期末专区（九年级上） 知识点题库

    Marco Polo was from Venice, Italy. In 1271, at the age of 17, Marco went on a trip with his father and uncle to China. Today people often travel to different places around the world. But it was very hard for people from Europe to visit China then. After three and a half years, the Polos reached China in 1275.

    While he was there, Marco Polo worked for Kublai Khan, the emperor of China. He was able to learn and experience many things that were new to Europeans. In his diary, he wrote, "Kublai Khan's palace is the greatest I've ever seen. The streets of the new capital, Dadu, are so straight and so wide." Paper money also took him by surprise, since it was not yet in use in the West at that time. Homes were heated with "black stones… which burn like wood." Those stones were coal, and most of the Europeans knew little about it then.

After 17 years in China, Marco and his family finally returned to Venice. After he returned home, Marco completed a book called The Travels of Marco Polo, full of facts about his wonderful experiences in China.

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    When I first came to New York, I didn't have many friends. I got upset easily. Luckily, one of my co-workers (同事), Frank, took great care of me. Actually, he changed me.

    I used to be shy. I had a hard time talking Io strangers. Frank knew it.  And he helped me deal with it.

    One day we were at a restaurant.  I dropped a piece of pizza on my shirt while eating. Frank told me to borrow a Tide pen (去污笔) from someone. I was nervous, but Frank encouraged me. So I went to ask for help. In the end, I was not only able Io clean my shirt, but also made friends with a stranger.  It was a good start for me.  I became more and more confident (自信的).

    Frank was optimistic about life. He always finds a way to change the bad things into something good.

    Because of a new job, I moved to a new city. Frank and I communicated with each other less and less. Then, one day, I got a call from a friend. Frank had passed away. It was one of the worst moments in my life. There was nothing I could do to deal with my sorrow (悲伤) except go lo sleep.

    I looked at a lot of videos about Frank. At the end of one video, Frank said, "After the rain, the sun shines through the clouds." I remembered Frank's optimism. Then I stopped crying. I decided to smile a bit wider and love fife more.

What  you    when you were five years old?

    Kids Go Wild (KGW) is a school holiday program for kids. The program was first started by Sunshine Zoo in 2016 and runs every weekday of school holidays. Children can take part in some different activities in one day. This summer, KGW is bigger and better than ever. The zoo will offer more new activities to kids, such as visiting secret areas of the zoo, watching animals up close, asking zookeepers questions about animals, joining in some cool craft (工艺制作) and having fun with other kids who are also crazy about animals. KGW is expected to bring different and amazing experiences. Please read the following to learn more about KGW in 2019.

— Of course. It ____________ a very common village, but now it becomes famous for a hot TV series Thunder. A lot of footage was shot there.

    My sister and I weren't exactly what you would call close. I used to think everything she did was 1, and always followed her and her friends around, hoping to be 2, but there isn't much room in a thirteen-year-old's life for a troublesome ten-year-old sister. Over time, we became 3 living in the same house, eating together but never communicating.

   4 last year when she told me she'd study abroad for ten months, I wasn't too upset.

    That first night after she 5, I sat in my room and tried to do homework. I couldn't shake the feeling that something was missing. Sitting there, I realized just how 6 it was without her in the house. I cried that night. I cried over all the years we had 7 trying to live our own lives and paying no attention to each other's. 8 as the night passed slowly, my tears changed to tears of new beginnings.

    I 9 the phone and called her halfway across the world.

    "Hello?" Her voice sounded as if it came from the room nearby and not South Africa.

    "Hey, Tova. It's me, Sara. I 10 called to tell you I love you." My words came out in a rush. I knew that if I stopped in the middle, I wouldn't have the 11 to continue. "I know we aren't as close as some sisters, but that doesn't mean I'm not 12 you."

    For a long time, there was only 13 on the other end. Finally, she spoke. "I've been sitting here, all alone, thinking about you back home," she said. "Your voice makes me feel as if I'm right there with you." And before she hung up she said, very 14 just as I had, "I love you, too."

    I'm counting down the days until my sister returns home, so I can say, "I'm so glad to have 15 home".

    After I finished college, I couldn't find a job in Los Angeles. At last I had to move to Las Vegas but left my family behind. I missed them all week, and I went home on most weekends to see them. I often rented a car because I would often have lots of problems on the way to Los Angeles or to Las Vegas if I drove my poor car.

    One time I decided to save money, and I drove my car. It got to California, but on the way back to Vegas it was broken. I didn't know what I should do. Then a middle-aged man drove up. He put in some coolant and repaired my car. He made it start soon.

    I gave him the $12 in my wallet, and he said he would use it for the next car. Then I knew that he was a mechanic who drove up and down the highway each weekend to help the drivers in trouble.

    Now fifteen years has passed, but I still think about what a great man he is.

— I asked her _______.

—Pardon? I didn't hear you(clear) just now.

When my family moved to Ohio last summer, I feared attending another new school and knowing no one. I had bright red hair and large glasses. In addition, I was1 and shy.

Getting on the school bus that first day, I felt like all eyes on 2. I could hear someone say quietly," She's huge!" Obviously, the kids on the bus had known each other well. I walked past them, took a3at the back of the bus and sat there in silence all the way.

The following day was even4 I did not notice a few boys had tied a shoelace across the aisle. As a result, I5 on the bus, dropping everything I was carrying. While I was embarrassingly6 my things, I could hear someone laugh," That felt like an earthquake!" Looking out of the window, I held back the tears in my eyes.

It was then that I started to make a 7. I began walking everywhere. I would wander through the woods behind our house. I would also walk to a 8 about two miles down the road, where I would chat silently with God. I began 9 the afternoon school bus on purpose, walking home instead. Then amazingly, I started losing 10. As I became content with myself, I began making friends.

One of my newly-found friends also fought with her weight, wanting to be a "perfect" cheerleader. She lived near my neighborhood, 11 we would meet and walk together. This became a daily activity with talking and laughing along the way - different from the12 walks. I had taken. My friend said that I didn't have to be perfect. I just had to be me and be happy with myself.

Looking back on that time of loneliness, sadness and embarrassment, I am13 I made it through. I always tell myself "This too shall pass" 14 I am fighting with any other problem in life. It's possible for us to get over all the difficulties if we face them 15 and keep on trying.

AI (人工智能) products are not new. However, researchers have been working to improve the technology. Now virtual (虚拟的) assistants, like Siri and Alexa, can have short conversations with us. AlphaGo taught itself to play Go and became better than the top human players.

Now an AI system (系统) has been tasked with passing a multiple-choice (多项选择) exam. The goal is to improve machines' language understanding and logic (逻辑) with so-called computer vision (视觉).

A system named Aristo was developed by the Allen Institute for AI, a lab in the United States city of Seattle. It recently passed an eighth-grade science exam taken by many US students. The New York Times reported. It correctly answered more than 90 percent of the questions. Then it was given a twelfth-grade exam, it scored more than 80 percent.

It's an example of the progress in AI development. Four years ago, 700 computer scientists tried to develop AI systems that could pass these kinds of exams. None scored higher than 60 percent.

Aristo was able to pass the exams because it can not only understand language but also use logical thinking to solve difficult problems. For example, it can understand what a forest fire is and how it could endanger animals like squirrels or make the food supply they need less.

The system used BERT, a kind of neural (神经的) network technology developed by Google, to answer the questions. BERT has "read" thousands of English articles. If it looks at a sentence with a missing word, it can correctly guess what the word is. With BERT's help. Aristo "read" many multiple-choice questions and answers. Over time, it was able to find logical patterns on its own.

It may still be in the earliest stages, said Jingjing Liu, a Microsoft researcher who has been working on similar technologies. "We can't compare this technology to real human students and their ability to reason."

However, Aristo's success means that Al systems are getting better at understanding users, and we might see improved search engines and hospital databases (数据库) in the near future.

When things aren't going so great, there's a saying to encourage us: when life gives you lemons, make lemonade (柠檬饮料).

That's what 15-year-old Zack Francom has been doing in the past nine years. He does that to improve the lives of people in developing countries. They need wheelchairs but don't have money for there.

It all started in 2010. His school held a fundraiser (募捐会) to raise $86 to buy a wheelchair for a charity. Although Zack was only 6 years old then, he wanted to keep the-fundraising going.

"I thought, `What if I couldn't walk or run or ride my bike? What would that be like?' I wanted to help make life easier for those who couldn't walk or run and didn't have money for a wheelchair to help them get around," he said.

Now hundreds of people line up in April to buy lemonade from Zack's store. In 2014 he sold a lot of lemonade, raising $5,300. With that money he was able to buy 37 wheelchairs at a cost of $143 each and ship them to places like Guam and Guatemala, where a wheelchair can cost more   than a person would make in one year!

Lots of people in poor countries have to pull themselves around with their hands and crawl (爬行) to get around, because wheelchairs are too expensive for them.

"We helped one lady in Guatemala who crawled for 10 miles with her baby on her back," said Zack's mom. "What a difference    it   has made in her life! Stories like this are what keeps Zack going.

Zack has no plan to slow down any time soon. In fact, he hopes other kids will follow him.

Osmanthus (桂花) is one of the most beloved autumn flowers. It is widely planted in China, with a very long planting history of more than 2, 500 years. This famous plant even appeared in The Classic of Mountains and Seas (《山海经》). And the flowers are seen in the cities of Hangzhou, Suzhou, and Guilin as their city flower.

The name "osmanthus" comes from the Greek, word osma, meaning "sweet", and anthos, meaning"flower", Since the ancient times, osmanthus has been a symbol of good things, like peace, love and happiness.

Legend (传说) has it that there was an osmanthus tree on the moon. A man named Wu Gang was ordered to cut it down. However, the tree could grow again. Wu had to keep on cutting it again and again on the moon. The tree has been growing till now.

Osmanthus flowers between September and October, and it is when the Mid—Autumn Festival is celebrated. so osmanthus has become the best flower for people to enjoy with a full moon. It has been loved by many poets, including Li Oingzhao and Yang Wanli from the Song Dynasty, Yang wrote that the sweetness of osmanthus is so clean and rich that it's hard to believe it comes from nature and not the moon in heaven.

The Chinese people's love for osmanthus has become a part of their drinks culture. Osmanthus wine and tea are popular traditional Chinese drinks. For those who have a sweet tooth, there are many foods made from osmanthus flowers. The flowers of osmanthus can also be collected to make honey and jam.