1 . Lego in China

Engineers gather around a table-sized model of the China Art Museum, a landmark of Shanghai, adding airports for helicopters, car parks and other improvements with colorful bricks.     1    Li Yang, visiting for a few days from Shenzhen, has been waiting for her daughter for two hours. Zhu Yunfei, watching his son, marvels at the variety: “Coming here to play with him is making up for my childhood,” he says. They drop by every week.

Lego’s rise in China has been shiningly attractive. In 2017 it overlook Alpha Group, a local giant, to become the country’s leading toy company (not including video games). In the past two years it has opened 89 stores and wants 50 more by December, which will bring it to 30 cities. Its first Chinese factory started making bricks in 2016. The toy industry is growing by 9% annually in the country, but the Danish firm’s Chinese section has won “very strong double digits(两位数)”, says Paul Huang, its boss.

    2     In 2017 Lego cut 1,400 jobs and recorded its first drop in revenues and profits in over a decade. But last year both ticked up again, by 4% each. Lego has thus retained its status as the world’s biggest toy-maker, snatched from Mattel in 2014 - even as its American rival last year earned its highest revenues in five years from its Barbie dolls.

Newly wealthy parents in China have helped Lego recover. “We have not reached the extreme out there, by far,” says Niels Christiansen, whom Lego brought in as chief executive two years ago.     3     Last year 98% of those surveyed by Lego said that play was essential for their child’s well-being, even more than Americans and Danes.

Lego has also sensibly managed to meet the demands of local tastes.     4     Fans were delighted at the attention to cultural detail. One was a Chinese New Year’s Eve dinner kit, with tiny red envelopes and chunlian, lucky couplets on banners pasted around doorways. A dragon boat race set included a sticky-rice dumpling, a popular festival snack. The high-quality kits are pricey, costing up to 700 yuan ($100) a piece.

A．It has done so even though the brick-maker’s global business has looked shakier.

B．It has been sold in great volumes with various kinds of sets and earned the fame as the most suitable toys for children to play with.

C．Removing a child from Lego’s vast shop near People’s Square can be like unsticking two stubborn bits of Lego.

D．Over the past decades, Lego’s sales volume in China is not as satisfying as it expected.

E．As in the West, the educational merits of bricks appeal to Chinese parents.

F．This year the firm launched several sets specifically for China, the first time it has done so for any country.

2 . Housing prices have been growing less and less affordable across the U. S.     1    

Paragon Real Estate, a San Francisco real estate(房地产)company, has calculated that the median housing price in the city has risen $205, 000 since the end of 2017, the highest six - month gain in at least a quarter century.     2    . That’s more than double the 7.2% rise in 2017, but not as high as the 26.1% rise in housing prices in 2000, during the peak of the bubble. It’s also below the 20% rise in 2007, just before the housing market crashed.

    3    . But it also reflects a broader trend in the U. S. The average home price in U. S. stands at around $260,000, after having risen for the past six years, Paragon said.

Home-buyers who can’t afford such inflationary(通货膨胀引起的)housing prices might consider buying an apartment.     4    .

Paragon said that a sudden increase in both the asking prices for homes and the bids being placed by buyers, coupled with a multi - year decline in the number of homes listed for sale, have contributed to the sudden increase in prices. Housing activists in the Bay Area have grown more outspoken in calling for more available housing in the region.

There are signs that the affordable - housing problems that many residents in San Francisco struggle with are recurring in other cities, even if at a smaller scale. Home prices across the U. S. are by some measures at their least affordable levels since the financial crisis.

A．The median price for San Francisco apartments rose by $71,000 in the first half of 2018, a comparative bargain.

B．On a percentage basis, the median home price in San Francisco rose 14.5% over the past year to $1.6 million.

C．No city is a more fitting poster child for that trend than San Francisco.

D．The current housing construction pick-up supported overall GDP growth in first quarter and should do so in second quarter.

E．San Francisco may offer an extreme example of rising home prices.

F．In part, house prices have risen because interest have fallen and incomes have risen.

3 . Directions: Fill in each blank with a proper word chosen from the box. Each word can be used only once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. hike       B. requires          C. hosts          D. man-made       E. attraction      F. Belonging   G. peak   H. introduce   I. romantic     J. fascinating     K. sun-bathe

Touring “Treasure Island”

Chinese mainland tourists will be able to visit Taiwan via charted flights in July according to two landmark agreements signed on June 13. So, 21^st Century invited two young Taiwanese to     1     their favorite site on the island.

Yangming Mountain, north of Taipei

Young couples can definitely enjoy a     2     evening on the mountain and a bird’s eye view of the Taipei city. College students often visit the mountain for a     3    : others ride motorbike to the top. The mountain and the nearby town of Pei-tou have many hot springs, which often appear in romantic Taiwan TV dramas.

Ali Mountain, Jiayi County

Ali Mountain is the general name for 18 hills. The highest     4     of Ali Mountain is Tower Hill, which has a height of 2,663 meters. Ali Mountain is famous for its “five rare sites” - the sunrise, the Ali mountain Forest Railway, the famous Alishan Sacred Tree, the Grand Sea of Clouds and the Flamboyant Cherry Blossom. The best time to visit the     5     scenery is during the comfortable midsummer.

Taipei 101 tower, Taipei

The 101-floor landmark is one of the world’s tallest completed skyscrapers. Besides the shops inside and outside the tower, Taipei 101     6     splendid firework shows during festivals. A new     7     next to the tower is under construction. It will be a     8     beach on which the public will be permitted to     9    .

Dr. Sun Yat-sen’s Memorial Hall and Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall, Taipei

The squares in front of these halls are open all day to the public. They have become a paradise to colleges students, who often meet there for an activity that     10     space. You will run into students dancing, rehearsing skits or even playing musical instruments.

4 . 概要写作

The Metaverse(元宇宙): The Future of Web Design and Development?

To many, the Metaverse might seem like this is something that is still far from becoming a reality. To others, it is the inevitable future of web design and development.

The Metaverse is an ambitious project that seeks to bring together many different web development and HiTech technologies in order to offer users a new experience of the web. Today, users view content on the web. On the Metaverse, users will be immersed(沉浸在)in the content thanks to technologies like Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, Machine Learning, and other forms of Artificial Intelligence.

In brief, it is the next iteration(迭代)of the Internet where users will be able to navigate through a virtual space instead of the current two-dimensional screens. Although much has been said about it, there is still much that needs to be done, and this is both an opportunity and a challenge. Whatever the case is, it is the future of web design, and companies need to start thinking about how to reap the benefits of it.

One of the most important implications of this upgraded version of the web is the impact it will have on apps and websites. The rise of the Metaverse will not eliminate digital products as we currently know them. On the contrary, it will most likely be the case that both will coexist in new and more powerful forms.

This means that business websites will not become obsolete(淘汰的). As a matter of fact, they will probably become more relevant. Traditional websites will probably end up coexisting with the Metaverse, creating synergies(协同作用)that benefit users and businesses alike.

Aside from the impact on business websites, it is also important to consider operational aspects like the changes in the role of the typical web designer and developer. Digital product teams will have to rethink the tech stacks(一大推)they use in order to build interfaces and experiences for the user journeys coming our way.

Business decision-makers need to understand this and allow their teams to experiment with what might be the future of web experiences for users. Yes, it is a risky bet, but this is something that is gaining a lot of strength, and we might be hearing more about it sooner than we expect.

As mentioned above, traditional websites and other digital products aren’t going anywhere, but they surely need to be reworked in terms of what is expected of the future of web design.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

5 . With advances in electronics and neuroscience, researchers have been able to achieve remarkable things with brain implant devices. In addition to restoring physical senses, scientists are also seeking innovative ways to ____ communication for those who have lost the ability to speak. A new “decoder” receiving data from an electronic device implanted inside the skull, for example, might help paralyzed patients speak using only their minds. Researchers from the University of California developed a two-stage method to turn brain ____ into computer-synthesized speech.

For years, scientists have been trying to control and use neutral inputs to give a voice back to people whose neurological damage prevents them from talking. Until now, many of these brain-computer interfaces have ____ a letter-by-letter approach, in which patients move their eyes or facial ____ to spell out their thoughts. But these types of interfaces are very slow - most max out producing 10 words per minute, a fraction of human’s average speaking speed of 150 words per minute.

The brain is undamaged in these patients, but the neurons - the pathways that ____ your arms, or your mouth, or your legs are broken down. These people have high cognitive functioning and abilities, but they cannot accomplish ____ tasks like moving about or saying anything, “says a co-lead author of the new study and an associate research specializing in neurological surgery at UCSF.” We are essentially by passing the pathway that’s broken down.“

The researchers started with high-resolution brain activity data collected from five volunteers over several years. These participants - all of whom had normal speech function - were already undergoing a ____ process for epilepsy(癫痫)treatment that involved implanting electrodes(电极)directly into their brains. The research team used these electrodes to ____ activity in speech-related areas of the brain as the patients read off hundreds of sentences.

From there, the UCSF team worked out a two-stage process to recreate the spoken sentences. First, they created a decoder to ____ the recorded activity patterns as instructions for moving parts of a virtual vocal tract(声道). They then developed a synthesizer that used the ____ movements to produce language.

Other research has tried to decode words and sounds directly from neural signals, ____ the middle step of decoding movement. However, a study the UCSF researchers published last year suggests that your brain’s speech center focuses on how to move the vocal tract to produce sounds, ____ what the resulting sounds will be.

Using this method, the researchers successfully reverse-engineered words and sentences from brain activity that ____ matched the audio recordings of participants’ speech. When they asked volunteers on an online crowd-sourcing platform to attempt to ____ the words and sentences using a word bank, many of them could understand the simulated(模拟的)speech, though their ____ was far from perfect. Out of 101 synthesized sentences, about 80 percent were perfectly transcribed(记录)by at least one listener using a 25-word bank.

1.

A．offer

B．facilitate

C．initiate

D．influence

2.

A．signs

B．consciousness

C．signals

D．waves

3.

A．featured

B．neglected

C．rejected

D．missed

4.

A．expressions

B．muscles

C．languages

D．masks

5.

A．contribute to

B．communicate with

C．match with

D．lead to

6.

A．daily

B．delicate

C．repetitive

D．tough

7.

A．growing

B．producing

C．checking

D．monitoring

8.

A．track

B．map

C．organize

D．design

9.

A．copy

B．transform

C．follow

D．interpret

10.

A．physical

B．virtual

C．individual

D．external

11.

A．considering

B．creating

C．skipping

D．moving

12.

A．other than

B．aside from

C．regardless of

D．rather than

13.

A．roughly

B．barely

C．similarly

D．formally

14.

A．spell

B．identify

C．parallel

D．invent

15.

A．version

B．fluency

C．pronunciation

D．accuracy

6 . 语法填空

Three Hours a Week: Play Time’s over for China’s Young Video Gamers

China has forbidden under-18s from playing video games for more than three hours a week, a stringent(严苛的)social intervention that it said was needed to pull the plug on a growing addiction to     1     it once described as “spiritual opium(鸦片)”.

The new rules,     2     (publish) on Monday, are part of a major shift by Beijing to strengthen control over its society and key sectors of its economy, including tech, education and property, after years of runaway growth.

The restrictions, which apply to any devices including phones, are a body blow to a global gaming industry that caters to tens of millions of young players in the world’s most profitable market.

They limit under - 18s to     3     (play) for one hour a day - 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. - on only Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, according to the Xinhua sate news agency. They can also play for an hour, at the same time, on public holidays.

The rules from the National Press and Publication Administration (NPPA) regulator coincide with a broader clampdown(压制)by Beijing     4     China’s tech giants, such as Alibaba Group and Tencent Holdings.

The campaign     5     (prevent) what state media has described as the “savage growth” of some companies has wiped tens of billions of dollars off shares traded at home and abroad.

Gaming companies will be barred from providing services to minors in any form outside the stipulated(规定)hours and     6     ensure they have put real-name verification systems in place, said the regulator,     7     oversees the country’s video games market.

The new rules swiftly became one of the most discussed topics on Weibo, China’s answer to Twitter. Some users expressed support for the measures     8     others said they were surprised at how drastic(严厉的)the rules were.

“This is so fierce that I’m utterly speechless,” said one comment that received over 700 likes.     9     expressed doubt that the restrictions could be enforced. “They will just use their parent’s logins, how can they control it?” asked one.

The NPPA regulator told Xinhua it     10     (increase) the frequency and intensity of inspections for online gaming companies to ensure they were putting in place time limits and anti-addiction systems. It also said that parents and teachers played key roles in curbing gaming addiction.

7 . Directions: Read the following three passages. Summarize the main idea and the main point(s) of the passage in no more than 60 words. Use your own words as far as possible.

Vertical farming isn’t actually a very new concept. The idea has existed since at least the 1950s. However, it was only recently that we began to seriously explore the idea, and put it forward as a solution to the world food crisis.

So what has vertical farming got going for it? At present, over 80 per cent of the world’s land that is suitable for farming is already being used. In order to grow enough food to feed the nine billion people that will be living on our planet in the middle of the 21 century, we’ll need TEN million more square kilometres of land - that’s an area 20 per cent bigger than Brazil!

The building used for vertical farming won’t take up much space because they are tail - they’re skyscrapers. They can be built in the middle of cities, where all the people are. The food would be on people’s doorsteps, almost literally, so transport costs are minimal. That’s great for helping to combat global warming and climate change.

Another advantage is that all food could be grown organically. The crops would need less water than traditional ones because all the water is recycled. All the nutrients are recycled too. The only thing that actually leaves the building is the produce, the food.

Vertical farming would create jobs too. Imagine the small businesses that would spring up around these farms - for packaging, distribution, catering, and so on - they would employ thousands of people.

Where is it likely to happen? Who will benefit most from it? First and foremost, countries that don’t have agriculture: cold countries, like Greenland and Iceland, and hot, desert countries, like Saudi Arabia. You would have sealed buildings in these places with an artificial climate - artificially warm in Iceland, artificially cool in a hot country.

The social benefits are amazing and everybody gets good, healthy food. People have reacted really well to this idea - I think the idea is about to develop into reality.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

8 . Fake news is “killing people’s minds,” Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple, has said. The technology entrepreneur said companies like Apple need to create tools that will help to stop the spread of lies, without limiting freedom of speech. Cook also said governments should lead information campaigns to stop fake news.     1     During these campaigns, supporters of each side used fake news to try to win the election.

“At the moment, unfortunately, some of the people that are winning are the people that try to get the most clicks, not tell the most truth,” said Cook. “It’s killing people’s minds.     2     We must try to do this without limiting freedom of speech and freedom of the press but we must also help the reader.”

    3     But many people believe Donald Trump’s campaign benefitted more from fake news reports. And the U. S. presidents’ team insisted that a huge crowd attended his inauguration(就职典礼), when the evidence showed only a small audience was there. Trump’s spokesman, Sean Spicer, insisted that the event attracted “the largest audience ever to watch an inauguration” and Trump said he believed the crowd went “all the way back to the Washington Monument.”

Images from the inauguration showed the crowd was quite small and did not get close to the Washington Monument. Senior aide Kellyanne Conwa later described the Trump administration’s lies as “alternative facts.” Hillary Clinton claimed that there was “no evidence” her emails were hacked but the FBI director, James Comey, said it was likely they were hacked.

A study by economists at Stanford University and New York University published two months after November’s U. S. presidential election found that just before the election, fake anti-Clinton stories were shared 30 million times on Facebook and pro-Clinton stories were shared eight million times. It said: The average American saw and remembered 0.92 pro-Trump fake news stories and 0.23 pro-Clinton fake news stories.     4    

A．All the technology companies need to create some tools that help to reduce the amount of fake news.

B．Just over half of those who remembered seeing fake news stories believed them.

C．Cook still demanded action to decrease the influence of fake news.

D．Fake news in politics was particularly common during recent election campaigns.

E．There were fake news reports on both sides of the recent U. S. election battle.

F．But the study showed that fake news reports on social media were not very powerful in changing the result of the election.

9 . Devotees of Stump-town Coffee, a high-end roastery with fewer than 10 total locations in four select cities, pride themselves on avoiding mainstream coffee chains. What they are probably unaware of, however, as they sip their mochas and cold brews, is that their favorite spot of individuality may soon be just another chain in the Phoenix airport. What they might suspect even less is that they will have a different shopping experience in the coffee shop.

Stump-town, the iconic small-scale brand, was recently acquired by Peet’s, a chain with a couple hundred locations. Peet’s has been in the news for taking over Intelligentsia, another well-loved and self-consciously indie coffee brand. Stump-town’s sale to Peet’s exemplifies an economic phenomenon not limited to the world of craft coffee. Stump-town joins the ranks of a number of popular brands that went from independent to corporate - then Italian San Pellegrino, now owned by the Swiss giant Nestle (along with its main competitor Perrier), the originally Quaker-owned chocolate-bar maker, Cad-bury, acquired by the U. S. corporation formerly known as Kraft, and The Body Shop, the cosmetics brand synonymous with ethical sourcing, bought by the French behemoth L’Oreal, to name a few.

Stump-town’s story is typical of an innovative young venture becoming a victim of its own success. Founded in 1999 by Duane Sorenson in his native Oregon, it turned into a national phenomenon and was at the forefront of the small-scale retailers that positioned coffee - making, and coffee-drinking, as a kind of art form. Stump-town’s business model rested on providing an intensely personal experience. Coffee-drinkers were treated with top-notch beans and unique brews crafted in Stump-town’s “coffee labs,” But these personal touches don’t fit well in the assembly lines of large-scale operations.

The arithmetic of the “bigger is better” paradigm(范例), or what economist call “economies of scale,” is simple enough. The larger the machine, the more lattes it can spew out. Most of all, scale translates into standardization: the conversion of an unpredictable creative process into a precise and highly economical algorithm(算法)of production. All of this means more profits.

But, based on studies of human behavior in places ranging from blood banks to daycare centers, academics now recognize that the calculus is more complex: People act more responsibly in the context of personal relationships that are meaningful to them than in strictly commercial deals, Loyal customers don’t mind going that extra mile to get the perfect cup of coffee.

Smaller institutions have much to offer - not just sentimentally, but also in terms of pure economics. The idea goes back to the 20^th century British economist E. F. Schumacher’s declaration that “Small is beautiful,” a notion fashionable again in the era of institutions “too big to fail.” Since the logic of scale is more attuned to quantity than quality, workers (whose wages are usually driven down), consumers (who enjoy lower prices, but usually get a worse product) and the landscape of the economy (which shows signs of marked decreases in diversity) all suffer from growth that is too rapid. Size is the traditional measurement of a company’s success, but when stability is pursued as passionately as profit, less may truly be more.

1. Which of the following statements about Stump-town Coffee is NOT true?

A．The brand of Stump-town used to highlight individuality.

B．The loyal consumers of Stump-town are aware of its intention for business expansion.

C．It was Stump-town’s own success that drew the attention of a large-scale corporation.

D．Stump-town’s acquisition case reflects a worldwide trend of independent brands going corporate.

2. What does “economies of scale” in the fourth paragraph mean?

A．It means bigger companies ensure a better relationship between the brand and its consumers.

B．It means economic returns increase with the rise of the cost.

C．It means standardized scale is the working model for big companies.

D．It means the precisely calculated process of mass production is the profitable model.

3. What can we infer from the last two paragraphs?

A．Blood banks offered valid proof for the idea “The bigger, the better.”

B．Loyalty of the customers is the central issue in the success of smaller businesses.

C．Smaller businesses make people feel emotional attachment, but they will ultimately fail because of their size.

D．Smaller companies stand a chance to succeed if they can ensure stability.

4. Which of the following is the bet title for the passage?

A．How Badly Hurting Are Those Acquisition Cases?

B．Should Every Business Scale Up?

C．How Long Will Uniformity Go in Globalization?

D．Will Stump-town Coffee Regain Its Identity?

10 . Directions: Fill in each blank with a proper word chosen from the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. content B. demands   C. guard     D. depressed   E. prioritized   F. fits G. failure   H. meant   I. competed     J. mere     K. independent

Happiness, as the Brazilian poet Vinicius de Moracs put it, is “like a feather flying in the air. It flies light, but not for very long.”

Humans are not designed to be happy or even     1    . Instead, we are designed primarily to survive and reproduce, like every other creature in the natural world. A state of contentment is discouraged by nature because it would lower your     2     against possible threats to your survival.

Evolution has     3     the development of a big frontal lobe(脑叶)in our brain (which gives us excellent executive and analytical abilities) over a natural ability to be happy. Different geographical locations and circuits in the brain are each associated with certain neurological(神经系统的)and intellectual functions, but happiness, being a(n)     4     idea with no neurological basis, cannot be found in the brain tissue.

In fact, experts in this field argue that nature’s     5     to eliminate depression in the evolutionary process is due precisely to the fact that depression as an adaption plays a useful role in times of difficulty, by helping the     6     individual get away from risky and hopeless situations in which he or she cannot win.

Our emotions are mixed and at times contradictory, like everything else in our lives. Research has shown that positive and negative emotions can coexist in the brain relatively     7     of each other. This models show that the right hemisphere processes negative emotions preferentially, whereas positive emotions are dealt with by the left-sided brain.

It’s worth remembering, then, that we are not designed to be consistently happy. Instead, we are designed to survive and reproduce. These are difficult tasks, so we are     8     to struggle, seek safety, fight off threats and avoid pain. The model of competing emotions offered by coexisting pleasure and pain     9     our reality much better than the unachievable bliss(极乐)that the happiness industry is trying to sell us. In fact, pretending that any degree of pain is abnormal will only develop feelings of inadequacy and frustration.

So, if you are unhappy at times, this is not a shortcoming that     10     urgent repair. Far from it. This fluctuation(波动)is, in fact, what makes you human.