in Florida, US. The 71-year-old has been doing this for the past five years, and simply wants to share his love for yoga. ―I come here as a volunteer and they are my students,‖ Huff said. ―I really don’t get nervous. I know where I am, but I don’t view them individually as criminals, but just as people participating in a class.‖

With the prison housing about 1,800 prisoners at any given time, there’s a waiting list to get into the class.

―I know this is a jail … but one day or another, these people are going to get released, so we want to make sure that they are productive members of society,‖ said Juan Diasgranados, public affairs manager for the prison.

Huff teaches yoga at two other jails and several libraries in Florida. When he’s not teaching yoga, he works as a substitute teacher at local schools. He said he got the idea for the yoga classes because he knew someone who had gone to prison, so he contacted local prisons and began offering his yoga services.

But what keeps him coming back each week? ―Because the people are so appreciative. They are very enthusiastic about every aspect about it,‖ he said, ―Because they spend most of their time in a dorm and are undergoing all kinds of stress, the classes are a peaceful space for them.‖

Some prisoners have said the weekly yoga classes have given them something to look forward to, as they offer a break in their routines.

―It makes me feel focused; it recharges me,‖ one 42-year-old prisoner from Miami said.

―I always was familiar with yoga but didn’t actually understand it fully.

―Now that I am in here, there are all these books and literature around. I started studying it and now understand it. I have taken it to another level.‖ 24. How might Huff describe teaching yoga in prisons?

A. Worthwhile. B. Disappointing. C. Profitable. D. Terrifying. 25. How is Huff’s Yoga class with the prisoners?

A. It helps the prisoners to get to know each other better. B. It is only given to those who will be released soon. C. It is very popular with the prisoners.

D. It has made many prisoners more productive.

26. What’s the most valuable part of doing yoga in some prisoners’ eyes?

A. It improves their physical health.

B. It gives them a break from stress. D. It helps them fit better into

C. It helps them feel like a normal person. society.

27. What is the best title of the passage?

A. Yoga Is For Everyone C. The Benefit of Yoga

B. How to Practice Yoga D. A Chance to Volunteer

C

In the first days of the new year, a photo from Rio’s traditional fireworks show on Copacabana Beach has spread like wildfire on Brazilian social networks — a shot of a little boy, alone, wading into the water, separated from the joyful crowd celebrating and taking pictures behind him. Arms crossed, he stares up wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the fireworks in the sky.

Despite the absence of any information about the child other than his age 9, the image Lucas Landau shot for Reuters news agency has sparked tens of thousands of shares and comments on social media, newspaper articles, blog posts and a national debate about race, class and inequality. To some, it’s just a photo of a young black boy attracted by the spectacular New Year’s Eve fireworks. People need to stop thinking that all black boys, without shirts on, are abandoned, sad, alone and unhappy. To others, the image is emblematic of Brazil’s acute inequality.

About half of Brazil’s population of 200 million identify as mixed-race/black, second only to Nigeria. But black and mixed-raced Brazilians are underrepresented in academia, politics and leadership roles. Less than 10 percent of Brazil's Congress is black, and just 18 percent of leadership roles are held by Afro-Brazilians.

For Luiz Augusto Campos, a sociologist at Rio State University, the wide-ranging interpretations of the photo, as well as the explosive debate it generated, represents a changing tide for Afro-Brazilians. ―The fact that it’s become so problematic is a

reflection of a complex transition in terms of race in Brazil,‖ he said, adding that 20 or 30 years ago, the photo would have stirred few or no concerns about whether it strengthened negative stereotypes(刻板印象).

―These changes are still relatively small in Brazil, but they have the long-term objective of dissociating the ideas of blackness and poverty,‖ Campos said. 28. What can we learn from the passage?

A. The boy in the photo has been abandoned and needs urgent help. B. Afro-Brazilians are mistreated because they are in the minority. C. The debate the image generates worsens the acute inequality. D. The boy’s age is mentioned in the news.

29. Which word can be used to replace the underlined word ―emblematic‖? A. Problematic. Significant.

30. Which of the following statements may Campos agree with? A. The debate reflects a positive tendency in Brazil.

B. The debate could have been more fierce 20 or 30 years ago. C. The Afro-Brazilians should fight for their rights.

D. The Afro-Brazilians have successfully raised their social status. 31. What problem does the photo reflect according to this passage? A. The racial inequality in Brazil. B. The social status of the Afro-Brazilians.

C. The stereotype to associate blackness with poverty in Brazil. D. The Afro-Brazilians’ fighting for rights.

B. Representative.

C. Objective.

D.

D

Scientists in Rome have unveiled the first bionic(仿生的) hand with a sense of touch that can be worn outside a laboratory. The recipient, Almerina Mascarello, who lost her left hand in an accident nearly 25 years ago, said ―It’s almost like it is back again‖.

In 2014 the same international team produced the world’s first feeling bionic hand.

But the sensory and computer equipment it was linked to was too large to leave the

laboratory. Now the technology is small enough to fit in a backpack, making it portable. The prosthetic hand (假肢) has sensors that detect information about whether an object is soft or hard. These messages are linked to a computer in a backpack that converts these signals into a language the brain will understand. The information is relayed to Almerina’s brain via tiny electrodes(电极) implanted in nerves in the upper arm. In tests Almerina - who was blindfolded - was able to tell whether the object she was picking up was hard or soft.

Professor Silvestro Micera, a neuroengineer at EPFL in Lausanne and Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies in Pisa told me, ―We are going more and more in the direction of science fiction movies like Luke Skywalker's bionic hand in Star Wars - a fully controlled, fully natural, sensorised prosthesis, identical to the human hand.‖ A robotic prosthesis better than the human hand is still a long way off, but the team believe it might eventually be a reality.

Almerina was able to keep the bionic hand for six months, but it has now been removed, as it is still a prototype. The scientific team say they hope to miniaturise（使小型化）the technology even further so that a sensory bionic hand can be commercialised. Almerina said that when the bionic hand is perfected, she would like it back for good. 32. What did the underlined word ―it‖ in Para.1 refer to?

A. The bionic hand B. her lost hand C. the sense of touch D. the accident 33. What does Para.3 mainly talk about? A. How the bionic hand is developed. experiment.

C. How the bionic hand works.

34. Which of the following is true according to the passage? A. The world’s first bionic hand is not practical in terms of size.

B. The researchers believe a robotic prosthesis will be better than the human hand. C. The researchers got the idea after being inspired by the film, Star Wars. D. We can hardly distinguish the bionic hand from a real one.

B. How Almerina feels in the

D. How to use the bionic hand.