备战2021年中考英语专题复习——任务型阅读 2（真题）

    Wake up, boys and girls! Put up your hand if you try to repair your tired body by sleeping in(睡懒觉)on weekends. A new study says the habit might not be a good idea for your health.

    The ten-day study came out in the magazine Current Biology. Volunteers were divided into three groups. The first group enjoyed nine hours' sleep each night. The second group was allowed to sleep only five hours each night. The third group was given five hours' sleep Monday through Friday.  But they were put back on the short sleep schedule the next Monday.

    Both the second and third groups ate more snacks at night and put on weight. They also saw a decrease (减少) in insulin sensitivity (胰岛素敏感性), a warning sign for diabetes (糖尿病). Researchers have long known a tack (缺乏) of sleep can increase health risks.

    "Even though people in the third group slept as much as they could on the weekend, it was not enough," said Dr Kenneth Wright, who led the study. "When they went back to the short sleep schedule the next week, their body failed to control blood sugar.

    So what should we do if sleeping in over the weekend is not a good choice?  Cut out the "sleep stealers" such as watching television shows or spending time on computers or mobile phones. Always remember. Getting enough sleep is as important as having good caring habits or doing exercise regularly.

    We all need a healthy environment, but we produce waste every day, and it is harmful to our environment. Repeat these three words daily: reduce, reuse and recycle.

    Reduce

    Reduce means "use less". Do not waste things. It saves money and causes less pollution. Do not order more food than you can finish. 当你不需要的时候就把灯关上。Before you buy something new, think whether it is really necessary because maybe the old one is just as good!

    Reuse

    Reuse means "use again". Use things for as long as possible. Look after them so that they will last. Repair them if possible. Do not throw them away and buy new ones. Do not use paper cups or paper bags.

    Recycle

    Recycle means "change things into something else to be reused". We throw tons of rubbish away each year, and we have to make a change. Divide your rubbish into plastic, glass, paper and rubber. Develop a recycling policy for the whole community. Buy products such as recycled paper to help save trees.

This 12-year-old Girl Built a Robot to Find Plastics in the Ocean

    Anna Du was walking along the beach when she noticed plastics there. She reached down to pick them up, and quickly realized there were many more tiny pieces than she could deal with. It seemed impossible to clean them all up.

    Du, 12 years old at the time, tried to solve the problem like any good scientist-first, by doing a little research. That's how she learned that 8 million tons of plastics end up in the oceans every year.

    Then she got to work building something that could help solve the problem; a remote-operated vehicle(遥控潜水器), or ROV. Her ROV can move through water and find plastics on the ocean floor.

    The actually cool part of Du's ROV is the detection(探测) system. She uses a camera along with three different kinds of light to find the plastics. She also uses visible(可见的) light to find unnatural colors that might make the plastics stand out.

    "She has a very good engineering sense to break down a problem like this and then go after it," says engineer Casey Machado. "It sounds simple, but it's a level of thinking that's really amazing."

    Du started attending public events and workshops at a university when she was five years old, and so she picked up the engineering skills necessary to build her ROV. She says actually getting her ROV to move through water well was not easy. She failed many times, but she never gave up trying and testing.

    When asked about future plans, she mentions wanting to address the effects of climate(气候) change. "I think there are a lot of problems that could be solved with new inventions," says Du.

    Du thanks her parents, who for years have taken her to student outreach activities, for supporting her interest in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). She says she has been able to meet students and scientists there.

    "I know I want to be an engineer because I like building things to help solve world problems," says Du. "But I'm not sure what kind of engineer I want to be yet."

    Too many people want others to be their friends, but they don't give friendship back. That is why some friendships don't last very long. You must learn to treat your friend the way you want your friend to treat you. Learning to be a good friend means learning three rules: be honest; be generous(慷慨的); be understanding.

    Honesty is where a good friendship starts. Friends must be able to trust one another. If you don't tell the truth, people usually find out. If a friend finds out that you haven't been honest，you may lose your friends trust.

    Generosity means sharing and sharing makes a friendship grow. You don't have to give your lunch money or your clothes, of course. Instead you have to learn how to share things you enjoy, your hobbies and interests. Naturally you will want to share your ideas and feelings. They tell your friend what is important to you. By sharing them you help your friend know you better.

    Sooner or later everyone needs understanding and help with a problem. Something may go wrong at school. Talking about the problem can make it easier to solve. So to be a friend you must listen and understand. You must try to put yourself in your friend's place so you can understand the problem better.

    But all true friendships have three things in common. If you plan to keep your friendships, you must practice honesty, generosity and understanding.

    Do you like playing basketball? If so, you must be very shocked and sad about the death of Kobe Bryant, a famous NBA basketball player. Kobe died in a helicopter (直升机) accident in California on January 26, 2020. Just three days before the accident, he sent out Chinese New Year wishes, and encouraged Chinese fans to live (实践)their dreams and dare to win.

    Bryant is a popular basketball player in China. On March17, 2019, Kobe Bryant visited a middle school in Shenzhen to meet students. At the school, he also shared his new sports novel.

    Kobe was known for trying the hardest to be the best. And he called it "Mamba Spirit". He once said, "Life is to short to get bogged down You have to keep moving.

    You have to keep going. "He retired from-basketball in 2016, but he still woke up before the sun rose to go training at 4:00 ar. From middle school to college, Bryant's stories went along with so many Chinese people and fired up their love for basketball "I grew up watching him play. Because of him, I began playing basketball, "one of his fans said. His excellent performance, strong will and continuing training made him a superhero among Chinese fans.

    Trees are one of the oldest "citizens" of our earth. They keep our air clean, reduce noise pollution, improve water quality and provide food and building materials.

    Just like us, trees change a lot as they grow. At 1 to 3 years old, young trees learn how to grow up safely. For example, many trees grow thorns to warn animals not to go near. Most young trees have large, deep green leaves so that they can catch enough sunlight and change it into their food and energy.

    When trees are 4 years old, they begin to grow very rapidly and become strong enough to face challenges later in life. At the age of 15, trees become young adults. They grow more slowly and begin to produce flowers and fruit.

    It is not until the tree is 20 to 25 years old that it becomes a real adult. The tree reaches its largest size. The adult tree gives us shade, oxygen and natural beauty. It is also a great place for a tree house, or a place for us to read a book, listen to music and so on. If we give the adult tree proper care, it will go on to live healthily for many years.

    Gradually, trees begin to grow older and older and even die. At this time, they still have their important place in nature. When a tree becomes hollow or part of it becomes dead, it provides a home for small animals and is a source of food for many other animals.

    In many ways, the life of a tree is similar to our own life experience. When we are looking at the life of a tree, we learn that each period of life brings its own form of joy and challenge. Enjoy every minute of the life of the trees and look after the trees!

Theof a Tree

Why Live Near the River?

    Imagine pioneers traveling west in the 1800s. In those days, it was hard to find running water and shops where to buy things. As time went by, most pioneers had to make their homes near a river so that they could get water easily.

    How did rivers help people live in the past?

    Back in the pioneer days, people grew their own food, caught their own fish, and collected their own water. People also used rivers as roads, traveling on boats. Traders shipped goods (货物) to people from other areas.

    When building many factories right next to rivers for the water's power to make machines work, some people choose to live near a river for working. They use the river to ship large goods, and some of them work at these fctories where power factories provide electricity to homes and businesses.

    Who wouldn't want to live near a river?

    Some people are nervous about living near rivers because rivers can cause floods (洪水). Every

once in a while, floodwaters rise higher than a house, ruining (泡坏) many things in the house.

    Such waste causes water to smell bad and pollutes the crops (庄稼) we eat. Water and crops in polluted areas can make people very sick.

    How do people decide where to live?

    Rivers can provide jobs and fun activities in a beautiful place. However, those living by rivers should be willing to accept possible problems as well.

    You've been learning words since you were a tiny baby. At first, you learned them only by hearing other people talk. Now that you're a reader, you have another way to learn words. What should you do when you come to a word and you think you don't know what it means?

Say it

    First, sound it out. Then say it to yourself.. Sometimes you know a word in your head but you don't know what it looks like in print. So if you match up what you know and what you read - you have the word!

Use context

    If this doesn't work, take the next step: look at the context - the other words and sentences around it. Read this sentence: When it rained, the dog looked for shelter in the doorway. . Rain and in the doorway might give you helpful information.

    If the context doesn't help, look at the parts of the word. Does it have any parts you know? These can help you understand what it means. If you don't know the meaning of miner, try looking at parts of the word. You might know that a mine is a place underground where people get coal and other valuable things. A lot of times, -er at the end of a word means “a person who does something”. So a miner might be someone who works in a mine.

Look it up

    If the three steps above don't work, you can look it up. .- either a book or online. Nobody knows the meaning of every word, but good readers know how to understand words they don't know.

A. Use word parts

B. Look at the words

C. It might sound like a word you know

D. You can find the word in a dictionary

E. Following some easy steps can help you

F. If the word shelter doesn't look familiar, look at the words around it

    In recent years, with the development of technology, many popular apps (应用程序) have been produced. These days, an app has caught great attention. It is Douyin, a video sharing app. Douyin first appeared in 2016. Now it is many people's favorite app, especially the young.

    With Douyin, users can record videos, edit (编辑) them and share them online. It is very easy and interesting. We can share our videos with our friends with just a tap on the mobile phone screen. What's more, it's a great way to spend our free time by looking through those funny videos.

    However, every coin has two sides. The app also has bad things. On the one hand, some people spend long hours on the app, which is harmful to their health. On the other hand, users can also find some bad things on the app. Such thing is unhealthy and unsuitable.

    In my opinion, Douyin should check the videos before they are uploaded (上传) in order to keep a healthy environment for its users. Douyin is not good for teenagers. We should not use it too often.

    Nirmal Purja has set several world records after climbing the world's 14 highest mountains in less than seven months.

     Though he was born 1, 600 meters above sea level, he didn't climb any serious mountains until he was 29.

    But Mr. Purja, now 36, was trained to be strong. He used to be a soldier in the British army, where he had special training for fighting in very cold weather.  

    There are only14 mountains in the world that are higher than8,000 meters. Mr. Purja had already climbed several of them.  The old record for climbing the 14 mountains was seven years, ten months and six days. It was set by South Korean climber Kim Chang-ho in 2013.

    Mr. Purja named his challenge "Project Possible".  On October 29, just a little more than six months after he started, Nirmal Purja had finished climbing the 14th mountain.

    Though Mr. Purja completed his challenge unbelievably quickly, it wasn't easy. For example, during one day of climbing Shishapangma Mr. Purja and his team climbed for 15 hours nonstop.

A. Mr. Purja was born in Nepal, in the Himalayas.

B. He had completed five more climbs in Pakistan.

C. He began on April 23, by climbing Annapurna in Nepal

D. His goal was to climb all of them in less than seven months.

E. They had to deal with winds as fast as 75 kilometers per hour.

F. In 2018, he left there to follow his dream of mountain climbing.

    Do you know what your friends watched on TV last night? Do your friends know what you had for breakfast today? Do you think you are using social media (社交媒体) too much?

    It is reported that around 2,800 million people often use social media. That's almost 40 percent of the world's population. But how much time do we really spend on social media? And what exactly do we spend that time doing?

    Research shows that, worldwide, the average (普通的) person spends two hours and 19 minutes on social media each day.  An average person there spends four hours and 17 minutes a day on social media. Research also shows that women use social media more than men. In the United States, for example, women spend around two hours more a week than men on social media.

    In general, it seems we spend more time looking at other people's pages than adding to our own. According to one survey, the most common social media activities are visiting friends' pages, reading their news, and commenting (评论) on their posts.

    It has over 2,000 million users. In second place, however, is the Chinese site Qzone. In 2017, Qzone was China's most popular social media site, with around 600 million users worldwide. That's more than Twitter and Instagram.

    Social media continues to grow.  And as Internet access (通道) becomes available to even more people around the world, this growth won't stop anytime soon.

A. What do most people do on social media?

B. Why do people communicate on social media?

C. People in Philippines are the most active users.

D. The most popular social media site is Facebook.

E. On Facebook, people post their news and photos.

F. Right now, there are 5 new Facebook users every second.

G. Social media is now a part of many people's everyday lives.

    It seems to me that families used to eat more meals together. There's often a TV nearby，or someone's talking on a cell phone or texting during dinner.

     We'd wait for everyone to get home, and then we'd all sit down together. During dinnertime conversation, everyone had a chance to talk. Back then, I was a little quiet, so my dad would often ask me to talk about my day.

    Speaking of taking turns，all of us kids used to take part in either preparing the meal or cleaning up. Sometimes my mom would let me help her in the kitchen. We'd always have fresh food - no fast food or take out.

    Now，I won't pretend (假装) our mealtimes were completely perfect. We used to fight all the time, and sometimes kick each other under the table. Nobody knew exactly what" or else" meant, but we didn't want to risk finding out.

    These days, it seems like families have little time together, especially at mealtimes. However, I wonder if those families know what they're missing.

Air Jordan (飞人乔丹) shoes are very popular and expensive. The first Air Jordan shoes were made in 1985. The next Air Jordan shoes came out in 1986. These shoes were special for basketball shoes, because they were made in Italy in 1990, which gave them a luxury (奢侈的) feel. Two years later, the third Air Jordan shoes were produced.

If you want to make your shoes look new, first, get out a toothbrush and some cleaning oil. Second, spray (喷) the oil on the shoes. Third, wash the dirt off with the toothbrush repeatedly while you are scrubbing (擦) . Finally scrub the shoes with a paper towel or clean cloth If you did a good job, your shoes should look as nice as when you first got them.

If you go to a dance party, you'll need to wear dress shoes. However, wearing dress shoes for a few minutes can be really painful. To solve the problem, you can bring a box of band-aids (创口贴) with you. When your feet hurt, put on those band-aids. The band-aids will create something that will reduce pain.

When playing golf and bowling (保龄球) , people need to wear special shoes. Golf shoes have sharp metal spikes (鞋钉) , while bowling shoes have almost no spikes a tall Both these shoes help players perform. Besides looking silly golf shoes and bowling shoes do not have soles (鞋底) that are fit for street use.

Are you wearing shoes? Why? People wear shoes for many reasons. The fist and most important reason is to protect their feet. Shoes keep people from hurting their feet while walking on hard roads. Some people wear special shoes designed to help them play a game. Some people wear expensive shoes to look fashionable. And a lot of other people wear shoes so that their feet won't stink (发臭) up the room.

    Long ago, as people got older, there was something wrong with their teeth and it would be very painful.

    Later people learned that cleaning their teeth was important, but they didn't have toothpaste(牙膏) at that time.

    About 100 years ago someone finally created a kind of cream to clean teeth. Not long after that, the toothpaste tube (管子) was invented, so people could press the toothpaste right onto the toothbrush! The army gave brushes and toothpaste to all the soldiers, and they learned to brush teeth twice a day. At that time toothpaste tubes were made of metal.

    Today there are plenty of toothpaste choices; lots of colors and tastes to choose from, and some kinds of toothpaste are made just for children. When you're choosing a kind of toothpaste, make sure it has fluoride (氟化物). When you brush your teeth, you don't need a lot of toothpaste: just press out a bit.