Robots in class

    Over 600,000 children in the United States spend their long time in hospital each year．Many of them say that they have difficult in returning to school after hospital stays．Thanks to technology，kids who are sick in the hospital no longer have to miss time in the classroom．

    A program called PEBBLES makes it possible for kids in hospital to take part in classroom discussions by using robot．PEBBLES(Providing Education by Bringing Environments to Students)supplies robots to help kids who are staying in hospital keep up with their classmates．

    For Achim Nurse，a 13-yers-old patient at Blythedale Children’s Hospital in Valhalla，New York，PEBBLES helped him so much．When he first learned about the program，he wasn’t so sure it would work．    

   “When I first saw it，it looked difficult，”said Achim．

    However，after 30 minutes of working with the robot，Achim discovered that he had gotten good at operating it．

    The robots work in pairs—一one in the hospital with the student，the other in the classroom．

    The robot in the classroom gives the student in the hospital a feel of“tele-presence．”A live picture of the students is shown on a video screen in the classroom．Meanwhile，in the hospital room，the student knows clear about what is going on in the classroom．

    The robot at the school has four wheels．so it can move around from class to class．Its“face” is an auto-focus(可以自动调焦的)camera．By using a control box，the student call turn the robot’s head，raise its hand，and adjust the volume(音量)．It is even equipped with a scanner(扫描器)and printer，so if the teacher want to have an exercise or testing class，the student can participate from the hospital．

   “The robot is greeted by students in the classroom．It is also greeted by the sick student。”said Andrew Summa，national director of the robot project．

根据短文内容完成下面各题。

1．Try to use the phrase underlined in the first paragraph to make a sentence．

2．Guess the Chinese meaning of“keep up with”．

3．The robot is greeted by students in the classroom．It is also greeted by the student in the hospital．(改写为同义句)

4．According to the passage，we can know that____

  A．We can operate this kind of robot easily．   

  B．the student in hospital cannot adjust the volume by using control box．

  C．The teacher wants to have a test in the class now. Although the student in the hospital has this kind of robot，he also cannot participate it．

5．What do you think of the robot project in the United States? Do you think it can help sick students? What do you think are its limitations?

The spider (蜘蛛) is very little and clever. Its body is made up of two parts. It has four pairs of legs and eight little eyes.

The spider loves work. It begins to work as soon as it begins to live. Every spider is a weaver. Even the youngest spider knows how to weave (编织) its web (网) just as well as the oldest.

The silk of which it makes its web comes from its body. It is like hairs. Many of these hairs come out at the same time, but they are all formed into one rope of silk. It is so thin that a hundred of them together are only as thick as a human hair.

First the spider fasten (固定) one end of the silk thread (丝线) to a leaf or to a piece of wood, then it turns and fastens it to the other end.

When the spider fastens both ends, it can run down the silk and fix some more threads. These are the cross ropes of the web. Then it weaves other lines round them, and makes about twenty rings.

Then spider works hard and fast, and it finishes its work in less than an hour. The web is then so strong that the wind cannot blow it away and the rain cannot break it. The purpose (目的) of the spider’s web is to catch insects (昆虫), which are its food.

Insects cannot walk or fly out of the web, because the spider covers it all with something like glue (胶水), which sticks to (粘) anything that touches the web and holds it fast (牢固).

Not all the spiders are the same sort of work to do.

Some spiders are masons(泥瓦匠). They build houses the size of a big thimble (顶针). They make doors in them, which they shut after them when they go in. They can even fasten the door of the house from the inside, so that no robber can get in.

The garden spider lets thread float in the air till they stick to plants or to the branches of trees. It then uses these threads as the roads or bridges to cross from one place to another. 

1. What is the spider’s silk like?

A. It’s very thin. One hundred of them are as thin as a human hair.

B. It’s very strong. It is made of human’s hair.

C. It’s really like human hair and it’s as thin as human’s hair.

D. It’s no color and it is a strong line just like human’s hair.

2. While the spider makes its web,         .

A. first it makes a leaf or a piece of wood

B. first it fixes one end of the silk thread firmly to a leaf or a piece of wood

C. first it fixes one end of the silk thread to its own head

D. first it fixes human’s hair to a leaf or a piece of wood. Then makes a web along the air

3. The spider makes about          rings.

A. thirty        B. a hundred        C. fifty         D. twenty

4. The spider finishes its work         .

A. more than a day                  B. in less than an hour

C. in a week                        D. in half an hour

5. Which of the following is true?

A. All the spiders are masons.

B. The garden spider lets thread float in the air to catch insects.

C. The silk of which makes its web comes from human’s hair.

D. The spider is both little and clever.

Concorde’s Birthday
CONCORDE, the world’s fastest passenger plane, will soon be over 33 years old. It first __1__ on 2 March 1969 in France. Concorde was developed by both France and Britain. From 1956 these two countries had a _2__ of a supersonic passenger plane. In 1962 they started to __3__ together on the project. The plane __4_ over 1.5 billion pounds to develop. It is the most tested plane in the history. It was given over 5000 hours of testing. Concorde flies at twice the speed of _5__. This means that it _6_ only 3 hours 25 minutes to fly between London and New York, compare with 7—8 hours in other passenger jets. Because of the five-hour time difference between the USA and Britain, it is _7__ to travel west on Concorde and arrive in New York before you leave London! You can catch the 10:30a.m. _8__ from London, Heathrow and start work in New York an hour _9_! Concorde is much used by business people and film stars. Each Concorde is built at a cost of 55 million pounds. Twenty have been built so far. Air France and British Airway _10_ the most. They each have seven planes.

补全对话（共5小题，每小题2分，满分10分）

根据语境，用恰当的语言完成对话。

—Excuse me. Who is your best pen pal, Jack?

—I have many pen pals. Mary is my favorite?

—1_________________________________

—She is very beautiful, and she has long curly blond hair.

—2__________________________________

—She comes from the USA.

—3____________________

—She speaks English and Chinese. And she speaks Chinese very well.

—Really? How great! Is she a student?

—Sure. We are studying in the same grade, grade eight.

—4. ______________________

—She says she wants to be a teacher. And she wants to work in China as an

English teacher.

—Maybe she can help me a lot with my English. Today it is very hot.

5.___________________

— I think it is not hot in USA. Mary often tells me it is warm there.

—Thank you for telling me so much about your pen pal.

—You are welcome.