第三部分：阅读理解(共两节，40分)
第一节(共15小题;每小题2分，共30分)
阅读下列短文，从每题所给的A、B、C、D四个选项中，选出最佳选项，并在答题卡上将该项涂黑。
A
What is PayQwiq?
PayQwiq is a fast and secure payment service that helps you go quickly through the Tesco checkout. It lets you add your credit or debit card details to the app so you can use your smartphone to pay for your shopping with just one scan. Not only that but it collects your Clubcard points automatically. This means you can now go wallet-free in all UK Tesco stores. So why not give it a go? It only takes a moment to download and you will receive these benefits:
﹡Collect your Clubcard points automatically
﹡Pay for your weekly shop up to￡250
﹡Use PayQwiq offline, even with no signal
﹡Track your spending in Tesco
Sign up to PayQwiq and collect 100 extra Clubcard points for each week you pay with the app, for up to 5 weeks—that’s up to 500 extra points.
Available to new customers who sign up by 3 September 2018 and make all payments by 31 October 2018. One offer per customer. Only one qualifying deal per week will collect the extra points. Additional payments in the same week will not receive extra points. Clubcard points will be added to a future Clubcard statement.
How does it work?
Head to the App Store or Google Play to download the PayQwiq app.
As soon as you’ve added your card details, you’ll be ready to shop using just your phone.
And there’s no need to worry about your bank details being stored on your phone—they’re all securely protected in our data centers. So not only is it quicker and easier, it’s safer too.
56. If customers use PayQwiq in UK Tesco stores, they can _____.
A. pay for their weekly shop without limit B. get Clubcard points automatically
C. budget their everyday spending D. win 500 extra points at a time
57. From the passage we can learn that _____.
A. users must sign up by 3 September 2018
B. users needn’t add their payment card information
C. PayQwiq can guarantee both convenience and safety
D. PayQwiq can be downloaded only from the App Store
58. What is the purpose of this passage?
A. To popularize the use of PayQwiq. B. To stress the importance of PayQwiq.
C. To describe the function of PayQwiq. D. To introduce the benefits of PayQwiq.
B
Traveling on an airplane can be a very tiring task even in the best of circumstances, which is why when Sophie Murphy boarded a recent flight from Sydney to Melbourne and noticed an “awful tension” in the cabin, she first thought it was caused by typical bad-tempered passengers. But as the flight neared its end, it became obvious that something was very wrong.
A teenage boy with Down syndrome (唐氏综合症) who was traveling with his family had become upset and would not return to his seat, regardless of the cabin crew’s warnings over the loudspeaker that it was almost time to land. The pilot was forced to circle above the airport, delaying the landing—and angering people on the already tense flight.
“If it was a cartoon,” remembered Murphy, “there would have been smoke coming out of people’s ears.”
As the boy’s elderly parents and adult brothers and sisters tried to persuade him to get off the floor and back into his seat, but in vain, Murphy, 42—who had been a teacher for more than 20 years—stood up and quickly headed to the back of the plane.
She found the boy in the passage between rows of seats, lying on his belly, and lay down on her stomach to face him. She began chatting calmly with him, asking his name, his favorite book, and his favorite characters. He told her he felt sick and she tried to comfort him.
Minutes later, he allowed her to hold his hand—and then together they got properly back into airplane seats. Murphy asked for sick bags, and held them as the boy threw up several times, including on her. As she helped him clean up, she repeatedly told him everything would be okay and that they’d get through it together.
After the plane was finally able to land, no one was impatient to step off the flight as one might expect. Instead, calmed passengers—obviously following Murphy’s amazing example—allowed the boy and his family to depart first, smiling at them as they passed. His parents tearfully thanked Murphy for what she had done, and a doctor sitting nearby also let her know he had even taken notes on her expert way of handling the situation.
59. The landing was delayed because _____.
A. a family ignored the warnings
B. a boy refused to sit in his seat
C. smoke was coming out of the engine
D. the pilot was forced to change the destination
60. Murphy successfully handled the “awful tension” by _____.
A. fighting against unfair treatment B. calling on other passengers to join her
C. communicating with the boy D. asking an experienced doctor to help
61. What changed the angry passengers’ attitude at last?
A. The boy’s improvement. B. The plane’s safe landing.
C. The crew’s behavior. D. The teacher’s efforts.
62. Which of the following words can best describe Murphy?
A. Generous and cautious. B. Patient and enthusiastic.
C. Wise and cooperative. D. Kind and cool-headed.
C
In some islands north of Scotland, head lice, which live on the hair or skin of people or animals, were a part of life. If the lice left their host, he became sick and feverish. Therefore, sick people had lice put in their hair intentionally. There was a method to their madness: As soon as the lice had settled in again, the patient improved. The story explains the confusion of cause and effect. If the lice leave the sick, it is because he has a fever and they simply get hot feet. When the fever breaks, they return. We may laugh at this story, but false causality misleads us practically every day.
Consider the headline: “Fact: Women Who Use Shampoo XYZ Every Day Have Stronger Hair.” This statement says very little—least of all, that the shampoo makes your hair stronger. It might simply be the other way round: Women with strong hair tend to use Shampoo XYZ—and perhaps that’s because it says “especially for thick hair” on the bottle.
A further example: Scientists found that long periods in the hospital did harm to patients. This was music to health insurers’ ears, who, of course, are keen to make stays as brief as possible. But, clearly, patients who are dismissed immediately are healthier than those who must stay on for treatment.
Recently I read that students get better grades at school if their homes contain a lot of books. This study was surely a shot in the arm for booksellers, but it is also an example of false causality. This simple truth is that educated parents tend to value their children’s education more than uneducated ones do. Plus, educated parents often have more books at home. In short, a dust-covered copy of War and Peace alone isn’t going to influence anyone’s grades; what counts is parents’ education levels, as well as their genes.
Another example of false causality was the supposed relationship between the birth rate and the numbers of stork (鹳) pairs in Germany. Both were in decline, and if you plot them on a graph, the two lines of development from 1965 to 1987 appeared almost the same. Does this mean the stork actually does bring babies? Obviously not, since this was a purely accidental connection.
In conclusion: Connection is not causality. Take a closer look at linked events: Sometimes what is presented as the cause turns out to be the effect, or just the other way around. And sometimes there is no link at all—just like with the storks and babies.
63. Which is an example of false causality?
A. Women with strong hair tend to use a certain shampoo.
B. Birth rate and the stork population are connected.
C. Longer periods in the hospital benefit patients.
D. Lice can make a person sick and feverish.
64. The underlined phrase “a shot in the arm” in Paragraph 4 means _____.
A. pain B. defeat C. guidance D. encouragement
65. According to the author, students get better grades probably because _____.
A. their homes are full of books
B. they have read War and Peace
C. their educated parents value education
D. their parents are successful booksellers
66. It can be concluded from the passage that _____.
A. connections are pure accidents
B. cause and effect are interdependent
C. connections are mostly cause and effect
D. linked events may turn out to be unrelated
D
Would you rather be an impressive employee in an ordinary firm, or land a role at the most well-known company in your industry?
The answer to that question might seem highly personal, based on factors like whether or not you are a competitive person and how much you enjoy a challenge. In fact, there’s another strong factor at play: People from different cultures react very differently to that question. The psychologists from the University of Michigan asked people theoretical questions about the decisions they take. Specifically, the researchers compared people with East Asian backgrounds and European American backgrounds. They found that Americans are much more likely to favor being a big fish in a small pond. East Asians, and specifically Chinese people, are much more likely than Americans to lean towards being a smaller fish in a bigger pond.
Researchers first asked 270 students at a large American university whether they would rather be a “big fish in a small pond” or the opposite. Of the students with East Asian American backgrounds, three quarters said they’d rather be a small fish, compared with just under 60% of students with European American backgrounds who said the same.
The researchers then compared American and Chinese adults. They asked the participants whether they would rather attend a top university but perform below average, and whether they would rather work for a top global company but do less well in comparison to their peers. Over half the Chinese adults chose the famous university, compared with just a third of Americans. In the case of the firms, well over half of people from both groups chose to do better at a less well-known firm, but Chinese people were still more likely to choose being a “small fish” than were Americans.
The final experiment sought to discover how American and Chinese people made judgments about whether they were succeeding. They found that Chinese people were more likely to compare their performance to the performance of people in other groups. Americans, meanwhile, were more likely to compare themselves to people within the same group, to judge whether or not they were doing well.
In East Asian cultures, it’s “not enough that you know you’re doing well in your school,” said Kaidi Wu, a PhD student in psychology who led the research. “It is much more important that other people—an outsider, a family relative, a future employer who has five seconds to glance through your resume—also recognize your academic excellence.”
America is the opposite: “Think about how many times themes like ‘You are your own person’ or ‘Stop worrying about what other people think’ course through song lyrics and self-help books,” Wu said, concluding: “The choices we make are the products of our culture.”
67. The psychologists from the University of Michigan find that _____.
A. Americans tend to achieve success in a big company
B. Chinese are likely to perform better in a big company
C. Americans prefer to shine in a relatively small company
D. Chinese are comfortable with working in a small company
68. The final experiment aims to _____.
A. compare different attitudes towards competition
B. find different views about personal success
C. judge performances of different groups
D. confirm which culture is better
69. A Chinese student will be more satisfied if he gains recognition from _____.
A. his neighbors B. his classmates C. his teachers D. his parents
70. According to Kaidi Wu, culture _____.
A. plays a key role in people’s choice making
B. shows who we grow up to be in the future
C. is the most important factor behind success
D. determines students’ academic performance
第二节(共5小题;每小题2分，共10分)
根据短文内容，从短文后的七个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。
Voluntourism
Volunteering to help people in need combined with travelling to faraway places is a new trend in the travel industry. It is called voluntourism. 71 They find it is the best way to get the best of the world.
Recent statistics show that in the past few years voluntourism has been one of the fastest-growing areas of tourism. More than 1.6 million people around the world are volunteers in other countries. They help build schools, assist in hospitals and do farming work in developing countries. 72 They keep in touch with their host families after they return home, and many return to visit.
There are many reasons why people want to engage in voluntourism. When people choose to join a voluntourism program, they are joining a global network of volunteers who are living and working with diverse cultures on projects that have a positive effect. The volunteers come from all over the world, and they will share the passion for giving back and the desire to broaden horizons. Some students also see it as a gap year after school, while others simply want to take time out from a job and do something else. 73 However, many voluntourists do not see volunteering as what it is. They think it is a cheap way of travelling and don’t really want to get involved in hard work.
While voluntourism has been around for over a century, modern volunteering started with the Peace Corps, a program that the US government started in the 1960s. From then on, voluntourism has become more and more popular. Many organizations start similar projects. 74 And they have hundreds of different types of programs for people to choose from in more than 30 developing countries. The programs run year round and each volunteer chooses when they want to start and the duration they would like to stay for.
75 They say that if people really want to help those in need, there are many opportunities in their own community to do this. On the other side, volunteers are often not skilled enough for the tasks that they do. Travel experts point out that in some cases voluntourists are often taken advantage of by the organization that sets up the trips.
A. Not everyone sees voluntourism in a positive way.
B. Some of them establish lasting bonds with people there.
C. And there are those who are bored and merely seek adventure.
D. Most voluntourism organizations employ people from similar fields.
E. By participating in voluntourism, they are contributing to local economy.
F. People travel to other countries, learn languages and gain new experiences.
G. They offer voluntourism trips to suit people’s interest, experience level or age.
第四部分：书面表达 (共两节，35分)
第一节(15分)
假设你是红星中学高三学生李华, 你的英国朋友George要来北京，其间他想参加中国传统文化方面的课程，来信希望你能推荐一个课程。请你给他回信，内容包括：
1. 你推荐的课程;
2. 该课程的内容;
3. 你推荐的理由。
注意： 1. 词数不少于50;
2. 开头和结尾已给出，不计入总词数。
Dear George,
Yours,
Li Hua
