When two Bangs meet
Sheldon Cooper is a scientific genius on the popular American TV show, The Big Bang Theory (《生活大爆炸》). He finally met his match last year: Stephen Hawking.
This is not the first time that the scientist has appeared on TV. He has also been on Star Trek (in 1987) and The Simpsons (in 1989). Each time, he played himself.
Hawking, 71, is perhaps the world’s most famous scientist after Albert Einstein. He has spent his whole life studying the beginning and the end of the universe, including the Big Bang (宇宙大爆炸) theory.
The Big Bang theory explains the early development of the universe. According to the theory, about 13.7 billion years ago everything was all squeezed （挤压）together in a tiny, tight little ball, and then the ball exploded. The results of that explosion are what we call the universe.
Hawking has always tried to make science more popular with people. His book: A Brief History of Time was published in 1988. In the book he shares his understanding of the universe in simple language. The book tries to explain many subjects about the universe to common readers, including the Big Bang, black holes and light cones (光锥).
Hawking’s achievements are even greater if you think about his disability. When he was 21, Hawking caught a bad illness that slowly stopped him from moving or talking. Now he sits on a wheelchair with a computer by his side. To communicate, he moves two fingers to control the computer’s mouse. He chooses his words from the screen, which are then spoken by a voice synthesizer (合成器).
Hawking also believes that there might be aliens in space. However, he believes they are probably very dangerous, so we should not look for them. “I imagine they might exist in very big ships ... having used up all the resources from their home planet,” Hawking said in a British documentary（纪录片） named Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking. What does the “two Bangs” in the title refer to?
| A．The director of “The Big Bang Theory” and the founder of it. |
| B．The director and the actor of “The Big Bang Theory”. |
| C．The founder of the “Big Bang” theory and its spreader. |
| D．The scientific genius on TV show and the one alive in real life. |
Acting in The Big Bang Theory is Hawking’s _____ time on TV.
| A．first | B．second | C．third | D．fourth |
According to Paragraph 5, Hawking wrote the book A Brief History of Time especially for _____.
| A．scientists who study the universe |
| B．people who know a lot about the universe |
| C．people who know little about the universe |
| D．people who only know simple language |
The Big Bang theory mainly explains _____.
| A．how the universe started | B．what the universe is like |
| C．how old the universe is | D．how the universe exploded |
According to the passage, which of the following about Hawking is TRUE?
| A．He was born with a disability. |
| B．He uses a computer to communicate. |
| C．He believes aliens are our friends. |
| D．He encourages people to look for aliens. |
Getting close to active or erupting volcanoes can be dangerous. But for Michael Rampino, it’s all in a day’s work. Rampino is a volcanologist, a scientist who studies volcanoes and how they affect our planet. Rampino has been close to red-hot lava flows (熔岩流) in Hawaii and explosive volcanoes in Indonesia. He knows when to get close to an active volcano and when to back away.
Rampino wasn’t always a volcanologist. He worked for NASA for seven years. He studied rocks until he began to research climate change and the effects that volcanoes have on climate. He became interested in the subject. “Once I started working with volcanoes,” Rampino said, “I was hooked.”
Rampino is a professor at New York University. As part of his job, he travels to areas where volcanoes have been active. “Active” means they have erupted within the past few centuries and probably will erupt again. Rampino studies the deposits (沉积物) of ash and other materials from the eruptions. The ash may hold clues to what happened to the Earth in the distant past. It may also help scientists predict what could happen to Earth’s climate in the future.
Rampino doesn’t work alone. He works with a team of scientists who use computers to stimulate (模拟) the effects volcanoes have on Earth’s atmosphere.
Being a volcanologist may be hard work, but it’s also fun. “It’s cool traveling the world studying volcanoes,” Rampino says. When he talks to students about his work, he tells them that his goal is “to understand the events that have shaped Earth’s history.”To Rampino, being close to active volcanoes is _____.
| A．adventurous but meaningful |
| B．scary but necessary |
| C．impossible and unnecessary |
| D．dangerous but urgent |
The underlined word “hooked” in Paragraph 2 probably means “_____”.
| A．trapped | B．touched | C．frightened | D．attracted |
Rampino’s study on volcanoes might help _____.
| A．warn people to protect the environment |
| B．support the study of Earth’s future climate |
| C．tell the future eruption time of the volcanoes |
| D．reduce the possibility of the volcanoes’ eruptions |
In which part of a newspaper could we find this text?
| A．Climate. | B．History. | C．People. | D．Business. |
What would you do if Martians (火星人) kidnapped (绑架) your mom? In the 3-D animated movie Mars Needs Moms, a young boy named Milo finds himself in this exact difficult situation. The aliens want to steal Milo’s mother’s “momness” for their own young. Now it’s up to the 9-year-old to get his mom back before she is lost forever.
Every good action movie has a bad guy. The villain (反派角色) in this film is the Martian Supervisor, played by Mindy Sterling. The Supervisor has an icy cold heart. Remarkably, Sterling acted out almost all of her scenes in a special Martian language created just for the movie. “Learning Martian was a piece of cake,” Sterling said. “There wasn’t too much to learn; sometimes, I just made it up!”
Anyone who has a mother will be moved by this movie. In fact, anyone who loves someone will be moved by this movie. Maybe it is because the story was inspired by a real-life event. The movie is based on a novel by prize-winning cartoonist Berkeley Breathed. He wrote the book after a dinner-table incident between his wife and son, who was then 4 years old. That night, Breathed’s son had thrown his broccoli into the air and rushed out of the room angrily, yelling at his mother on the way out. Breathed told his son, “You might think differently about your mom if she were kidnapped by Martians.” He wrote the novel that same evening.
All kids get into arguments with their parents. The fights may be about homework, chores or eating vegetables. Mars Needs Moms tells us to look past these silly disagreements and to remember the importance of family and the things that really matter.In the movie Mars Needs Moms the aliens want to _____.
| A．kill Milo’s mother |
| B．take Milo as their kid |
| C．make Milo’s mother their kids’ mom |
| D．send their kids to Milo’s family |
To Mindy Sterling, learning Martian language is _____.
| A．simple | B．difficult | C．interesting | D．unacceptable |
What made Breathed write the novel?
| A．The movie producer’s idea. |
| B．His wife’s inspiration and help. |
| C．His good relationship with his mother. |
| D．His son’s bad behavior toward his mother. |
In the last paragraph the author wants to _____.
| A．advise children to help with the housework |
| B．encourage readers to learn something from the movie |
| C．stress the importance of doing something different |
| D．ask parents to be good teachers of their children |
Melbourne Zoo’s Close-up Visits will bring you face to face with some of our zoo’s most popular animals.
Each experience includes a 6×8 photograph, taken by one of our professional photographers, to help you keep the memory of your visit to Melbourne Zoo.
Please note: The price of a Close-up Visits ticket does not include entry to Melbourne Zoo.
Meerkat Close-up
| Price per person |
$30 |
| Max group size |
4 people |
| Restrictions (限制) |
Minimum age: 5. Children aged 5 to 12 must be accompanied by a paying adult |
| Time |
11:30 am |
Big Tortoise Close-up
| Price per person |
$15 |
| Max group size |
4 people |
| Restrictions |
Children under 12 must be accompanied by a paying adult |
| Time |
11:00 am |
Giraffe Close-up
| Price per person |
$30 |
| Max group size |
6 people |
| Restrictions |
Minimum age: 5. Children aged 5 to 12 must be accompanied by a paying adult |
| Time |
11:30 am |
Kangaroo Close-up
| Price per person |
$30 for up to 2 people |
| Max group size |
4 people |
| Restrictions |
Children under 12 must be accompanied by a paying adult |
| Time |
2:00 pm |
Bookings Information
● Bookings can be made by calling Zoo Photos on 0392859406.
● Bookings can be made on the day by visiting Zoo Photos from 9:30 am.
● A Zoo Photo Animal Experience does not include entry to Melbourne Zoo.
Terms and Conditions
● Group size and restrictions are needed to pay attention to.
● The photographer have the right to stop any experience at any time for reasons relating to animals’ health or visitors’ bad behavior.If you buy a ticket for Melbourne Zoo’s Close-up Visits, you _____.
| A．can enter Melbourne Zoo for free |
| B．are asked to work for the wildlife |
| C．can have a photo of yourself taken |
| D．aren’t allowed to meet animals face to face |
If you are free in the afternoon, you may choose to see _____.
| A．kangaroos | B．giraffes | C．big tortoises | D．meerkats |
Giraffe Close-up is different from Meerkat Close-up in _____.
| A．price | B．max group size | C．restrictions | D．time |
What do we know from the passage?
| A．You can make a booking from 9 in the morning. |
| B．Children of all ages can visit the animals in the zoo. |
| C．The photographer has the right to deal with your photos. |
| D．You may be forced to leave the zoo if you behave badly. |
Melissa Poe was 9 years old when she began a campaign for a cleaner environment by writing a letter to the then President Bush. Through her own efforts, her letter was reproduced on over 250 donated ( 捐赠) billboards (广告牌) across the country.
The response to her request for help was so huge that Poe established Kids For A Cleaner Environment (Kids F. A. C. E.) in 1989. There are now 300,000 members of Kids F.A.C.E. worldwide and it is the world’s largest youth environmental organization.
Poe has also asked the National Park Service to carry out a “Children’s Forest” project in every national park. In 1992, she was invited as one of only six children in the world to speak at the Earth Summit in Brazil as part of the Voices of the Future Program. In 1993, she was given a Caring Award for her efforts by the Caring Institute.
Since the organization started, Kids F.A.C.E. members have distributed and planted over 1 million trees! Ongoing tree-planting projects include Kids’ Yards — the creation of backyard wildlife habitats (栖息地) and now Kids F.A.C.E. is involved in the exciting Earth Odyssey, which is a great way to start helping.
“We try to tell kids that it’s not OK to be lazy,” she explains. “You need to start being a responsible (负责任的) , environmentally friendly person now, right away, before you become a resource-sucking adult.” Kids F.A.C.E. is __________.
A. a program to help students with writing
B. a project of litter recycling
C. a campaign launched by President Bush
D. a club of environmental protection What can we learn about Poe?
| A．She was awarded a prize in Brazil. |
| B．She donated billboards across the country. |
| C．She got positive responses for her efforts. |
| D．She joined the National Park Service. |
Kid’s Yards is ____________.
| A．established in national park |
| B．started to protect wildlife |
| C．a wildlife-raising project |
| D．an environment park for kids |
Which of the following can be inferred from the text?
A. Adults are resources –sucking people.
B. Poe sought help from a youth organization
C. Kids F.A.C.E. members are from the U.S.
D. Kids are urged to save natural resources. Poe was a girl aged _____when she began a campaign for a cleaner environment
by writing a letter to the then President Bush.
| A．nine | B．nineteen | C．eight | D．Fifteen |
An increase in students applying to study economics (经济学) at university is being attributed to （归因于）the global economic crisis (危机) awakening a public thirst for knowledge about how the financial system works.
Applications for degree courses beginning this autumn were up by 15% this January, according to UCAS, the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service. A spokesman for the Royal Economic Society said applications to do economics at A-level were also up.
Professor John Beath, the president of the society and a leading lecture at St Andrews University, said his first-year lectures which are open to students from all departments—were drawing crowds of 400, rather than the usual 250.
“There are a large number of students who are not economics majors, who would like to learn something about it. One of the things I have done this year is to relate my teaching to contemporary events in a way that one hasn’t traditionally done. ” He added.
University applications rose 70% last year. But there were rises above average in several subjects. Nursing saw a 15% jump, with people’s renewed interest in careers in the pubic sector（部门）, which are seen as more secure in economic crisis.
A recent study showed almost two thirds of parents believed schools should do more to teach pupils about financial matters, and almost half said their children had asked them what was going on, although a minority of parents felt they did not understand it themselves well enough to explain.
Zack Hocking, the head of Child Trust Funds, said: “It’s possible that one good thing to arise from the downturn will be a generation that’s financially wiser and better equipped (使…有能力) to manage their money through times of economic uncertainty.” Professor John Beath’s lectures are.
| A．given in a traditional way |
| B．connected with the present situation |
| C．open to both students and their parents |
| D．warmly received by economics |
Careers in the public sector are more attractive because of their.
| A．greater stability | B．higher pay |
| C．fewer applications | D．better reputation |
In the opinion of most parents , .
| A．economics should be the focus of school teaching |
| B．more students should be admitted to universities |
| C．the teaching of financial matters should be strengthened. |
| D．children should solve financial problems themselves |
According to Hocking , the global economic crisis might make the youngsters_____.
| A．wiser in money management |
| B．have access to better equipment |
| C．confident about their future careers |
| D．get jobs in Child Trust Funds |
What’s the main idea of the text?
| A．Universities have received more applications. |
| B．Economics is attracting an increasing number of students |
| C．college students benefit a lot from economic uncertainty |
| D．parents are concerned with children’s subject selection. |