1 . In recent years, Britain has seen a rise in interest in learning and teaching Chinese as a second language. In 2015, Britain’s Department for Education devoted 10 million pounds to Chinese teaching in state schools across the country. Hundreds of pupils are taking part in the program, which aims to make at least 5, 000 young people fluent in Chinese by 2022.
A Chinese-English nursery named Hatching Dragons was established in London in 2015, accepting babies from as young as 6 months to 5 years old. Two years later, the first bilingual (双语的) English and Chinese primary school was opened at Kensington, London.
Petts Wood Mandarin-English Preschool, which opened Friday at Bromley in southeastern suburb of London, is the first Chinese immersion (沉浸式) preschool founded in Britain. After three years of planning and preparation, the school has drawn expert opinions on Chinese immersion learning from Europe, the US and China. It offers Chinese and English bilingual immersive education for children aged 2 to 5.
Bromley Councillor Kim Botting, who has visited China three times, is very interested in Britain-China education exchanges. He called the school a wonderful and fantastic thing for the community while attending the opening ceremony on Friday.
The local community showed huge interest and support to the newly established preschool. Xu Zhi, head teacher of Petts Wood, said the preschool offered up to 25 places and six children registered (before the opening, with many families signed up for trial lessons in the next few weeks.
“I had the idea of establishing a bilingual preschool three years ago when I realized that more and more British families wanted an earlier start for their children’s Chinese learning,” Xu said. “Many high school students in Britain also learn Chinese at school for two or three hours each week, but that is not enough and also a bit late for language learning.”
1. What do we know about Petts Wood Mandarin-English Preschool?| A．It opens to all children aged 2 to 6 in the community. |
| B．It requires all students to register before the opening. |
| C．It is the first Chinese immersion preschool in Britain. |
| D．It employs teachers from Europe, the US and Japan. |
| A．Positive. | B．Doubtful. | C．Unconcerned. | D．Unclear. |
| A．To show the difficulty of learning Chinese. | B．To stress the importance of bilingual learning. |
| C．To praise high school students for their efforts. | D．To explain the necessity of a bilingual preschool. |
| A．A short story. | B．A book review. | C．A news report. | D．A research article. |
2 . Be it sugar or social media, the response in our brain is the same: It produces a “feel-good” chemical called dopamine. It first brings about pleasure, but it doesn’t last very long. It is then followed by pain so that we have to search for the pleasurable things again.
“This cycle of pleasure and pain made sense in the time of early humans when we had to constantly search for our basic needs-food, water, shelter,” says Dr. Anna Lembke, a Stanford Medical School researcher. “But our brains weren’t adjusted to put out the ‘fire of dopamine’ caused by pleasurable things that are so easily available in modern life.”
In addition, when we’re repeatedly exposed to pleasure-producing things, we’re not able to take joy in the same rewards. Instead, we need stronger and stronger stimulus (刺激) just to feel good. Otherwise, the cycle will lead us to anxiety, depression and many other problems.
“This is a universal problem—not one limited to those struggling with the disease of addiction. If we want to stay mentally healthy, we must rethink how to break the cycle in a dopamine-overloaded world,” says Lembke.
Her suggestions for the addicts?
Take a 30-day break from anything that we rely on for pleasure. This doesn’t mean going cold turkey forever. But this first month is key to breaking the pleasure-pain cycle and it’s a lot easier to cut out an addictive behavior entirely at first. Then re-introduce the pleasurable things little by little, like just a few bites of ice cream at a time or just one hour online a night.
Another strategy is to create physical distance between us and our addiction. That could mean just removing the addictive thing from our personal space. For someone who’s addicted to video games, that could mean a separate laptop for work and one for play.
“In a time of abundance, we have to strike a pleasure-pain balance, which means intentionally avoiding pleasure and seeking the kind of purposeful pain that keeps us healthy, such as exercise,” Lembke says. “By doing so, we will reset reward pathways and eventually be a lot happier. It’s not easy, but it’s well worth doing in the long term.”
1. What can we learn about dopamine from the text?| A．It has always been harmful to humans. |
| B．It gives us less joy for the same rewards. |
| C．It can be caused by anything available. |
| D．It can lead to a lasting good feeling. |
| A．Abandoning. | B．Waiting. | C．Cooking. | D．Repeating. |
| A．Avoid pleasure in life. |
| B．Set a strict limit on pleasurable things. |
| C．Change reward pathways. |
| D．Expose ourselves to repeated rewards. |
| A．Ways to Live With Dopamine in Peace |
| B．Tips on Getting Rid of Social Media Addiction |
| C．Strategies for Making Most of the Modern Life |
| D．The Need to Strike a Pleasure-pain Balance |
3 . After limiting the screen time, the minors in China are prohibited against getting tattooed (文身) now.
According to the guideline, which came out on June 6th, 2022, any enterprise, organization and individuals should be stopped from providing inking services. The guideline also prohibits “encouraging or forcing” children into getting tattoos, while encouraging parents to advise their children against getting tattooed.
“All agencies that provide tattooing services should clearly display signs refusing minors, and ask customers to show their IDs if it’s hard to judge their age based on their appearance,” the guideline said.
Tattoo culture has gained popularity especially among the country’s youth in recent years. They regard it as a form of fashion and self expression. However, tattoos haven’t been widely accepted in the society and they might have a bad influence on people in some situations.
Amanla, a tattoo artist in the southwestern Yunnan Province, said he agreed with the ban. He said, “Protection is necessary. But more deeply, it’s also disrespectful for people to do something merely to be cool without knowing what they really want or understanding the pattern being drawn on their body.”
In recent years, several regions have issued local regulations banning tattoo services for children. In June of last year, a court in the eastern Jiangsu Province ordered a tattoo shop to stop tattooing minors after being accused of using ink containing harmful pigments (色素).
Yuan Ningning, a legal advisor specializing in family education law, said that the working guideline has cleared up the responsibilities between different regulators and called for more education and specific punishments.
“The central government has already formed a consensus (共识),” Yuan said. “But it takes a learning process among the local authorities for the guideline to be effective. That’s the first and a very crucial step.”
1. What should the tattoo shops do according to the regulation?| A．Refuse to serve the minors. | B．Offer quality service for teenagers. |
| C．Ask the minors’ parents for advice. | D．Keep the minors safe while tattooing. |
| A．Tattooing has a long history in China. |
| B．The society has been influenced by tattooing. |
| C．Young people are more interested in tattooing. |
| D．Tattooing helps people do their work better. |
| A．Tattoos are not for everyone. |
| B．Tattooing for minors must be punished. |
| C．We should learn about tattoos before getting one. |
| D．It is not easy for the regulation to be put into practice. |
| A．Those who break the rules will be punished. |
| B．It has got wide recognition among the public. |
| C．Educators play a key role in carrying out the rules. |
| D．It is a long way for the guideline to make a difference. |
4 . September is upon us, which means one thing for parents and children alike: new term time. With our teachers, students, support staff and many other members of the education ecosystem returning to their own schools, many will be excited to engage in person, after months of remote learning. Unfortunately, this won’t apply to everyone.
Throughout the summer, No Isolation worked with independent researcher, Henry Peck, to better understand the effect of lockdown on educational and emotional development in school-aged children. We collected responses from 1,005 parents and carers of 1,477 children from primary and secondary school and were sad to find that more than 75% of these children were lonely some or all of the time during the lockdown.
We were alarmed to find that, according to our research, about 540,000 people will continue to stay at home, due to mental or physical health concerns in the USA, directly related to the COVID-19 pandemic. For those children that aren’t able to attend classes in person, keeping some form of connection with their peers is greatly significant. Video calls have been one of the options to protect their educational development and to prevent them from becoming isolated.
They are normal during the pandemic, but are not necessarily the answer for those studying from home. When everyone is online in a video call, it can be an acceptable experience. However, if everyone is gathered and a single student is watching through a video call, it can have the opposite effect. Therefore, having an engaging experience over a video conference can be very difficult for some children, making it easy to switch off.
If you’re worried about how your child might be reacting, or concerned that a more digital life could be leaving them isolated, the first thing to do is talk with them: meaningful solutions should be developed in partnership with the people they’re aimed at. Now, we should be listening to children and helping to make sure they are heard in these stormy times.
1. What can we learn from the first paragraph?| A．Learning alone is significant. |
| B．All students will return to school life. |
| C．No student needs remote learning. |
| D．Some students will remain at home. |
| A．By investigating. | B．By telephoning. |
| C．By e-mailing. | D．By interviewing. |
| A．Everyone is online in a video call. |
| B．Everyone is gathered except one still online . |
| C．Students are busy with a video conference. |
| D．Students have the video switched off. |
| A．Make school children’s voice heard. |
| B．Help school children with Covid loneliness. |
| C．Support school children’s video conference. |
| D．Connect school children through video calls. |
5 . We live in an age when all scientific knowledge — from the safety of vaccines (疫苗) to the reality of climate change — faces organized and often angry opposition. Doubters have declared war on the consensus (共识) of experts. It seems that people have turned argumentative overnight.
In a sense, all this is not surprising. Our lives are affected by science and technology as never before. The world seems full of real and imaginary dangers. Though scientists agree that the Ebola virus is spread only by direct contact with blood or body fluids (液体), if you type “airborne Ebola” into an Internet search engine, you’ll find that some people believe that this virus has almost supernatural powers.
In this often confusing world, we need to rely on science to decide whether what we choose to believe has a basis in the laws of nature or not. But science doesn’t come naturally to most of us. Science has often led us to truths that are really mind-blowing. For example, although the roundness of the Earth has been known for thousands of years, some still feel it hard to accept.
Even when people become scientifically educated, most of them still try to make sense of the world by relying on personal experience, stories or emotions rather than statistics. When they hear a number of cancer cases in a town with a dangerous waste dump (垃圾场), they believe pollution caused the cancers. Yet two things happening together doesn’t mean one caused the other. Even when they turn to the Internet, they let in only the information they agree with to strengthen beliefs that have already been shaped by their worldview.
How can scientists convince doubters? Throwing more facts at people may not be enough. More efforts are supposed to be made.
1. What’s the text mainly about?| A．How people view the world. | B．What challenges science faces. |
| C．Whether science is worth respect. | D．Why people show disbelief in science. |
| A．Unbelievable. | B．Desirable. | C．Dangerous. | D．Obvious. |
| A．They apply logical thinking. |
| B．They stick to their own beliefs. |
| C．They form the views on assumptions. |
| D．They rely on the information on the Internet. |
| A．Through comparison. | B．Through quotation. |
| C．By giving examples. | D．By making definitions. |
6 . Chatting in her bright two bedroom flat, Shirley Meredeen, aged 91, doesn’t hesitate in describing the benefits of living here. “It keeps my brain going. We are all very active because there is so much to do...We’re really lucky to have such a supportive community.”
In 1998, Meredeen first heard of the concept of cohousing as developed in the Netherlands and decided to copy its model in the UK and create the Older Women Cohousing (OWCH) with her friends. But they didn’t imagine that it would be an 18-year struggle. The novelty of the idea coupled with the lack of data to prove the social and economic benefits made it difficult for them to access public money. Councils always compared their idea to sheltered accommodation and saw it as a burden for their already overstretched budgets.
In fact, the community-led housing is a departure from the conventional understanding of later life. Now, the community comprises 25 flats as well as a shared kitchen, meeting room, laundry, garden, car park and a guest room. People live together based on interdependence. They can take control of their future instead of relying on their families or care homes. All the neighbours look out for each other, not after each other, which means accompanying to medical appointments, doing the local shopping, having family contacts in preparation for an emergency... But the limits of such informal care among residents still need to be worked out.
OWCH has paved the way to alternative living arrangements in later life and the support for community-led housing is starting to emerge in the form of guidance and funding, according to UK Cohousing Network.
1. What do we know about Meredeen?| A．She first tried cohousing in the Netherlands. |
| B．She is a regular visitor to OWCH. |
| C．She is a pioneer in elderly care service. |
| D．She founded OWCH single-handed. |
| A．It didn’t benefit social economy. | B．It didn’t keep up with the time. |
| C．It called for careful budgeting. | D．It was hard to get public funding. |
| A．They are more independent. | B．They are responsible for each other. |
| C．They receive more care services. | D．They can rely on their relatives. |
| A．To describe an ambitious figure. | B．To introduce a new lifestyle of seniors. |
| C．To ensure elderly people’s welfare. | D．To inspire the aged to achieve their dreams. |
7 . Mukbangs—eating shows—are becoming increasingly popular, in which people eat huge amounts of food throughout their shows. Some people believe that the point of mukbang is to get paid, which isn’t wrong, but it’s not the main point. The key point of mukbang is that people love watching other people enjoy their food, which is why mukbang has become so popular.
If you are creating mukbang videos, it can be very inviting to just keep eating and eating,which can result in weight gain. Mukbangers do gain weight, but only if they eat all the time.Many mukbangers are not big eaters, so they don’t have trouble losing weight, But if you are someone who likes to eat, then you might find that you shouldn’t create mukbang videos.
If you find yourself gaining weight every time you create a mukbang video, you should consider eating one meal a day and reduce or avoid eating more than one meal a day. It might be very hard to switch from three meals a day to only one big meal a day,but the results might be worth it, If you are a mukbang lover and don’t want to quit eating all those delicious, fatty foods, we recommend you start working out and make sure to eat healthy.
Some other mukbangers never gain weight because they can control their eating. So it would be hard for them to gain weight.Make sure to track your calorie intake(卡路里摄入量),which is related to overweight.
There are many people who like watching mukbang videos. Many of them do this all the time because it’s so satisfying to watch other people enjoy food. If you’re watching food videos while dieting, there’s not much to worry about as long as you don’t overeat from your own plate.Personally,watching mukbang videos won’t break your fast(禁食期).So you can watch as many videos as you like.
1. What is the main point of mukbang?| A．To earn money. | B．To enjoy food. |
| C．To teach cooking. | D．To please the viewers. |
| A．Do exercise. | B．Eat less healthy food. |
| C．Have no meals per day. | D．Have weight-loss medicine. |
| A．Body weight. | B．Diet plan. |
| C．Life style. | D．Food choice. |
| A．Uncertain. | B．Supportive. |
| C．Negative. | D．Uninterested. |
8 . Wayne Boone knew he should be dead. His cab(驾驶室)had crashed into the guardrail on the far right edge, destroying the metal barrier that protected his truck from dropping into the water below, almost flying through the air. It all happened so fast. How was he still alive? Somehow, the back of his cab had got stuck on the bridge’s edge before it could complete its falling. His empty trailer(拖车), meanwhile, leaned to the left, sliding sideways at a 90-degree angle to the cab.
Whatever the force was that held the cab on the edge, Boone knew it couldn’t last. He was injured, but his body had yet to fully noticed the pain. He forced himself to focus. If he had any chance of escaping the cab and surviving, he had to get free from his seat belt. The cracked windshield(挡风玻璃)beneath him exposed the dark waters below. If he put any weight on the glass, he risked bursting through and falling the rest of the way. Under the howl of the wind, he heard voices from above. “It’s about to go!”
Got to get free. Releasing his seat belt, Boone tried to hold on to the seat, but he immediately slid into the windshield. The glass shifted in its frame. He climbed upward, aware that he was getting cut along the way. He slipped again. And again. Each time his feet met the windshield, the glass gave a little more. The next time could be the last. Gathering all his strength, he pulled himself between the seats and threw himself back as far as he could behind the driver’s seat.
Minutes passed—to Boone, it felt like hours—before he heard the approaching whistle. To his ears, the harsh sound could have been angels singing. Hearing people shout with joy when they saw a firefighter deliver him to safety, Boone felt his heart full of gratitude. He was rushed to the hospital.
1. Where did the accident happened?| A．In the street. | B．In the river. | C．On the bridge. | D．In the hospital. |
| A．The trailer was flying through the air. |
| B．Boone was badly injured during the crash. |
| C．A certain force could stop the cab falling finally. |
| D．Boone released his seat belt to jump into the river. |
| A．To say hello to the people above. |
| B．To stop the cab falling into the river. |
| C．To avoid falling through the windshield. |
| D．To protect the windshield from being broken. |
| A．Disappointed. | B．Scared. | C．Worried. | D．Hopeful. |
9 . Liao Wentao, a pet undertaker, put the body of 2-year-old Garfield on a small bed surrounded by flowers. Then he let the cat’s owner say a last goodbye before cremation (火化). “We send off 400 to 500 pets each year, and there’s a great demand for pet funerals,” he told China News.
Keeping pets has become a trend for young people in China and people are more than willing to pay for whatever their pets need. From 2019 to 2021, China’s pet market grew by almost 18% and hit 348.8billion yuan in value in 2021, according to a report by Research Consulting Group.
As the pet economy develops, animal lovers’ various needs have boosted the emergence and development of related businesses such as bathing, pet food, pet beauty and healthcare.
In addition to basic services, pet owners are increasingly paying for many new services, such as training, pet funerals, insurance, photography and entertainment. The growing pet market has also given birth to a large number of new pet-related jobs, noted CCTV News.
Liu Wei, 33, is a famous pet detective in Shanghai. He and his team work on finding families’ lost pets. “We have successfully helped find more than 1,000 pets. Besides cats and dogs, there are other pets like birds, lizards and hamsters,” Liu said. “In many big cities, cats and dogs have become an important part of many families and are taken good care of. So what we look for are not just pets, but family members.”
Apart from pet undertakers and detectives, some people work as pet food testers, pet sitters and pet trainers. According to Tu Di, secretary—general of the Hunan Pet Industry Association, the booming pet market shows people’s improved living standards.
However, there are also problems with the industry, for example, the high fees of taking pets to the vet (兽医). Many pet owners have called for stricter pricing regulations for pet medical services, reported Global Times.
1. Why is Liao’s story mentioned in the first paragraph?| A．To introduce the topic. | B．To teach readers a lesson. |
| C．To sum up the main idea. | D．To involve readers in a story. |
| A．By introducing an argument. | B．By telling some true stories. |
| C．By giving numbers and examples. | D．By focusing on basic pet—related services. |
| A．Negative. | B．Positive. | C．Doubtful. | D．Indifferent. |
| A．The low quality of services. | B．The rapid growth of the industry. |
| C．The lack of related regulations. | D．The various needs of animal lovers. |
10 . As temperatures rise to record levels and wildfires happen around the world, the need to meet net zero targets has never been more urgent. At the same time, increasing climate resilience (适应力) across food systems will be needed to fight rising hunger, according to UN General Assembly President Abdulla Shahid.
Agrivoltaic farming (光伏农业), which uses the shaded space under solar panels (太阳能电池板) to grow crops, could be a way out. In the system, solar panels have to sometimes be lifted or suspended to allow plants to grow beneath them. Another option is putting them on the roofs of greenhouses. This allows enough light and rainwater to reach the crops and provides access for farm machinery.
Certain crops appear to grow well when grown in such environments, according to many recent studies. Researchers in South Korea have been growing a kind of vegetable underneath solar panels. The panels are positioned 2~3 metres off the ground and sit at an angle of 30 degrees, providing shade and offering crops protection from the sun. The researchers, from Chonnam National University, discovered that the vegetable produced was a deeper shade of green, thus attracting many consumers.
Elsewhere, Agrivoltaic systems in East Africa are allowing farmers to make better use of land. An Agrivoltaic farming project in Kenya is using solar panels held several metres off the ground, with gaps in between them. The shade from the panels protects vegetables from heat stress and water loss. This has resulted in rural farmers being able to grow a greater range of higher-value crops. The project effectively harvests the power of the sun twice, the researchers say.
Overall, Agrivoltaic farming is one way of using the same area of land to produce more food while also rolling out more sources of renewable energy. According to Brite Solar CEO Dr. Nick Kanopoulos, who is a highly skilled solar energy expert, it’s a new way of farming—one that is fully electric, runs on renewable resources, and is capable of producing the food we need to feed the future.
1. What is the second paragraph intended to introduce about Agrivoltaic farming?| A．How it is built. | B．How it is accepted. |
| C．How it is spread. | D．How it is developed. |
| A．Crops. | B．Plants. | C．Solar panels. | D．Roofs. |
| A．It uses land more efficiently. | B．It saves money on labor costs. |
| C．It can reduce wildfire risks. | D．It is easily managed. |
| A．A common belief. | B．An expert’s opinion. |
| C．A conclusion of previous research. | D．An organization’s announcement. |
