广东省广州市增城市2020-2021学年八年级上学期英语期中考试

A few years ago, I took a sightseeing trip to London. I saw many of our nation's treasures. Standing on the Oxford Street, I heard a voice1 , “Can you help me?” When I turned around, I saw 2 elderly blind woman with her hand extended. I was annoyed because I was troubled by a beggar. However, I still gave her all my change but without3 at her. But the blind woman smiled and said, “I don't want your money. I just hope you4help me find the post office.”

In a second, I realized what I had done. I'd judged a person5by what I supposed she had to be. I hated6I saw about myself. I believed that I never looked down upon others,7 I'd lost that belief for a moment.

Actually, I was not a local person and came from 8 poor country. I 9 my hometown and arrived in Britain at the age of fifteen. I started my new life 10 two suitcases, my brother, my sister and a strong mother. Through the years, I had been a dish washer, mechanic, cashier and done11 other different jobs. Finally, I became a network engineer.

So far, in my own life, I have experienced many acts of being looked down upon by others. When I was seventeen, I worked as a busboy (餐厅打杂工). Once, a father told his little boy,” If you do not do well in school, you 12 up like him.” It really made me sad at that time.

But now, living my Britain middle-class lifestyle, I feel it too 13to forget my past. That blind woman dealt with14 blindness successfully. She reminded me of my belief on never looking down upon others and always keeping my eyes and heart open.15 priceless lesson she gave me!

There was a hard-working student called Nancy. She spent plenty of time on her 1. She studied so hard that she became ill. She couldn't go to sleep at night. So when she 2 the next morning, she felt very tired. She couldn't listen to the teachers carefully and she even did 3in the tests.

Finally, Nancy went to see a doctor. After 4 Nancy's words, the doctor said, “You are too stressed out (紧张的). You must eat more5food like fruit and vegetables. Besides, you can try to 6 numbers when you are staying in bed. By the time you count to one thousand, you will be 7I'm sure of it.”

The next day, Nancy came to the hospital again. “Well,” said the doctor. “How are you8today?

Nancy still looked 9. “The same as before,” she said. “I tried to count one, two, three, four.. up to one thousand. But when I counted to five hundred and sixty, I feel sleepy (困倦的). I had to get up and drink some 10so that I could go on counting up to one thousand. But then I still couldn't be asleep.”

A young man wanted to find a job. He went into the company Microsoft. The manager of the company asked him some questions and then watched him cleaning the floor as a test.

“You are in,” he said. “Give me your e-mail address and I'll send you the information you need to write down, as well as date when you may start.”

The man replied, “But I don't have a computer, neither an e-mail.”

“I'm sorry,” said the manager.” If you don't have an e-mail, you are not living in the world. So you cannot have the job.”

The man left with no hope at all, He didn't know what to do with only ten dollars in his pocket. He then decided to go to the supermarket and buy 10 kg tomatoes. He then sold the tomatoes from door to door. In less than two hours, he doubled his money. He continued to do it a few times, and returned home happily with 60 dollars.

The man realized that he could live in this way. Then he started to go every day earlier, and return late. So his money doubled and doubled every day. In a short time, he bought a cart (手推车), then a truck, and then he had his own team. Five years later, the man is one of the biggest food retailers (销售商) in the US.

One day the man was having a talk with a businessman.

When the conversation finished, the businessman asked him his e-mail. The man replied, “I don't have an e-mail.”

The businessman answered surprisedly, “You don't have an e-mail, and yet have done such a successful job. Can you imagine what you could have been if you had an e-mail?” The man thought for a while and replied, “Yes, I'd be an office boy at Microsoft!”

Yang Luoshu, a 92-year-old man from Shandong Province, is among those who show a great love woodblock (木板) painting. Yang has worked as a craftsman (工匠) for 77 years, always practising his carving (雕刻) skills.

“When I was young, I often saw my father carving, and I was curious (好奇的) about it,” Yang said. “One day, my father went out for a while. I quickly took up his knife and carved on a woodblock. That was my first carving experience.” Since then, Yang has carved different kinds, including flowers, birds, mountains, rivers and traditional Chinese gods. “Though carving is hard in general, carving gods is especially difficult, for their lively facial expressions. Still, I can manage it.” Yang said confidently, and he also got a prize as a master in 2010.

Being the 19^th generation (代) painter in the family, Yang runs a century-old family. workshop, and he is now working with a group of experienced craftsmen. They make around 150,000 New Year paintings every year, which are not only sold in China, but also in other countries such as the USA, Singapore and Japan.

Yang Luoshu loves Yangjiabu New Year woodblock painting very much. It appeared during the Ming Dynasty around 600 years ago. It is now one of China's three important traditional paintings for the New Year, together with Tianjin's Yangliuqing and Suzhou's Taohuawu. “I want to keep this alive.” Yang said. For Yang, the next thing to do is to find good successors (继承人) to make sure the skills are passed down to younger generations.

It's a sad story: someone keeps failing an exam for four years. It's the story of Torobo, a robot from Japan.

Torobo has been tying to enter the University of Tokyo in Japan. The university, also called Todai, is one of Asia's top universities. Since 2013, Torobo has taken the national college entrance exam with other Japanese students. However, the robot has failed to get the required (必需的) scores for Todai every year. This year was no exception (例外).

Torobo is part of a project called “Can a Robot Get into the University of Tokyo?” Japan's National Institute of Informatics started the project in 2011. Torobo does not walk around. It is a robot brain that has arms to complete the test.

Researchers of the project want to find out what intellectual abilities (智能) will be replaced by machines. Results show that Torobo has grown in ability year by year. This year it got a score higher than Japan's national average (平均分), which is enough to enter other good universities, but not Todai. With its big database (数据库), Torobo is good at solving knowledge-based questions and mathematical calculations. That's why it got good scores in physics, history and math. But Torobo has a hard time thinking independently. As a result, it got weak scores in language and writing.

Luckily, after four years of suffering, researchers have decided to free Torobo from taking the test. They will improve Torobo's ability in the fields it's doing well in, so that it can be used in those industries (工业) in the future.

So although Torobo will never graduate from Todai, it can still expect to have a bright future!

Canada displays musical talent at festivals right across the county all year round. These four Canada music festivals offer great live music. Don't miss them!

There are seven music festivals in Canada. 1f you want to know more about them you can click the website: http://gocanada.about.com.

There was once a man called Mr. Flowers, and flowers were his only joy in life. He spent all his free time in taking care of his glass houses and grew flowers of every color, with long and difficult names, for competitions. He tried to grow a rose of a new color to win the silver cup for the Year of the Rose.

Boys often threw stones at Mr. Flowers' glass houses. So Mr. Flowers did his best to be in or near his glass houses at the beginning and end of the school day.

Mr. Flowers had tried many ways to protect his glass houses, but they didn't work. He had been to school to report to the headmaster, but this had not done any good, either. But they could run faster than him and laughed at him from far away. He had even picked up all the stones that he could find around his garden so that the boys would have nothing to throw, but they soon found some from somewhere else.

At last, Mr. Flowers had a good idea. A He had written the words on it: DO NOT THROW STONES AT THIS NOTICE. After this, Mr. Flowers had no similar trouble again.

I have to tell you.

It's important to your family.

This kind of living things years ago.

Mozart was one of in the 18^th century.

We've got we need.

The heavy rain part in the competition.

We are you again in Guangzhou.

1）小 (与英语书一样大小)、轻、方便、实用；

2）能装书，能与人交流，能唱歌跳舞，还可以查询信息；

3）每天提醒我按时起床和睡觉；

4）我喜欢这个发明的原因  (请你补充至少一个原因。)

注意：1）参考词汇：practical  实用；communicate with  交流；search for  查询；

remind sb. to do  提醒某人做……

2）词数80词左右(短文的开头已给出，不计入词数)；

3）不得透露学校、姓名等任何个人信息，否则不予评分。

My invention —a super schoolbag

My invention is a super schoolbag.