【推荐1】Our busy lifestyles can be hard on our family’s health. Rushing to and from school and work can make it hard to find time to be physically active. We can also slip into the habit of choosing unhealthy snacks and take-away foods or spending our free time watching TV or in front of the computer. However, these choices can be dangerous for our health and children’s health— both now and in the long term.     1    .

Here are five simple ways for your family to lead a healthy lifestyle and get back on track:

1.    2    . Children and young people should get at least 60 minutes of physical activity every day. Parents should be good role models and have a positive attitude to being active.

2. Choose water as a drink.     3    . It doesn’t come with the added sugar found fruit juices, soft drinks and other sweetened drinks.

3. Eat more fruit and vegetables. Eating fruit and vegetables every day helps children grow and can reduce the risk of many diseases. Have fresh fruit as a convenient snack and try to include fruit and vegetables in every meal.

4.     4    . “Still” time spent watching TV, surfing online or playing computer games is linked to kids becoming overweight. Plan active indoor and outdoor games or activities for your children as alternatives to watching TV or playing on the computer.

5. Eat fewer snacks and select healthier alternatives.     5    . Snacks based on fruit and vegetables, reduced fat dairy products and whole grains are the healthiest choices. Avoid snacks that are high in sugar fat such as chips, cakes and chocolates.

A．Get active each day

B．Switch off the screen and get active

C．That’s how to follow your own lifestyle

D．Water is the best way to satisfy your thirst

E．Snacks can help children and young people meet their daily nutritional needs

F．Healthy snacks help children and young people meet their daily nutritional needs

G．That’s why it’s so important to stop and make a decision to follow a healthy lifestyle

【推荐2】There’s nothing like a good night’s sleep—but what does that really mean? It turns out that the answer depends not only on your age, but also on your lifestyle. Some people are productive and happy with fewer hours of sleep, while others need more. Still, experts can determine guidelines that work for most people. The National Sleep Foundation researched the topic and gave new recommendations. The foundation acknowledges that sleep needs will vary—lifestyle and stress should be taken into consideration—but their recommendations offer a general guideline. For example, teenagers need 8-10 hours’ sleep every day.

To create the recommendations, some sleep and medical experts reviewed 312 articles from journals published during the last decade. This is the first time that a professional organization has developed age-specific recommended sleep duration based on a systematic review of the world scientific literature.

A lack of sleep can be linked to weight gain, because that causes an increase in appetite, according to the foundation. It can also have serious consequences on the brain. People who do not get enough sleep are at increased risk of depression, and can endanger others. Those who become sleepy while driving, for example, risk both their lives and the lives of those around them.

Researchers also have found in the past that too much sleep can have negative effects. Low socioeconomic status(收入水平低) and depression reportedly are significantly associated with longer sleep. However, experts nowadays find that research on oversleeping is still unconvincing and needs more attention. Currently, there is no strong evidence that sleeping too much has health consequences. There is, however, laboratory evidence that short sleep duration of four to five hours has negative consequences. We need similar laboratory studies to determine whether long sleep duration results in physiological changes that could lead to disease before we make any recommendations against sleep extension.

1. What can be learned about sleeping time ?

A．The time you need for sleep is related to your state of mind

B．Experts’ guidelines for sleeping time apply to all the people

C．The less you sleep, the more productive you are

D．The more you sleep, the more energetic you are

2. How did the National Sleeping Foundation do the research?

A．By interviewing different people

B．By reading lots of articles

C．By consulting other experts

D．By doing systematic experiments

3. What will people without enough sleep probably do according to the research?

A．Lose some weight

B．Eat more food

C．Dream during their sleep

D．Drive faster than usual

4. What can be learned from Paragraph Four ?

A．Too much sleep may result in social changes

B．Researchers now agree with those in the past

C．More research on oversleeping is needed

D．Research on oversleeping is quite convincing

【推荐1】From classic books like A Wrinkle in Time to classic movies like Back to the Future, children and adults both have been fascinated by the concept of time travel for hundreds of years. But is it even possible?

Time travel sounds simple: you just move back and forth between different points in time like you would between different points in space. You could jump forward into the future, or you could jump back to sometime in the past.

Exactly how would this be done? Most artistic works that feature time travel finish it with the help of a special device usually called a time machine. The time machine features whatever technology has been developed to transport people successfully to other points in time.

But could time travel really happen? Some scientists believe that parts of Albert Einstein’s theories of special and general relativity might allow for the possibility of time travel. These theories are complex and very hard to understand. They involve unusual astronomical things like black holes and wormholes. Traveling faster than the speed of light might also be required.

It can be fun, though, to think about what problems might be presented by time travel. It may create an absurd (荒谬的) situation. For example, let’s say that you travel back in time to the day your parents met. What if your showing up on the day your parents met caused a ripple (连锁反应) in time that led to them not meeting? If they had never met, you would never have been born. If you had never been born, how could you ever exist to travel back in time to cause the problem you just caused? Confusing as it sounds, we hope that any scientist who ever manages to make time travel possible works out these problems in advance.

1. What kind of film is Back to the Future most likely to be?

A．An action film.	B．A fantasy film.
C．A historical film.	D．An adventure film.

2. What does the author mainly do in Paragraph 2?

A．Add a topic.	B．Give an example.
C．Explain a concept.	D．Make a conclusion.

3. What is some scientists’ judgement on the possibility of time travel based on?

A．Previous similar cases.	B．Accurate scientific research.
C．Some scientific theories.	D．Advanced space technology.

4. What does the author think of time travel?

A．It will certainly come true one day.

B．It is an impossible and absurd idea.

C．It will change some historical events.

D．It may cause self-contradictory situations.

【推荐2】Aging happens to all of us, and is widely thought of as a natural part of life. It would seem silly to call such a thing a “disease.”

On the other hand, scientists are increasingly learning that aging and biological age are two different things, and that the former is a key risk factor for conditions such as heart disease, cancer and many more. In that light, aging itself might be seen as something treatable, the way you would treat high blood pressure or a vitamin deficiency(不足).

Biophysicist Alex Zhavoronkov believes that aging should be considered a disease. He said that describing aging as a disease creates incentives(动机) to develop treatments.

“It unties the hands of the pharmaceutical (制药的) industry so that they can begin treating the disease and not just the side effects,” he said.

“Right now, people think of aging as natural and something you can’t control,” he said. “In academic circles, people take aging research as just an interest area where they can try to develop interventions（介入，参与）. The medical community also takes aging for granted, and can do nothing about it except keep people within a certain health range.”

But if aging were recognized as a disease, he said, “It would attract funding and change the way we do health care. What matters is understand that aging is curable.”

“It was always known that the body accumulates damage,” he added. “The only way to cure aging is to find ways to repair that damage. I think of it as preventive medicine for age-related conditions.”

Leonard Hayflick, a professor at the University of California, San Francisco, said the idea that aging can be cured implies the human lifespan can be increased, which some researchers suggest is possible. Hayflick is not among them.

“There’re many people who recover from cancer, stroke, or heart disease. But they continue to age, because aging is separate from their disease,” Hayflick said. “Even if those causes of death were removed, life expectancy would still not go much beyond 92 years.”

1. What do people generally believe about aging?

A．It should cause no alarm whatsoever.

B．They just cannot do anything about it.

C．It should be regarded as a kind of disease.

D．They can delay it with advances in science.

2. What does Alex Zhavoronkov think of “describing aging as a disease”?

A．It will urge people to take aging more seriously.

B．It will greatly help reduce the side effects of aging.

C．It will free pharmacists from the conventional beliefs about aging.

D．It will motivate doctors and pharmacists to find ways to treat aging.

3. What do we learn about the medical community?

A．They now have a strong interest in research on aging.

B．They differ from the academic circles in their view on aging.

C．They can contribute to people’s health only to a limited extent.

D．They have ways to intervene in people’s aging process.

4. What does Professor Leonard Hayflick believe?

A．The human lifespan cannot be lengthened.

B．Aging is hardly separable from disease.

C．Few people can live up to the age of 92.

D．Heart disease is the major cause of aging.

【推荐1】Have you ever been in mid-conversation with someone, when you look over and find them standing in the same position as you or holding the same facial expression? It may seem like they have consciously(有意识地) copied you, but it is much more likely that it is the chameleon(变色龙) effect at play.

The chameleon effect is the unconscious imitation(模仿) of another person’s gestures or behaviour. Just as a chameleon attempts to match any environment’s colours, people acquire the behaviour of others to bring them closer together and help make their interactions smooth.

The chameleon effect was confirmed in an experiment by psychologists John Bargh and Tanya Chartran d in 1999. The first part of their experiment included 78 people, who each spoke with an experimenter. During the test, Bargh and Chartrand studied whether participants would copy the actions of someone they hadn’t met before, like moving the foot and touching the face. The second part measured the impact that copying someone has on the person being imitated.

In the first stage, participants increased their face touching by 20% and their foot movement by 50% while in conversation about a photograph with the experimenter. The individuals weren’t aware of what they were being studied for, and the photograph was used to catch their attention to ensure unconscious acts. The second stage involved half of the participants being copied, and then determining the likeability of the experimenter. The results showed that those who were imitated scored the experimenter higher. It has shown that when someone copies our behaviour, we develop more positive feelings about them. These interactions could be a person unconsciously willing to be liked, and forming a moment of connection.

The main reasons behind humans’ imitation are positive. However, when people carry this chameleon effect to the extreme, they can lose their sense of self. Those who change their entire personalities in different groups often go unnoticed. But more common signs of the chameleon effect are easier to notice. Next time you are in a social gathering, take a look around and you might just see some chameleons for yourself.

1. Why do people acquire others’ behavior?

A．To grab others’ attention.	B．To build a bond with others.
C．To adjust to the surroundings.	D．To match the environment’s colour.

2. How did the experimenter ensure participants’ unconscious behaviors?

A．By hiding a camera from them.

B．By keeping a close eye on their actions.

C．By distracting their attention from a photo.

D．By directing their attention to a photo.

3. What can be concluded from the experiment?

A．Too much of the chameleon effect can be positive.

B．People imitating others are not easy to be observed.

C．People tend to appreciate others imitating their behavior.

D．The copied movements help people to feel less anxious.

4. Which of the following reflects the chameleon effect according to the passage?

A．A comedian copies a celebrity vividly on stage.

B．Close friends share similar behaviors over time.

C．Students adopt teachers’ accents for fun in secret.

D．People change their habits to cheer up others on purpose.

【推荐2】Bloomy spring days come again, another year of job hunting as well. So fierce is the competition that job hunters must make careful decisions in every aspect. Whatever we are wearing, our family and friends may accept us, but the workplace may not.

A newspaper said it is unfair for companies to discourage visible tattoos(纹身), nose rings, or certain dress styles. It is true you can’t judge a book by its cover, yet people do “cover” themselves in order to convey certain messages. What we wear, including tattoos and nose rings, is an expression of who we are. Just as people convey messages about themselves with their their appearances, so do companies. Dress standards exist in the business world for a number of reasons, but the main concern is often about what customers accept.

Others may say how to dress is a matter of personal freedom, but for businesses it is more about making or lose money. Most employers care about the personal appearances of their employees, because those people represent the companies to their customers.

As a hiring manager, I am paid to choose the people who would make the best impression on our customers. There are plenty of well-qualified applicants, so it is not wrong to reject someone who might disappoint my customers, Ever though I am open-minded, I can’t expect all our customers are.

There is nobody to blame but yourself if your set of choices does not match your preferred employer’s. No company should have to change to satisfy an applicant simply because he or she is unwilling to respect its standards, as long as its standards are legal.

1. Which is the newspaper editor’s opinion according to Paragraph 2?

A．People’s appearances carry messages about themselves.

B．Customers’ choices influence dress standards in companies.

C．Applicants with tattoos or nose rings should be fairly treated.

D．Strange dress styles should not be encouraged in the workplace.

2. What can be inferred from the text?

A．Hiring managers leave the best impression on their applicants.

B．What to wear is not a matter of personal choice for companies.

C．Companies sometimes have to change to respect their applicants.

D．Applicants can wear what they themselves prefer for an interview.

3. Which of the following would be the best title for the text?

A．Hiring Managers Matter	B．Appearances Matter
C．Personal Choices Matter	D．Employees Matter

4. The author’s attitude towards strange dress styles in the workplace may be      .

A．negative	B．positive
C．appreciative	D．indifferent

【推荐3】Hip-hop dancing (街舞) is popular with many young people today. They like it because they can invent their own moves. They use this dance to show their love for life. It also shows that they feel good about life, that they just want to be themselves and enjoy life, and that they are not afraid of problems.

Hip-hop dancing has a history of more than 30 years. It first began in the 1980s in the USA. In early times, it was seen in New York and Los Angeles. At that time, many young black people often danced to the music in the streets. They used their legs, arms, heads and even shoulders to dance. Many young people still use most of these moves today.

Hip-hop dancing became popular all over the world because of the 1983 movie Flash dance (霹雳舞). Some people performed Hip-hop dancing in the movie. People enjoyed their performance. They began to dance like them. Then it became popular. There are two kinds of Hip-hop dancing: new school and old school. More and more young people are learning Hip-hop dancing. People believe that it is a good way to exercise their bodies, and that it is good for their health.

1. Young people like Hip-hop dancing because ________.

A．it has a history of more than 20 years	B．it first began in the 1980s in the US
C．they can invent their own moves	D．many young black people dance it

2. At first, Hip-hop dancing was seen ________.

A．in the movies

B．in the streets

C．in old schools

D．in new schools

3. Hip-hop dancing became popular all over the world ________.

A．in 1983

B．in the 1990s

C．20 years ago

D．last year

4. Which of the following is true about Hip-hop dancing?

A．It’s not a good way to exercise the bodies.

B．It shows that young people feel bad about life.

C．Young people use this dance to show their love for life.

D．It shows that young people are afraid of problems.

【推荐2】The next time you need to get somewhere, you may be able to follow your nose. A study has found that a strong sense of smell is associated with a strong sense of direction.

Researchers conducted an experiment at McGill University in Canada. Fifty-seven adults were invited to participate in a virtual “way-finding task" in which they had to make their way around a virtual environment. They were given 20 minutes to learn about the virtual city. After having passed by each of eight landmarks at least twice, the participants were placed in front of one of the landmarks and asked to find the most direct route to one assigned by the researchers.

The participants also smelled 40 scented (有香气的) pens one at a time. After a brief sniff, the participants chose one word that best identified the smell from four words on a screen.

An additional exercise used a virtual maze (迷宫) to determine if the participants were more likely to rely on landmarks to find the way or if they used a more habit-based method built over time as people traveled the same route over and over again.

What the researchers found was that those with the ability to correctly identify the smells of the pens also had the easiest time performing the way-finding task by way of landmarks. A strong sense of smell was not identified in the participants who used the more habit-based method.

The connection between the sense of smell and way-finding likely came about as a result of the evolution of the nervous system. The original function of the sense of smell in humans may have been intended to support our spatial memory.

Keep that in mind the next time you get lost going to the dentist. It won't prevent you from getting horribly lost, but it's good food for thought along the way.

1. How does the author support his argument?

A．By examining differences.	B．By doing virtual experiment.
C．By providing examples.	D．By analyzing cause.

2. What were the participants asked to do after smelling a scented pen?

A．Decide whether they liked the smell.

B．Use a sentence to describe the smell.

C．Choose a suitable word for the smell.

D．Find the landmark that featured the smell.

3. Which of the following factors is related to a strong sense of direction?

A．The way of using landmarks.	B．More experience in describing things.
C．Quick adjustment to the virtual world.	D．A more habit-based way-finding method.

【推荐3】Why elephants rarely get cancer is a mystery that has confused scientists for decades. A study led by researchers at Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI), at the University of Utah and Arizona State University may have found the answer.   

According to the results, elephants have 38 additional modified copies of a gene that encodes p53, a definite tumor suppressor, as compared to humans, who have only two. Further, elephants may have a more powerful mechanism for killing damaged cells that are at risk for becoming cancerous. In isolated elephant cells, this activity is doubled compared to healthy human cells, and five times that of cells from patients with Li-Fraumeni Syndrome, who have only one working copy of p53 and more than a 90 percent lifetime cancer risk in children and adults. The results suggest extra p53 could explain elephants’ increased resistance to cancer.

“Nature has already figured out how to prevent cancer. It’s up to us to learn how different animals overcome the problem so we can adapt those strategies to prevent cancer in people,” says co-senior author Joshua Schiffman, M.D., pediatric oncologist (儿科肿瘤医生) at Huntsman Cancer Institute, University of Utah School of Medicine.

But Prof Mel Greaves, from the Institute of Cancer Research in London, says we should focus on why humans have such high levels of cancer. He pointed to the rise of unhealthy, cancer-causing behaviors, such as obesity and sunbathing. “You’ve never seen an elephant smoke!” he added.

According to Schiffman, elephants have long been considered a walking problem. Because they have 100 times as many cells as people, they should be 100 times more likely to have a cell slip into a cancerous state and cause the disease over their long life span of 50 to 70 years. And yet analysis of a large database of elephant deaths estimates a cancer death rate of less than 5 percent compared to 11 to 25 percent in people.

1. Why are elephants less likely to get cancer than humans?

A．Elephants are bigger than humans.

B．Elephants have more p53 genes and mechanism killing damaged cells.

C．Elephants are not as clever as humans in walking.

D．Elephants eat more than humans.

2. Which of the following can be the equivalent of the underlined word “suppressor”?

A．multiplier

B．complex

C．restrainer

D．coordinator

3. What’s Prof Mel Greaves’ attitude towards the discovery?

A．Doubtful.

B．Neutral.

C．Critical.

D．Favorable.

4. What can we infer from the last paragraph?

A．Elephants have longer life than people.

B．There is no chance that elephants die from cancer.

C．The rate of elephants dying from cancer is increasing.

D．It was thought theoretically that elephants could get cancer more easily.