As human beings retreat (退回) into their homes with the covid-19 expanding across the world, nature seems to be taking back urban areas.
According to The Straits Times, many wild animals have recently skipped onto empty streets in many cities. In Spain, a wild boar (野猪) climbed down the hills and wandered around Barcelona. Sika deer nosed their way around the deserted subway stations of Nara in Japan. It is certainly great news for species because this is the habitat they once had and that humans have taken away from them.
Hundreds of years ago, people lived in harmony with wildlife. They shared natural resources from sunlight to water and from forests to land. But as human beings evolved and formed their own civilizations, they fought with animals for more space and resources. Gradually, human beings came to lose connection with nature. More skyscrapers were built to meet the needs of the flock of people in the cities, which drove away many wild animals from their habitats.
However, the recent lockdown of cities during the pandemic gives a chance of freeing space for other animals and reflecting on humans’ relationship with nature. Stuck indoors, with their worlds reduced to a few square meters, urban people have suddenly become keen bird-watchers. They have realized that the sky is a great arena — anything can fly past and, at the very least, it will give them peace. The message is simple: keep looking up.
Right now the most important phenomenon perhaps is humans’ relationship with nature is changing-with people locked up in their homes realizing how much they miss nature. More importantly, by missing nature, humans may come to respect — and live in harmony with-nature once again.
1. What keeps human beings indoors according to the text?| A．Expansion of the world. | B．Spread of a disease. |
| C．Return of wild animals. | D．Retreat of urban areas. |
| A．A quieter city. | B．busier sky. |
| C．A better human-nature relationship. | D．civilized habitat. |
| A．Stage. | B．Room. |
| C．Cage. | D．Message box. |
| A．Mankind wins. | B．Nature rages. |
| C．Wildlife moves in. | D．Citizens resist. |
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【推荐1】Who would win in a fight, a lion or a tiger? Well, if size has anything to do with the matter, the tiger would win. That’s because tigers are the largest of all cat species. Tigers are not only large, they are also fast. They can sprint as fast as 40 miles per hour for short distances and leap as far as 30 feet horizontally. You might not think that such large, fast, and fierce creatures need help to survive, but they do.
It is estimated that at the start of the 20th century, there were over 100,000 tigers living in the wild. By the turn of the century, the number of tigers outside of captivity dwindled to just over 3,000. Interestingly, the most serious threats that tigers face come from a much smaller species, one with an average weight of around 140 lbs. That species is Homo sapiens, better known as humans. Humans threaten tigers in primarily two ways: hunting and destroying habitat.
Tigers are hunted for many reasons. People have long valued the famous striped skins. Though trading tiger skins is now illegal in most parts of the world, tiger pelts are worth around $10,000 on the black market. Though the fur would be incentive enough for most poachers, other parts of the tiger can also fetch a pretty penny. Some people in China and other Asian cultures believe that various tiger parts have healing properties. Traditional Chinese medicine calls for the use of tiger bones, amongst other parts, in some prescriptions.
Tigers have also been hunted as game. In other words, people hunted tigers solely for the thrill and achievement of killing them. Such killings took place in large scale during the 19th and early 20th centuries, when an English hunter might claim to kill over a hundred tigers in their hunting career. Though this practice is much less popular today than it was in the past, it has not ceased entirely.
Humans have done considerable damage to the world’s tiger population through hunting, but perhaps more damage has been caused through the destruction of habitat. Tigers once ranged widely across Asia, all the way from Turkey to the eastern coast of Russia. But over the past 100 years, tigers have lost 93% of their historic range. Instead of spanning all the way across Asia, the tiger population is now isolated in small pockets in southern and southeastern Asia. This is because humans have drastically changed the environments. Humans have built towns and cities. Road and transit systems were created to connect these towns and cities. To feed the people living in these areas, forests and fields have been cleared to create farmland.
A major obstacle to preserving tigers is the enormous amount of territory that each tiger requires. Each wild tiger demands between 200 and 300 square miles. Tigers are also both territorial and solitary animals. This means that they are protective of the areas that they claim and they generally do not share with other tigers. Because tigers need so much territory, it is really difficult for conservationists to acquire enough land to support a large population of tigers.
1. Which of the following is NOT a reason in the article explaining why tigers are hunted?| A．Because tiger skins are worth a lot of money. |
| B．Because tiger parts are used as medicines in some cultures. |
| C．Because some tigers attack local villages. |
| D．Because tigers are hunted for enjoyment by some people. |
| A．attractive | B．innovative | C．alternative | D．respective |
| A．Because tigers are under threat from other animals. |
| B．Because tiger skins are extremely valuable. |
| C．Because the environment has been changed. |
| D．Because tigers need so much space to survive. |
| A．To provide readers with interesting information about the lifestyles of tigers. |
| B．To persuade readers to help the world’s tiger population and to offer ways to help. |
| C．To entertain readers with stories about how tigers hunt and are hunted. |
| D．To explain to readers why the world’s tiger population is endangered. |
【推荐2】What would you think if someone suggested knocking down St Paul’s Cathedral to widen the road? Or pulling down Big Ben to make way for a car park? It would be ridiculous, right? But when it comes to devastation (毁灭) of the natural world, we aren’t so easily shocked. But we should be...or we’ll be in a lot of trouble.
Nature is shrinking by the day. Ancient forests are destroyed. Wetlands are becoming dry. Woodland is disappearing, and all in the name of progress. This is bad in itself, but it’s devastating for biodiversity.
Biodiversity refers to the variety of plants, animals and other living things that are all interconnected. The ecological services provided by biodiversity are vital to everyday life. The air we breathe is a product of photosynthesis (光合作用) by green plants. Insects, worms and bacteria break down waste and make soils rich. And tiny organisms clean the water in rivers and sea. In fact, all life on the earth exists thanks to the benefits of biodiversity. More than 90 percent of the calories consumed by people worldwide are produced from 80 plant species. And 30 percent of medicines are developed from plants and animals. Maintaining a wide diversity of species in each ecosystem is necessary to preserve all living things.
The loss of biodiversity could be devastating. “It is wrong to think that biodiversity can be reduced indefinitely without threatening humans,” said Harvard University biologist Edward O. Wilson, known as the “father of biodiversity”. He warned, “We are about to reach a critical point beyond which biodiversity loss will become irreversible (不可挽回的).”
But what can we do? The present problem is that the concept of biodiversity is so vague (含糊的). People might care about giant pandas, but it is much harder to excite them about the fate of tiny sea creatures which are being boiled to death in the cooling systems of power stations along coastlines. The Guardian newspaper is trying to help. It has launched the Biodiversity 100 campaign to try to convince governments around the world to take action to deal with the widespread concerns about biodiversity. This includes persuading the UK government to create a series of marine reserves to reserve the decrease in the sea-life caused by industrial fishing, stopping fishing sharks by the Japanese fishermen and banning the killing of dingoes (wild dogs) in Australia, among many other things.
There is a lot to do. And we’d better act quickly if we don’t want to end up with a planet that can’t sustain life!
1. The writer thinks it ________ to pull down Big Ben to make way for a car park.| A．unreasonable | B．necessary | C．difficult | D．essential |
| A．nature is badly polluted by humans | B．species are becoming fewer and fewer day by day |
| C．rainforests are being cut down every day | D．nature is full of mysteries |
| A．it doesn’t matter to reduce biodiversity | B．people have done enough to preserve biodiversity |
| C．the situation of biodiversity is very serious | D．biodiversity loss has become irreversible |
| A．people might not clearly know what is biodiversity and what should be protected |
| B．people are not aware that giant pandas are endangered |
| C．people don’t realize that biodiversity is vital to everyday life |
| D．people hunt sea creatures for food |
| A．The UK government. | B．The concept of biodiversity. |
| C．The action to deal with the problem. | D．The Guardian newspaper. |
【推荐3】Now Sea World on the Gold Coast is the only dolphin park in Australia to continue keeping dolphins in captivity. This wouldn't have been possible without thousands of warm-hearted supporters being a voice for dolphins protection over many years.
In August last year, Ben Pearson, our head of campaigns in Australia and New Zealand, appeared before the NSW upper house inquiry into the use wild animals for entertainment to put forward our case for ban on captive Dolphin breeding in the state. “If a dolphin were bred today, it may still be alive in 2070. This regulation frees future dolphins from being kept in lockdown at a time when the public acceptability of keeping dolphins in captivity for entertainment is declining. As the tide turns against using marine mammals in captivity for entertainment, conversation about what will happen to the dolphins at Sea World needs to start now. First step is a ban on further breeding,” Ben Pearson said.
Major travel brands including Tripadvisor and Booking. com have already committed to stop selling tickets to dolphin shows and encounters. As well as these great changes for dolphins from the travel industry, Canada recently passed a ban on keeping dolphins and whales for entertainment. This is part of a global movement towards better treatment of these wild animals, which includes the nations of Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Costa Rica, India, Luxembourg, Norway, Switzerland, and the UK.
Dolphins are magnificent, intelligent animals. They belong in the wild and should not be bred in captivity for entertainment. In their natural environment, dolphins swim freely in 100 square kilometres of ocean, sometimes more, but the average dolphin in captivity has a fraction of that space. Together, we can make this the last generation of dolphins in captivity.
1. What makes Sea World on the Gold Coast the only dolphin park?| A．Dolphins take too long a time to feed. |
| B．People's awareness of protecting dolphins. |
| C．Sea World on the Gold Coast has enough money. |
| D．Dolphins in Sea World on the Gold Coast like people's voice. |
| A．A ban on further breeding. | B．A conversation about protecting environment. |
| C．A plan for dolphin entertainment. | D．A dolphin show. |
| A．More parks for dolphins will be built. | B．More dolphins will be kept in parks. |
| C．Wild animals will live a better life. | D．More countries will feed wild animals. |
| A．Make Dolphins Live Freely. | B．Protect Sea World on the Gold Coast |
| C．Change the Ways of Entertainment. | D．Prevent People from Feeding Animals |
【推荐1】A short while ago, I lost access to my We Chat account.I am not sure why it wouldn’t let me log in; perhaps it was my ancient, out-of-date phone. But I wasn’t upset because it offered me an opportunity to take a break from social media-something more and more people are doing.
In the United States, Twitter and Facebook has seen a 44 percent decline among its younger users. Stars such as Taylor Swift and Ed Sheeren have taken a break from social media because they were tired of so many Internet trolls leaving negative comments. Ordinary people (like me) are turning away from it because of the feeling that they were spending more time online and enjoying less.
It is not unusual for people to spend two or three hours a day posting or reading posts, to the point where it becomes an addiction.And it is an addiction. There is a chemical in your brain known as dopamine (多巴胺) which is sometimes called the “reward molecule”and its release gives you a feeling of pleasure. For instance, when you post a photo on We Chat and get a hundred likes, you feel happy. That’s dopamine at work.
In my case, being off We Chat is actually an added bonus. No doubt I missed my dopamine. And I got e-mails from friends wondering if I was fine or if I was just being anti-social. But I soon began to feel quite peaceful and started to worry less about what other people were doing and concentrate more on my personal life. And I’m getting better sleep at night.
I’m not advocating that all of you quit social media, but spending less time on these platforms does bring you advantages.
1. How did the author feel after he lost access to We Chat account?| A．Calm. | B．Worried. |
| C．Disappointed. | D．Surprised. |
| A．To illustrate the importance of social media. |
| B．To compare them with ordinary people. |
| C．To give examples of quitting online platforms. |
| D．To show the popularity of social media. |
| A．Desire. | B．Benefit. |
| C．Mission. | D．Joy. |
| A．How to form good online habits. |
| B．How to use social media properly. |
| C．How to be smart online learners. |
| D．How to cut down the time spent online. |
【推荐2】Carlos Slim’s proposal that we work a three - day week sounds crazy. But many, in 1922, thought Henry Ford crazy when he announced that his staff would work a five - day week.
Our working week seems normal to us because it is what we all always do. He certainly could be for those he was most concerned about when he made his three - day - week statement at a business conference in Paraguay: the workers who are not ready to retire. As Mr. Slim said, it no longer makes sense for people to stop working in their fifties or sixties when they may still have up to a third of their lives ahead of them. “People are going to have to work for more years, until they are 70 or 75, and just work three days a week - perhaps 11 hours a day.” he said.
Keeping older employees at work makes sense for societies, especially those with a diminishing number of young people who are expected to support long - living retirees.
He appeared to be suggesting that these short - week workers earn the same as they did full - time. That is what happens at Telmex, his Mexican fixed - line phone company, where those qualified for retirement can choose to work four - day weeks on full pay.
Older workers elsewhere might prefer shorter weeks on reduced pay - and eight or nine - hour days rather than 11. Their companies might value keeping their experience while saving money on their salaries. What about everyone else? There are those who are unemployed, or in unstable jobs, who would be delighted to have three secure, well - paid days of work a week.
Shorter weeks don’t work in every job, but they work in more jobs than most tradition - bound managers think. Agreeing to them requires two shifts in management thinking. The first is the realization that much of the time spent in offices is wasted anyway. Second, senior executives need ro understand that the best way to measure people is by the work they produce - not by how much time they spend at their desks.
People living longer, in better health, are changing working life too. Mr. Slim’s idea is in tune with the times.
1. According to paragraph 2 why did Mr. Slim think it unwise for people in their fifties or sixties to retire ?| A．Because they have longer life to live in their future. |
| B．Because they have children and old parents to support |
| C．Because they have much interest in their present work. |
| D．Because they have more experience than young workers. |
| A．The decision of working five days a week by Ford was considered normal in the past. |
| B．Old people continuing working can reduce young people’s pressure to support their old parents |
| C．Some companies don’t want their old workers to go on working because they can save money. |
| D．Much time spent at work is wasted if managers don’t agree to reduce old employees’working time. |
| A．Different from. | B．Superior to. |
| C．Far from. | D．Consistent with. |
| A．Retire Or Not, This Is A Question! |
| B．Shorter Weeks Is Welcome By All |
| C．Working Three Days A Week: A Great Idea |
| D．Carlos Slim - Crazy For More Resting Time |
【推荐3】Not long ago, my wife and I spent a weekend together without any of our three children. This was the first time we had been alone for more than a few hours since our oldest was born four years ago.
What did we do on our short vacation? My wife read the first hundred or so pages of Tom Jones , a book she has been meaning to read for ages. There was takeout and a nice long walk along the shore of Lake Michigan. Football was watched. But mostly? We slept, without worrying for once about whether a shrill voice might awaken us between the hours of 9 p.m. and 6 a.m. to demand a glass of water (“No，not that one，the Tinkerbell cup!’’）. We were too relaxed to do anything else.
As parents, we might tell other people that given the chance for even a short child-free break we would love to do some reading or take in a concert. This is not true. The truth is that what most of us really want is a chance not to think about how well we are using our time.
By admitting this，I realize the myth(错误的看法）of the brain-dead parents. Being brain-dead is what a parent like me looks forward to rather than something to be accused of. The novelist Lucy Ellmann recently provided a convenient summary in an interview：
You watch people get pregnant and know they’ll be emotionally and intellectually absent for 20 years. Thought, knowledge, adult conversation, and vital political action are all put on hold. With a kiddo, you become a human koala while your old friends continue to have “interests”. They do art and literature and science, you see, not diapers(尿不湿）.
When you become responsible for the life of a very small person, nothing is more important than shouldering that responsibility. In that sense，parenting is a chance to reconsider the value of an extra 20 minutes in bed or a short phone conversation with an old friend. As to my wife and me, we spent the weekend eating steamed dumplings and drinking wine until we fell asleep.
We value the all-too-rare experience of being brain-dead.
1. What did the author and his wife mainly do on the weekend?| A．They did some reading. | B．They had a sound sleep. |
| C．They had a nice long walk. | D．They watched a football match. |
| A．In control. | B．Forbidden. |
| C．Abandoned. | D．In vain. |
| A．He begins to feel lonely. | B．He is no longer responsible. |
| C．He becomes absent-minded. | D．He hardly has his own time. |
| A．Tips for new parents | B．Avoiding being brain-dead parents |
| C．The myth of brain-dead parents | D．How to steal time as brain-dead parents |
【推荐1】For decades, the homework standard has been a "10-minute" rule, which suggests a daily maximum of 10 minutes of homework per grade level.
But some schools have begun to give their youngest students a break. A Massachusetts elementary school has announced a no-homework pilot（试点的）program for the coming school year, extending the school day by two hours to provide more in-class instruction. "We really want kids to go home at 4 o'clock, tired," Kelly Elementary School Principal Jackie Glasheen said. "We want them to enjoy their families. We want them to go to soccer practice or football practice."
New solutions to homework differ by community. These local debates aren't easily understood by the fact that even education experts disagree about what's best for kids.
The most all-round research on homework so far comes from an analysis（分析）by Duke University professor Harris Cooper, who found evidence（证据）of a positive relationship between homework and student achievement, meaning students who did homework performed better in school. Cooper's analysis focused on how homework influences test scores. The relationship was stronger for older students-in 7th through 12th grade-than for those in younger grades, for whom there was a weak relationship between homework and performance.
Although there is the weak relationship between homework and performance for young children, Cooper argues that a small amount of homework is useful for all students. Second-graders should not be doing two hours of homework each night, he said, but they also shouldn't be doing no homework.
However, Cathy Vatterott, an education professor at the University Missouri-St. Louis, thinks there is not enough evidence that homework is helpful for students in elementary school, "Relationship is not a cause," she said "Does homework cause achievement, or do high achievers do more homework?" Vatterott thinks there should be more stress on improving the quality of homework tasks, and she supports efforts to ban homework for younger kids.
1. What will Kelly Elementary School have in the new term?| A．No homework. | B．Some football practice. |
| C．"10-minute" homework. | D．More physical education classes. |
| A．Younger students in all grades with no homework. |
| B．Younger students in lower grades with no homework. |
| C．Older students in lower grades with more homework. |
| D．Older students in higher grades with more homework. |
| A．Positive. | B．Negative. | C．Unknown. | D．Doubtful. |
| A．Is homework good for students? | B．How much homework is proper? |
| C．Does high-quality homework work? | D．Do students really hate homework? |
【推荐2】Even with wonderful friends, family and a partner, I don't always want to be surrounded by people. “Table for one? Or will someone else be joining you?” A dinner reservation for one person never fails to raise a few eyebrows. I actively choose to spend time alone when possible. But not everyone has the luxury of choosing to be alone, of course, many are forced into one-on-one time because they have no one.
But for those of us who spend our days surrounded by colleagues in the workplace, our evenings and weekends with family, friends and partners, all the while being constantly bombarded by WhatsApp,social media and email, time to ourselves can be a rare treat. Time to yourself not only gives you the chance to do practical things you don't normally get round to but also the activities your pals don't want to do. In a less real way, spending time alone also allows-or perhaps forces- you to sit with your own thoughts, to think about things that might normally be drowned out by conversation and the noise of companionship. When you're alone you get time to think without purpose.
It is worth noting that I'm a real introvert(性格内向者）,so perhaps sitting alone with my thoughts-refilling my energy reserves-might just be indulging personality traits that others don't have. But I believe more people could benefit from it.
Given this constant social conditioning since childhood that we should be surrounded by people , it's no wonder many hesitate to press forward at the idea of spending time alone-a sign we've failed at climbing that social ladder. And if you're an extrovert who gets their energy from other people, this must be even harder. But as someone who has come to love spending time alone, even when there are many wonderful souls in my life I can spend time with, I wish more people would give solo a go.
Reservation for one, please.
1. What can we learn from the first paragraph?| A．The author wants to be alone all the time. |
| B．The author feels bored with family and friends. |
| C．Surrounded by people, the author still feels lonely. |
| D．Reserving a table for one will draw disapproving looks. |
| A．The benefits of alone time. |
| B．The weaknesses of social media. |
| C．The definition of being alone. |
| D．The ways of spending time alone. |
| A．By eating delicious food. |
| B．By reflecting on their own thoughts. |
| C．By socializing with others. |
| D．By reading their favourite books. |
| A．quote others' words |
| B．answer the waiter's question |
| C．excite the readers' appetite |
| D．stress the author's determination |
【推荐3】To battle the plagiarism (抄袭), some schools in America have responded to ChatGPT by taking action, according to the New York Times.
New York City public schools, for example, recently prevented ChatGPT access on school computers and networks, saying “concerns about negative influence on students learning, and concerns about the safety of content.” Schools in other cities, including Seattle, have also limited its use.
A US online course provider Study.com recently asked 1,000 students over the age of 18 about the use of ChatGPT in the classroom. The responses were surprising. Around 89 percent said they’ve used it on homework. Over 50 percent said they used ChatGPT to write an essay, while 22 percent admitted to having asked ChatGPT for a paper outline.
While the chatbot (聊天机器人) is raising fears of academic cheating on schools, some educators believe introducing the AI-ended tools to the academics could even overturn the traditional education.
“For researchers, finding valuable scientific problems and solving them in creative ways come first, and then writing academic papers. Some AI-enabled writing tools can create words or even write long text based on a few keywords shortly,” said Zhu Wei, a law professor in China. For example, ChatGPT helps writers gather writing materials for their papers, which not only increases the efficiency of the work, but also allows researchers to devote more energy to more creative work.
“Whether to use ChatGPT depends on whether to use it correctly. For those students who just use it to deal with homework or exams,” Zhu said, “this is putting the cart before the horse, which should be limited.” To avoid this problem, Zhu suggested introducing soft wares to help educators. He believes schools should accept ChatGPT as a teaching aid to unlock creativity in students. “The most important part of such tools is not to replace human thinking, but to improve human thinking.” Zhu said.
1. How does the author describe the results of Study.com’s research in Paragraph 3?| A．By listing figures. | B．By conducting tests. |
| C．By giving examples. | D．By referring to other studies. |
| A．Disagreeable. | B．Supportive. | C．Objective. | D．Unconcerned. |
| A．Showing how software is applied in schools. |
| B．Giving examples of how students use ChatGPT. |
| C．Listing advantages of using AI-ended tools properly in schools. |
| D．Introducing ways to use ChatGPT to improve students’ creativity. |
