Our room was on the second floor but you could still hear the roar of the ocean and see the stars at night. I used to take long walks along the water. The food in town was wonderful and the people were very friendly. The area was very quiet and peaceful, and fairly deserted.

    The last evening of our vacation, however, we all heard strange footsteps following closely behind us as we were walking up to our room in the holiday centre. We turned around and noticed a fairly young man moving very rapidly across the beach and getting closer to us. He was tall and wore a baseball cap. We couldn't see his face and he was approaching us very rapidly. The man's actions made my dad very nervous. Dad warned us that we'd better try to make it to our hotel room as quickly as possible. I didn't like my dad's voice; I could hear fear in it. It was late and we were all alone. We didn't have any cell phones on us. I never saw Dad as worried as he was then and I knew that something was terribly wrong. The sense of fear started to overwhelm Mom and me. We had had such a good time in town. Now, the night was rapidly turning into a dangerous situation.

    We could hear the man's footsteps getting closer. Dad's face was almost pale. The so-called intruder (侵入者) had moved nearer and nearer when all of a sudden, the nearby vending (自动贩卖) machine started going crazy and spitting out cans of soda! The noise actually scared the intruder and he ran out of sight. My parents were shaking, but we all turned around to see who had put money into the vending machine downstairs, and actually saved us, but no one was around at all. Not a soul.

    It's one vacation I will never forget.

根据短文内容，选择最佳答案，并将选定答案的字母标号填在题前括号内。

    In high school, all Canadian students take part in a very exciting event. It is "Take Your Children to Work Day". Students will have a chance to work with their parents. My day took place in my mom's work, the York Region Police Department.

    When I arrived, a coach was teaching the officers basic combat(格斗)skills. Everyone tried their best to practice. I could see them sweating and panting (喘气).

    The most exciting part of my visit was a stop at the 911 Communication Center. 911 is the same as 110,119 and 120 in China. Every 911 call in the city is answered here. When I entered the center, I stood beside a call dispatcher (分派人员)arid watched him dealing-with the calls.

    Suddenly, the phone rang, he picked it up and a woman cried for help. There was a robbery in her house. The call dispatcher told her, "Please calm down and move to the safe place quietly. Don't fight with them. Just let them take what they want. Please make sure you are not hurt. We are sending officers there."

    He followed the call and found the address. The call dispatcher chose the five closest police cars from the satellite map and clicked(敲键盘) to send the policemen.  I saw the police cars from the satellite map were quickly moving to the woman's house. Five minutes later, they arrived .I asked the call dispatcher why he sent five cars. He said, "There are different levels of emergencies. Robbery is a high priority (优先),so we have to send five cars." The day was interesting. I leaned how the different departments worked together. The officers were very friendly and admirable.

    Bill Gates recently has predicted that online learning will make place-based colleges less significant, and five years from now, students will be able to find the best lectures in the world online. I applaud Mr. Gates. But what's taking us so long?

    As early as 1997, MIT(麻省理工) decided to post videos of all university lectures online, for free, for all people. But today, how many students have you met who mastered advanced mathematics or nuclear physics from an MIT online video? Unfortunately, the answer is not many. The problem is the poor quality of online education websites and the experience they provide to students. Those who go to the MIT website and watch courses online are surely very smart people, but it's not like playing a video game such as World of Warcraft. Only the most ardent students, those who are highly motivated, will devote themselves to studying these boring online videos.

    The real question is why we aren't spending more to develop better online education platforms. Where is the Avatar of education? Think about this. The market for Hollywood films per year is worth around 30 billion USD. Education in the world is a trillion-dollar-a-year market, hundreds of times bigger than Hollywood movies. Yet the most expensive digital learning system ever built cost well under 100 million dollars.

    Bill Gates' prediction is going to happen. There is no doubt about it. But it will only happen when we create high level educational content and experiences that engage and excite more than has ever been possible in the real world.

    Chinese writers seldom win a big prize in the world. One of those prizes is the Hans Christian Andersen Prize, the highest honor in the world that can be given to an author and an illustrator of children's books. No Chinese writer had ever won it, until April 4, 2016, when 62-year-old Cao Wenxuan received the prize. Cao received the honor at the Bologna Children's Book Fair in Italy.

    Patricia Aldana praised Cao's “deeply humanistic” books. These novels admit that life can be sad for children.

    Instilling children with good virtues for the sake of humankind is something that Cao stresses. He said, “It's time for us to alter our understanding of reading. Books should bring not only joy to young readers, but also have their ideas about life.”

    That feature of his works has touched many adults too. “The common choice of the judges, Cao writes beautifully about the lives of children facing great challenges,” said Aldana.

    After his success, Cao praised good translation for bringing attention to his work. Chinese children's literature could get high honor in the world if it were correctly translated in a style that could be easily understood, he said.

    Other writers, including Jin Bo, have also blamed poor translation as the reason why Chinese literature fails to get honor in the world. Jin was named for the Hans Christian Andersen Prize in 1992, but at that time, he had to translate, in a hurry, several paragraphs from his book to give to the judges. "On one hand, the jury has little knowledge of Chinese authors. On the other hand, it is we ourselves who didn't introduce our work and promote (促进) ourselves enough," he said in a class in 2013.

    Scientists recently discovered that pictures on cave walls at Creswell Crags are the oldest known in Great Britain. But they didn't find out in the usual way.

    Archaeologists often date cave art with a process called radiocarbon dating. The technique can measure the age of carbon found in charcoal (木炭) drawings or painted pictures. Carbon is an element found in many things, including charcoal and even people. But in this case, there was no paint or charcoal to test. People carved the pictures of animals and figures into the rock using stone tools. The scientists had an "aha!" moment when they noticed small rocks stuck to the top of the drawings. The small rocks must have formed after the drawings were made.

    "It is rare to be able to scientifically date rock art," said Alistair Pike, an archaeological scientist at Britain's University of Bristol. "We were very fortunate that some of the engravings were covered by stalagmites(石笋).

    When a test proved that the stalagmites formed 12,800 years ago, the scientists knew the art underneath them had to be at least that old. And some of the animals shown, like the European bison, are now extinct-another tip-off that the art is quite old.

    The artists came to Creswell Crags, This place is one of the farthest points north reached by our ancient ancestors during the Ice Age. At that time, much of the North Sea was dry, so people could move about more easily.

    Some tools and bones found there are 13,000 to 15,000 years old. They show that the travelers hunted horses, reindeer, and arctic hare. Their artwork is similar to art in France and Germany. It tells scientists that the Creswell Crags artists must have had a close connection to peoples several thousand kilometers away—another important clue to understanding how humans spread out across the world.

The Silk Road is neither an actual road nor a single route. It instead refers to a trade network which {#blank#}1{#/blank#} (date) from the Han dynasty of China. German geographer and traveler Ferdinand first used the term "silk road" in 1877 C.E. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} (describe) the well-traveled pathway of goods between Europe and East Asia. Although the trade network is commonly referred to {#blank#}3{#/blank#} the Silk Road, some historians favor the term Silk Routes because it better reflects the many paths {#blank#}4{#/blank#} (take) by traders.

One of the most {#blank#}5{#/blank#} (influence) travelers of the Silk Road was Marco Polo. He traveled with his father to China when he was just 

17. Upon his return, he wrote about his adventures, {#blank#}6{#/blank#} (make) him and the routes he traveled famous.

From China, merchants carried silk to Europe, where it was well received by the nobility and wealthy people. {#blank#}7{#/blank#} traveled together with silk from Asia were jade, porcelain, tea and spices. In exchange, horses, glassware, textiles and manufactured goods traveled eastward.

The significance of the Silk Road to human history has received widespread {#blank#}8{#/blank#} (recognize). Towns along {#blank#}9{#/blank#} routes grew into multicultural cities. The exchange of information gave rise to new technologies and innovations {#blank#}10{#/blank#} would change the world. Today, parts of the Silk Road are listed on UNESCO's World Heritage List.