① 活动的目的(experience hard working)、时间(last Sunday morning)和地点(in a community near the school);
② 活动内容(clean up the streets and parks; visit the elderly in the community);
③ 活动的感受。
注意：
① 词数100词左右;
② 可适当加入细节，使内容充实、行文连贯。
A Meaningful Social Practice
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________2 . In human behavioral science, bandwagon effect is a cognitive bias (认知偏见) where people assume that an idea or belief is true because many or most others believe in it or have adopted it. As many people already support the belief others also “join the bandwagon” and do not consider questioning the decision or if there is evidence supporting the same. Cognitive biases help people think and reason more quickly, but there is a high possibility of making mistakes.
For example, when talk shows in the west had hosts wearing suits, other people started following the same trend regardless of their working conditions and climate. In India, we have climates ranging from warm to extremely hot and moderately cold conditions. It never gets cold enough for an overcoat. Also, not all shooting locations have air conditioning facilities. Even though the “suit” is not the best fit for working and climatic conditions in India, people still wear it because it is recognized by many people as classy and suitable clothes for talk shows or outdoor media events.
One more fitting example for the bandwagon effect is a whole generation of teens all over the world going crazy over a “Korean” band because they were liked by many others. With all respect to the music they made and their popularity, teens were going crazy even though they didn’t understand a word of what was being listened to. Although the band was covering much needed and sensible subjects like bullying (霸凌), elitism (精英统治), and mental health, not all people following them got the true meaning of the songs. People got onto the “bandwagon” as they wanted to go along with the trend that was a hit throughout the world.
We can use various debiasing (消除偏见) techniques in order to avoid falling for the bandwagon effect. One is to consider alternative options that are not necessarily supported by the majority but may be a better choice. Give yourself some time to think and understand what is it that you really need which will allow you to make decisions in a less biased manner. It’s also important to remember that going with the crowd is not entirely bad. In many situations, it can be beneficial while making a decision, as long as you can do it in a way that allows you to make reasonable decisions.
1. What may people do if they fall for the bandwagon effect?| A．Trust every one around them. |
| B．Do as most people do. |
| C．Doubt people surrounding them. |
| D．Make reasonable choices. |
| A．All the hosts in talk shows wear suits. |
| B．Indian talk show hosts love suitable suits. |
| C．Following trend may make mistakes. |
| D．India weather is agreeable for outdoor media events. |
| A．They all love the members. |
| B．They all appreciated the lyrics. |
| C．Most of them follow the trend. |
| D．Most of them understand the songs. |
| A．Objective. | B．Favourable. | C．Critical. | D．Indifferent. |
3 . Want a relaxing but fun challenge at home?
Puzzles come in a huge range of sizes and difficulty levels. For beginners, a 100-piece puzzle is usually a good starting point.
For a real test, puzzles that have 1,000 pieces or more are a tough task and it’s best to complete them with friends or family if you can. Choosing a scene that interests you, such as a favourite film, sport or location, can help keep you interested and determined to work to the final piece. You can get fun educational puzzles, too.
Some of the best places to pick up puzzles are charity shops. They’re often on sale for less than £5. Once you have completed a puzzle, it’s nice to exchange it with a friend.
| A．So others can have a go. |
| B．You can’t beat a good puzzle. |
| C．Some companies make personalized puzzles. |
| D．However, a good start doesn’t always lead to a good result. |
| E．Most people like to start by getting the four edges of a puzzle laid out. |
| F．It can get you used to sorting out how the shapes, patterns and colors go together. |
| G．For example, you may try a map of the world or historical timelines. |
4 . With so many festivals taking place in the UK, it’s getting harder every year to decide which ones to go to—and more importantly, which ones you can actually afford.
Parklife — Heaton Park, ManchesterDates: 10th — 11th June
Headliners: The 1975, Skrillex and Aitch
Cost: From £149.50 (weekend ticket), from £84．50 (one-day ticket)
Manchester’s favourite music festival is, unsurprisingly, a favourite with the city’s large student population. The weekend usually features a top-drawer line-up with loads of acts. You can’t camp at Parklife, so you also have to factor in accommodation in Manchester.
Latitude — Henham Park, SouthwoldDates: 20th — 23rd July
Headliners: Pulp, Paolo Nutini and George Ezra
Cost: £286.45 (weekend ticket with standard camping), from £90.75 (one-day ticket)
Latitude is one of the pricier festivals out there, but the lineup normally justifies (证明……正确) the dollar. The festival will have big artists alongside its main headliners. It’s a great all-rounder festival, where you can get back to nature by camping and lake swimming before dancing to DJs until the early hours.
Wireless — Finsbury Park, LondonDates: 7th — 9th July
Headliners: Playboi Carti, Travis Scott and 50 Cent
Cost: From £248.39 (weekend ticket), from £88 (one-day ticket)
We’re still a bit upset with Wireless for cancelling the festival’s Birmingham stop, making it a London-only event. Wireless hosts the sounds of grime, hip-hop, rap and R&B in North London’s Finsbury Park. Wireless isn’t a camping festival, so you’ll have to factor in the price of London accommodation for this one.
Victorious — Southsea Seafront, PortsmouthDates: 25th — 27th August
Headliners: Jamiroquai, Kasabian and Ben Howard
Cost: £180 (weekend ticket with camping), £60 (one-day ticket)
Although it has an excellent line-up of big names, this is still a relatively little-known festival. Since there are so many big acts, it’s also a pretty cost-effective option too. Best of all, the Castle Stage is situated in front of the stunning Southsea Castle, making this one of the most picturesque festivals around.
1. What do Parklife and Wireless have in common?| A．They are for students. | B．They are in London. |
| C．They don’t offer campsites. | D．They are in July. |
| A．Heaton Park. | B．Henham Park. | C．Finsbury Park. | D．Southsea Seafront. |
| A．Parklife. | B．Latitude. | C．Wireless. | D．Victorious. |
5 . In recent years breakfast cereals (谷物) seem to have lost their appeal. Many contain things that
Now, the manufacturers are boasting a(n)
Cereal firms have tried many ways to cope with customer’s
Makers are also spending to help their main brands. Kellogg has put more fruit in its Special K Red Berries cereal. General Mills plans to
For now, cereal-makers can take
| A．anxious | B．regular | C．satisfied | D．potential |
| A．demand | B．standard | C．reputation | D．disrespect |
| A．continuity | B．distinction | C．turnaround | D．equivalent |
| A．compete | B．succeed | C．protest | D．refuse |
| A．shrinking | B．promoted | C．inexhaustible | D．intellectual |
| A．declined | B．regretted | C．diversified | D．patented |
| A．changed | B．embarrassed | C．acquired | D．replaced |
| A．doubted | B．fled | C．ignored | D．wandered |
| A．conceal | B．receive | C．remove | D．expect |
| A．distant | B．traditional | C．mysterious | D．profitable |
| A．boost | B．review | C．reject | D．describe |
| A．responsibility | B．comfort | C．charge | D．action |
| A．failed | B．risen | C．paused | D．mattered |
| A．Warm-hearted | B．Fun-loving | C．Would-be | D．Health-conscious |
| A．reliable | B．wealthy | C．famous | D．intelligent |
6 . To show empathy (共情) is to identify with another’s feelings. It is to emotionally put yourself in the place at another. The ability to empathize is directly dependent on your ability to feel your own feelings and identify them.
If you have never felt a certain feeling, it will be hard for you to understand how another person is feeling. If you have never put your hand in a flame, you will not know the pain of fire. If you have not experienced jealousy (妒嫉), you will not understand its power. Reading about a feeling and intellectually knowing about it is very different than actually experiencing it for yourself.
Among those with an equal level of emotional intelligence, the person who has actually experienced the widest range and variety of feelings — the great depths of depression and the heights of fulfillment, for example — is the one who is most able to empathize. On the other hand, when we say that someone “can’t relate to” other people, it is likely because they haven’t experienced, acknowledged or accepted many feelings of their own. Once you have felt discriminated (歧视) against, for example, it is much easier to relate with someone else who has been discriminated against. Our innate emotional intelligence gives us the ability to quickly recall those instances and form associations when we encounter discrimination again. We then can use the “reliving” of those emotions to guide our thinking and actions. This is one of the ways nature slowly evolves towards a higher level of survival.
For this process to work, the first step is that we must be able to experience our own emotions. This means we must be open to them and not distract ourselves from them or try to numb (使麻木) ourselves from our feelings through drugs, alcohol, etc.
Next, we need to become aware of what we are actually feeling—to acknowledge, identify, and accept our feelings. Only then can we empathize with others. That is one reason why it is important to work on your own emotional awareness and sensitivity — in other words, to be “in touch with” your feelings.
1. How does the author explain the feelings of empathy?| A．By giving examples. | B．By having classification. |
| C．By making comparison. | D．By providing data. |
| A．Low level of empathy leads to fewer varieties of feelings. |
| B．The deeper one’s feelings are, the more empathetic one is. |
| C．Empathy is a way we recently picked up for better survival. |
| D．Rich experiences of emotions may go with a high level of empathy. |
| A．To advise a sincere attitude to one’s experiences. |
| B．To suggest a right understanding of empathy. |
| C．To recommend sensing and recognizing one’s emotions. |
| D．To call for true acceptance of one’s identity. |
| A．How Empathy Unfolds | B．Be Open to Your Emotions |
| C．Why Is Empathy Important | D．Accept Your True Self |
7 . Some Ways to Improve Social Interaction
Greet someone
Nobody wants to feel unwelcome or unappreciated. If they do, they will feel like outcasts (被排斥者).
People have a natural curiosity as to what you are all about. The best way to communicate this is to engage in a simple conversation. Some people are naturally shy and tend to withdraw from such communication. If one person is not willing to start a conversation, another should take the initiative simply by asking the other, “How are you?” or “What do you think?”
Volunteer
Ask for advice
Too often people are too proud to ask for directions in our journey through life. But asking for advice from a co-worker accomplishes two things: first, you might get the answer you seek, and second, it says you trust the person and respect his/her opinion.
Be polite
Your manners and how to improve interaction with others say a lot about your character.
| A．Be curious |
| B．Engage in conversation |
| C．The objective is to make people feel at home |
| D．Basic manners mean you are socially well adjusted |
| E．It means you are sensitive and interested in the person |
| F．Many people prefer to sit back and watch as others perform the work |
| G．By confiding in an individual, the advisor becomes concerned with your best interests |
8 . Bill Bryson’s phenomenally popular books are a great success of amateur enthusiasm over scholarly expertise. In the highly reviewed Shakespeare (2007), he raced us through the playwright’s life and works in 222 pages; A Short History of Nearly Everything (2003) was his 624-page analysis of “everything that has happened from the Big Bang to the rise of civilisation” — and it remains the best-selling science book of the 21st century so far. Can he make it again with A Really Short Journey Through the Body, which promises us a “head to toe” tour in 138 pages?
In his books for adult readers, Bryson’s success has lain in an ability to turn vast, complex subjects into an easy and pleasant narrative, filled with tiny facts and odd stories. His latest book, which follows his adult title The Body (2020), is aimed at children as young as eight, for whom this proven writing style works well.
“No doubt about it, the human body is a truly remarkable thing,” Bryson writes, and it’s the remarkable facts that interest him the most. Did you know that you bl ink 14,000 times a day? Or that it takes seven billion billion billion atoms to make you? And that if you formed all your DNA into a single line, it would reach 10 billion miles across the solar system?
Fresh doctors might find some of the entries frustratingly brief. The tongue, for example, receives only a paragraph, while, a chapter, entitled ‘Poo and Farts’, is relatively detailed: “In your life, you’ll probably po o the weight of 5 cars but you’ll have eaten the weight of 60. So that’s not a terrible result.”
Biology books can be heavy weather, but Bryson’s skill, as ever, is to turn the story of the human body into a thoroughly digestible read.
1. What do Bryson’s latest book and The Body (2020) have in common?| A．They are easy to read. | B．They are both about physics. |
| C．They are intended for adults. | D．They are both best-selling books. |
| A．To analyze the structure of the book. | B．To illustrate the attraction of the book. |
| C．To show the scientific value of the book. | D．To display the main contents of the book. |
| A．Packed with facts. | B．Weather-related. |
| C．Hard to understand. | D．Popular and readable. |
| A．An introduction to a book. | B．An essay on biology. |
| C．A news report on science. | D．A biography of a writer. |
9 . Australia may be better known for its beaches and natural wonders — and, of course, kangaroo s and koalas. But it is also a country rich in art and culture. From historical to contemporary art, including both local and international artists, there is a lot to be seen in Australia. Here is a selection of three Australian art galleries and museums to visit.
Art Gallery of New South Wales
Located in Sydney, the Art Gallery of New South Wales is one of the largest art galleries in Australia. It was first founded as the New South Wales Academy of Art in 1872. Presenting nearly 40 exhibitions per year, the gallery holds a strong collection of Aboriginal (土著的), Asian, Australian, and Pacific art. European and contemporary art are also present, as well as photographic works.
Location: Sydney, New South Wales
Opening Hours: Daily, 10 a. m. — 5 p. m.(Wednesday s 10 a. m. — 9 p. m.)
Admission: Free entry (a few special exhibitions might require tickets)
Art Gallery of South Australia
The Art Gallery of South Australia holds one of the largest art collections in Australia: almost 47,000 works of art, including paintings, sculptures, photographs, ceramics (陶器), jewelry, and much more. The collection of Australian art is especially renowned, but European, Asian, and North American art are also represented. Located in Adelaide, the gallery welcomes around 512,000 visitors per year.
Location: Adelaide, South Australia
Opening Hours: Daily, 10 p. m. — 5 p. m.
Admission: Free entry(charges may apply for some exhibitions)
Heide Museum of Modern Art
The Heide Museum of Modern Art is a museum of modern and contemporary art located in Bulleen, Victoria. It was founded by the couple John and Sunday Reed, who collected a broad range of art themselves. The Heide consists of three exhibition buildings that hold a collection of over 3,500 works in all media. Besides that, a sculpture park and Heide’s heritage-listed gardens can also be visited. Admission fees are required to enter the museum but entrance to the gardens is free.
Location: Bulleen, Victoria
Opening Hours: Tuesday to Sunday, 10 a. m. — 5 p. m.
Admission: Adult-$20, free for children under 16 (other concessions can be found on the museum’s website)
1. What do Art Gallery of New South Wales and Art Gallery of South Australia have in common?| A．They were totally free to visit. |
| B．They were founded by private persons. |
| C．They are largest art galleries in Australia. |
| D．They have noted Australia and Asian art collections. |
| A．$ 20. | B．$ 60. | C．$ 40. | D．$ 32. |
| A．Writers. | B．Artists. | C．Archaeologists. | D．Photographers. |
10 . Third grade was the worst year ever. My parents split up that year, and my dad moved out. I know that every divorce is different, and I’m told that not all of them are as painful as ours was. Ours was cruel.
There were other difficult things happening, too. I was epileptic and had a brain tumor. So I had to leave he classroom sometimes, to go to the nurse’s office to take pills or to head to the hospital for blood work, an EEG, or a CAT scan. Not fun.
And I turned, as kids often do, to books. Books were doorways out of my cold house, to imagined ands, full of magical creatures and wishes-come-true. I read from sunup to sundown. I read at breakfast, and I read late into the night. I devoured books.
Originally, in that terrible year, I sought out books that distracted me from my pain. I loved Half Magic; The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe; Mary Poppins, books where regular kids encountered magic in the world around them. I was eager for something unexpected to happen and radically alter my world, so those books were many of my favorites. But they were not my only favorites.
The other books I loved were the books that made me cry. My brain is still full of so many perfect painful moments. Beth, dying in Little Women. I read Oscar Wilde stories in which all hearts were broken. The Nightingale, dead from love.
I’ve thought a lot about why these books mattered so much. And I think it was because I was very alone in my sadness. Lonely, I sought company, the best way I could. Books were company. And though Half Magic was one kind of company, a distracting, cheerful friend — that wasn’t enough.
So sometimes you need a friend who is also struggling, a friend who is sad in the very way that you are sad, and so makes you feel normal. For me, sad books were that friend. After a sad book, I slept easier.
1. What didn’t happen to the author in the third grade?| A．The author’s dad left him/her. | B．The author had to quit school. |
| C．The author had serious diseases. | D．The author’s parents got divorced. |
| A．Fantasy books. | B．Funny books. |
| C．Sad books. | D．Medical books. |
| A．Because the author didn’t want to read cheerful books. |
| B．Because reading these sad books could make him/her cry. |
| C．Because he/she liked the perfect painful moments in the books. |
| D．Because they made the author feel he/she was not alone in sadness. |
| A．To share with readers his/her experience of growing up. |
| B．To encourage readers to read more books in their spare time. |
| C．To call on readers to pay more attention, to those who are suffering. |
| D．To tell readers how he/she got through a tough time in his/her life by reading. |
