①Sugar-free cookies, reduced-sugar cereal, sugar-free candy, diet soda. Do these seem like healthier alternatives (替代物)? After sugar became something forbidden in the nutrition and fitness world, sugar-free products acted as alternatives for once beloved sweet drinks and snacks. Claiming to be ZERO sugar, they were believed as healthier choices, especially for those people who manage diabetics (糖尿病), or aim to slim down. But the truth is they aren’t equal to better.
②When a product is labeled sugar-free, it means artificial sweeteners are used instead of real sugar. Artificial sweeteners don’t come from natural sources but they are chemical substances that are added to food and drinks to make them sweeter. Actually, most artificial sweeteners are a lot sweeter than sugar, even 200—600 times sweeter, so only a tiny amount is needed.
③Let’s find out how artificial sweeteners work. They work similarly to regular sugar by exciting your taste buds. The taste buds send signals to the brain that they have tasted something sweet and you feel a similar sense as you would with sugar.
④In recent studies, scientists have revealed artificial sweeteners are more harmful to our body than real sugar. Many businesses market sugar-free alternatives as “low-calorie” or “no-calorie”. It misleads people to believe sugar-free products can make them slim and healthy. But it’s reported that you get no nutritional value from consuming them.
⑤What’s worse, when you eat this kind of sweet food, your body continues to desire it even though your body can’t metabolize (新陈代谢) these sugar-free alternatives. Your brain does not know the difference, either. In turn, sugar-free alternatives connect to weight gain and Type 2 diabetes.
⑥Similarly, artificial sweeteners also damage your gut’s ability to break down sugar which affects everything you eat. In other words, your body doesn’t know how to deal with artificial sweeteners because they have nothing real to process.
⑦Here’s a golden rule: stay away from artificial sweeteners and look for non-sugar, natural sweeteners like Stevia or date sugar. In the war against artificial sweeteners and real sugar, both lose. Satisfy your sweet tooth with natural sugars that come from fruits and stay away from products claiming to be sugar-free or diet!
1. What’s special about sugar-free products?| A．They don’t taste delicious. | B．They are good for health. |
| C．They can make people excited. | D．They contain artificial sweeteners. |
| A．using | B．storing | C．breaking | D．controlling |
| A．People should fight against sugary products and stay away from them all the time. |
| B．People who like sweet food can choose fruit sugars to improve their ability to metabolize. |
| C．It’s wise for people to refuse artificial sweeteners because they result in some health risks. |
| D．There is still a need for more scientific studies on sugary products whether they are safe or not. |
A． | B． |
C． | D． |
2 . Most people are lucky to grow up with caring parents. However, many of them have trouble finding the way to spend time with parents. Why not try these ideas below?
Plan a family meal.
If you live nearby, a weekly get-together around the table is a perfect choice. It can be at your place or theirs, or in famous restaurants. Take the chance to chat about daily happenings.
Make a weekly phone call.
For those who live far from their parents, there is no possibility of usual visits in person. But your parents will be glad to hear your voice, so try to call them at least once a week. They will be even happier if this could be a video call.
Ask for parents’ advice.
No matter what problem you may be having, it’s a safe bet that your parents have been through it before. So talk about the problem with them, and if they make it clearer for you, it might be the best few minutes you ever spent.
Share relaxation time.
That is, spend time together doing something you both enjoy. A shopping trip or a film night could satisfy your mother. Sometimes fathers and sons could enjoy golf or fishing together.
 Eat together.·Get together to have a ·Talk about what has happened recently. ·If it isn’t possible to visit them, make sure they can hear your voice or see your face on the phone. Problem: People don’t know how to spend time with parents.  Turn to your parents for advice.·Your parents are more experienced in problems. ·Talking with them may make the problem  Share fun activities.·Do things you both enjoy, such as seeing a What other ideas do you have? |
3 . Smart transportation is leading to the birth of new apps for smart cities in China. In recent years, technology companies have worked hard to speed up the use of robotaxis and Baidu is one of the pioneers.
In June 2019, Baidu started to test its driverless robotaxis in certain areas in Changsha. In 2020, its Apollo Go robotaxis, also known as “Luobo Kuaipao” in Chinese, officially began its service in certain areas in Changsha, Cangzhou and Beijing, with a safety officer sitting in the driver seat who would monitor (监视) the drive and deal with accidents. In March 2022, Beijing allowed Baidu to test fully driverless robotaxis on certain roads, which meant a further step forward. In June 2023, Baidu carried out its driverless taxi service in Shenzhen across an area of 188 km2 from 7 am to 10 pm daily.
Booking a ride on Apollo Go is as simple as a few taps on your phone screen. Passengers just need to tell the app Apollo Go or Baidu Map where they are and where to go. Then, a car will appear. With sensors (传感器) and cameras all over the car, a computer takes full control of the drive. A screen on the back seat shows customers the information of the ride and how the robotaxi “looks” at the space around to see other cars, humans, and anything else that might get in its way.
“The robotaxi goes at about the same speed, providing a good riding experience,” a user posted online. By September 2023, the number of orders has reached four million. The user satisfaction rating for the Apollo Go app has reached 4. 9 out of 5 and 97.12% of the reviews are five-star ratings. So far, Apollo Go robotaxi service has covered 11 cities and by 2025, it plans to test its robotaxis in other 65 cities.
However, safety is the key in the development of driverless robotaxis. Didi and AutoX both had cases (事例) when the safety officer inside had to take over control of the drive. In the future, Apollo Go and the other companies should take more time to improve the system in order to provide comfortable and safe rides.
1. What is Baidu working on according to the passage?| A．Driverless taxis. | B．Robot taxi drivers. |
| C．Taxi Safety apps. | D．Maps for robotaxis. |
| A．The risk of Apollo Go. | B．The future of Apollo Go. |
| C．The advantages of Apollo Go. | D．The development of Apollo Go. |
| A．By telling a story. | B．By doing experiments. |
| C．By listing numbers. | D．By making comparisons. |
| A．People in Shenzhen could take a ride even at midnight in June 2023. |
| B．Internet safety officers monitored the taxis instead of sitting in them in 2020. |
| C．Passengers sitting on the back seats can know about their rides from a screen. |
| D．It provides safer service than Didi and AutoX, and will be the most popular app. |
4 . 阅读下面短文，根据文章信息，完成下面的海报，每空限填一词。
Today, I am going to talk about Bangkok, my home town and the capital of my country, Thailand.
The streets in Bangkok are very crowded, so it can take a long time to get from place to place. It sometimes takes me more than two hours to get to school by bus! I often sleep on my way there! Lots of people take tuktuks to get through the traffic quickly. They are like little cars with three wheels (轮子).
Bangkok is next to a big river. It is interesting to visit the Floating Market on the river. At the market, people sell lots of fresh fruit and vegetables from their boats. In November, we have the Festival of Lights. Everyone makes lights during the festival. Then, after dark, we put then into the river and watch them float away.
Thailand is also famous for its food. Thai food is very hot, like some Chinese food. So if you like Sichuan food, you’ll love Thai food!
The Writer’s Home Town—Bangkok. ★ Its streets They are very crowded. It usually takes the writer over ★ Its transport (交通) Many people take ★ Its Floating Market It’s on the ★ Its festival—the Festival of Lights It’s in November. People make lights and put them into the river after it gets |
5 . Moon’s Reservoirs
How much water is there on the Moon? This is a question we have tried to answer for many years. A group of scientists from China and the UK found that the Moon may have water “reservoirs (水库)”, according to Nature Geoscience.
Over a large amount of years, asteroids (小行星) have hit the Moon, causing the soil to melt and fly into space. It is then cooled down and falls back to the Moon, forming beads (珠子) of glass. The Chang’e-5 probe, which returned to the Earth on December 17, 2020, brought back a total of 1,731 grams of rocks and soil from the Moon, including glass beads, reported Xinhua.
The international research team looked into 32 glass beads. They found that about one ton of glass beads may contain 0.5 kilograms of “water”. “This ‘water’ wasn’t a liquid but instead took the form of hydrogen (氢) in the glass beads, which can easily be turned into the water we can use,” one of the study authors told Science and Technology Daily.
Researchers estimated that the water contained in the glass beads could probably reach to as much as 270 trillion kilograms. “It’s a lot more than we thought,” the author added.
The study said the hydrogen in the glass beads may come from the Sun as part of solar winds. The glass beads have many small holes which can absorb (吸收) hydrogen from the wind.
This finding would be a “really big deal” for space exploration, as humans plan to settle on. the Moon in the future, a space scientist told ABC News.
1. How did the glass beads on the Moon form?① The Moon soil falls back to the Moon. ② The Moon soil cools down.
③ The Moon soil flies into space. ④Asteroids hit the Moon.
⑤ The Moon soil melts.
| A．⑥④③②① | B．②③④①⑥ | C．④②⑤③① | D．④⑤③②① |
| A．There is water inside the beads. | B．The beads are actually water drops. |
| C．There is 0.5kg of water from the beads. | D．The beads have material that can be turned into water. |
| A．证明 | B．担心 | C．估计 | D．解释 |
| A．how solar winds form | B．how the study was done |
| C．why there is hydrogen in the beads | D．what else the study has found |
6 . Predicting (预测) something in the future seems as if it would need supernatural powers—which doesn’t sound very scientific! But there’s no magic here. Instead, scientists who study the weather use special tools to help make their predictions.
Weather science is called meteorology. That may sound as if it’s about studying meteors (流星), but it’s not. The name comes from an ancient Greek word and means “the study of things that are up high.” And, to study those high-up things, scientists put tools up there to help. Now let’s see how these tools are used to help predict the weather.
First of all, a small tool called the weather station is connected to a weather balloon. And then scientists send both the weather station and the weather balloon high into the sky. There, the weather station takes important information about the things like air pressure and temperature. What’s happening way up there can influence what happens in our part of the sky.
After that, the weather stations on the ground throughout the world give correct, real-time information, which help scientists see how the weather is changing from moment to moment. At the same time, the satellites (卫星), both far above our atmosphere and within it, are other tools that also collect facts or important information for weather scientists. After receiving information from weather stations and satellites, radar (雷达) shows rainfall and where it’s moving, as well as wind speed and direction.
Finally, all the information is sent into supercomputers, which can tell what might most probably happen next (according to what has happened under those conditions before).
Scientists combine all of this with their own knowledge and experience to let you know what kind of weather might be on the way. Since a change in any factor (因素) can change the final result, weather predictions are more precise for upcoming hours and days, rather than weeks. That’s why scientists need to change their predictions often-and can’t tell you today whether it will rain when you’re at camp in July!
1. The writer thinks predicting the weather ______.| A．needs supernatural powers | B．is all about studying meteors |
| C．requires some special tools | D．was popular in ancient Greece |
①The information like temperature is recorded.
②Supercomputers tell what is going to happen.
③Radar tells information about rainfall and wind.
④The weather station is connected to a weather balloon.
| A．①④③② | B．①③④② | C．④②③① | D．④①③② |
| A．cheaper | B．safer | C．more exact | D．more convenient |
| A．How do satellites help predict the weather? | B．How do scientists know about the weather? |
| C．How does nature tell secrets about the weather? | D．How does the weather station influence the weather? |
7 . 
①Japanese-style gardens first got attention in the US in 1893. About 120 years later, they started to be a great part of American garden design. Today, there are over 200 Japanese-style public gardens in North America.
②Japanese-style gardens are different in many ways. First, they bring together indoor and outdoor spaces. The house-garden relationship is set up to be connected. Gardens are around the house, so it’s as if the living space reaches out much further. Wherever a person looks out from their home, a garden should look almost like a painting. In fact, the idea of bringing the beauty of nature into daily lives is the most important idea in Japan so gardeners in Japan pay special attention to the beauty of rocks and stones.
③What’s more, Japanese-style gardens look as if they do not require much work. However, garden designers who are experts in this kind of garden say that Japanese gardens sometimes need even more work than other kinds of gardens.
④In these years, there have been some changes in Japanese-style gardens in the US. “When Japanese-style gardens were first introduced to the US, people paid little attention to whether outdoor scenery was connected to indoor spaces.” said John, who received training in Japan in 2000. But today, more Americans prefer the idea of “connecting the indoors to the outdoors.”
⑤Another change is that in the past, the trees chosen were often native to Japan. But today, the purpose is to use some trees that grow well in local environments. So now it’s very possible to create a wonderful Japanese garden using all native trees.
1. Japanese-style gardens became a great part of American garden design in about ______.| A．1893 | B．1913 | C．2000 | D．2013 |
| A．Plant the gardens with local trees. | B．Connect natural beauty to everyday lives. |
| C．Find as many rocks and stones as possible. | D．Make the gardens as beautiful as paintings. |
| A．Japanese-style gardens are attractive but require less hard work. |
| B．Nowadays more local trees are chosen for the gardens in the US. |
| C．The US has connected the indoors to outdoors since ancient times. |
| D．Americans think Japanese-style gardens are better for local environments. |
A． | B． | C． | D． |
8 . When someone has a sharply different viewpoint from our own, we naturally choose two common ways, either avoiding a conversation with that person or trying to convince (说服) them they are wrong. Research shows there is another way: using receptive (接纳性的) language, showing that we are truly interested in a new point of view.
Many of us try to avoid disputed (有争议的) discussions. We prefer to talk with someone with similar opinions. This happens because we usually think that talking to someone who has disagreements will be more unpleasant than it actually is. When we do have to talk with people holding different views, we typically try to convince them to give up their belief because we think we are right and try to “win” the argument. And the other side is likely to think the same way, which leads to even more difficult problems to walk through.
A more effective method is being conversationally receptive. Research shows that when we appear receptive to others’ different views, our arguments sound more convincing. Receptive language can also make those with whom we disagree more receptive in return. It makes us more likable, and others more interested in partnering with us.
Researchers suggested three tips that can help us improve conversational receptiveness in even the most heated disagreements.
Recognize the other person’s point of view. Say “I understand that…or”, “I believe what you’re saying is…” to show that you take an active part in the conversation and find value and even trust in their points.
Hedge your statements. When we talk, we usually hold the opinion that we should be strong and confident and express our views in a direct, forceful way. But if we show that we are not so sure about our belief, our views will be better received.
Express your arguments in an acceptable way. You might say, “Let’s consider the possible benefits of having fewer people working on the project “rather than”, “We should not add more people to the project.” The second sentence sounds unpleasant, showing that the speaker is not open to the possibility of further discussion.
By following these tips in our communication, we’ll be more likely to have an effective conversation and bridge the differences.
| A．Why people dislike those with different opinions. |
| B．How people convince others to give up their belief. |
| C．How people communicate to deal with difficult problems. |
| D．Why people use two common ways when facing disagreements. |
| A．Effective communication. | B．Creative statements. |
| C．Increased confidence. | D．Divided opinions. |
| A．Explain your reasons clearly. | B．Raise your questions politely. |
| C．Voice your ideas less forcefully. | D．Express your excuses more directly. |
| A．To stress the importance of productive communication. |
| B．To introduce a better way to deal with disagreements. |
| C．To explain the reasons for using receptive language. |
| D．To provide three effective tips to win an argument. |
9 . ①It’s known that green tea is a symbol of Chinese culture. Also, it helps to improve health in so many ways that some people think of it as a kind of medicine. Perhaps that is why the Chinese have been using it for more than 4,000 years to treat all kinds of medical problems. Today, scientists know that there are catechin, caffeine, vitamin C and theanine in green tea that are good for health.
②Catechin is helpful for lowering (降低) cancer (癌症) risk. It protects the body from cancer-causing substances (物质) and slows the growth of cancer. Besides fighting cancer, catechin prevents serious health problems like heart disease.
③Caffeine causes the heart to beat faster. That’s why it was once thought that caffeine was not very healthy, but studies suggest that there are also good reasons for drinking caffeine. Specifically, caffeine has to do with a lower risk for Parkinson’s disease and liver (肝脏) disease. Yet, caffeine also has some weaknesses. It can influence sleep and make people nervous, so experts advise teenagers not to have more than 100 ml of caffeine a day. This is about the caffeine of a small cup of coffee.
④Vitamin C is something that the human body cannot make enough by itself. So we have to get it through food and drink. The vitamin may play a role in improving physical conditions to colds and the flu. Also, it helps people to get well more quickly from those illnesses.
⑤Theanine is another healthy substance found in tea. It has been shown to lower stress, both mental and physical, and increase mind abilities. It is also used for preventing some brain diseases.
⑥As you can see, green tea has many good values. Drinking it may help you stay healthy. Of course, as with any healthy substance, it is important to check if there are any bad influence as well.
| A．Because it’s delicious for us to drink. | B．Because it helps to deal with illnesses. |
| C．Because it’s a symbol of Chinese culture. | D．Because it’s made into different drinks. |
| A．It lowers cancer risk. | B．It makes the heart to beat faster. |
| C．It lowers liver disease risk. | D．It makes people less stressed. |
| A．Tea can take the place of medicine. | B．We should drink as much tea as possible. |
| C．Tea has some bad influence on our health. | D．Drinking tea may help people to stay in health. |
A． | B． | C． | D． |
10 . 阅读下面材料，从A-D中选出与1-4图片相对应的广告技巧，并回答第5题。
Every day we see ads on TV, in magazines, on websites, on the street, and on our computer screens. Are you an ad detective? Can you understand the messages advertisers send you? To be an ad detective, it is useful to know how ads work. Let’s look at some typical advertising techniques.
A. Group pressure: An ad shows lots of people, each with their own cell phone.
Message: Everyone has a cell phone. You need one, too!
B. Testimonials: A famous pianist says he uses a certain brand of pianos.
Message: You’ll be good at playing the piano too if you buy this brand of pianos. Or because a famous pianist uses this piano, and you can trust the product.
C. Repetition: These ads mention the product many times and say wonderful things about it.
Message: You need to remember the product.
D. Time pressure: These ads use expressions like “Buy now! Half price this week.”
Message: You should buy the product quickly before you miss a great opportunity.
Ads are interesting, but you can make better decisions about what to buy when you know these techniques!
1.
2.
3.
4.
5. Which advertising technique do you think is the most useful? Why? (No more than 20 words)
