lives?
A. Rodney Brooks. B. Hiroshi Ishiguro.
C. Maja Mataric. D. Ken Goldberg.
2.Which of the following proverbs can best express the idea of the paragraph 4?
A. Great hopes make great men. B. If we can dream it, we can do it.
C. Where there is life, there is hope. D. Where there is a will, there is a way.
3.According to the text, future robots will .
A. become smaller B. cheaper
C. be more like machines D. be more like humans
4.What would he the best title for this passage?
A. Ready for the Robot Revolution?
B. The Uses of Future Robots
C. The Changes for the Future World
D. Happy About Scientific Development?
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）划掉。