1 . Here are some of the coolest robots in the world.
Pleo
Pleo is one of the most good-looking robots on the market. The robot is designed to learn from its experiences, and the environment it is kept in. Pleo has become especially popular among children, as it could be used for both entertainment and educational purposes. It exhibits lively behavior like eating and sleeping. It can now be bought at a price of $469.
BigDog
BigDog is the most advanced rough land robot on earth. Designed to serve military (军事的) uses, the machine is around 3 feet long, 2.5 feet tall, and weighs 240 pounds. The robot can move on rough land at a speed of four miles per hour, and is able to carry up to 340 pounds of weight.
I-Sobot
An Amazing human-like robot, I-Sobot is one of the smallest human-like robots, with a height of just 6.5 inches and a weight of 12 ounces. It costs $300. It has become the most-produced robot in the world. This small robot can walk, play the air guitar, and perform about 200 moves. This robot can be controlled by either a remote control or voice commands.
Schaft
Schaft is an award-winning robot by Google. It looks like a man. Schaft can perform several tasks on its own, and is able to get through disaster areas and work with any tools and materials at hand. With the strength of 10 average people, Schaft is able to lift and clear heavy things. It weighs 209 pounds. It is able to move at a speed of 2km / h.
KeepOn
KeepOn is a small robot which can perform simple and natural interaction. Developed in 2015, KeepOn is an interactive toy designed to help children with autism(自闭症) in their social development, and costs anywhere from $40 to $100.
1. What makes Pleo different from the other four robots mentioned in the text?| A．Being very cheap for customers. | B．Having a very special appearance. |
| C．Having the ability to learn new things. | D．Being able to be played with all the time. |
| A．Pleo | B．BigDog | C．I-Sobot | D．KeepOn |
| A．It can move fast. | B．It is difficult to control. |
| C．It is expensive to produce. | D．It has been very popular. |
| A．Entertainment | B．Interacting with children |
| C．Educational purposes | D．Performing rescue tasks |
| A．Children who want to win an award. |
| B．Old and lonely people who need much help. |
| C．Parents with a child who cannot interact well. |
| D．Parents who want their children to learn new things. |
2 . The following four famous paintings—from Jan van Eyck’s portrait to Pablo Picasso’s masterpiece—have stood the test of time.
The Arnolfini Portrait
The Arnolfini Portrait of Jan van Eyck, an oil painting on wood produced in 1434, in which a man and a woman hold hands with a window behind him and a bed behind her, is undoubtedly one of the masterpieces in the National Gallery, London. This painting is as visually interesting as it is famed. It is also an informative document on fifteenth-century society, through Jan van Eyck’s heavy use of symbolism—while husbands went out to engage in business, wives concerned themselves with domestic duties.
The Starry Night
During his 12—month stay at the mental hospital near Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, France between 1889 and 1890, Vincent Willem van Gogh painted The Starry Night, an oil on canvas(帆布), a moderately abstract landscape painting of an expressive night sky over a small hillside village. When the Museum of Modern Art in New York City purchased the painting from a private collector in 1941, it was not well known, but it has since become one of Van Gogh’s most famous works.
The Harvesters
The Harvesters is an oil painting on wood completed by Pieter Bruegel the Elder in 1565. It depicted the harvest time which most commonly occurred within the months of August and September. Nicolaes Jonghelinck, a merchant banker and art collector from Antwerp, commissioned this painting. The painting has been at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City since 1919.
Guernica
Guernica, a large black-and-white oil painting, was painted by the Cubist Spanish painter, Pablo Picasso in 1937. The title “Guernica” refers to the city that was bombed by Nazi planes during the Spanish Civil War. The painting depicted the horrors of war and as a result, has come to be an anti-war symbol and a reminder of the tragedies of war. Today, the painting is housed at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia in Madrid.
1. Which of the following paintings was produced earliest?| A．Guernica. | B．The Harvesters. |
| C．The Starry Night. | D．The Arnolfini Portrait. |
| A．Pieter Bruegel the Elder. | B．Vincent Willem van Gogh. |
| C．Jan van Eyck. | D．Pablo Picasso. |
| A．It was an oil painting on wood. |
| B．It depicted the painter’s life in mental hospital. |
| C．It wasn’t widely recognized before 1941. |
| D．It was given away to the museum by a private collector. |
3 . When I was a boy growing up in New Jersey in the 1960s, we had a milkman delivering milk to our doorstep. His name was Mr. Basille. He wore a white cap and drove a white truck. As a 5-year-old boy, I couldn’t take my eyes off the coin changer fixed to his belt. He noticed this one day during a delivery and gave me a quarter out of his coin changer.
Of course, he delivered more than milk. There was cheese, eggs and so on. If we needed to change our order, my mother would pen a note — “Please add a bottle of buttermilk next delivery” — and place it in the box along with the empty bottles. And then, the buttermilk would magically (魔术般) appear.
All of this was about more than convenience. There existed a close relationship between families and their milkmen. Mr. Basille even had a key to our house, for those times when it was so cold outside that we put the box indoors, so that the milk wouldn’t freeze. And I remember Mr. Basille from time to time taking a break at our kitchen table, having a cup of tea and telling stories about his delivery.
There is sadly no home milk delivery today. Big companies allowed the production of cheaper milk, thus making it difficult for milkmen to compete. Besides, milk is for sale everywhere, and it may just not have been practical to have a delivery service.
Recently, an old milk box in the countryside I saw brought back my childhood memories. I took it home and planted it on the back porch (门廊) . Every so often my son’s friends will ask what it is. So I start telling stories of my boyhood, and of the milkman who brought us friendship along with his milk.
1. Mr. Basille gave the boy a quarter out of his coin changer to __________.| A．show his magical power | B．pay for the delivery |
| C．satisfy his curiosity | D．please his mother |
| A．He wanted to have tea there. | B．He was a respectable person. |
| C．He was treated as a family member. | D．He was fully trusted by the family. |
| A．Nobody wants to be a milkman now. | B．It has been driven out of the market. |
| C．Its service is getting poor. | D．It is not allowed by law. |
| A．He missed the good old days. | B．He wanted to tell interesting stories. |
| C．He needed it for his milk bottles. | D．He planted flowers in it. |
4 . Gifted students in the Wichita Falls Independent School District in Texas had the opportunity to travel to STEM facilities and learn coding and other technical skills, but the transportation is not convenient. “We just started talking about, ‘Wouldn’t it be cool if we were able to design a mobile STEM lab? ’ ”says Dr. Peter E. Griffiths, the district’s associate superintendent. Educators soon realized that they could retrofit an old bus into a mobile STEM lab, which would provide increased access to career and technical education (CTE) experiences for students.
Districts sold off buses when the vehicles became too old. Griffiths and his colleagues decided to retrofit one of those old vehicles. “Give me your ‘best worst’ bus,” Griffiths said to the transportation department. Soon the process of transforming began. Griffiths reached out to Reuben Rodriguez, the owner of a local car company, and explained what they wanted to do. Rodriguez agreed to work with the district on the price on condition that they could send CTE students to lend a hand with some of the building work. And bringing the bus from the dream stage to fruition has taken a lot of joint efforts of educators and the community.
Called STEAM Machine, the bus looks like a device from a video game or a real-life Lego truck, and rides as a mobile maker space. “It has two touch screen TVs outside. It comes complete with drones and drone obstacle courses that will help students learn about coding in an enjoyable way,” Griffiths says. “Those are things that a lot of these kids have never experienced before.”
To drive the bus, the district has hired a retiring teacher who will take the bus to various schools and engage in different lessons with students and educators. “We were so concerned about kids losing out on experiences before, and this is a solution. We aren’t going to let this go. The STEAM Machine will be equipped with all the necessary materials and resources, and it may change the way students learn and engage with their education,” Griffiths said.
1. What is the main purpose of the mobile STEM lab?| A．To develop students’ interest in STEM research. |
| B．To replace traditional school buses with electric ones. |
| C．To provide fun activities for students during long trips |
| D．To enable students to get more learning chances. |
| A．Educators needed to pay him in advance. |
| B．Some students could help with the building work. |
| C．The old bus should be equipped with high technology. |
| D．The district must provide him with necessary materials. |
| A．It brings students fun learning experiences. |
| B．It awakens students’ curiosity about bus driving. |
| C．It protects students’ health with its special design. |
| D．It saves students’ time by reducing traffic on the road. |
| A．Doubtful. | B．Worried. | C．Hopeful. | D．Unclear. |
| A．Safe and long-lasting. | B．Fashionable and comfortable. |
| C．Creative and educational. | D．Cheap and eco-friendly. |
5 . Global Essay Competition
The John Locke Institute encourages young people to develop the characteristics that turn good students into great writers. Our Essay Competition invites students to explore a wide range of challenging and interesting questions beyond the limits of the school curriculum (课程).
All of our essay prizes are judged by senior academics from the University of Oxford. The judges will choose their favourite essay from each subject category and an overall “best essay” across six subjects: Philosophy, Politics, Economics, History, Psychology and Law.
Entry Requirements
Entry is open to students from any country. Candidates must be eighteen years old, or younger, on the date of the submission deadline, 30 June. Candidates for the Junior Prize must be fourteen years old, or younger, on the date of the submission deadline. Each essay should address only one of the questions in your chosen subject category, and must not exceed (超过) 2, 000 words.
Key Dates
30 June: Submission deadline
14 July: Short-listed candidates informed
26 August: Awards Dinner for the Junior Prize
2. September: Awards Dinner for the Economics Prize and other prizes
Prizes
There is a prize for the best essay in each category. The prize for each winner of a subject category, and the winner of the Junior category, is a scholarship worth US $2,000 towards the cost of attending any John Locke Institute programme, and the essays will be published on the Institute’s website. The prize-giving ceremony will take place in Oxford.
The candidate who submits the best essay overall will be awarded an honorary John Locke Institute Junior, Fellowship, which comes with a US $10, 000 scholarship to attend one or more of our summer schools.
1. What should the entry be about?| A．The limits of school courses. | B．The characteristics of great writers. |
| C．One of the given questions. | D．Anything in the chosen fields. |
| A．It sets a word limit on essays. |
| B．It has six subject categories. |
| C．Its prizes are judged by voting online. |
| D．It is open to any student regardless of his or her nationality. |
| A．10 | B．14 | C．18 | D．20 |
| A．On 30 June. | B．On 14 July. |
| C．On 26 August. | D．On 2 September. |
| A．A fellowship at Oxford University. | B．A summer school scholarship. |
| C．A chance to get published. | D．A US $1, 000 award. |
6 . What’s On?
Electric Underground
7.30pm－1.00am Free at the Cyclops Theatre
Do you know who’s playing in your area? We’re bringing you an evening of live rock and pop music from the best local bands. Are you interested in becoming a musician and getting a recording contract? If so, come early to the talk at 7.30 pm by Jules Skye, a successful record producer. He’s going to talk about how you can find the right person to produce your music.
Gee Whizz
8.30pm-10.30pm Comedy (喜剧)at Kaleidoscope
Come and see Gee Whizz perform. He’s the funniest stand-up comedian on the comedy scene. This joyful show will please everyone, from the youngest to the oldest. Gee Whizz really knows how to make you laugh! Our bar is open from 7.00pm for drinks and snacks(快餐).
Simon’s Workshop
5.00pm-7.30pm Wednesdays at Victoria Stage
This is a good chance for anyone who wants to learn how to do comedy. The workshop looks at every kind of comedy, and practices many different ways of making people laugh. Simon is a comedian and actor who has 10 years’ experience of teaching comedy. His workshops are exciting and fun. An evening with Simon will give you the confidence to be funny.
Charlotte Stone
8.00pm-11.00pm Pizza World
Fine food with beautiful jazz music; this is a great evening out. Charlotte Stone will perform songs from her new best-selling CD, with James Pickering on the piano. The menu is Italian, with excellent meat and fresh fish, pizzas and pasta(面食). Book early to get a table. Our bar is open all day, and serves cocktails, coffee, beer, and white wine.
1. Who can help you if you want to have your music produced?| A．Jules Skye. | B．Gee Whizz. | C．Charlotte Stone. | D．James Pickering. |
| A．The Cyclops Theatre | B．Kaleidoscope | C．Victoria Stage | D．Pizza World |
| A．It requires membership card. | B．It lasts three hours each time. |
| C．It is run by a comedy club. | D．It is held every Wednesday. |
| A．5.00pm-7.30pm. | B．7.30pm－1.00am. | C．8.00pm-11.00pm. | D．8.30pm-10.30pm. |
7 . Styrofoam, or polystyrene, is a light-weight material, about 95 percent air, with very good insulation (隔热) properties, according to Earthsource.org. It is used in products from cups that keep your drinks hot or cold to packaging material that protects items during shipping. With the above good features, Styrofoam still enjoys a bad reputation. It cannot be recycled without releasing dangerous pollution into the air. The U. S. Environmental Protection Agency says it is the fifth-largest creator of harmful waste.
But now the common worms which are usually disgusting can come to the rescue, specifically, mealworms. Scientists from the U. S. and China have discovered that mealworms can digest plastic. One mealworm can digest a pill-sized amount of plastic a day. Study co-author Wei-Min Wu says that in 24 hours, the plastic is turned into carbon dioxide.
Since Styrofoam has no nutrition at all, are the worms hurt by eating plastic? Much to the scientists’ surprise, the study found that worms eating Styrofoam were as healthy as worms eating bran (谷糠). The researchers will study the worm’s eating habits and digesting system, looking to copy the plastic breakdown but on a larger scale. Once the way can be put into practice, it will make a revolutionary difference to the disposal of plastic.
“Solving the issue of plastic pollution is important”, says Wu, a Stanford University environmental engineering instructor. After all, our earth is small and landfill space is becoming limited with too much garbage waiting to be dealt with, he says.
About 33-million tons of plastic are thrown away in the United States every year. Plastic plates, cups and containers take up 25 percent to 30 percent of space in America’s landfills. One Styrofoam cup takes more than 1 million years to recycle in a landfill, according to Cleveland State University.
1. What do we know about Styrofoam?| A．It can be used to cool drinks. |
| B．It is a weightless material. |
| C．It is harmful when recycled. |
| D．It is usually used on ships. |
| A．Mealworms have amazing digesting power. |
| B．Mealworms are not bad in their nature. |
| C．Mealworms can rescue people’s lives. |
| D．People misunderstood mealworms in the past. |
| A．To find ways to help mealworms grow larger. |
| B．To imitate their ways of breaking down plastic. |
| C．To help develop their digesting ability. |
| D．To make sure of their safety after eating plastic. |
| A．by raising amounts of mealworms |
| B．by environmental engineering instructors |
| C．using a method inspired by eating mealworms |
| D．without sending out dangerous pollution |
| A．Styrofoam is widely used in daily life. |
| B．Mealworms are genius at eating plastic. |
| C．Plastic recycling may be no more a problem. |
| D．Plastic can be turned into carbon dioxide. |
8 . National Music Theater Competition
The 2024 National Music Theater Competition (NMTC) will be held. It was launched in 2011 as the first national competition for the emerging professional music theater soloist (独唱者). NMTC has provided industry connections for past competitors and winners that have led to their success on Broadway and other venues.
Prizes (each prize only for a person)
The champion: $5,000 plus a concert at the next national conference of National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS), a $1,000 Gift Certificate from Hal Leonard, a Career Management Services package from Stage Door Connections.
The runner-up: $2,500 plus a $500 Gift Certificate from Hal Leonard.
The third place: Louise Lerch Prize; $1,000 cash prize.
The fourth place: Bill Hayes Prize; $750 cash prize.
Qualification
Singers aged from 20 to 28 as of September 15, 2023.
Entrance Procedure
Application requires a fee of $900, but for these students of NATS members the fee is $75. Application fees due to cancellation by the applicant won’t be returned. All application materials must be submitted by September 15, 2023. If you are planning to submit your application for the online round, you must complete the submission by September 15, 2023, but you’ll have 30 days after the deadline to upload your audition (试唱) videos. Late or incomplete applications will not be considered.
Where to Audition
The preliminary (预选的) round
Live auditions: November 1 to 10, 2023 in New York City.
Online auditions: Video submission deadline is October 15, 2023.
Semifinal and final rounds
Live auditions: The semifinal round: January 3 to 9, 2024; the final round: January 15 to 20, 2024.
The semifinal and final rounds will be held in New York City as part of the 2024 NATS Winter Workshop.
1. Why was the National Music Theater Competition launched?| A．To make people like music. |
| B．To promote the leisure industry. |
| C．To popularize Broadway musicals. |
| D．To seek promising talents. |
| A．A $500 Gift Certificate and Louise Lerch Prize. |
| B．$2,500 in prize money and a Gift Certificate. |
| C．A Career Management Services package. |
| D．A chance to perform at a concert. |
| A．Being at least 28 years old. |
| B．Applying for membership of NATS. |
| C．Submitting application materials on time. |
| D．Uploading audition videos by September 15. |
| A．Competitors can enter the semifinal round on January 18, 2024. |
| B．Both online and live auditions are available in any round. |
| C．There are three rounds in the competition in total. |
| D．Application submission deadline is October 15, 2023. |
| A．To call on people to explore their potential in music. |
| B．To attract young singers to apply for the competition. |
| C．To appeal to young singers to become NATS members. |
| D．To encourage people to enter the musical industry. |
9 . Returning to nature
Imagine getting the chance to go camping for five days. It would be an adventure (冒险) in the wild. You could row on a lake every day and leave your smartphone at home. Would you want to try this?
In June, four teenage girls from Minnesota, US, went camping in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (边界水域泛舟区). They had a great time——even without their smartphones.
Julia Ruelle, 16, put the group together. Earlier this year, she won an essay contest sponsored (赞助) by a company. The award was a five-day canoe and camping adventure with up to three friends. No parents or guides would be there. This award was supposed to encourage kids to be less dependent on technology.
Ruelle had been to the area before, but she had always gone with her parents. Sharing the experience with friends would be very different. She invited three friends: Anna Wander, Madeline Wilson, and Julianna Torelli.
They came up with a daily plan. “We would wake up early every day. We were done paddling (划桨) by noon. We ate lunch at the campsite. Then it was time for hammocks (吊床), reading, writing, making friendship bracelets (手链), talking and napping,” Ruelle said.
“I’m a lot less worried about things,” Wander said when asked how she felt without her cellphone. Her favorite thing to do was lie in her hammock and look at the lake. Torelli enjoyed cooking. She made blueberry pancakes and sandwiches.
No one felt hungry or homesick. “Mental (心理的) health can be improved so much. It really helps to get away and reconnect with yourself,” Ruelle said.
1. The camping trip was unique because the girls _____.| A．had to live on a boat for several days |
| B．needed to finish many tasks |
| C．had to live without their smartphones |
| D．needed to find a guide on their own |
| A．not using her smartphone at school |
| B．asking her parents for help |
| C．working in a company |
| D．winning an essay contest |
| A．Worried. | B．Happy. |
| C．Hungry. | D．Homesick. |
| A．It is easy to get lost without our phones. |
| B．The girls didn’t make any camping plans. |
| C．Wilson enjoyed making pancakes and sandwiches. |
| D．Using smartphones less can improve our mental health. |
10 . In the UK, the government showed throwaway cups should be forbidden altogether by 2023 if they are not all being recycled. As a result, Starbucks said it would try out a 5p (5 pence) cup charge in 20 to 25 central London shops. “We will begin it next month and at first it will last for three months,” the company said, adding that it continued to offer a 25p (25 pence) discount to customers who brought their own reusable cups.
The government agrees plastic waste is a problem and will consider taxing disposable (一次性的) plastics. The committee’s chair, Mary Creagh, said, “The UK throws away 2.5 billion disposable coffee cups every year. Almost none are recycled. Coffee cup producers and shops haven’t taken action to change this. So we need to kick-start a change in recycling.”
The Liberal Democrats said they had been suggesting a charge on coffee cups since September 2016. The party’s spokesman, Tim Farron, said, “The result is clear that the tax works. The 5p charge on plastic bags has largely cut down the usage and helped protect our environment.”
The 5p tax is being against by the makers of paper cups. Mike Tuner, of the Paper Cup Alliance, said paper cups were the safest solution for drinks. “The paper cups we produce in the UK can be recycled, and are being recycled. We are trying to increase recycling rates. Taxing the morning coffee run won’t solve the problem, but it will hurt consumers,” he said.
Disposable coffee cups are technically recyclable, but most are not because the UK has just three machines that can split the paper and plastic parts for recycling. The committee has called on the government to require coffee cups from cafes without in-store recycling systems to carry “not recycled” marks to remind customers. Cafes with in-store recycling systems should print their cups with “recyclable in store only”.
1. About the throwaway cups, Starbucks will ________.| A．offer a half-price discount to customers with their own cups |
| B．support the idea of forbidding throwaway cups till 2023 |
| C．charge customers 5p per throwaway cup in some shops |
| D．stop to offer throwaway cups in its shops right now |
| A．Coffee cup makers will take action to recycle the water. |
| B．The use of the disposable plastics is a nationwide problem. |
| C．Coffee cup users pay much attention to the plastic problem. |
| D．The UK government will ban all disposable coffee cups by 2023. |
| A．More people will fight against the charge. |
| B．There will be little change in our environment. |
| C．Fewer people will use the disposable coffee cups. |
| D．There will be a competition between coffee shops. |
| A．will be supported by the makers of the paper cups |
| B．will affect the consumers instead of solving the problem |
| C．can give a hand to increasing recycling rates of the makers |
| D．can be the best solution for the government to cut down waste |
| A．There are not enough professionals in this area. |
| B．There is not enough professional equipment. |
| C．Consumers don’t have recycling knowledge. |
| D．Cafes don’t have recycling systems at all. |
