假设你是明启中学高三学生赵磊,你的外国朋友William一直对中国文化很感兴趣。近日,他在网上了解到有两个相关的线上节目(节目信息如下表所示),但他对节目选择有些茫然,想听听你的建议。请给William回复一封邮件,邮件内容须包括:
(1)推荐其中一个节目;
(2)通过比较两个节目的信息,说明你推荐该节目的理由。
节目名称 | 故宫里的国宝 Treasures of the Forbidden City | 寻访中国美食 Exploring Chinese Cuisine |
节目内容 | 介绍故宫里的国宝及其背后的故事 | 介绍中国传统美食及其烹饪方式 |
节目形式 | 纪录片 | 短视频 |
节目语言 | 英语解说 无字幕 (subtitles) | 中文解说 英语字幕 |
Why Ear-worms Get Stuck in Your Head
We all get a sensation when a song, for no apparent reason, refuses to leave your head — in fact we’re no strangers to the dreaded “ear-worm.” But a new study published in Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity and the Arts reveals a fascinating insight into ear-worms, and why some songs are better than others in sticking in our heads by investigating the actual elements of the song that make it catchy in the first place.
To do this, most frequent ear-worms of the participants were entered into a database and compared to songs that had never been reported as an ear-worm at all. The melodic features of the tunes were then analyzed, revealing that ear-worm tunes were typically those songs that have overall melodic shapes common in Western pop music. A classic example of a common contour (音调的升降曲线) pattern is heard in Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, where the first phrase rises in pitch and the second falls. This makes the tune easy to remember and has been exploited in many other nursery rhymes, but also in pop music.
In addition to the melodic shape, the other ingredient to the ear-worm formula is the unusual interval structure. The aim of this is to surpass the listener’s expectations of an average pop song, showing unexpected leaps or more repeated notes than usual. “Our findings show that you can, to some extent, predict which songs are going to get stuck in people’s heads based on the song’s melodic content,” says one of the researchers, “This could help song-writers or advertisers write a jingle (短歌) everyone will remember for days or months afterwards.”
The authors conclude that studies of ear-worms can help explain how the brain works, and improve our understanding in how perception, emotions, memory and spontaneous thoughts behave in different people.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________9 . Your Life Is Better Than You Think
The undeniable popularity of self-help books, wellness podcasts, and happiness workshops reflects the constant human desire to make life better.
While we may have a loving family, a good place to live, and a decent job, we often fail to notice those things. It’s not because we are ungrateful or stupid, but it’s because of a basic feature of our brain, known as habituation.
Habituation is the tendency of neurons to fire less and less in response to things that are constant. You enter a room filled with roses and after a short while, you cannot detect their scent any longer; and just as you get used to the smell of fresh flowers, you also get used to a loving relationship, to a promotion, to a nice home, to a wonderful work of art. Like the front page of a daily newspaper, your brain cares about what recently changed, not about what remained the same.
The key is taking small breaks from your daily life. For example, when people return home from a long business trip, they often find their old life has “reshined.” Ordinary things suddenly seem amazing. If something is constant, we often assume (perhaps unconsciously) that it is there to stay, and as a result, we focus our attention and effort on the next thing on our list.
A.And so, what once took your breath away becomes part of life’s furniture. |
B.But could it be that many of our lives are already better than we recognize? |
C.Habituation to the good drives you to move forward and progress. |
D.But if we can make the constant less so, our attention will naturally turn back to it. |
E.Rather than focus on how to see our life better, we need to learn to better our life. |
F.The good news is that you can dishabituate. |
Typical desert activities like sandboarding, dune bashing and quad biking
With this tour, you’ll have half a day of adventure activities in the desert.
You’ll start your tour by driving to a scenic spot on the top of a tall sand dune (沙丘) for a chance to take photos of the area. On top of a sand dune, you’ll have the chance to slide down the side by sandboarding. From here, you’ll get ready for hitting some dunes in a four-wheel drive vehicle. Next, you’ll hop on a quad bike and have time to drive around the desert in the open air. Finally, you’ll have a camel ride around a small part of the desert.
What’s included
Pickup and drop-off
20 minutes of sandboarding
35 minutes of dune bashing
25 minutes of quad biking
10-minute camel ride
Water and soft drinks
A drive through a camel farm
Additional information
Requires a high level of physical fitness.
Not suitable for children between 0 and 5.
Children under 18 must be accompanied by an adult.
Tours starting after noon include a BBQ dinner with sweets and fruits, which costs an additional US$ 45/person only.
1. What kind of experiences can participants expect from this trip?A.Taking a sand bathing on the top of a sand dune. |
B.Exploring the expansive desert freely on a camel ride. |
C.An exciting day adventure filled with diverse activities. |
D.Capturing the breathtaking desert landscape with a camera. |
A.US$ 180. | B.US$ 220. | C.US$ 265. | D.US$ 400. |
A.The show was great! I highly recommend! |
B.It was a lot of fun and I enjoyed every minute of it. |
C.The place is cool, easy to find and get to with metro. |
D.Arrive early for tickets to avoid a long queue. |