It’s a good idea to buy from local nursery(苗圃)to get a variety of plants that grow well in your region. Here’s our latest list of plant and garden events in the L. A. area in February.

California Native Container Plants, a class about growing native plants in pots—taught by Flora Ito, nursery sales manager at the Payne Foundation nursery, 10459 Tuxford St. in Sun Valley, from 9 to 10:15 a. m. Feb 4. Participants must have proof of full vaccination against COVID-19 or a negative COVID-19 PCR test taken within 72 hours of the class. Register online, $25, or $20 for members.

Secrets of a Healthy Vegetable Garden, a free workshop sponsored by the Orange County Organic Gardening Club and taught by Julie Bawden-Davis, master gardener and author of “Southern California Vegetable Gardening, ”at 7:30 p. m. Feb 8 in the Orange County Fairgrounds Silo Building, 88 Fair Drive in Costa Mesa.

Camellia Society’s 49th Camellia Show at Botanical Gardens, 1151 Oxford Road, San Marino, from 1 to 5 p. m. Feb. 12. The show is free to visitors after $29 admission to the gardens ($24 for seniors 65 and older, $13 ages 4-11. Members and children under age 4 enter free. ) Masks are required indoors.

Payne Foundation Winter Plant Sale at the foundation’s nursery, 10459 Tuxford St. in Sun Valley, from 8:30 a.m.to 4 p.m.Feb. 15-19. The sale includes native seeds, books and other merchandise(货物), as well as one of the region’s largest selections of native plants. Members receive a 15% discount, and nonmembers get a 10% discount on all plants and seeds.

1. Who is the passage intended for?

A．College students in Botany.	B．Gardeners and plant lovers.
C．Researchers on native plants.	D．Nursery sales managers.

2. How much will a nonmember who attends a lecture on container plants pay?

A．$20

B．$24

C．$25

D．$29

3. Which place might a native plant shopper go to?

A．1151 Oxford Road	B．88 Fair Drive
C．the Organic Gardening Club	D．the Payne Foundation nursery

When Peter Kahn became an English teacher at the Chicago Oak Park High School, he was terrified of teaching poetry. “Poetry was my least favorite subject as a student, and my least favorite subject to teach as a teacher, ”he says. “I was terrible at it. ” So he asked a former student of his for help, who suggested the idea of a poetry slam — a competition in which poets perform spoken word poetry before a live audience. “The student with the lowest grade in my class ended up winning it, ” says Kahn. “And I realized this is something powerful.”

That was 1999. Inspired by the club’s potential to engage students, Kahn created an after-school spoken word club at the high school. And for over 20 years, the club has created space for students to engage in storytelling.

Many students have gone on to become award-winning poets, scholars, or even National Youth Poet Winners. Now a new poetry collection called Respect the Mic is showing a portion of that talent. The collection features 76 honest, powerful poems by the club’s students and alumni(校友), with a foreword by Pulitzer-prize winning poet Tyehimba Jess. Over the years, Kahn has invited distinguished poets like National Book Award winner Terrance Hayes and National Poetry Slam champion Patricia Smith to visit his classroom.

For Kahn, the collection and the club were all about helping students who just didn’t like school, as well as students of color — Black students in particular — who, Kahn writes in the book, faced an “opportunity gap” in classrooms. On average, they had a lower GPA (Grade Point Average) than white students.

Ultimately, the editors and some critics hope the club will take this power of poetry and move it beyond the Oak Park classroom, so that teachers like Kahn, who were once afraid of poetry, will be able to get themselves and their students excited about it.

4. What does Kahn think of the idea of a poetry competition?

A．Effective.

B．Nonsense.

C．Disappointing.

D．Demanding.

5. What do we know about the poetry collection Respect the Mic?

A．It’s a record of students’ life.

B．It’s about Kahn’s teaching experiences.

C．It includes a poem by a Pulitzer-prize winning poet.

D．It shows the students’ gift for writing poetry.

6. Kahn’s after-school spoken word club __________.

A．can wipe out color discrimination in the high school

B．is helpful to the black students

C．fails to fill the opportunity gap in the classroom

D．has moved to classrooms of other schools

7. What is the text mainly about?

A．A reunion of Kahn’s outstanding students.

B．An English teacher overcoming the fear of teaching.

C．A high school spoken-word club changing students’ lives.

D．A famous poem composed by a club’s students.

Every so often, a Chinese fashion symbol unknowingly turned the fashion landscape upside down. This time, we unearth the imperial tomb of China’s Empress Dowager Cixi(慈禧)(1835-1908)and find her great passion for luxurious nails.

Ancient Chinese nobles started growing long nails during the Warring States Period to show that they weren’t manual laborers, but it wasn’t until the Ming Dynasty that long nails and nail guards became an important symbol of material prosperity. And the trend reached its peak in the Qing Dynasty, with Cixi as its poster woman. Cixi nurtured a nail length of roughly 20 cm on her ring and pinky fingers and took care of them in gem-laden(镶满宝石), colorful nail guards. During the day, Cixi usually wore nail guards made of gold or silver. According to the memoirs of her maid, before bed, she would switch them into nail pockets made of bright yellow satin(缎子), probably in a motherly manner similar to covering her nail babies into their sleeping bags.

The origins of nail guards began in the Han Dynasty more than 1000 years prior to their mainstream glory. At that time, they weren’t particularly decorative. It wasn’t until the Qing Dynasty that they became as expensive and delicate as people today know them to have been. Common design patterns included plants, flowers, and calligraphy art. Cixi, on the other hand, had unique rights to dragon and phoenix(凤凰)carvings on her nail guards. Needless to say, she didn’t skimp on exercising these rights.

Long nails may no longer be front and center on the fashion stage today. Yet the period drama series like Empresses in the Palace (2011), Ruyi’s Royal Love in the Palace (2018), and Story of Yanxi Palace(2018)brought in the popularity of the Morandi color palette(莫兰迪调色盘)in China’s nail art circle. Inspired by Italian painter Giorgio Morandi, the manicure(美甲)industry today also adopts a more softened color scheme that gives off a feeling of balance and elegance.

8. What does the writer mainly tell us?

A．The legend of China’s Empress Dowager Cixi.

B．The history of long nails and nail guards.

C．Long nails plays an important role in period drama series.

D．Women in ancient times should wear long nails and nail guards.

9. What can we learn from the text?

A．Cixi took off nail guards when she went to bed.

B．Nail guards can show the status on the royal ladder in the Han Dynasty.

C．Ming and Qing Dynasties had lower degree of acceptance of long nails.

D．Cixi can only wear nail guards with dragon and phoenix carvings.

10. What do underlined words “skimp on” mean in the third paragraph?

A．subscribe to

B．delay

C．be mean with

D．practice

11. What can we infer from the last paragraph?

A．Fashion nail art will permanently be on the fashion stage.

B．The period drama series are very popular today.

C．Morandi is a great master in period drama.

D．There is still a market for nail art.

When faced with a problem, people tend to select solutions that involve adding new elements rather than taking existing components away.

Adams, a social psychologist at the university of Virginia and her colleagues wanted to figure out why this was the case. They wanted to investigate whether, and to what degree, people actually overlook subtraction(减法)when they are tasked with changing things.

The researchers looked through a profile of ideas for improvement submitted to a university president, and found that only 11 percent of 651 proposals involved removing an existing rule or program. Similar results appeared across tasks about adjusting essays and plans. The vast majority of people chose to add rather than remove.

The team dug deeper by conducting eight experiments with more than 1,500 participants. In one experiment, people were asked to stabilize(固定)the roof of a Lego structure held up by a single block that rested on top of a cube-shaped base. The reward for completing the task was $ 1, and participants could add new blocks for 10 cents a piece or get rid of blocks for free. One group was reminded, “Each piece that you add costs ten cents but removing pieces is free, ” while another group was just told, “Each piece that you add costs ten cents. ”Almost two thirds of people who had been reminded chose to get rid of the single block rather than adding new ones, compared with 41 percent of those who had not been reminded.

These findings were published in Nature, suggesting that “additive solutions tend to come to mind quickly and easily. Subtractive solutions are not necessarily harder to consider, but they take more effort to find. While the tendency for businesses and organizations to choose for complexity rather than simplification was previously known, the novelty(新颖)of this paper is that it shows that people tend toward adding new features even when subtracting would clearly be better.

The team hopes that these findings will encourage more people to think about subtractive options that might often be overlooked.

12. What can we know about the researchers’ findings in their researches?

A．People added elements to deal with problems in any case.

B．People tended to add elements to solve problems.

C．People preferred subtraction options to additive options.

D．People refused to remove elements to avoid costs.

13. What is special about the experiment mentioned in Para 4?

A．The experiment was carried out in the most advanced way.

B．The participants chose to add pieces whatever costs.

C．It was hard to choose between adding and removing.

D．The participants got rid of pieces when it was clearly to their advantage.

14. What is the purpose of the research team?

A．To encourage more people to do further research.

B．To get more participants involved in their next research.

C．To inspire more people to consider subtraction choices.

D．To get a handsome reward from businesses and organizations.

15. What can be the best title for the text?

A．Adding New Features Is More Effective

B．Removing Features Is More Difficult

C．Subtraction Outweighs Addition

D．Our Brain Typically Overlooks Subtraction

Travel with a Green Conscience(良知)

Travel is a form of consumption, from jet fuel to trash.     16     . For me, seeing the world has been an education on the environment and the challenges we face. Witnessing other cultures has inspired me to reduce my carbon footprint. Ironically, travel has made me “greener. ”

● Take public transport or carpool. Public buses or trains are an eco-friendly option for getting around your destination. Many youth hostels have carpool sing-ups for popular trips, which is an exciting way, to meet fellow travelers.     17     Exploring on foot is great exercise and offers excellent people watching opportunities.
● Be aware of food packaging and waste. As for packaging, to-go containers are made of Styrofoam, paper or plastic bags, which almost always end up in the garbage. Be conscious of your purchases. Street vendors (小商贩) sometimes offer delicious finger food, such as kabobs, which have little to no food packaging. Pack your own silverware.     18     Every little bit helps.
●     19     As I backpacked through Thailand recently, I noticed that the majority of the trash littered on the beaches and in the streets was from tourists. It disgusted me. Why would you come all this way to see a beautiful beach, only to destroy it? I began picking up litter when I saw it and disposing of it properly. When I go on a hike and see trash on the trail, I pick it up. You can help compensate (补偿) for others by going the extra mile!
●Consider the sustainability of the ecosystem.     20     Are the waters overfished? Do they import their meat from another country? How much meat, fish, grain does the average local eat? How much water, gas, electricity does the average local use? This information can help you make educated discussions on your consumption. Being eco-friendly will enhance your adventure.

A．Refuse a straw in your drink.

B．Challenge yourself to live like the locals.

C．Be a part of the solution, not the problem.

D．Before traveling to a new country, do your research.

E．On my first day in a new city, I get a map and start walking!

F．My travel clothes are also quick-dry fabrics or wool, so they dry quickly.

G．It’s up to you to determine how much waste you will produce on your trip.

Princess Power

“Elsa, it’s you!” It was the four-year-old’s _________ birthday party, and her favorite Disney character Elsa from Frozen had arrived. The two cheerfully began to sing the movie’s big song, “Let It Go, ” and were soon _________ by Tinker Bell and four other fairy-tale princesses: Anna, Ariel, Jasmine, and Snow White.

You would swear they were _________ at the most _________ place on earth. But this wasn’t Disney World. It was the pediatric（儿科）cancer ward at a hospital on Long Island in New York. And the _________ were college students who _________ for A Moment of Magic, a _________ organization whose mission is to _________ the spirits of sick children.

It all began once upon a time with a family movie night _________ Frozen. McGrane, now 23, __________ that she and Elsa had __________ blond hair and big blue eyes. McGrane and her friend McAndrew were then searching for a new community project, __________ one with kids.

That sparked an idea- __________ Disney princesses and visiting pediatric cancer patients.

“When kids are in a __________ for so long, they don’t get all the magic that most kids do, ” says McGrane. “It’s nice to give them time to be __________.”

21.

A．unhappy

B．panic

C．surprise

D．trial

22.

A．spotted

B．defended

C．tripped

D．joined

23.

A．recalling

B．celebrating

C．displaying

D．pursuing

24.

A．primitive

B．complex

C．magical

D．secure

25.

A．princesses

B．cartoons

C．magicians

D．educators

26.

A．struggle

B．emerge

C．ask

D．volunteer

27.

A．nonprofit

B．potential

C．massive

D．multiple

28.

A．cease

B．lift

C．expand

D．shift

29.

A．featuring

B．opposing

C．proving

D．meaning

30.

A．expected

B．noticed

C．figured

D．argued

31.

A．comparing

B．making

C．checking

D．matching

32.

A．ideally

B．logically

C．regularly

D．generally

33.

A．speaking up

B．taking care of

C．dressing up as

D．engaging in

34.

A．home

B．hospital

C．college

D．party

35.

A．themselves

B．characters

C．patients

D．adults

阅读下面材料，在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。

As an Internet hot word, Gen Z     36    (refer) to the young people born between 1995 and 2009 in the Internet era with avant-garde (前卫的) worldviews and new-age behaviors, some of     37     are becoming leaders in different fields.

The average age of Team China at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics is 25. 2 years old, with the youngest being 17 years old,     38     (make) Gen Z as the backbone of China’s winter sports. So far they     39    (impress) the world with their sportsmanship,     40     (strong) and charm.

The 18-year-old Gu Ailing won the women’s freeski big air competition. She took a risk and challenged     41     (she) in her final run-a left double 1620 with a safety grab-after it was certain that she was in the top three. She became the first female skier at the Winter Olympics     42     (complete) this difficult task.

Besides, Gen Z volunteers are also worth mentioning. They contribute to the Games with their top-class services. Their     43     (commit) has originated from their passion for the Olympic Games. Outside of the Olympics, the Gen Z audiences have followed every game. Snow and ice cannot freeze the enthusiasm of Gen Z audience who     44     (active) talk about the Winter Olympics and show their love     45     sports.