Jane was a young girl. She loved to see the bad side of life.

Once, her father took her to the kitchen. He asked Jane to take a potato, an egg, ________ two spoons of tea leaves. Jane was ________, and asked her father, “Do you want me to cook?”

“No, “ her father said.

He then took three pots and ________ some water into each pot. The pots were placed on the stove. Once the water started to boil, he put the potato in a pot, the egg in ________ one and the tea leaves in the third one.

“Why are you doing all these things?” Jane felt puzzled and asked.

“You’ll get the answer in fifteen minutes,” said her father.

Jane tried her best ________ for around 15 minutes.

Now, he placed the two plates, one with the potato and ________ with the egg, and the cup of tea in front of Jane.

Jane asked, “What does it mean, father? I don’t understand! “

“Each object faced similar adversities (不幸), but reacted (反应) ________. After we put the potato into boiling water, it became very weak. The soft egg became very hard ________ we put it in boiling water. And the tea leaves changed the water itself, giving it a nice smell. ________ fantastic it is!”

Jane understood that we could create ________ new even when we experienced adversities.

So, what are you? A potato, an egg or tea leaves?

Chinese dishes highlight (增色) Beiiing Winter Olympics. Many foreign Winter Olympics players have gone crazy about Chinese food.

	Julia Marino has tried lots of different foods in Beijing. But when she was asked in an interview what her favorite meal was at the Olympic Village, Marino answered quickly, “My favorite food is jiaozi. I’ve probably had about 200 jiaozi since I came here.”
	Snowboarder Jenise Spiteri, from Malta, is another big fan of Chinese food, especially red bean buns. “Is my favorite food that I have in the Olympic Village,” said Spiteri. “I started eating them on the first day and then for breakfast, lunch and dinner.” She has become the “red bean bun girl” in China.
	Utta Leerdam, a 23-year old speed skating player, from the Netherlands, posted (发帖) her favorite spicy hotchpotch (麻辣烫) on the Internet. “This is the famous Chinese snack spicy hotchpotch. It is healthier than burgers and fries.”
	German figure skater Nicole Schott said one of her favorite foods in the Olympic Village was rice. “It is different from all of our European rice,” she said. “That’s actually what I eat every single day although I have brought foods from home.”

On the afternoon of March 23, 2022, Chinese astronauts on board China’s Tiangong space station gave a science lesson 400 kilometers above Earth. It was a great success. Do you still remember the first space lesson taught by Wang Yaping in 2013? Helped by the other two astronauts, she gave the lesson to more than 60 million school children all over the country.

While watching the science lesson from the Tiangong-1 on the morning of June 20, 2013, Wang Lutian, a 10-year-old disabled (残疾的) student at a special school in the center of Beijing, was drawing a colorful rocket with crayons in his classroom. “Moon... stars...a rocket to the sky,” Wang said in a happy voice. At that time, he and more than 100 other disabled students were enjoying the lesson given by Wang Yaping, who talked about movements in micro-gravity (微重力) environments. “Zero gravity!” Qian Shaohong, another student at the school, shouted when’ he saw astronaut Nie Haisheng making a show of crossing his legs in mid-air. “Scientific knowledge helped open a window for the children to know about the world,” said Zhang Yini, a teacher at the school.

The lesson also added interest in space science among teenagers living on the “roof (屋脊) of the world”. “I was most interested in the show of the ‘water ball’ in a gravity-free environment. It’s really amazing,” said Rigzin Jigme Doje, a high school student in Lhasa, Tibet. Doje said the lesson helped him stay true to his dream of becoming a physicist.

The lesson also encouraged other Tibetan school children to relate the mysterious world of outer space to their hometown.

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We all know that computers changed (改变) our lives in the 1980s. We realized that the Internet changed our lives in the 1990s. Can you predict that robots will change our lives in the future? It’s not a dream that every home will have a robot. We believe that there will be robots in people’s homes.

Now, robots are able to help people do the housework. They can also help doctors do difficult operations, play chess with people, play the piano and do some other things.

It is really funny to have a cooking robot. It can cook all the dishes on the menu. What you only need to do is just to wait for two to four minutes. You’ll be surprised at how delicious the food will taste.

In the future, the robot will be a nurse, a guard or a partner in your life. Robots will become part of the family, and provide close service for people. We all look forward to the new robot age.

In movies, you might see cars that can drive by themselves, you tell them where you want to go, and they take you there as fast as possible. With 5G, cars like this may soon come into our real life because 5G can connect many different smart devices (智能装置) to one network (网络).

Finland’s “robot buses” are a good example. Telecom company Nokia builds 5G transmitters (信号发射器) along a 1 kilometer road. These transmitters are able to control the buses, making them driverless, according to Raconteur Media.

There are also 5G roads. These roads will have many 5G transmitters. They can give you smart services, such as telling you where the nearest oil station is. People can also use them to control traffic on the roads. “People will use a road network in real time, controlling traffic light, traffic numbers through computer programs,” said a scientist.

In south Korea, a subway station builds a smart system. This system has a 3D map, sensors (传感器) and an advanced (先进的) camera system that make the station more useful and safer, according to Arirang News.

And of course, there are driverless cars. These cars can send signals (信号) to each other. They also “talk” to traffic lights and road sensors. 5G will let these car drive more safely because they can communicate (交流) with each other, as well as with traffic lights and road sensors.

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Did you see pop-ups (弹出窗口) when you went online?

These days it’s common for you to get a pop-up which lets you     36     ( put ) the App in “teen mode (模式)”every time you begin to use Apps like QQ or Tiktok? A lot of Apps, especially video Apps, have added this feature (功能) to protect teenagers. It’s said that it will bring teenagers     37     (good) experiences than before and make sure they’re using the Apps in a healthier way. For example, Apps like Tiktok have the feature to prevent teenagers from watching videos for long and with the feature, they might only be allowed     38     (watch) for 40 minutes. The videos that teenagers can watch are made sure to be safe and even educational. There are no advertisements and teenagers cannot pay any m    39     for the videos. In QQ’s teen mode, teenagers can only talk to people on their contact lists.     40     (they) typing words show pinyin, which is useful for primary school students.

    41     (然而), the teen mode does not work for all Apps, according to a recent report by the National Consumer Council. There aren’t any     42     (different) between the teen mode and the normal mode in some Apps. And in some video Apps, the teen mode won’t start     43     ( 直到) users watch videos for 40 minutes. But users can get past it b    44     clicking (点击)”I know” and continue watching.

Though you can learn a lot from short videos, it’s n    45     not to watch them for a long time.

Many scientists find that colors can change people’s feelings. It’s very interesting.

Some colors can make people feel relaxed, and some colors can make people feel nervous. Now, this kind of knowledge is being used in many places. For example, school walls are always painted green because green makes students feel relaxed. It is also good for the students’ eyes. Some books are also green or light blue for the same reason. Restaurant owners not only have to know how to make food, but also have to know how to make money. Here are something they’ve learned from scientific (科学的) studies. The color red makes people hungry. Many fast food restaurants have red furniture (家具) or walls. Brown makes customers want to eat quickly and leave. Many restaurants, especially fast food restaurants use brown tables and chairs to make customers eat fast. Soft colors like pink and light blue make people feel relaxed. They spend more time eating.

56. 假如你叫Mary，你的朋友Cindy邀请你周日晚上去参加她的生日聚会。但是你的妈妈这几天得了流感，你需要帮她做一些家务活，还要照顾你的妹妹。此外，你还要准备周一的英语测验。所以请写一封信感谢并拒绝Cindy的邀请。

Thank you so much for inviting me to your birthday party.___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Yours,

Mary