1 . My name is Alice. Early last year, I was troubled by an anxiety that crippled ( 削弱 ) my ability to do anything. I felt like a storm cloud hung over me. For almost a year I struggled on, constantly staring at this wall that faced me. My perfectionist tendencies were the main root of this: I wanted to be perfect at whatever I did, which obviously in life is not possible, but it consumed me.

One day, I attended a presentation by wildlife conservationist Grant Brown at my high school. His presentation not only awed and inspired me, but also helped emerge an inner desire to make a difference in the world. I joined a pre-presentation dinner with him and that smaller setting allowed me to slowly build up my courage to speak one-on-one with him—an idea that had seemed completely impossible. This first contact was where my story began.

A month later, Brown invited me to attend the World Youth Wildlife Conference. Looking back, I now see that this would be the first in a series of timely opportunities that my old self would have let pass, but that this new and more confident Alice enthusiastically seized. Shortly after I received his invitation, applications to join the Youth for Nature and the Youth for Planet groups were sent around through my high school. I decided to commit to completing the applications, and soon I was a part of a growing global team of young people working to protect nature. Each of these new steps continued to grow my confidence.

I am writing this just six months since my journey began and I’ve realised that my biggest obstacle ( 障碍 ) this whole time was myself. It was that voice in the back of my head telling me that one phrase that has stopped so many people from reaching their potential: I can’t. They say good things come to those who wait; I say: grab every opportunity with everything you have and be impatient. After all, nature does not require our patience, but our action.

1. What was the main cause for Alice’s anxiety?

A．Her inability to act her age.	B．Her habit of consumption.
C．Her desire to be perfect.	D．Her lack of inspiration.

2. How did Grant Brown’s presentation influence Alice?

A．She decided to do something for nature.	B．She tasted the sweetness of friendship.
C．She learned about the harm of desire.	D．She built up her courage to speak up.

3. The activities Alice joined in helped her to become more ________.

A．intelligent

B．confident

C．innovative

D．critical

4. What can we learn from this passage?

A．Practice makes perfect.	B．Patience is a cure of anxiety.
C．Action is worry’s worst enemy.	D．Everything comes to those who wait.

2 . Hundreds of scientists, writers and academics sounded a warning to humanity in an open letter published last December: Policymakers and the rest of us must engage openly with the risk of global collapse. Researchers in many areas have projected the widespread collapse as “a credible scenario(情景) this century”.

A survey of scientists found that extreme weather events, food insecurity, and freshwater shortages might create global collapse. Of course, if you are a non-human species, collapse is well underway.

The call for public engagement with the unthinkable is especially germane in this moment of still-uncontrolled pandemic and economic crises in the world's most technologically advanced nations. Not very long ago, it was also unthinkable that a virus would shut down nations and that safety nets would be proven so disastrously lacking in flexibility.

The international scholars’ warning letter doesn't say exactly what collapse will look like or when it might happen. Collapseology, the study of collapse, is more concerned with identifying trends and with them the dangers of everyday civilization. Among the signatories(签署者) of the warning was Bob Johnson, the originator of the “ecological footprint” concept, which measures the total amount of environmental input needed to maintain a given lifestyle. With the current footprint of humanity, “it seems that global collapse is certain to happen in some form, possibly within a decade, certainly within this century,” Johnson said in an email.

“Only if we discuss the consequences of our biophysical limits,” the December warning letter says, “can we have the hope to reduce their speed, severity and harm”. And yet messengers of the coming disturbance are likely to be ignored. We all want to hope things will turn out fine. As a poet wrote,

Man is a victim of dope(麻醉品)

In the incurable form of hope.

The hundreds of scholars who signed the letter are intent(执着) on quieting hope that ignores preparedness. “Let's look directly into the issue of collapse,” they say, “and deal with the terrible possibilities of what we see there to make the best of a troubling future.”

1. What does the underlined word “germane” in Paragraph 3 probably mean?

A．Scientific.	B．Credible.
C．Original.	D．Relevant.

2. As for the public awareness of global collapse, the author is________.

A．worried	B．puzzled
C．surprised	D．scared

3. What can we learn from this passage?

A．The signatories may change the biophysical limits.

B．The author agrees with the message of the poem.

C．The issue of collapse is being prioritized.

D．The global collapse is well underway.

3 . 阅读下列短文，根据短文内容填空．在未给提示词的空白处仅填写1个恰当的单词，在给出提示词的空白处用括号内所给词的正确形式填空。

There     1    (be) a dramatic rise in the number of extreme weather events over the past 20 years,    2    (cause) largely by rising global temperatures,according to a new report from the United Nations. From 2000 to 2019, there were 7,348 major natural disasters around the world,    3    (result) in USD 2,970 billion in economic loss．Much of this increase can be due to climate change. The findings show a critical need     4     (invest) in disaster prevention.

4 . 阅读下列短文，根据短文内容填空．在未给提示词的空白处仅填写1个恰当的单词，在给出提示词的空白处用括号内所给词的正确形式填空。

Why do we dream？Scientists aren't completely sure,and they have diverse    1     (idea)．Dreams might be a side effect of memory making.When you sleep,your brain sorts through everything     2     happened during the day，trying to link new experiences to old memories.As it     3     (connect) things，your brain turns them into a story,and you get a dream．

5 . 阅读下列短文，根据短文内容填空．在未给提示词的空白处仅填写1个恰当的单词，在给出提示词的空白处用括号内所给词的正确形式填空。

Sam is an in-real-life streamer（播主），and he live streams himself just going about his day．While riding his bike home     1     a cold night，he came across a sad-looking elderly woman wandering the streets by herself．The poor woman wasn't able to give him any information about     2     she lived．Sam walked her to a nearby convenience store so that she could     3    （safe） wait for the police to take her home．

6 . 阅读下面短文，根据题目要求用英文回答问题。

Tom, a 15-year-old inventor and entrepreneur (创业者), witnessed at his own school the widespread consumption of sugary drinks by kids. He knew there had to be a better portable drink solution and decided to innovate from something he saw in his own home: fruit infused (浸泡) water.

Tom watched his mum make healthy fruit infusions but then struggle for a take-along option. From observing his mum and from his desire to give kids better drink options, he came up with his original model for the Fun Bottle. “I wanted to come up with a healthy, natural way for people to drink when on the go. A big part of my mission is to get people of all ages off sugary drinks,” Tom explains.

The bottle is made with a strainer (滤网) that allows the great tastes and natural sugars of the various fruits and vegetables you choose to come through the water, without any of the seeds or skins flowing through.

Tom is proud of his design and excited to be selling the Fun Bottle on his website and in stores, but this 15-year-old is most proud of the opportunities that Fun Bottle presents to others. It helps to provide healthy alternatives to sugary drinks; and also Tom donates part of the profits to the Organisation for a Healthier Generation (OHG).

Tom has been awarded several prizes, but this teenage innovator remains humble. When asked what advice he’d give other entrepreneurial youth, he says, “Prepare and have your family’s support. It is important to know from the beginning that there are a lot of highs and lows, and there is no such thing as overnight success.”

1. What did Tom witness at his own school?
2. Where did Tom get the idea for the original model for the Fun Bottle?
3. Please decide which part is false in the following statement, then underline it and explain why.
Tom is most proud of the opportunities that Fun Bottle presents to others because he not only provides healthy alternatives to sugary drinks but also donates all the profits to the OHG.
4. Among Tom’s qualities, which one(s) do you think will be important for us? Why?(In about 40 words)

7 . What Makes Art Valuable?

Why do people buy art? An even bigger question is, why do people pay tens of millions of dollars to own art? Is it for status, prestige(威望), and approval from peers? One thing to remember is that value isn’t only linked to its artist quality.    1    

Provenance

In the art world, an artwork’s value can be the result of provenance. In other words, who has owned the painting in the past.    2    The masterpiece went from a value of less than $10,000 when David Rockefeller first owned it, to upwards of $72 million when it was later sold by Sotheby’s.

The Thrill of Auction(拍卖)

The salerooms at Christie’s or Sotheby’s are full of billionaires—or better yet, their advisors.    3    They know when to bump up a lot and when to slightly tip the scales. They’re running the show and it’s their job to make sure the highest bidder(出价者)has a shot and that values soar.

Historical Significance

Historical significance works in a couple of ways when it comes to determining the value of art. Firstly, you can consider the piece in terms of its importance to art history in its genre. For example, a painting by Claude Monet is worth more than other more recent impressionist work since Monet changed the standard of art history and impressionism as a whole.    4    After all, art is often a reflection of the culture of its time and as it became a product, art was affected by political and historical changes.

    5    Whether in a perfect storm of passion and desire or a calculated risk of business deals and rewards, art collectors continue to spend millions upon millions each year at art auctions. What makes art valuable beyond the cost of supplies and labor? We may never truly understand.

A．World history also affects the value of art.

B．It’s interesting to explore what makes art valuable.

C．It seems as though all of these factors combine to determine the value of art.

D．Auctioneers are skilled salesmen who help raise those prices up and up and up.

E．It’s obvious that changes in polities have a historical effect on the value of art to different people.

F．For instance, art describing beautiful women tends to be sold for higher prices than that of beautiful men.

G．For example, Mark Rothko’s White Center was owned by the Rockefeller family, one of America’s most powerful dynasties.

8 . Physicist and Nobel Prize winner Richard Feynman developed a clever learning method known as the Feynman Technique. It involves explaining what you're learning to others. By teaching what you’ve learned from memory, you engage in active recall.     1     It also ensures that you understand the topic, because you can only explain an idea if you truly understand it. The technique consists of four repeatable steps.

To begin, choose a concept or topic you wish to fully understand.     2     The more interested you are, the faster you’ll grasp it. Moreover, a personally interesting topic will keep you motivated and engaged.

    3     Write notes and explain it in a way that makes sense to a five-year-old. If you’d rather avoid actually teaching someone, you can just teach it to an imaginary audience. But it works much better if you use a real person. They’ll be able to let you know when something isn’t clear.

While teaching you may discover gaps in your understanding.     4     Review your notes, reread books, or seek external help to ensure you have a complete understanding of the context before moving forward.

Now that you fully grasp the concept, test your understanding by trying to teach it to another person. This will help you identify any remaining areas of uncertainty you need to revisit.

The Feynman Technique is a great way for kids and grown-ups to learn.     5     You need to actively think about the problem instead of passively reading or listening to someone else. However, with great efforts in mastering this method, you’ll see your learning results improve quicker than ever before.

A．It is mentally demanding.

B．This helps the information stick in your mind better.

C．Teach it to a five-year-old, who would give you direct feedback.

D．Your curiosity about it will determine the pace of your learning.

E．Once you have chosen a topic, you can teach it to someone else.

F．Active engagement plays a key role in promoting deeper learning.

G．When this happens, refer back to the original material for the missing pieces.

9 . At a museum in Vietnam, Lena Bui’s film Where Birds Dance Their Last reflected on the beauty and vulnerability of Vietnamese feather farms after Bird Flu. During a festival in Rwanda, Ellen Reid’s audio experience Soundwalk was shared in a hopeful discussion about music, parks and mental health. These are a few of the things I have helped bring to life over the years, working at the intersection of scientific research, the arts and advocacy to support science in solving global health challenges.

Science is key to addressing these issues. But it isn’t the only key. To achieve its potential and for its advances to be implemented and reach all who could benefit, science depends on trust and good relationships. People might not always see science as relevant, trustworthy or meaningful to their lives. There are reasons why some see science as having a chequered past, from nuclear weapons to eugenics, and are therefore uninterested in, or suspicious of, what it proposes. Others feel excluded by the incomprehensibility of hyper specialist knowledge.

In its capacity to build upon and test an evidence base, science is powerful, but researchers and funders haven’t been as good at ensuring this evidence base responds to the needs and interests of diverse communities, or informs policy makers to take action. Science might be perceived as distancing itself from the personal, the poetic and the political, yet it is precisely these qualities that can be most influential when it comes to public interest in atopic or how a government prioritizes a decision.

A moving story well told can be more memorable than a list of facts. This is where the arts come in. Artists can give us different perspectives with which to consider and reimagine the world together. They can redress the proclaimed objectivity in science by bringing stories —subjectivities —into the picture, and these can help foster a sense of connection and hope.

In 2012, I set up artist residencies in medical research centres around the world. Bui was attached to the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit in Vietnam. The head of the research team was delighted, finding that Bui, as a Vietnamese artist, had license to be in, and to share useful insights from, villages where infectious disease researchers weren’t welcome. Six years later, I led Wellcome’s Contagious Cities program, which established artist residencies worldwide to support locally led explorations of epidemic preparedness. The recent pandemic made this work more noticeable, and has informed our Mindscapes program which is currently sharing experiences of mental health through the work of artists.

With pandemic, climate and mental health crises upon us, rising inequality and what feels like an increasingly broken world, never has there been more need to build and nurture hopeful and imaginative spaces to grow human connection and shared purpose for the common good. Science and the arts can work hand in glove to achieve this.

1. The author lists two works in Paragraph 1 mainly to ______.

A．reveal the gap between science and art	B．prove his competence in both science and art
C．introduce successful science-related artworks	D．show that science can be promoted in art forms

2. What does the underlined word “chequered” in Paragraph 2 probably mean?

A．Recent and remote.	B．Good and bad.
C．Usual and unusual.	D．Peaceful and scary.

3. Which of the following would the author agree?

A．Policy-makers base their decisions on science.	B．Researchers popularize science effectively.
C．Science is well received among the public.	D．The arts help people build connections.

4. Which of the following would be the best title for the passage?

A．The Value of the Arts to Science	B．Where Do Science and the Arts Meet?
C．A New Way to Fight Pandemic—the Arts	D．Which Matters More, Science or the Arts?

10 . The environmental practices of big businesses are shaped by a fundamental fact that offends our sense of justice. A business may maximize the amount of money it makes by damaging the environment and hurting people. When government regulation is effective, and the public is environmentally aware, environmentally clean big businesses may out-compete dirty ones, but the reverse is likely to be true if government regulation is ineffective and the public doesn’t care.

It is easy to blame a business for helping itself by hurting other people. But blaming alone is unlikely to produce change. It ignores the fact that businesses are not charities but profit-making companies, and they are under obligation to maximize profits for shareholders by legal means.

Our blaming of businesses also ignores the ultimate responsibility of the public for creating the conditions that let a business profit through destructive environmental policies. In the long run, it is the public, either directly or through its politicians, that has the power to make such destructive policies unprofitable and illegal, and to make sustainable environmental policies profitable.

The public can do that by accusing businesses of harming them. The public may also make their opinion felt by choosing to buy sustainably harvested products; by preferring their governments to award valuable contracts to businesses with a good environmental track record; and by pressing their governments to pass and enforce laws and regulations requiring good environmental practices.

In turn, big businesses can exert powerful pressure on any suppliers that might ignore public or government pressure. For instance, after the US public became concerned about the spread of a disease, transmitted to humans through infected meat, the US government introduced rules demanding that the meat industry abandon practices associated with the risk of the disease spreading. But the meat packers refused to follow these, claiming that they would be too expensive to obey. However, when a fast-food company made the same demands after customer purchases of its hamburgers dropped, the meat industry followed immediately. The public’s task is therefore to identify which links in the supply chain are sensitive to public pressure.

Some readers may be disappointed or outraged that I place the ultimate responsibility for business practices harming the public on the public itself. I also believe that the public must accept the necessity for higher prices for products to cover the added costs of sound environmental practices. My views may seem to ignore the belief that businesses should act in accordance with moral principles even if this leads to a reduction in their profits. But I think we have to recognize that, throughout human history, government regulation has arisen precisely because it was found that not only did moral principles need to be made explicit, they also needed to be enforced.

My conclusion is not a moralistic one about who is right or wrong, admirable or selfish. I believe that changes in public attitudes are essential for changes in businesses’ environmental practices.

1. The main idea of Paragraph 3 is that environmental damage__________.

A．is the result of ignorance of the public

B．requires political action if it is to be stopped

C．can be prevented by the action of ordinary people

D．can only be stopped by educating business leaders

2. In Paragraph 4, the writer describes ways in which the public can__________.

A．reduce their own individual impact on the environment

B．learn more about the impact of business on the environment

C．raise awareness of the effects of specific environmental disasters

D．influence the environmental policies of businesses and governments

3. What pressure was given by big business in the case of the disease mentioned in Paragraph 5?

A．Meat packers stopped supplying hamburgers to fast-food chains.

B．Meat packers persuaded the government to reduce their expenses.

C．A fast-food company forced their meat suppliers to follow the law.

D．A fast-food company encouraged the government to introduce regulations.

4. What would be the best heading for this passage?

A．Will the world survive the threat caused by big businesses?

B．How can big businesses be encouraged to be less driven by profit?

C．What environmental dangers are caused by the greed of businesses?

D．Are big businesses to blame for the damage they cause to the environment?