【推荐2】Japan is a paradise for food lovers. It has been famous for a __________ food culture. The climate there is good for farming, with rice being the chief __________. About half of Japan’s arable land (land able to be farmed) is __________to growing rice. In addition, it accounts for about 8 percent of all the fish caught in the world, which __________ Japanese people’s consuming large amounts of fish. According to the statistics, each person in Japan eats more than 150 pounds of fish per __________, or around three pounds of fish per week.

Japanese cuisine (菜肴) has been influenced by the food customs of other nations in the long history, but has adopted and __________ them to create its own unique cooking style and eating habits. The first foreign influence on Japan was China around 300B.C., when the Japanese learned to cultivate rice. Similarly the __________ of chopsticks and the __________ of soy sauce and soybean curd (tofu) also came from China.

__________ you can find a perfect combination of the local food in this island nation and food originating in other countries, you can also find some food that is only to be seen in Japan. Okosama Lunch is one __________ example. __________ of fried shrimps, hamburger steak, pudding and a small portion of rice, this special menu for kids has gained nationwide popularity. It is said that Okosama Lunch was __________ in 1930 by Taro Ando, a chief manager of Mitsukoshi Department Store, who made __________ achievements in Japanese cuisine. He was first inspired by the idea that with all the cute decoration it would probably appear more appetizing and thus more __________ to kids. And now Okosama Lunch is available in most Japanese restaurants, though the detail of the special menu __________ from place to place.

【推荐3】Creativity at Work

“People will soon get tired of staring at a plywood box every night.”— Daryl F. Zanuck, head of 20th Century Fox, commenting on television in 1946.

The need for creativity is changing how the workplace is organized and what people do. These changes centre on the use and _______ of information: the basis for ideas. A company’s future depends upon how well it _______ , interprets, and acts upon information. Today the spread of information technologies —including computers and data bases— is _______ a sea of change in the business world.

Yet how workers interpret that information is as important as the information itself. Interpretation is, in fact, a _______ act. But the degree of creativity is influenced by our feelings: our belief that we can speak without fear of retribution, our feeling of being _______ by others, a confidence in our own intuition all affect how we _______ the information before us.

There are many ways in which the creative spirit can find expression in the workplace: innovations in management, _______ in distribution methods, or new ideas for financing a business. Creative ideas can also be used to _______ the organization itself by increasing the _______ of workers. One such innovation is the elimination of restrictive job descriptions that put workers in “boxes” and ________ their performance. Another idea is to ________ all financial information with all of the employees. Elimination of traditional corporate secrets ________ workers to understand the larger reality of the business and encourages them to generate ideas of their own to ________ costs and increase revenues.

Since creative problem-solving requires the psychological ________ of the whole person, the modern workplace must undergo vital changes. From the efforts of ________ companies around the world, a set of key ideas are emerging that can change the psychology of the workplace.

【推荐1】About 70,000,000 Americans are trying to lose weight (减肥). That is almost 1 out of every 3 people in the United States. Some people eat_______ food and they hardly have any fats or sweets. Others do running, exercise with machines, take medicines, or even have operations. _______ you can see losing weight is_________work, and it will also cost a lot of money. But _______ do so many people in the United States want to lose weight?

Many people in the United States worry about their look of the body. For many people, looking nice also means to be_______. Other people worry about their health as many doctors _______ overweight is not good.

Most people want to find an   _______way to take off fat, and books of this kind are very popular. These books tell people how to lose weight. Each year a lot of new books like these are     3_______. Each one says it can easily help people take fat away.

Losing weight can be _______ Some overweight people go to health centres, like La Costa in California. Men and women __________ several hundred dollars a day at these health centres. People live there for one week or two, __________exercise, eating different foods. Meals there may be just a little. All these work for losing weight. __________ 4 days on the programme, one woman called Mrs. Warren lost 5 pounds (2.27kg). At $ 400 a day, she spent $ 320 to lose each pound. But she said she was still __________to do so.

Health centres, books, medicines, operations, running and exercise machines all__________a lot of money. So in the United States, losing weight may mean losing __________ too.

【推荐2】In a room at Stanford University, scientists are studying a small animal called a gecko (壁虎)．It’s a(n)__________animal because it can move very quickly up and down a tree and even upside down on ceilings (天花板). The scientists are particularly __________the gecko’ s feet. They want to use the__________design on a metal robot that looks like the gecko. It has four feet and can walk up walls made of glass or plastic, __________it still has trouble walking upside down.

Animals and plants can__________humans a lot. As a result, many engineers, scientists, and designers spend time__________them. When they have a problem, nature often has the__________. This science is called biomimetics. Bio means “living things”and mimetics means “copying”. In other words, scientists—or biomimeticists-study animals and plants in order to__________their design.

For example, engineers in Canada are studying whale flippers (鲸鱼的鳍) because they move so__________through water. The engineers believe the shape can__________the movement of wind turbines (风力机). Similarly, engineers at Mercedes-Benz in Germany are__________the shape of the boxfish to one of their new cars because it makes the car__________and more fuel efficient.

Velcro (威扣魔术贴) is probably the most famous__________of   biomimetics. Most people have some Velcro on an item of clothing. It was__________by the Swiss engineer George de Mestral in 1948. He was walking in the countryside when he pulled a burr (牛蒡芒刺) off his clothes. He noticed how well the burr__________his clothes so he studied its design. The__________was Velcro, which became an affordable__________for the traditional zipper(拉链).

In 1982 inventor Wilhelm Bartlott got a great idea studying the leaf of a lotus plant. He noticed that water always ran off the leaf. When he had a closer look, he discovered how this__________. Bartlott copied the leaf’s__________ surface and now you can find it in specialized paint products that don’t allow water and dirt to stick to them.

In conclusion, biomimetics not only has helped to__________our world but promises many more possibilities.

【推荐3】Music is part of every culture on Earth, which can be _________, sad, romantic, sleepy, healing—all kinds of things. But what is it? Some people call it an art that sounds _________time. Our ears receive it as loud or _________, high or low, rapid and short, or slow and _________. The sounds need to continue for a time in some sort of pattern to become _________.

Music, like _________, is a human form of communication. As with language, there are many different kinds. In North America, people listen to jazz, rock, classical, folk, country, and many other kinds of music. Each kind of music has its own rules and “_________” to us in its own way.

No one knows for sure when music _________. Perhaps while working, people sang to make it go faster. People who were _________ movements—picking crops or rowing boats, for example—could sing in time __________ for the work. Navajo Indians, for example, had corn-grinding songs.

Over time, people __________ musical instruments. They might have started by clapping their hands and stamping their __________. Sticks and objects that rattled (碰响) could have __________ the human body as early __________. Both instruments and music became more complex (复杂) with time.

Today, music in many cultures __________ art music and music of the people. Art music, which we call classical music, is more __________ than the music of the people—__________ music and popular music. Art music is __________ harder to write and perform. Musicians who perform it need a lot of __________. Popular and folk styles typically are easier to __________, perform, and understand.