【推荐2】Skills you need for future work

Creativity

    1     Robots currently can’t compete with humans on creativity. The future workplace is going to demand new ways of thinking, and human creativity will be the key to it.

Emotional intelligence (EQ)

You exhibit high emotional intelligence if you have empathy (同感) and work well with others. A machine can’t easily replace a human’s ability to connect with another human being.     2    

Critical thinking

A person with critical thinking skills can suggest innovative solutions and ideas and solve complex problems using reasoning and logic.     3     After observing, someone who is a strong analytical thinker will rely on logical reasoning rather than emotion, collect the pros and cons (利与弊) of a situation and be open-minded to the best possible solution.

Technology skills

The 4th industrial revolution (革命) is fueled by technological innovations. This means that everyone will need a certain level of comfort around technology.     4     This requires some technical skills. Everyone needs to be able to understand the potential impact of new technologies on their industry, business, and job.

    5    

Due to the speed of change in the future workplace, people will have to be agile (机敏的) and able to embrace and celebrate change. Not only will our brains need to be flexible, but we’ll also need to be adaptable as we are required to adjust to shifting workplaces, expectations, and skill sets. A skill needed for the future will be the ability to see change as a chance to grow.

A．Active learning.

B．Accepting change.

C．So those who have high EQs will be in demand.

D．People should understand and respect others despite differences in culture.

E．Most employees will be required to access data and determine how to act on it.

F．The first step in critical thinking is to analyze information from various resources.

G．Human workers need to be creative to fully realize the benefits of all the new things in the future.

【推荐2】Susannah was a shy but clever girl. She had worn glasses for as long as she could remember. And again, for as long as she could remember, some of her classmates had habitually picked on her.

The worst thing was that Lewis called her “Four Eyes”. She acted like she didn’t mind, but in fact Susannah couldn’t stand it

One day, the class went on a school outing to visit some famous caves. The children were walking towards the caves, while Lewis slipped. While falling, he grabbed onto Susannah, who walked next to him, and both fell down the hole.

They landed in a dark cave. All that could be seen was a single ray of light coming from the cave roof, many metres above, and some tree roots and trunks which had fallen through the hole. Susannah and Lewis shouted for help, but no one came.

The next morning they still hadn’t been found and Lewis continued shouting for help, but no response and he started feeling scared.

It must have been noontime, because Susannah noticed that the ray of light just landed on the floor in front of her. Quickly, she took a piece of wood that had fallen into the cave, and, using her glasses as a magnifying (放大) glass, she focused the ray of light onto the wood until a little flame sprang up. Now they had a torch(火把) . Lewis watched with surprise and excitement and then they went to explore the cave.

It took them some time, and they had to burn quite a few torches, but finally they found a way out. Amid (在其中) hugs and cries of relief, Lewis gave Susannah his heartfelt thanks.

1. What does the underlined part “pick on”(in Para. 1) probably mean ?

A．Pick up

B．Catch on

C．Get rid of

D．Make fun of.

2. Why did Lewis watch with surprise when Susannah made the torch?

A．He never thought Susannah disliked him

B．He never thought Susannah could see the light

C．He never thought Susannah was so calm and clever

D．He never thought Susannah could keep him company

3. What can we know from the passage?

A．Susannah slipped and fell down the hole.

B．Susannah was pulled down the hole by Lewis.

C．They stayed in the cave for three days and two nights.

D．They were saved by their classmates and teachers.

4. What can we infer from the passage?

A．Susannah can’t forgive Lewis for his misbehaviour.

B．Most students like to play jokes about Susannah wearing glasses.

C．Lewis is a shy boy and didn’t get along well with others.

D．Lewis would never play tricks on others disabilities again.

【推荐3】When I made the decision to quit my full-time employment, I never thought that I could get involved in an increasing global trend. I had to leave my relatively high-profile position for an unexpected move that hurt my pride and prevented me from getting promoted. Yet, I excused my departure by saying “I wanted to spend more time with my family”.

Curiously, after around two and a half years, my experience in what Americans refer to as “downshifting” has turned my excuse into an absolute reality. I have been transformed from a passionate advocate of Linda Kelsey’s “have it all” concept, which she has been promoting for the past seven years in the pages of She magazine, into a woman who is content to accept a little bit of everything.

I have discovered that abandoning the idea of “juggling your life” and adopting the alternative strategy of “downshifting” has benefits that go far beyond financial success and social status. Nothing could convince me to go back to the lifestyle Kelsey used to promote and which I had previously enjoyed: 12-hour workdays, tight deadlines, the terrifying pressure of office politics, and the demand of being a parent on “quality time”.

After the widespread layoffs (裁员) brought on by cost-cutting in the late 1980s, America started to move toward a simpler, less materialistic way of life as a response to the economic downturn. In America, simplifying one’s life is frequently done for financial reasons, but in Britain, at least among the middle class I know, we have different motivations for doing so. For the women of my generation who were encouraged to keep juggling, downshifting is not so much a search for a mythical (虚无的) good life—growing your own organic vegetables, and risking turning into one—as a personal recognition of your limitations.

1. What can we learn from paragraph 1?

A．The writer didn’t take pride in her original job.

B．Full-time employment is a new international trend.

C．The writer was eager to spend more time with her family.

D．The writer was forced to resign due to an external factor.

2. What do we know about downshifting according to the text?

A．The writer abandoned her high social status for downshifting.

B．Downshifting allowed the writer to make her dream come true.

C．The writer changed her way of thinking through downshifting.

D．The writer accepted the concept of She magazine because of downshifting.

3. What does the underlined phrase “juggling your life” in paragraph 3 mean?

A．Settling for a bit of everything.

B．Choosing to live a simple life.

C．Adopting a busy and stressful lifestyle.

D．Staying away from a materialistic way of life.

4. What does the writer intend to tell us?

A．It is never too late to pursue your dream.

B．Downshifting results in a more satisfactory and simpler life.

C．There is a difference between the American and British cultures.

D．People should adopt downshifting to search for mythical experiences.

【推荐1】Researchers have recently discovered that gut microbiome (肠道微生物群)—bacteria that grow within our body-helps the brain build important social skills.

According to a paper published in PLOS Biology in November, zebra fish were used to research subjects to test how a lack of microbiome could alter social skills. Zebra fish are social animals as even 2-week-old fish starts to hang out in groups of 4 to 12.

The experiment started with making a group of fish “germ-free” through their diet. The other group were injected with a healthy mix of gut bacteria after they were hatched (孵化出来). About 15 days later, the second group began swimming in groups while the “germ-free” group “shockingly, didn’t,” Judith Eisen, a co-author of the new research, said to Quanta Magazine.

The team then examined the fish’s brains, discovering obvious differences between the two groups. The ones who lacked the gut microbiome had more interconnections among the neurons (神经元) in their brains in charge of social behavior. It also led to fewer microglia, the neural immune cells (神经免疫细胞) that help clean the brain’s unwanted neurons. With less microglia to clear the brain’s neurons, social neurons were seen to have overgrown. This made the fish more cautious in social situations.

Scientists supposed that the bacteria could release a special chemical that crosses the blood-brain barrier to reach the brain directly. Or, the immune cells might move between the gut and the brain, sending messages. Although the experiments were only on fish, the findings can theoretically be applied to humans. The team wishes to explore how gut microbiome affects the human brain in the future, which may lead to solutions to mental health problems.

Perhaps many people who claim that they have “social phobia” (社交恐惧症) can blame their guts. However, social phobia, or social anxiety disorder, can be a serious illness if overlooked. According to the National Health Service in the UK, it is more than shyness but instead a constant fear of social situations. Patients may experience panic attacks which are an overwhelming fear and anxiety that last for a few minutes.

1. What did the research aim to find out?

A．The causes of social phobia.	B．The way zebra fish build social skills.
C．The influencing factors of social behavior.	D．The link between gut bacteria and social behavior.

2. How did researchers conduct the study?

A．By examining the fish’s guts.	B．By collecting and analyzing data.
C．By observing the fish’s appearance.	D．By comparing different groups of fish.

3. What do we know about the fish without gut microbiome?

A．They tend to behave less socially.	B．They have more neural immune cells.
C．Their brains have fewer unwanted neurons.	D．Their social neurons are loosely connected.

4. What does the author think of social phobia?

A．It is often overlooked.	B．It is caused by inactive neurons.
C．It should be taken seriously.	D．It affects the amount of gut microbiome.

【推荐2】Blue sharks use large, spinning ocean currents, known as eddies(漩涡), to fast—track their way down to feed in the ocean twilight zone—a layer of the ocean between 200 and 1000 meters deep—containing a large number of fishes according to new research by the Applied Physics Lab.

Researchers tagged(给……加上标签) more than a dozen blue sharks off the US. Northeast Coast and monitored them for nine months. The tags relayed data back to the researchers via satellite, showing that the sharks had spent a good part of their days diving down to the ocean twilight zone through the eddies in the ocean. There, they’d spend an hour or so hunting for food like small fish before returning to the surface to warm up before diving again.

Dives were less frequent at night, when many twilight zone animals make their daily migration from the ocean’s mid—water to feed at the surface. Camrin Braun, lead author of the study, said that an evening trip possibly isn’t worth the effort for hungry blue sharks since the zone isn’t particularly well filled with fish after dark.

Braun said the behavior of the blue sharks was generally similar to that of the white sharks the team tracked in a previous study last year. However, the two species had different preferences when it came to water temperature. White sharks, which are warm-blooded animals, used a combination of warm and cold—water eddies to reach the twilight zone, while blue sharks relied only on warm water eddies. because they belong to a cold-blooded species.

Blue sharks are considered a “near threatened” species due to heavy fishing pressure on populations across the globe. “This research helps fill important knowledge gaps about where they go and why, which can inform decision making to help protect them,” said biologist Simon Thorrold. “It is significant to do further research on the blue sharks.”

1. What can we know about the ocean twilight zone?

A．It’s a place with spinning ocean currents.

B．It provides blue sharks with small fishes.

C．It’s part of a surface layer of the ocean.

D．It lies off the U.S. Northeast Coast.

2. Why do blue sharks less frequently dive to the zone at night?

A．The tags are attached to them.

B．They can’t warm up on the surface.

C．They need to avoid white sharks there.

D．Small fishes are not enough for them to have.

3. What can we infer from the passage?

A．Blue sharks and white sharks feed in different depths of the ocean.

B．Blue sharks and white sharks reach the zone with the same eddies.

C．Blue sharks can not regulate their body temperature to stay warm.

D．Blue sharks suffered from much less overfishing than white sharks.

4. What was Simon Thorrol’s attitude to the research of Camrin Braun’s team?

A．Favorable.

B．Doubtful.

C．Opposite.

D．Indifferent.

【推荐3】To many people, honey bees symbolize prosperity (兴旺), sustainability and environmentalism. But as a honey bee researcher, I have to tell you that only the first item on that list is defensible. Although they are important for agriculture, honey bees also destabilize naturar ecosystems by competing with native bees - some of which are species at risk.

The rise in hobby beekeeping, now a trendy activity for hundreds of thousands of Americans, followed strong awareness campaigns to “save the bees.” But as a species, honey bees are least in need of saving Sheila Colla, a conservation biologist, says, “People mistakenly think helping honey bees is somehow helping native bees. They have a surprisingly poor understanding of the diversity of pollinators (传粉者) and their roles in pollination.”

There are millions of honey bee colonies (群) in NorthAmerica. Around 30,000 bees per colony, that’s roughly a billion honey bees in Canada and the U.s. alone. Huge numbers of honey bee colonies increase competition between native pollinators, putting even more pressure on the wild species that are already in decline. Honey bees are extreme generalist foragers (觅食者), leading to exploitative competition — that is , where one species uses up a resource, not leaving enough to go around.

Alfredo Valido and Pedro Jordano, researchers from the spanish National Research Council, used the Canary Islands to study how honey bees affect the native pollinating community. In the highlands of the islands’ Teide National Park, thousands of honey bee colonies are introduced seasonally for honey production and removed again at the end of the flower season, creating an excellent condition for experimentation. Their results do not make honey bees look like the sustainability celebrities they have become. Bringing in honey bees reduced the conneetedness of the plant-pollinator networks. Besides, the resilience (恢复力) of the ecosystem has also declined.

I used to believe that honey bees were a gateway species, and that concern over their health and prosperity would spread to native bees, benefitting them, too. However, evidence shows that misguided enthusiasm for honey bees has likely been the native bees’ disaster.

1. How does the auther feel about the rise in hobby beekeeping?

A．Confused.

B．Concerned.

C．Surprised.

D．Pleased.

2. How are native pollinators affected by introduced honey bees?

A．They have trouble finding food.	B．They become generalist foragers.
C．They get protected as honey bees.	D．They fail to form their own colonies.

3. What did the experiment on the Canary Islands show concerning hone bees?

A．They fitted into the native pollinating community.

B．They improved the sustainability of the islands.

C．They slowed the recovery of the ecosystem.

D．They shortened the flower season.

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

A．The threat to honey bees	B．The problem with honey bees
C．Save the bees, save the planet	D．Focus on honey bees, not native bees