1 . We’re all familiar with the feeling―it usually starts with a little itch (痒) deep inside the nose. Next comes the awareness that it’s going to happen. Then, achoo! Air rushes out of our nose at a shocking 100 miles per hour, bursting out whatever was causing the itch. The high-pressure from a sneeze (喷嚏) has led some people to think that if we didn’t close our eyes, they could be pushed out.
For decades, countless people have tested the theory. When finding it almost impossible to keep their eyes open while sneezing, many have concluded that the theory must be true. If you try it yourself, the possibilities are that your eyes are still where they belong. That’s because they are held firmly by the muscles in the eyes. Furthermore, increased pressure from sneezing actually builds up in the blood vessels (血管), which may cause vessels to break but may not be possible to push the eyeballs out.
Why did this theory start, anyway? Some say that it all began in 1882, when the New York Times reported an incident of a woman who burst one of her eyeballs during a sudden sneeze. Others point at the fact that different high-pressure experiences, such as childbirth, can cause blood vessels in the eyes to break out. Still others say that closing our eyes when we sneeze shows the theory is true. Scientists, on the other hand, explain that we close our eyes for the same reason we sneeze ― to prevent unwanted things from entering our bodies. Either way, as far as we know, there are no actual recorded cases of anyone losing an eyeball because of a sneeze, so don’t lose any sleep over it!
1. What is mainly talked about in paragraph 1?A.The cause of a sneeze. | B.The danger of sneezing. |
C.The importance of a sneeze. | D.The experience of sneezing. |
A.Because they are fixed firmly in the eyes. |
B.Because high pressure builds up in the eyes. |
C.Because they are held strongly by blood vessels. |
D.Because increased pressure prevents them from bursting out. |
A.Sneezes usually cause an itchy nose. |
B.People sneeze to burst out unwanted things. |
C.The high pressure caused by a sneeze will become less through breathing. |
D.People close their eyes when sneezing to stop their eyeballs from popping out. |
A.A guidebook. | B.A magazine. |
C.A storybook. | D.A textbook. |
2 . Creative ways to change your workouts
Most people know working out is good for your health, both physical and mental.
Create a word or image with your exercise route
Runners often map routes through city streets that create a word or image, then use a GPS device to “draw” it as they run.
Join a free fitness group
Exercising can be more fun with others, so look for group fitness opportunities. Many communities offer free exercise opportunities. Fitness in the Park is a summer-long activity that has been operating in New York state for a decade. Everyone is welcome to head to one of 18 different parks.
Sure, you can run a 5 K. But why not try orienteering (定向越野赛)? This timed navigational sport requires you to use detailed maps to find orange-and-white flags that are hidden in parks or remote areas. Races involve difficult running routes
Dance
Whether you take a class or practice at home, dancing is a great way to get your body moving. Dancing doesn’t seem like exercise to a lot of people, which is why it’s always a popular choice.
A.Hit the road. |
B.Sign up for a new-to-you event. |
C.Participants have ranged in age from about 10 to over 70. |
D.But staying motivated — especially for the long term — can be a struggle. |
E.The event is timed, so people often jog or power walk from flag to flag. |
F.You can do the same, whether your favored exercise is running, walking or biking. |
G.It’s also something you can do anywhere, to any kind of music, salsa, hip-hop — it all works. |
3 . 3 Most Walkable Cities in Europe
Walking on holiday is a great way to stay fit, but also to see the sights a city has to offer. Here are the three most walkable cities in Europe.
Athens, Greece
Athens is one of the oldest cities in the world. The capital of Greece ranks fifth, with a slightly longer—but very worthwhile—route of 2.1 miles between its top-rated tourist attractions.
Visitors to Athens can set off at the Acropolis, climbing to discover the ancient Parthenon that stands as a landmark to the city’s ancient legacy. Then it leads to the Acropolis Museum, with the neighbourhood of Plaka waiting to be explored in the shadow of the Acropolis. The National Archaeological Museum is also close-by.
Seville, Spain
Seville is home to some wonderful sights that are best seen when walking. Seville in Spain takes the top spot as Europe’s most walkable city, offering the shortest walking route between the top five tourist attractions.
Visitors to this charming Spanish city can explore the impressive Plaza de Espana public square, before wandering over to the UNESCO-listed palace of Real Alcazar and Seville Cathedral. After that it’s only a short trip on foot to visit the beautiful Barrio Santa Cruz neighbourhood and admire the Torre Giralda bell tower hanging above. With just 20 minutes of walking between these attractions.
Venice, Italy
Venice is famous for walkers, so it’s no surprise it ranks as the second best location for walkable city breaks. Walking is the best way to explore the bridges over the canals the city is famed for. There are endless charming alleyways to explore, as well as plenty of bridges over the canals that the city is famous for. Just under half an hour of walking here will take you on a tour of the impressive Grand Canal.
1. What’s the recommended starting point of the city walk in Athens?A.Plaka. |
B.The Acropolis. |
C.The Acropolis Museum. |
D.The National Archaeological Museum . |
A.It offers some wonderful sights. |
B.Visitors can explore five tourist attractions. |
C.It makes visitors enjoy their time to the full. |
D.Visitors can tour five tourist attractions in the shortest walking distance. |
A.Those who are hiking during the vacation. |
B.Those who want to find suggestions on where to travel. |
C.Those who are looking for the best traveling destinations. |
D.Those who usually choose walkable cities for their vacation. |
4 . Josie, who is 17 years old, said, “Why do my parents do the same things they tell me not to do? For example, my mum stops me from shouting through the walls and asks me to go and speak to her face-to-face, but she always shouts through the walls to me. What can I do?”
That is a very good point. Parents can be completely inconsistent (不一致), and usually they don’t realize it. You see this a lot in many things like smartphones. Parents always say to their kids, “Oh, you can’t use that. That device (设备) is bad for you, so stop using it at the table. It’s harmful.” But then they are on theirs continually. So what do you expect teenagers to do?
The whole “Do as I say, not as I do” thing is an annoyance, especially for a teenager who is dying for independence and respect but isn’t getting them.
What can teenagers do with it? I would say you should point it out by calmly saying something like “You tell me not to scream through the walls, but you do it to me, so you can understand where I’m coming from. That’s not ideal.” They might object to it, but I think most parents who care about being parents would logically say, “That’s a reasonable point.”
There are a lot of conflicts (矛盾) going on between teenagers and their parents, but a lot of studies show that the conflicts are resolved a lot more when they turn into a dialogue.
If you can talk at a time when you’re both feeling a bit calmer, like just in the kitchen or doing something unimportant, then go in and say, “Can I just mention it? You tell me not to do this, but you do it too.” If you can approach it in a more calm and stress-free manner, most parents will respond positively.
1. How did Josie feel according to her words in paragraph 1?A.Hopeful. | B.Bored. | C.Proud. | D.Confused. |
A.The parents’ smartphones. | B.The tables in the house. |
C.The devices in the house. | D.The teenagers’ points. |
A.Object to it personally. | B.Complain of it continually. |
C.Talk with their parents calmly. | D.Do some studies differently. |
A.To list a fact. | B.To offer a suggestion. |
C.To show a result. | D.To ask a new question. |
5 . One day of the last December, I was sitting on a long, black and folding medical table. Beside me was a woman in a down jacket talking about the cold change the weather had taken recently. A radio in the corner was playing Christmas music, even though it was still weeks away. I took a drink from the bottle of lemonade I had brought with me, so I wouldn’t get dizzy (眩晕的).
I looked around at all the other people lying on their medical tables. Each of us had a needle in our arm, which was connected to a tube that led to a plastic bag. Each of us had come to give a precious gift to help others, make the world a better place, and perhaps even save a life.
It was the local blood drive and I had driven 12 miles across snowy roads to get there. I tried never to miss one even in winter. Despite all the time it took, I felt blessed being able to give this gift back to others. I had been given so much in my life: a kind husband, a loving family, many friends, and enough money to meet my needs. These gifts made me feel wonderful, yet the one thing that brought me more happiness was giving something back.
As you know, in the world, nothing brings you as much joy as taking your place in the great circle of love. In this circle, the more you give back, the more you get in return; the more love you let flow from your heart, the more love flows into it.
There are so many gifts you can give in this life: a smile, a kind word, a few dollars, a hug, a caring letter, and even a pint of blood. Each of them is priceless and precious. What you have to do is take action. In this way, the world will be filled with love.
1. What did the author do on the day of the last December?A.She went to give blood. | B.She visited a woman. |
C.She went to see a doctor. | D.She bought a medical table. |
A.It was lonely. | B.It was happy. |
C.It was worrying. | D.It was interesting. |
A.Caring. | B.Brave. | C.Honest. | D.Hard-working. |
A.We should always keep smiling. | B.We need to write letters to others. |
C.We should pay love back to others. | D.We need to buy friends priceless gifts. |
6 . Two weeks ago, a 5-year-old girl named Sunshine Oelfke emptied out her piggy bank (存钱罐) onto the living room floor and started counting. Her grandmother, Jackie Oelfke, thought she was playing as she carefully lined up the coins. But then she saw the girl put the coins in her backpack.
“What are you doing with that money?” Jackie asked her granddaughter.
“I’m taking it to school,” Sunshine replied. “I’m going to take it for milk money. My friend Layla doesn’t get milk—her mom doesn’t have milk money and I do.”
Jackie’s heart melted at Sunshine’s words. Choked (哽咽) with strong feelings, Jackie held her sweet granddaughter tightly in her arms.
Last week, Jackie and Sunshine met with her teacher, Rita Hausher, and handed her the $30 the girl had saved. There are 20 kids in Sunshine’s class and about half don’t get milk. It costs $ 0.45 a carton (纸盒). The total adds up to about $180 a month for every child in the class to have milk every day.
After dropping Sunshine off at school, Jackie posted a video on Facebook to explain her granddaughter’s plan. To her surprise, many people offered to donate toward the cause. Within a week, Jackie raised more than $1,000. Now every student in Sunshine`s class can get free milk for the rest of the year.
Jackie said Sunshine doesn’t see her kind act as a big deal. She was just trying to look out for her friends. “She doesn’t understand the influence she’s brought about,” Jackie said. “But now she knows she can do whatever she puts her heart to.”
1. Why did Sunshine empty her piggy bank?A.She hoped to show off her savings in class. | B.She needed to train her counting skills. |
C.She wanted to play with the coins. | D.She planned to pay for her friend’s milk. |
A.Annoyed. | B.Touched. | C.Curious. | D.Proud. |
A.Two heads are better than one. | B.A friend in need is a friend indeed. |
C.Nothing is impossible to a willing heart. | D.There’s no such thing as a free lunch. |
A.Small Coins, Big Changes | B.Jackie’s Piggy Bank |
C.Piggy Bank and Carton Milk | D.A Moved Grandmother |
7 . Enjoy Fresh Air
Namba Parks, Osaka, Japan
Architects creating Namba Parks shopping mall in Osaka showed that you needn’t sacrifice (牺牲) green spaces for commercial (商业的) development.
The shopping center, built in 2003, provides eight floors of commercial space for cinemas, stores, events and restaurants.
The garden at its top begins at street level. Visitors are treated to green spaces and there is no money necessary to enjoy the simple pleasures.
Promenade Plantee, Paris, France
The space was developed on a disused railway line and runs from the Opera Bastille to the Bois de Vincennes in the city.
Around 1.5 km of the park is higher than the street, with other parts at street level, even passing through disused railway tunnels (隧道).
The project began in 1988 and finished in 1994 and the space is now home to many trees and plants, including bamboo and cherry trees.
Jurong Lake Gardens, Singapore, Singapore
Jurong Lake Gardens is a 90-hectare green space in the heart of Singapore. Although some areas are still under development, the first part opened in 2019.
The gardens were developed with nature and community in mind — with a large 2.3-hectare play area for children. The park has also developed a learning program to help educate students about biodiversity (生物多样性).
The High Line, New York, USA
You’ve probably heard of Central Park in New York. But did you know this is only the fifth largest park in New York, a city that has 180 state parks in total?
Wanting to increase its biodiversity further, city planners also created a city park known as the High Line between 2009 and 2019. This 2-kilometer public park was built on a disused railway line and is now home to over 150,000 plants and trees.
1. Why is Namba Parks special?A.It serves as a shopping center. | B.It is still under development. |
C.It is the fifth largest park in Japan. | D.It includes different parks in Osaka. |
A.They were created by architects from Singapore. |
B.They are famous for learning programs. |
C.They were private gardens at first. |
D.They are ‘on old railway lines. |
A.Namba Parks. | B.Promenade Plantee. |
C.Jurong Lake Gardens | D.The High Line. |
8 . Atomic shapes are so simple that they can’t be broken down any further. Mathematicians are trying to turn to artificial intelligence (AI) for help to build a periodic table of these shapes, hoping it will assist in finding yet-unknown atomic shapes.
Tom Coates at Imperial College London and his colleagues are working to classify atomic shapes known as Fano varieties, which are so simple that they can’t be broken down into smaller components. Just as chemists arranged element s in the periodic table by their atomic weight and group to reveal new insights, the researchers hope that organizing these atomic shapes by their various properties will help in understanding them.
The team has given each atomic shape a sequence of numbers based on its features such as the number of holes it has or the extent to which it bends around itself. This acts as a bar code (条形码) to identify it. Coates and his colleagues have now created an AI that can predict certain properties of these shapes from their bar code numbers alone, with an accuracy of 98 percent.
The team member Alexander Kasprzyk at the University of Nottingham, UK, says that the AI has let the team organize atomic shapes in a way that begins to follow the periodic table, so that when you read from left to right, or up and down, there seem to be general patterns in the geometry (几何) of the shapes.
Graham Nib lo at the University of Southampton, UK, stresses that humans will still need to understand the results provided by AI and create proofs of these ideas. “AI has definitely got unbelievable abilities. But in the same way that telescopes (望远镜) don’t put astronomers out of work, AI doesn’t put mathematicians out of work,” he says. “It just gives us new backing that allows us to explore parts of the mathematical landscape that are out of reach.”
The team hopes to improve the model to the point where missing spaces in its periodic table could point to the existence of unknown shapes.
1. What is the purpose of building a periodic table of shapes?A.To gain deeper insights into the atomic shapes. |
B.To create an AI to predict the unknown shapes. |
C.To break down atomic shapes into smaller parts. |
D.To arrange chemical elements in the periodic table. |
A.Its holes. | B.Its bends. |
C.Its atomic weight. | D.Its properties. |
A.Design. | B.Help. | C.Duty. | D.Threat. |
A.Thanks to AI, new atomic shapes have been discovered. |
B.Mathematicians turn to AI to create more atomic shapes. |
C.AI helps build a relationship between chemistry and maths. |
D.A periodic table of shapes can be built with the help of AI. |
9 . Doing fitness routines is challenging and sometimes boring. Here is some advice on how to make exercise as fun as video games.
Have an objective
When you’re playing a game, there’s always an objective. It helps us focus on the task at hand and motivates us to keep playing until we win the game.
Compete against others
Adding an element of competition to your exercise routine can actually help you work out harder. If you’re seeking a similar motivation, look into fitness programs that encourage friendly competition. The app Zwift, for example, is a good choice.
Team up with others
Getting a group to work together toward a common goal was also an effective way to increase physical activity. You can try to recreate this dynamic by working toward an exercise goal with other people, particularly those who you have a close relationship to.
Add a sense of playfulness
Some people love video games because there’s a lot of unpredictability and surprise.
A.Exercise should be no different. |
B.Just remember every moment of playful engagement is a victory. |
C.But how to apply these techniques to our everyday fitness routines? |
D.Similarly, you can do many things to bring back a sense of childlike wonder. |
E.It allows you race against others around a virtual world using your own bike. |
F.This approach encouraged each member of the group to try to meet the day’s step goal. |
G.They can help you hold yourself accountable in a way you might not do with a stranger. |
10 . China is one of the world’s ancient civilizations and has the earliest outstanding bronze casting technology. Here we’ve created a list of 4 museums where you can gain an in-depth understanding of Chinese bronze.
Sanxingdui Museum
Address: Sanxingdui Ruin Site, 133 Xian Road, Guanghan, Deyang, Sichuan province
Hours: Comprehensive Gallery (the first exhibition hall): 8:30-18:00; Bronze Gallery (the second exhibition hall): 8:30-18:30. Last tickets sold at 17:00. Closed on the morning of Chinese New Year’s Eve
Ticket booking: 0838-5651526
General admission: Gallery ticket 80 yuan
Note: Children shorter than 1.2m (including 1.2m) can visit the gallery free of charge. The ticket must be used on the day it is sold and authorizes one visit to each gallery.
National Museum of China
Address: East side of Tian’anmen Square, Dongcheng district, Beijing
Hours: 8:30-17:00 (no entry after 16:30)
General admission: Free (passport required for entry), Closed Mondays (except for national holidays)
E-mail: webmaster@chnmuseum.cn
Shanghai Museum
Address: 201 Renmin Avenue, Huangpu district, Shanghai
Hours: 9:00-17:00 (no entry after 16:00), Closed Mondays (except for national holidays)
E-mail: webmaster@shanghai-museum.org
General admission: free (a max of 8, 000 admitted daily)
Hunan Museum
Address: 50 Dongfeng Road, Changsha, Hunan province
Hours: 9:00-17:00 (no entry after 16:00), Closed Mondays (except for national holidays) and the eve of Chinese New Year
Tel: (+86-731) 8415833, 84475933
E-mail: web@hnmuseum.com
General admission: Free (passport required for entry)
1. Which museum should you choose for your family to visit next Monday?A.Sanxingdui Museum | B.Hunan Museum |
C.Shanghai Museum | D.National Museum of China |
A.They are all free of charge. | B.They all set a deadline for entry. |
C.They all lie in the south of China. | D.They can all be available through E-mail. |
A.Science | B.Today’s News | C.Entertainment | D.History and Culture |