1 . Have you ever had this kind of childhood memory: a family sits together casually, drinking and tasting tea after lunch or dinner?
After being spread to different parts of the world,
Traditional tea processing techniques and associated social practices in China consist of the knowledge, skills and practices concerning the management of tea plantations (茶园) as well as the picking of tea leaves, manual processing, drinking, and sharing of tea, noted UNESCO.
Weilu zhucha is a replacement in the cold seasons for the camping craze. Sitting around a stove, boiling some tea, people chat, admire the scenery and immerse themselves in traditional Chinese culture by boiling tea together in person. “
| A．Take tea making for example. |
| B．This can be fully shown by weilu zhucha. |
| C．tea is common in Chinese people’s daily lives. |
| D．It’s good to feel the warm atmosphere when boiling tea. |
| E．China now has 43 items on the intangible cultural heritage list. |
| F．tea has delighted and fascinated the world for a thousand years. |
| G．This has been a daily activity for Chinese people throughout their history. |
2 . I had always dreamed of living and working in New York, which promised endless opportunities. But as soon as I arrived, I realized that my journey was going to be filled with countless setbacks and challenges.
My first major failure came when I landed my dream job at a famous company. However, after just a few months, I was let go due to budget cuts. I was shocked and felt like all of my hard work had been for nothing.
Determined to bounce back, I applied for a new job at another company. This time, things seemed to be going better. I was making progress and gaining valuable experience, but then I was suddenly laid off again due to company restructuring.
Feeling defeated and hopeless, I decided to take a break from the job search and focus on self-improvement. I enrolled in courses and attended workshops to learn new skills and expand my knowledge. But even with all of this effort, I still couldn’t find the right job.
One day, while searching online job listings, I found an opportunity that seemed too good to be true. It was a remote position that offered a competitive salary and flexible hours. Without hesitation, I applied and was thrilled when I received an offer letter.
However, as soon as I started working remotely, I realized that it wasn’t the same as being in an office with colleagues (同事) around me. I struggled to communicate effectively and found it difficult to stay motivated without the support of my team.
Despite these challenges, I refused to give up. I reached out to my colleagues and tried to build relationships with them through virtual meetings and social media. With their help and encouragement, I was able to adapt to the new environment and excel in my role. Looking back on my journey, I realized that success is not about avoiding failure, but rather about learning from it and persevering through the tough times. I encouraged others who may be facing similar challenges in their own careers to never give up on their dreams and to keep pushing forward even when things get tough.
1. How did the author feel about his journey when he arrived?| A．Better. |
| B．Promising. |
| C．Tough. |
| D．Well-paid. |
| A．Company restructuring. |
| B．Financial problems. |
| C．Being short of skills. |
| D．Working attitude. |
| A．He wanted them not to give up. |
| B．He wanted to get support from them. |
| C．He wanted to be better than them. |
| D．He wanted to hold a meeting with them. |
| A．Perseverant. |
| B．Modest. |
| C．Imaginative. |
| D．Generous. |
3 . As the lyrics to Taylor Swift’s hit song “Bad Blood” go: “Cause, baby, now we got bad blood. You know it used to be mad love.” It’s a song about falling out of friendship, but to 14-year-old Hallie Barnard, who was born with a rare blood disorder, the song holds a much deeper meaning.
At just 15 months old, Barnard was diagnosed (诊断) with Diamon Blackfin Anemia, or DBA, and she spent most of her life in and out of the hospital. The Swiftie said she relied on the singer to bring her joy.
The only way to survive DBA is with a bone marrow transplant (骨髓移植) and Barnard was desperate for one. But she knew thousands of other patients are, too. So, a few years ago, she decided to do something about it, creating her own foundation: Hallie’s Heroes. “It started selfishly as just trying to save my life, but then we realized there were so many other children out there that needed a bone marrow transplant,” she said. “So, so far we’ve tested 8,000 people and found over 300 matches.”
After a 9-year wait, Barnard got her own match — through her own foundation. But more obstacles stood between her and normal life as a kid. The blood disorder led to a cancer diagnosis: osteosarcoma. She received surgery to cut the cancer out of her leg at MD Anderson in Houston.
The recovery was difficult, but Hallie said she stayed hopeful. “My survival instinct (本能) just kicked in. I was trying to do anything that I could to survive. So, of course, it was scary but in my mind, I was just thinking that I wanted to be at my sister’s future weddings. I wanted to play games and run again,” she said.
Her survival instinct —combined with Taylor Swift―helped her through her operation, where doctors cut her cancer out, and reattached her foot and ankle to her upper leg to work as a knee.
1. Why does the author mention Taylor Swift’s song “Bad Blood”?| A．To stress the power of music. |
| B．To introduce the topic of the text. |
| C．To show Taylor Swift’s popularity. |
| D．To state Taylor Swift’s song is a hit. |
| A．To raise money for her heroes. |
| B．To treat her rare blood disorder. |
| C．To help other children with DBA. |
| D．To have an operation for her cancer. |
| A．Strong-minded and selfish. | B．Hard-working and patient. |
| C．Kind and optimistic. | D．Outgoing and helpful. |
| A．Bad Blood Inspired a Little Girl |
| B．Hallie’s Heroes: a Useful Foundation |
| C．Taylor Swift: a Popular Singer with Teens |
| D．A Cancer Survivor Helped Others Find Matches |
4 . Bike Rental & Guided Tours
Welcome to Amsterdam, welcome to MacBike. You see much more from the seat of a bike! Cycling is the most economical, sustainable and fun way to explore the city, with its beautiful canals, parks, squares and countless lights. You can also bike along lovely landscapes outside of Amsterdam.
Why MacBike
MacBike has been around for almost 30 years and is the biggest bicycle rental company in Amsterdam. With over 2,500 bikes stored in our five rental shops at strategic locations, we make sure there is always a bike available for you. We offer the newest bicycles in a wide variety, including basic bikes with foot brake (刹车), bikes with hand brake and gears (排挡), bikes with child seats, and children’s bikes.
Prices
Hand Brake, Three Gears | Foot Brake, No Gears | |
1 hour | €7.50 | €5.00 |
3 hours | €11.00 | €7.50 |
1 day (24 hours) | €14.75 | €9.75 |
Each additional day | €8.00 | €6.00 |
Guided City Tours
The 2.5-hour tour covers the Gooyer Windmill, the Skinny Bridge, the Rijksmuseum, Heineken Brewery and much more. The tour departs from Dam Square every hour on the hour, starting at 1:00 pm every day. You can buy your ticket in a MacBike shop or book online.
1. What is an advantage of MacBike?| A．It gives children a discount. | B．It offers many types of bikes. |
| C．It organizes free cycle tours. | D．It has over 2,500 rental shops. |
| A．€15.75. | B．€19.50. | C．€22.75. | D．€29.50. |
| A．The Gooyer, Windmill. | B．The Skinny Bridge. |
| C．Heineken Brewery. | D．Dam Square. |
5 . Turning soil, pulling weeds, and harvesting cabbage sound like tough work for middle and high school kids. And at first it is, says Abby Jaramillo, who with another teacher started Urban Sprouts, a school garden program at four low-income schools. The program aims to help students develop science skills, environmental awareness, and healthy lifestyles.
Jaramillo’s students live in neighborhoods where fresh food and green space are not easy to find and fast food restaurants outnumber grocery stores. “The kids literally come to school with bags of snacks and large bottles of soft drinks,” she says. “They come to us thinking vegetables are awful, dirt is awful, insects are awful.” Though some are initially scared of the insects and turned off by the dirt, most are eager to try something new.
Urban Sprouts’ classes, at two middle schools and two high schools, include hands-on experiments such as soil testing, flower-and-seed dissection, tastings of fresh or dried produce, and work in the garden. Several times a year, students cook the vegetables they grow, and they occasionally make salads for their entire schools.
Program evaluations show that kids eat more vegetables as a result of the classes. “We have students who say they went home and talked to their parents and now they’re eating differently,” Jaramillo says.
She adds that the program’s benefits go beyond nutrition. Some students get so interested in gardening that they bring home seeds to start their own vegetable gardens. Besides, working in the garden seems to have a calming effect on Jaramillo’s special education students, many of whom have emotional control issues. “They get outside,” she says, “and they feel successful.”
1. What do we know about Abby Jaramillo?| A．She used to be a health worker. | B．She grew up in a low-income family. |
| C．She owns a fast food restaurant. | D．She is an initiator of Urban Sprouts. |
| A．The kids’ parents distrusted her. | B．Students had little time for her classes. |
| C．Some kids disliked garden work. | D．There was no space for school gardens. |
| A．Far-reaching. | B．Predictable. |
| C．Short-lived. | D．Unidentifiable. |
| A．Rescuing School Gardens | B．Experiencing Country Life |
| C．Growing Vegetable Lovers | D．Changing Local Landscape |
6 . How to Survive in the Woods
Getting lost in the woods can be a scary situation. Whether you’ve got lost on a hike, your car broke down on a wilderness road, or any other reason, surviving in the woods is difficult.
Don’t panic. Panicking can cause you to make poor decisions and affect your judgment. If you’re going to get out of the woods, you need to have a clear head.
Avoid using too much energy.
Signal your location with smoke signals. Build a fire and add a bunch of green leaves or pine needles to create a lot of smoke. Take a large branch with green leaves on it and cover the fire for 3-4 seconds to stop the smoke from escaping.
| A．Build a shelter. |
| B．Stay where you are. |
| C．However, it can be done. |
| D．Search for a source of fresh water. |
| E．Take deep breaths and focus on the tasks at hand. |
| F．It may be difficult for you to find adequate food and water. |
| G．Then, remove the branch to allow the smoke cloud to escape. |
7 . Two managers in the same organization were coming into conflict when having disagreements in their work. After thinking about a particularly troubling issue throughout the night, the first manager wrote a letter to the other one, outlining his thoughts as reasonably as possible. He gave it to the other person and asked him to read it later and suggested that after working through their anger, they discuss it again.
The following day the first manager stopped by the office of the other and asked how it would go. The second one admitted that he was very upset at first, but after thinking it over he realized that most of their disagreements were for a lack of understanding. He stated that he felt if they could discuss it without losing their tempers, they could work things out. That is exactly what they did later and got the issue settled with flying colors (成功地).
American president Abraham Lincoln was known for writing two letters when he needed to communicate with someone else who had made him angry. He first wrote a letter that severely conveyed just what he thought. Then he tore up that letter and wrote a second one that was appropriate and reasonable, and sent the letter out.
Effective communication is the key to any relationship. When we allow ourselves to become emotional and react immediately to what we feel without thinking, emotions overwhelm (压倒) the situation and prevent true communication. Step back, think evaluate what happened or what was said, and ask to clarify questions if it is needed. Then, you can respond appropriately.
Don’t let overwhelming emotion control your life. Instead, choose to think and process internally whatever comes your way before externally responding. That is when you can communicate with others effectively and you will be able to keep good relationships with them.
1. What did the first manager do in his letter?| A．He expressed his general ideas reasonably. |
| B．He explained why the issue was troubling. |
| C．He apologized to the second manager sincerely. |
| D．He invited the second manager to discuss the issue. |
| A．Any great man can get angry. |
| B．Making plan B is necessary in work. |
| C．Writing letters was very popular in the past. |
| D．We should deal with matters after calming down. |
| A．A bad first impression. | B．Ineffective communication. |
| C．The high chance of failure. | D．The breakdown of a relationship. |
| A．Learn to answer questions indirectly. | B．Avoid anger to keep good relationships. |
| C．Never be overwhelmed by your emotions. | D．Think reasonably before making a decision. |
8 . Before the Renaissance (文艺复兴), art developed very slowly for about 1,000 years in Europe. Most art was made to serve the Church. Human beings in the art work were typically described as morally fallen and had to be saved by God and human life was regarded just a preparation for the happiness in the other world.
But the Renaissance (14〜16 century) upended all the above ideas. The “Renaissance Men” thought that the best way to serve God was not to bow down in church all day long but to recognize and make better use of the talents that God gave them. Human life was much more than a preparation for the other world.
For the Renaissance artists, they started to combine art and science in their work. They studied human bodies like doctors, nature like biologists and the laws of perspective like mathematicians to create realistic paintings and statues. For example, Leonardo da Vinci — an Italian sculptor, engineer, inventor and thinker — studied human bodies and observed the flight of birds. Another equally inventive and fearless Italian artist, Michelangelo Buonarroti, even went so far as to show in his work that human beings were truly made in God’s own image and that they were as great as their own creator. Raffaello Santi, the youngest of the great three Italian Renaissance artists，combined the quiet elegance of Leonardo with the raw power of Michelangelo. In his huge painting, The School of Athens, Raffaello celebrated the great ancient thinkers — a shocking break from Church tradition. And to make these once forbidden figures seem even greater, Raffaello presented the great thinkers of ancient Greece as the leading geniuses of his generation. Not only did these Renaissance-era Italians appreciate the great minds of the ancient world, they considered themselves in the same league.
Although the cultural explosion slowed down in Italy by 1600, people from around the world were already attracted to see the Renaissance-era masterpieces by then. Especially today, people continue to get inspiration from the great works of the era in the country.
1. What did the “Renaissance Men” think of human beings?| A．They should make best use of their own talents. |
| B．They were playthings of the religious authorities. |
| C．They were morally bad guys and had to be saved by God. |
| D．They had to abandon God in order to enjoy life in this world. |
| A．He was innocent. | B．He was unfearing. |
| C．He was unashamed. | D．He was too out-spoken. |
| A．Italy has a long history. |
| B．Nothing can exist forever. |
| C．The Renaissance has a lasting influence. |
| D．People love beautiful and thoughtful things. |
| A．The Greatest Renaissance Thinker in Greece |
| B．The Renaissance’s Artistic Significance in Italy |
| C．The Causes Leading to Slow Development in Europe |
| D．The Bad Influence of the Church Before the Renaissance |
9 . My mother used to take me to my grandparents’ in Belgium during the school holidays. While I would play chess with my grandfather, he would tell me stories about growing up, falling in love, and travelling around the world.
I didn’t realize the importance of preserving memories until my grandfather passed away, which ultimately changed my outlook on remembering our loved ones and the stories we share. I thought about solutions to help other people record the precious memories for those they love—before it’s too late. So I began matching ghostwriters (代笔人) to clients to help them write a book as smoothly and beautifully as possible, and Story Terrace was born.
Since then, we have explored the power of stories and their ability to connect us with our past and make sense of the present. It has been documented that increased family connection is significantly linked to less loneliness. Learning more about one’s family history, however, has been linked to boosting emotional health, increasing compassion and providing a deeper sense of cultures and traditions.
What we have found through our own research is that so many of us have missed out on the opportunity to explore our origins. 56 percent of Brits agreed that much of their family history is lost because they are no longer able to speak with the person who knows the most about it. A further 51 percent expressed regret as they wished they could tell their younger self to document their family’s life story, feeling that most of it had been forgotten. But when it comes to telling these stories, many don’t know where to begin.
We have seen numerous times when people come to us with random journal entries and notes from over the years, and these can be developed into a wonderful work of art that can be passed down for generations to come.
Half of the projects we see at StoryTerrace are heritage stories, with family occupying a dominant theme for most stories. Alongside this, common themes we see are of course love, overcoming challenges, settling in new surroundings and so on. However, family is a thread that always ties these together.
1. What does Story Terrace do?| A．It boosts the mood of your family members. |
| B．It gives treatment to people with mental illness. |
| C．It links people from different cultures together. |
| D．It helps turn your beloved one’s stories into a book. |
| A．Why StoryTerrace matters. |
| B．How StoryTerrace functions. |
| C．What StoryTerrace focuses on. |
| D．Where StoryTerrace beings your story. |
| A．It is part of the national heritage. |
| B．Its stories are mostly about family. |
| C．It dominates half of the market. |
| D．Its stories gain much popularity. |
| A．Family Stories Worth Telling |
| B．Create Your Own Story Books |
| C．Documents of Family History |
| D．Preserve Memories with StoryTerrace |
10 . Need more excitement in your life? Maybe it’s time to take up an extreme sport!
No one knows exactly how it started, but Cooper’s Hill CheeseRolling Race is an annual event that has taken place for over 100 years.The name comes from Cooper’s Hill where the “sport” takes place, just outside the village of Brockworth, England.
But what makes the sport so extreme, and why has the local government tried to ban the tradition? Injuries—and lots of them.The hill is so steep that it’s not actually possible to run down it.
| A．It’s as silly as it sounds. |
| B．If you win, you get to keep the cheese. |
| C．Is it wrong to let children do extreme sports? |
| D．These popular activities can be extremely dangerous. |
| E．Be prepared to both laugh and cover your eyes in shock. |
| F．Instead, you fall, bounce and roll your way to the bottom. |
| G．Extreme sports are activities that involve a high amount of danger and excitement. |
