With increasing information through technology, our students are becoming less active and do not develop relationships with self, others and the environment. Outdoor Education does not only promote physical development in students but it also focuses on each of their personal, social and self-awareness development.
That is what the Outdoor Education Programme (OEP) at Marymount Convent School aims to do. The most interesting part of Marymount’s OEP is the adventure camp that helps students to grow in determination and courage as they deal with challenges. The adventure camp provides an opportunity for the students to learn more about basic survival skills, respect and responsibility for self, others and environmental awareness.
For the energetic ones, like Sofia-Jane Wong Enqi, the activities in OEP are a dream come true. She loves activities such as hiking and team-building activities. During hiking, the primary 6 student learnt the value of cooperation (合作) instead of competition. She discovered how easy it was for her and her teammates to complete challenges when people were not fighting to take the lead but instead stopping and listening to each other.
Another primary 6 student, Mithra Anandan, got an even greater benefit while hiking. She had never been very interested in physical activities but as she joined her friends on a hike, she learnt to continue despite having to stop for breaks. Working hard to reach the end of the hike taught her the value of adaptation even if others can go farther or faster. It is not about a race; it is about completing and enjoying a journey.
Their parents also observed clear improvements in their children’s self-management and responsibility. “My parents praised me for my positive change in character and of course, I had burnt a good amount of calories!” says Mithra laughingly. Sofia-Jane adds: “Days after I returned from the camp, my mom said that I became more independent, cleaning up after my meals and doing my homework without being reminded.”
1. What does the underlined word “That” in Paragraph 2 probably refer to?| A．Promoting the all-round development of students. |
| B．Increasing students’ knowledge of technology. |
| C．Helping students enjoy their love of adventure. |
| D．Letting parents take part in outdoor activities. |
| A．It taught her basic life skills. |
| B．It improved her self-management skills. |
| C．It helped her know the importance of cooperation. |
| D．It raised her awareness of the environment. |
| A．Strong physical strength. | B．A competitive spirit. |
| C．Great determination. | D．A sense of responsibility. |
| A．How to survive in the wild |
| B．Why students love adventure camps |
| C．Outdoor Education Programme: a team-building activity |
| D．Beyond the classroom: learning in the great outdoors |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】Heritage on the Edge
In an effort to preserve some of the world’s most famous landmarks，Google has announced a new project to transform a few of the most endangered by climate change into interactive 3D models，just in case one or all is irreparably(不能恢复地)damaged in the coming decades.
Edinburgh Castle
Edinburgh Castle comprises 27 buildings on top of an extinct volcano. It was home to many kings and queens. But old roofs and rainwater management systems will become insufficient as they will be unable to deal with the level of storm water associated with extreme weather events. Besides，if temperatures continue to rise，the rate of decay(腐烂)will increase further.
Kilwa Kisiwani
Kilwa Kisiwani was a regional center of the medieval trading civilization along the East African Coast. Its permanent architecture included ports，Muslim buildings，and the unique“stone houses”. However，the drier weather and subsequently heavy rainfall is threatening the stability of the ruins，causing the worsening of this exposed heritage site.
Mosque City of Bagherat
The Mosque City of Bagherat was once a lost city. It has many Muslim buildings，bridges，roads and palaces. A recent report stressed the increasing impacts of sea level rise and changes in salinity(盐度)on this community. Increased salinity not only makes much of the water undrinkable but damages structures.
Chan Chan
Chan Chan was the capital city of Chimu empire，stretching for nearly a thousand kilometers along the coastline. The city planning reflects a strict political and social strategy. But site managers today face challenges in rainfall and droughts due to El Nino events and climate change that threaten to gradually wash the ancient city away.
1. What do we know about Edinburgh Castle?| A．It was built along the coast. | B．It is the largest castle in the world. |
| C．It is in danger of being washed away. | D．It used to be the home of royal families. |
| A．Water pollution. | B．Water’s becoming salty. |
| C．Water shortage. | D．Water’s being overused. |
| A．Temperature rises. | B．Volcanic eruptions. |
| C．Sea water. | D．Environmental damage. |
【推荐2】China and India are leaders in improving global(全球的) tree cover, a new study based on NASA research showed.
They took a 31.8% part together of the total global new leaf area between 2000 and 2017. China played a major role, adding 25% to this increase, and India added 6.8%, followed by Canada and Russia. The study in the Nature Sustainability journal shows that more than 5.5 million square kilometers of green leaf area was added globally. Since 2000, there has been a five-percent increase in global green cover, it said.
“The greening over the last twenty years shows an increase in leaf area on plants and trees which is as large as the area of the entire Amazon rainforest," Chi Chen, a Boston University researcher and lead of the study told Nature Sustainability. Large plantation activities to protect forests in China contributed nearly 42% to the country's green cover, and agriculture added another 32%. In India, 82% of the increase in leaf area was because of agriculture.
“China and India take up one-third of the greening, but hold only nine percent of the planet's land area covered in green plants," Chi Chen told NASA Earth Observatory. “That is a surprising finding, considering the land degradation(退化) in countries with large populations.”
Boston University's research team first detected an increase in global green cover in the 1990s but were unsure about what contributed to the increase. Finally, with the help of NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites research, they managed to find out the increase in leaf cover from different areas and places.
1. Which country increased the largest part of the new leaf area?| A．India | B．China |
| C．Canada | D．Russia |
| A．To show how great the achievement was. |
| B．To show the importance of rainforest. |
| C．To explain what difficulties we have now. |
| D．To explain the reason for increasing forests. |
| A．China and India have large populations and land degradation problem |
| B．about 9% of the planet’s greening is in China and India |
| C．China and India are leading in the global green cover increase |
| D．the leaf cover area in China and India is still limited if viewed globally |
【推荐3】Most educators know the basics of peer (同龄人) pressure. When peers are around, teenagers take more risks. For example, teenage males drive faster with other boys in the same car because the reward centers of teenagers’ brains are more active with peers than when alone.
However, risk taking in an educational context is an important skill that enables progress and creativity, which is just one of positive peer effects. People often talk about negative (消极的) peer effects but ignore many studies that show a lot of negative behavior of high school kids is discouraged by friends. There is a lot of very positive pressure that peers apply, like, “No, man, that’s stupid.” This prevention is one of the many underreported forms of peer effects.
In a 2018 study of college freshmen, researchers found that having friends with a higher willingness to study is predictive (预测的) of receiving higher freshman grades. Because the study looked at both assigned (指派的) roommate pairings and chosen friend groups, the researchers were able to show the effect wasn’t just a reflection of “selection bias”, with hard-working kids having already chosen to befriend each other. Hanging out with someone who’s hard-working, they concluded, caused teenagers to study for more hours and achieve higher grades. The findings prove previous research showing a connection between how a child views the importance of doing well in school and how their friends do. Similar effects have been proved for volunteer work and health-promotive behaviors, such as exercise.
What does all this mean for educators? Effective students can definitely improve classroom situations. In one program, kids were trained to publicly encourage anti-conflict (反冲突) practice. Reports of student conflict dropped 30% over one year. To some extent, this success may lie in the fact that the program got kids’ help. Efforts that engage (使……参与) teens in actual, real-life tasks have been the most promising when it comes to changing the content of the values spread within teenager peer groups.
1. What can bring peer pressure to teenagers?| A．Presence of their peers. | B．Being cheated by their friends. |
| C．Encouragement from the elders. | D．Stress response in difficult situations. |
| A．Appreciative. | B．Unclear. | C．Acceptable. | D．Unsupportive. |
| A．Love me, love my dog. |
| B．No competition, no progress. |
| C．Kids can be influenced by close association. |
| D．A true friend reaches for your hand and touches your heart. |
| A．By sorting classroom activities. |
| B．By training students to keep away from conflict. |
| C．By discouraging students from choosing friends. |
| D．By leading students to positive social activities. |
【推荐1】With the cold weather drawing nearer, few people will choose swimming as a daily or usual activity.
Good for your brain.
Swimming is one of the best activities you can do all year round, which benefits your body and your mind. Swimming has been found to increase blood flow to the brain, which leads to more oxygen.
Work your muscles.
Every time you swim, it is like doing a mini-resistance workout. Each kicks and pull works your muscles more than you could imagine, especially your arms, shoulders and gluteus — the muscles that are inactive all day when you’re sitting at your desk.
Lift your spirits.
While swimming is an individual sport, it is also very social. You can meet people from all walks of life when swimming. Have a chat in the lap pool, join a swimming club or get involved in social water sports to get to know people in your community. Besides, the great thing about swimming is that you can do it — rain or shine. Although your backyard pool, the river or beach cools down over winter, most inside swimming pools run heated pools year round, so you’ve got no excuse to stop swimming.
| A．Benefit your body. |
| B．Meet new people. |
| C．These chemicals can control your thought and action. |
| D．Swimming also works your abs (腹肌) and will reduce your waist line. |
| E．Exercise gives off chemicals in your body called endorphins (内啡肽). |
| F．And that means you’re experiencing better memory and sharp mind. |
| G．However, swimming in winter is of great benefit in cold days. |
【推荐2】Even though people have been disabled playing sports like rugby and football, extreme sports take the whole ordeal (磨难) to the next level. Sports like downhill cycling are very dangerous because one would be going downhill, over rocky or dirt zones, through forests, even at potentially deadly speeds. A slip-up could be your downfall.
Nobody who gets into extreme sports goes with the desire to do harm to themselves. With that, athletes train for years and years before they attempt anything extreme. To most people, extreme sports are extreme simply because they take more skill than what an average person has. An athlete with skill and training makes an extreme thing become a daily routine, which does not wipe out the danger, but greatly reduces it.
Even when there is a lot of skill involved, things might not go the athlete’s way, not at all. Luck and circumstances have a lot to do with how things develop, whether above 8, 000 meters or in a wood, going downhill. In some places, crossing the street is an extreme sport, considering how wild traffic can get.
Some view parkour, the sports of running, jumping and climbing under, around and through buildings, as an extreme sport, while it is more of a life philosophy, where the athlete does not have to do anything remotely dangerous. Free soloing, which means climbing a rock or ice face without safety gear, is absolutely deadly, where one slip means almost certain death, depending on the height, of course. Skateboarding is relatively safe, but if you constantly find ridiculous places to practice on, like the fence of a bridge, then things can get very complicated. The extreme part depends on the athlete.
To summarize, yes, extreme sports are dangerous, but the danger depends on the athlete, their choice of sport, direction in which they take it, as well as the circumstances. Some things are out of our control, while others we can influence through exercise and healthier risk choices.
1. What does Paragraph 2 mainly talk about regarding extreme sports?| A．Extreme sports differ from one another. |
| B．Skill matters a lot in maintaining safety. |
| C．Athletes’ luck is a key factor that influences safety. |
| D．Extreme sports are more dangerous than regular sports. |
| A．To explain danger depends on the athlete. |
| B．To show free soloing is the most dangerous. |
| C．To compare which one involves the most skill. |
| D．To demonstrate how to choose an extreme sport. |
| A．Objective. | B．Doubtful. |
| C．Intolerant. | D．Unconcerned. |
| A．Do Extreme Sports Test Your Courage? |
| B．Why Should Extreme Sports Be Banned? |
| C．Are Extreme Sports Really That Dangerous? |
| D．Why Do We Take to Extreme Sports So Much? |
【推荐3】Race walking shares many fitness benefits with running, research shows, while most likely contributing to fewer injuries. It does, however, have its own problem.
Race walkers are conditioned athletes. The longest track and field event at the Summer Olympics is the 50-kilometer race walk, which is about five miles longer than the marathon. But the sport’s rules require that a race walker’s knees stay straight and one foot remain in contact with the ground at all times. It’s this strange form that makes race walking such an attractive activity, however, says Jaclyn Norberg, an assistant professor of exercise science at Salem State University in Salem, Mass.
Like running, race walking is physically demanding, she says. According to most calculations, race walkers moving at a pace of six miles per hour would burn about 800 calories per hour, which is approximately twice as many as they would burn walking, although fewer than running, which would probably burn about 1,000 or more calories per hour.
However, race walking does not pound the body as much as running does, Dr. Norberg says. According to her research, runners hit the ground with as much as four times their body weight per step, while race walkers, who do not leave the ground, create only about 1.4 times their body weight with each step.
As a result, she says, some of the injuries related to running, such as runner’s knee, are uncommon among race walkers. But the sport’s strange form does place considerable stress on the ankles and hips, so people with a history of such injuries might want to be cautious in adopting the sport. In fact, anyone wishing to try race walking should probably first talk with a coach or experienced racer to learn proper technique, she says. It takes some practice.
1. Why are race walkers conditioned athletes?| A．They have to follow special rules. | B．They are suitable for the marathon. |
| C．They must run long distances. | D．They are good at swinging their legs. |
| A．It’s more effective in body building. | B．It’s less challenging physically. |
| C．It’s less likely to cause knee injuries. | D．It’s more popular at the Olympics. |
| A．becoming an experienced coach. | B．Having a medical checkup. |
| C．Doing regular exercises. | D．Getting experts’ opinions. |
| A．Objective. | B．Negative. | C．Doubtful. | D．Positive. |
