Kenya has been at the forefront(前沿)of the global war on plastic since the government banned single-use plastics in protected areas in June 2020. Unfortunately, the preventive measures have barely received attention. Hundreds of tons of industrial and consumer polymer waste continue to get dumped into landfills daily. However, if 29-year-old Nzambi Matee has her way the unsightly plastic heaps(堆)will soon be transformed into colorful bricks.
The materials engineer’s seeking to find a practical solution to control plastic pollution began in 2017. She quit her job and set up a small lab in her mother’s backyard. It took her nine months to produce the first brick and even longer to convince a partner to help build the machinery to make them. But the determined eco-entrepreneur was confident in her idea and did not give up.
She says, “I wanted to use my education to handle plastic waste pollution. But I was very clear that the solution had to be practical, sustainable, and affordable. The best way to do this was by channeling the waste into the construction space and finding the most efficient and affordable material to build homes.” Her company produces over 1,500 bricks a day. The pavers are made using a mix of plastic products that cannot be reprocessed or recycled.
The collected plastic is mixed with sand heated at very high temperatures, and compressed(压缩)into bricks that vary in color and thickness. The resulting product is stronger, lighter, and about 30 percent cheaper than concrete bricks. More importantly, it helps repurpose the lowest quality of plastic. “There is that waste they cannot process anymore; they cannot recycle. That is what we get.” Matee says.
Matee is not nearly done. Her dream is to reduce the mountain of trash to just a hill by increasing production and expanding her offerings. She says, “The more we recycle the plastic, the more we produce affordable housing, the more we created more employment for the youth.”
1. What does the underlined sentence in paragraph imply?| A．Plastic waste hasn’t attracted enough attention. | B．Matee’s idea has been widely accepted. |
| C．Colorful bricks are in huge demand. | D．Matee’s method can be effective if adopted. |
| A．Generous and ambitious. | B．Confident and grateful |
| C．Creative and determined. | D．Optimistic and modest. |
| A．To tackle plastic pollution. | B．To support the government. |
| C．To create job opportunities. | D．To build cheaper houses. |
| A．Kenya: Pioneer in Banning Plastic Single-use Plastics |
| B．Nzambi Matee: Innovator in Solving Plastic Waste |
| C．Mix of Plastic Products: A New Construction Material |
| D．Plastic Recycling: A Creative Solution to Pollution |
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【推荐1】I’ve reported about tigers on the news, however, nothing could have prepared me for what I found in India. I didn’t know what to expect, so when I saw my first tiger in the wild, I was shocked what a beautiful and powerful creature it is!
But they live with a price on their heads—a single tiger skin is worth up to £8, 000, and their bones possibly more. Another problem is that farmers need to clear a large number of areas of the forest for their cattle. This means deer are losing their living places. As a result, tigers are losing their natural prey, so they end up eating the cattle.
Tigers are not easy to live close to. I met a farmer who had been mauled by one. But despite that, he told me everything had its place in the world and he had no right to kill the tiger. He was really kind.
Those who work for the Tigers Forever Project realize that to ensure their survival, tigers don’t only need space. They need space away from people.
They are working to stop the conflict(冲突)between tigers and people by separating them. I visited a new town. People had been moved to it from a settlement in the forest. And it really has worked. It has given tigers a better life and better opportunities for the children of the resettled people.
Only 2,500 tigers are now left in the wild in India. Three out of eight tiger sub-species have already disappeared. Tigers that once lived across Asia only survive in 7% of their original living places now.
1. Why does the author mention his experience in the first paragraph?| A．To present the beauty of tigers. | B．To express tigers’ happy life. |
| C．To introduce the topic of the text. | D．To show his excellent report. |
| A．Hunted. | B．Killed. | C．Injured. | D．Kissed. |
| A．Tigers need space far from people. |
| B．Children are happy to live far from tigers. |
| C．There are only 2,500 tigers in the wild in India. |
| D．Tigers in Asia will die out if we don’t protect them. |
| A．Tigers and Cattle | B．More Space for Tigers |
| C．Expensive Tigers | D．A Kind-hearted Farmer |
【推荐2】Scientists have been conducting plenty of research aiming at changing thee deserts back to good land again. Via countless research and investigations, they are learning more and more about deserts,and have tried various methods to recover wasted deserts, including bringing water in so that people can live and grow food there. However, things don't seem to go well. The earth is becoming desert day by day, and some think that the scientists might not be able to change this severe situation in time.
So why is land becoming desert? Though it is partially related to natural changes, many scientists believe that it is human beings that should take the responsibility, Believe it or not, people make deserts.Some places on Earth don't get much rain, but they still don't become deserts. This is because some green plants are growing there. It is a pity that despite the countless efforts scientists have made to promote the importance of plants to stop land from becoming desert, many people still don't pay enough attention.
Small green plants and grass are very important to dry places, and prevent the sun from making the earth even drier. Plants don't let the wind blow the soil away, either. When a bit of rain falls, the plants hold the water. Without plants, the land can become desert more easily. If there were no green plants on Earth, the whole planet would eventually become desert.
1. Which of the following statements is true about deserts?| A．There have never been plants or animals in deserts before. |
| B．All the deserts on Earth can be turned into good land soon. |
| C．There is little water for growing food in the deserts. |
| D．Deserts are more often caused by natural changes in history. |
| A．scientists know well how to change desert into good land. |
| B．people should follow the scientists' suggestion to stop the land from becoming desert. |
| C．if scientists can bring water to desert, people can manage to live and grow food there. |
| D．human activity is the only reason why land is becoming desert. |
| A．Plants can keep dry land from becoming desert. |
| B．It is good to remove all the grass from the desert. |
| C．All places without much rain will become deserts. |
| D．It is better to grow grass than trees on dry land. |
| A．In a novel on desert exploration. | B．In an academic report on water shortages. |
| C．In a blog on desertification. | D．In a poster about environmental protection. |
【推荐3】National lawmakers are calling for more effective environmental protection of the Qilian Mountains, a vast natural habitat in western China.
The mountains stand across the border between Gansu and Qinghai provinces. The nature reserve became a national protected site in 1988, but hundreds of mines in the area and various construction projects took a toll on the environment.
Thanks to the recovery of the mountains’ environment and greater efforts to protect wildlife, many protected and rare wild animals have been sighted very often in recent years.
The city has also moved away all farmers, herdsmen and one-third of its people who were living in the mountains to a new zone and helped them find jobs in an effort to reduce the pressure on the environment.
Scientific research and advanced technology are key to the restoration (重建) of the mountains’ ecology (生态), said Wang Tao, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Northwest Institute of Eco-Environment and Resources.
Wang said a research center led by the institute was set up last year to focus on ecosystem recovery and the ecological management of the mountains under the influence of global climate change.
The center has begun research to carry out environmental observation and assessment (评估), providing support for the creation of a Qilian Mountains national park, he added.
To better protect the mountains, Wang said, it’s necessary to promote large-scale, rapid observation approach and build a great ecological assessment system in the reserve.
A data-sharing (数据共享) management system should be pushed forward to create a database (数据库) of the mountains, environment, which would support its protection in a scientific way, he added.
1. What does the underlined phrase “took a toll” in the second paragraph mean?| A．protected | B．ignored | C．harmed | D．controlled |
| A．To create a national park |
| B．To found a research center. |
| C．To increase the number of wildlife. |
| D．To reduce the pressure on the environment. |
| A．Rare wild animals can be seen everywhere in the reserve. |
| B．A research center was established for ecosystem restoration. |
| C．Since 1988, the Qilian Mountains have been well protected. |
| D．Many effective laws have been made to protect the environment. |
| A．An ecological assessment system should be set up. |
| B．Scientific research plays the biggest part in restoring ecology. |
| C．Global climate change influences the research on ecological assessment. |
| D．A data-sharing management system has been widely applied in the reserve. |
【推荐1】 I’m not so sure I like my friends any more. I used to like them — to be honest. We’d have lunch, talk on the phone or exchange emails, and they all seemed normal enough. But then came Facebook, and I was introduced to a sad fact: many of my friends have dark sides that they had kept from me.
Today my friends show off the more unpleasant aspects of their personalities via Facebook. No longer hidden, they’re thrown in my face like TV commercials — unavoidable and endless advertisements for the worst of their personalities.
Take Fred. If you were to have lunch with him, you’d find him warm, and self-effacing (谦逊的). Read his Facebook and you’ll realize he’s an unbearable, foodobsessed boring man. He’d pause to have a cup of coffee on his way to save a drowning man — and then write about it.
Take Andy. You won’t find a smarter CEO anywhere, but now he’s a CEO without a company to run. So he plays Mafia Wars on Facebook. He’s doing well — level 731.Thanks to Facebook, I know he’s playing about 18 hours a day. Andy, you’ve run four companies — and this is how you spend your downtime? What happened to golf? What happened to getting another job?
Take Liz. She is positive that the flu vaccine will kill us all and that we should avoid it. And then comes Chris who likes to post at least 20 times a day on every website he can find, so I get to read his thoughts twice, once on Facebook and once on Twitter.
In real life, I don’t see these sides of people. Face to face, my friends show me their best. They’re nice, smart people. But face to Facebook, my friends are like a blind date which goes horribly wrong.
I’m left with a dilemma. Who is my real friend? Is it the Liz I have lunch with or the antivaccine mad woman on Facebook? Is it the Fred I can grab a sandwich with or the Fred who weeps if he’s at a party and the wine isn’t up to his standards?
1. What’s Andy probably busy in doing now?| A．He’s running his company. |
| B．He’s playing golf all day. |
| C．He’s looking for another job. |
| D．He’s playing computer games. |
| A．a dilemma | B．my real friend |
| C．Facebook | D．Twitter |
| A．giving examples |
| B．following the time order |
| C．listing figures |
| D．raising questions |
【推荐2】Empathy begins with awareness of another person’s feelings. Once we have figured out how another person feels, we show empathy by acknowledging the emotion or through a simple sign of affection such as a hug or a tender touch. Though empathy is usually used in reference to sensing someone else’s painful feelings, it can also apply to someone’s positive feelings. In this case, a “high five” would also be a sign of empathy.
It is likely that empathy decreases with age. In other words, I suspect that children are by nature relatively empathetic and they slowly lose their feelings of empathy.
There is the socialization process which may lead to a drop in empathy. This could be happening for several reasons. For instance, I have noticed that I cannot feel empathy for someone if I am preoccupied with my own needs. It makes sense, then, that if they grow up with many unmet emotional needs, these children will slowly become more concerned with their own interests in general, and less able to empathize with the troubles of someone else.
Another factor that could be contributing to a drop in empathy is the general low value which society places on feelings and emotions. Not until recently do people seem to have appreciated the value of our feelings and emotions. I certainly say that this concept was never introduced to me in my formal education. The higher education system, the more emphasis is placed on the intellectual, cognitive brain, which seems to be at the expense of the development of the emotional brain.
Finally, when we are children we are instructed to control our feelings and the expression of emotion. We are told that this is part of what it means to be “mature”. We are led to believe that emotions are irrational, signs of weakness, femininity, etc. All of this would tend to lower our empathy.
1. What does a “high five” mean?| A．Acknowledgement of someone’s success. |
| B．Consciousness of someone’s failure. |
| C．Knowledge of someone’s mixed feelings. |
| D．Awareness of someone’s painful feelings. |
| A．To illustrate his or her empathy. | B．To stress the education of empathy. |
| C．To provide convincing evidence. | D．To clarify the meaning of empathy. |
| A．Favorable. | B．Doubtful. | C．Indifferent. | D．Unclear. |
| A．How empathy forms. | B．What empathy means. |
| C．Why empathy declines. | D．Whether empathy matters. |
【推荐3】Summer is by far my favorite season of the year. I love the warm temperature, the longer, sunnier days and the opportunity to spend more time by the lake. But my love for the season quickly ends when I think of mosquitoes (蚊子). While their bites alone can be annoying, it’s just infuriating when I come inside with several new bright-red welts (红肿) while my friends so kindly report how they don’t have a single one.
Why is that? It’s not that we’re particularly unlucky. There are actually scientific reasons why mosquitoes single out certain people.
Contrary to what you might think, mosquitoes don’t bite people for food—they feed on plant nectar (花蜜). Only female mosquitoes bite, and they do so to receive proteins from your blood needed to develop their eggs.
A common belief is that mosquitoes are attracted to certain blood types. While there are no firm conclusions as to which blood type is more attractive to mosquitoes, several studies have suggested that mosquitoes are not so attracted to people with blood group A. However, they find people with blood group O a little tastier.
Mosquitoes are highly visual hunters when it comes to finding a human to bite. Research has shown that mosquitoes are more attracted to the color black, but there has been little additional research into why this is the case.
Mosquitoes can smell out a person through the carbon dioxide given off when we breathe. Therefore, people who give off more of it—larger individuals and people who are breathing heavily when working out—are more attractive to a mosquito.
In a study, mosquitoes were observed to land on participants more frequently after they had drank a small amount of beer. Probably, mosquitoes are more attracted to people who have been drinking beer.
Mosquito bites are annoying. The best way to handle mosquito bites is not to get bitten in the first place.
1. What does the underlined word “infuriating” in Paragraph 1 probably mean?| A．Making somebody greatly amused. | B．Making somebody extremely angry. |
| C．Making somebody completely tired out. | D．Making somebody even more determined. |
| A．To spread certain diseases. | B．To enable them to fly around. |
| C．To hunt for food for themselves. | D．To provide proteins for their eggs. |
| A．A short and thin man in black. |
| B．A teenager fond of eating sweet food. |
| C．An overweight woman with blood group A. |
| D．A young man having just drunk lots of beer. |
| A．Treatment of mosquito bites. |
| B．Ways to prevent mosquito bites. |
| C．Why certain people get lots of mosquito bites. |
| D．Why mosquito bites are harmful to human beings. |
