Singer-songwriter Tori Kelly is close to a huge breakthrough. Her recent performances on the BET Awards shows have created a sensation（轰动）in pop music. You couldn’t call Kelly an overnight success. Sure she’s only 22.
The Southern Californian girl first appeared in public on the talent show “Star Search” when she was only 10. But her real appearance came from posting videos on YouTube. Eventually Kelly made her way to “American Idol”, and advanced through to Hollywood. But she did not make the Top 24. That loss encouraged her to write more of her own material, which eventually became part of her first album “Handmade Songs by Tori Kelly”.
“Even just releasing music in general is an achievement. I get to put out a whole album of songs that I just put my whole heart into, and people are responding really well to it,” she said. “It’s like the best feeling in the world because these are songs about my life. So it’s really cool to be able to do what I love.”
“Handmade Songs” sold well enough to reach the top 10 in a number of music charts（排行榜）.She followed that success with live performances at clubs in Los Angeles. Recently, Kelly excited audiences at the Billboard Music Awards with her performance of her song “Nobody Love”.
The singer-songwriter says that being within reach of her goal is amazing. “I think all the awards shows I have done so far have just been so surreal,” she said. “Like, I always dreamed of being on different awards shows, sitting at home on my sofa and watching. I think as a kid I just always put myself on that stage, and the fact that it’s actually happening, that I get to be a part of these shows is unbelievable.”
Kelly released her full-length album “Unbreakable Smile” in June, 2015. Her single “Should’ve been us” is also rising on the Billboard Hot 100.Tori Kelly is not an overnight success because_________.
| A．she often performs on the shows all around the world |
| B．she has released a lot of albums since she was ten |
| C．she has been working to be a pop star for over ten years |
| D．she has won many awards in the music world |
Which of the following is the first album of Tori Kelly?
| A．“Unbreakable Smile” |
| B．“Nobody Love” |
| C．“Should’ve Been Us ” |
| D．“Handmade Songs By Tori Kelly” |
The underlined word “surreal” in Paragraph 5 means______.
| A．impossible | B．dreamlike | C．unworthy | D．valuable |
It can be known from the passage that Tori Kelly_______.
| A．has a great gift for pop music |
| B．focuses on her career because she loves music |
| C．will change her profession soon. |
| D．will face more difficulties in the future. |
Computers Help Fire Fighters
In Kansas City, Missouri, a computer helps fire fighters. The computer contains information about every one of the 35000 street addresses in the city. When fire fighters answer a call, the computer will give them important about the burning building, its position and almost all the ways of helping fire fighters with the problems facing them. For example, it can give medical information about invalids living in a burning building. With this information, the fire fighters can take special care to find these sick persons and carry them away quickly and safely.
The Kansas City computer system also keeps a medical record of each of the city’s 9000 fire fighters. The kind of information is especially useful when a hospital can treat the injured. With this information, doctors at the hospital can treat the injured fire fighters more quickly and easily.
1. Missouri is most likely the name of ___________.
A. a well—known river B. the head of the fire fighters
C. a state in the USA D. a new kind of computer
2. The computer can give ______________.
A. useful and useless information about the city
B. useful information about everyone living in the city
C. useful information about every street address in the city
D. information about every town around the city
3. In this passage the word “invalid” means a person __________.
A. who is badly injured B. who is helped by firemen
C. who wants to be a firemen D. who has become weak through illness or injury
4. If injured, the firemen will ___________.
A. be treated at once with the computer’s help B. hardly get any treatment
C. ask doctors and nurses for help D. be taken to hospital by the computer
第三部分：阅读理解（共20小题；每小题2分，满分40分）
阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项（A、B、C和D）中，选出最佳选项。
On the evening of June 21, 1992, a tall man with brown hair and blue eyes entered the beautiful hall of the Bell Tower Hotel in Xi’an with his bicycle. The hotel workers received him and telephoned the manager, for they had never seen a bicycle in the hotel ball before though they lived in “the kingdom of bicycles”.
Robert Friedlander, an American, arrived in Xi’an on his bicycle trip across Asia which started last December in New Delhi, India.
When he was 11, he read the book Marco Polo and made up his mind to visit the Silk Road. Now, after 44 years, he was on the Silk Road in Xi’an and his early dream were coming true. Robert Friedlander’s next destinations(目的地) were Lanzhou, Dunhuang, Urumqi, etc. He will complete his trip in Pakistan.
1. The best headline (标题) for this newspaper article would be ___________.
A. The Kingdom of Bicycles B. A Beautiful Hotel in Xi’an
C. Marco Polo and the Silk Road D. An American Achieving His Aims
2. The hotel workers told the manager about Friedlander coming to the hotel because ___________.
A. he asked to see the manager
B. he entered the hall with a bike
C. the manager had to know about all foreign guests
D. the manager knew about his trip and was expecting him
3. Friedlander is visiting the three countries in the following order, _________.
A. China, India, and Pakistan B. India, China, and Pakistan
C. Pakistan, China, and India D. China, Pakistan and India
4. What made Friedlander want to come to China?
A. The stories about Marco Polo. B. The famous sights in Xi’an.
C. His interest in Chinese silk. D. His childhood dreams about bicycles.
American and British researchers have proved that judgments based on how someone looks are important. They found that appearance tells a lot about your personality.
The researchers included Laura Naumann of Sonoma State University in California, and Simine Vazire of Washington University in Saint Louis, Missouri. They were joined by Sam Gosling of the University of Texas at Austin and Peter J. Rentfrow of Britain's Cambridge University. The results of their study were published in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin in December, 2009.
The subjects（接受实验者）were asked to judge the personality of people the
y had never met. The judges examined pictures of one hundred twenty-three people. The people in the photographs had been told how to stand. They looked into the cameras without showing their feelings. The same people also were photographed the way they themselves wanted to stand. Those who wanted to smile could smile.
Then the judges attempted to decide what the people were like. The researchers compared the judges’ opinions with the way the people who were photographed thought of themselves. Three people who knew those in the photographs well also provided information about their personality and behavior.
The judges looked for ten qualities in the people in the pictures. The qualities included extroversion (having a confident character and enjoying the company of other people) and self-esteem (being satisfied with oneself).
The judges also l
ooked for signs of loneliness, conscientiousness（正义）, emotional control and religious and political beliefs.
The researchers said the judges could identify some personalities even when people were pictured in controlled positions. They could recognize personalities like extroversion and self-esteem. But it was hard for the judges to decide about most other personalities under the controlled conditions.
When the people smiled and stood naturally, however, judging their personalities was easy. Then the judges’ choices were correct for nine of the ten personalities.
Researcher Laura Nauman said that we live in the world where first impressions are important.
1. According to the passage, who were the judges?
A. The researchers of the study. B. The subjects in the study.
C. Parents and other adults. D. People in the photographs.
2. Which of the following qualities could the judges identify even when people were pictured in controlled positions?
A. Extroversion B. Religious beliefs C. Loneliness D. Emotional control
3. We can infer
from the passage that ____________
A. the study was carried out by four researchers from America.
B. in the study126 people were photographed for judges to decide their personalities.
C. the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin is an official publication（出版物）.
D. it was 
hard to recognize personalities when the people were pictured with natural looks.
4. What will the author most probably talk about next?
A. The quality of the judges. B. The personalities of Laura Nauman.
C. Signs of emotional control. D. The reason why one’s appearance is important.
The sun shone in through the dining room window, lighting up the hardw
ood floor. We had been talking there for nearly two hours. The phone of the “Nightline” rang yet again and Morrie asked his helper, Connie, to get it. She had been taking down the callers’ names in Morrie’s small black appointment book. It was clear I was not the only one interested in visiting my old professor—the “Nightline” appearance had made him something of a big figure—but I was impressed with, perhaps even a bit envious of, all the friends that Morrie seemed to have.
“You know, Mitch, now that I'm dying, I’ve become much more interesting to people. I’m on the last great journey here—and people want me to tell them what to pack.”
The phone rang again. “Morrie, can you talk?” Connie asked.
“I’m visiting with my old friend now,” he announced, “Let them call back.”
I cannot tell you why he received me so warmly. I was hardly the promising student who had left him sixteen years earlier. Had it not been for “Nightline”, Morrie might have died without ever seeing me again.
What happened to me? The eighties happened. The nineties happened. Death and sickness and getting fat and going bald happened. I traded lots of dreams for a bigger paycheck, and I never even realized I was doing it. Yet here was Morrie talking with the wonder of our college years, as if I’d simply been on a long vacation.
“Have you found someone to share your heart with?” he asked. “Are you at peace with yourself?” “Are you trying to be as human as you can be?”
I felt ashamed, wanting to show I had been trying hard to work out such questions. What happened to me? I once promised myself I would never work for money, that I would join the Peace Corps, and that 1 would live in beautiful, inspirational places.
Instead, I had been in Detroit for ten years, at the same workplace, using the same bank, visiting the same barber. I was thirty-seven, more mature than in college, tied to computers and modems and cell phones. I was no longer young, nor did I walk around in gray sweatshirts with unlit cigarettes in my mouth. I did not have long discussions over egg salad sandwiches about the meaning of life.
My days were full, yet I remained, much of the time, unsatisfied. What happened to me?
1. When did the author graduate from Morrie’s college?
A. In the eighties. B. In the nineties. C. When he was 16. D. When he was 21.
2. What do we know about the “Nightline”?
A. Morrie started it by himself. B. It helped Morrie earn a fame.
C. The author helped Morrie start it. D. It was only operated at night.
3. What can we infer from the passage?
A. Both the author and Morrie liked travelling.
B. Morrie liked helping people
pack things for their journeys.
C. The author envied Morrie’s friends the help they got from him.
D. The author earned a lot of money at the cost of his dreams.
4. What’s the author’s feeling when he writes this passage?
A. R
egretful. B. Enthusiastic. C. Sympathetic. D. Humorous.
Most people know that a wedding ring is symbolic of the bond of love and commitment between two people. But not everyone knows about the history behind this
small yet powerful symbol. The history of the wedding ring goes back not just hundreds but thousands of years. No other currently practiced wedding tradition has been around as long.
The Egyptians were the first recorded civil
ization to use the wedding ring. In Egyptian hieroglyphics（象形文字）, a circle represented eternity because there's no beginning and no end. Once a woman accepted the ring she became the “property” of the person wh
o gave it to her and she was in a sense “his”. The first wedding ring could have been made of braided grass or hay （which would have been changed often）, ivory, bone, or leather. Eventually, metal was used, but the first wedding bands were in the completely natural state and rough. However, the wedding rings always expressed the same eternal and lasting love.
The Egyptians wore the wedding ring on the left hand because it was believed that a vein(静脉) in the left hand went st
raight to the heart. This tradition is still commonly practiced today in most parts of the world largely for practical purposes（most people are right handed）. It is worn on the fourth finger of the left hand. But there are some countries and groups which do not follow this tradition. In the Jewish faith, the wedding ring is put on the index finger. Roman Catholics traditionally wore their wedding band on the 
right hand, and in many countries and regions in Europe some people still follow this tradition.
It is interesting to note that in the long history of the wedding ring, it is only in the last century that men began to wear them. However, now both men and women show their love and commitment by exchanging rings on their wedding day.
Once you begin shopping for rings you may be amazed by the choices that await you. There are several different types of metals: traditional gold, white gold, platinum, and titanium. You can have an inscription put on the inside of the band if you like. Some people are even choosing a tattoo band. The styles vary from a simple yet elegant band to an elaborate (精巧的) ring covered with jewels. If you do not buy the wedding and engagement rings as a set, you will want to be sure the styles can match perfectly. Choose carefully because this choice will need to stand the test of eternity.
1. What’s the best title for this passage?
A. History of rings. B. Interesting facts about rings.
C. Different beliefs about rings. D. The meaning of the rings.
2. What may the word “eternity” in paragraph 2 probably mean?
A. Elegance B. Marriage C. Wedding D. Foreverness
3. Which is NOT true according to the passage?
A. The meaning of the rings remained unchanged.
B. Jewish are so faithful to their beliefs to wear rings on the fourth finger.
C. One should be careful of choosing a ring in a shop from different kinds.
D. Now most people in the world still follow Roman Catholics traditionally.
4. What can we infer from the passage?
A. Men were looked down upon by women for thousands years.
B. Only women have the right to make themselves beautiful.
C. Women wore rings thousands of years earlier than
men.
D
. You can have an inscription put on the inside the band.
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