1 . Almost all of us do it. We get up early to go to the gym. We stay up too late responding to work emails. Or we end up bingeing(狂欢) on Netflix (网络剧集,电影）in bed. Whatever it is, we often cut corners when it comes to sleep.
If you can squeeze(挤出)in even an extra hour, it will almost certainly make you look better, feel better, and be better at your job. But an extra hour should be just the beginning, experts' caution. The real benefits of sleep come from setting a personal, optimal(最佳的)sleeping schedule—and sticking to it no matter what.
It turns out that the benefits of more sleep—and consistent sleep—are diverse and plentiful. “You are going to feel better, you will have more energy, you will have better ideas, you will contribute to your team or organization in a better way," says Rachel Salas, a professor of neurology who specializes in sleep medicine and sleep disorders at Johns Hopkins University in the US.
"Your mood is going to be better, you will have better reason to engage and share ideas," she says. It will also show on the outside—skimp on sleep and you may find yourself “gaining weight and looking tired with bags under your eyes".
In 2013, the BBC partnered with the University of Surrey's Sleep Research Centre for an experiment that found an extra hour of sleep improved participants' mental agility in computer texts.
An American study last month showed that students who slept for eight hours a night performed better in final exams. One from the University of Michigan in October found that a lack of sleep affected memory and job performance in fields as varied as baking and surgery.
Another study found that two nights in a row of less than six hours' sleep could make you sluggish(萎靡不振）for the next six days. And a Swedish study published this year which looked at over 40,000 participants for 13 years found that those who slept for short periods had higher mortality rates(死亡率）than those who don't,especially among over 65s.
Problems that appear over the long haul(拖)could be weight gain,migraines(偏头疼),or constant fatigue(疲乏). It could be sleep apnoea or even what she calls "microsleeps"—when your brain briefly shuts down during the day for just a few seconds, sometimes with your eyes open (an obvious danger to drivers, for example).
1. What is the meaning of the underlined word in the first paragraph ?| A．Avoid sleeping | B．Spend long time |
| C．Save time | D．Choose the easy way |
| A．more energy | B．more grades |
| C．more productivity | D．more inspirations |
| A．more possibility to die | B．seven days' less energy |
| C．quick response | D．fine memory |
| A．Mr. Smith had a short rest between classses. |
| B．Mrs. Smith took a nap at noon. |
| C．After a long time work, the old man fell asleep. |
| D．Li Lei was sleepy, eyes open but brain resting. |
2 . Money Survey
A recent survey has investigated the way American teenagers aged 16-18 relate to money — what they do with it, how they are affected by the recent financial problems in the world and what they expect in the future. The results make interesting reading.
Of those surveyed, almost all have a mobile phone and more than three-quarters have iPod or MP3 player. 66% own a computer, 46% own a TV and 27% own a car.
Over two-thirds of these young people do some form of work in order to earn money. The average earnings are $1,630 per year, with boys earning more than girls.
Many teenagers are worried about rising university costs and the difficulty of finding jobs.
| A．However, 59% still believe they will be in a better financial position than their parents in the future. |
| B．Most teens also save money - they are usually saving up for clothes, a piece of technology, future university expenses or a car. |
| C．Nevertheless, many of them still reported asking parents for money to buy clothes. |
| D．The world has been hit hard by financial problems lately and 93% of the teens said that this had affected them and their family. |
| E．However, most of their own money is spent on clothes. |
| F．They also talk about what matters most in terms of their choice of career. |
3 . A group of farmers in Nigeria is using a technology-based method to grow crops from small drops of water in the air. The method, known as aeroponics, does not involve soil. Instead, plant roots hang in the air.
Aeroponics is not well-known in Nigeria, but farmers there are working to make the technique more popular. The technique could make a big difference in places like the city of Abeokuta. Violent conflicts and desertification--the process by which rich land becomes deserts--have made huge amounts of land unsuitable for farming.
Biochemist Samson Ogbole is popularly known as Nigeria's smart farmer. He and his team are growing crops without soil at the technology-based farm they started three years ago in Abeokuta. “We are putting an end to seasonal food shortage in Nigeria,” said Ogbole. “Because we are the ones controlling everything that the plant requires--we are not depending on seasons. So it's no longer seasonal farming. It is just farming any time of the year, meaning you can plant any time of the year. We can harvest any time of the year,” said Ogbole.
But setting up the aeroponic farm was not easy. “It required more than $180,000,” Ogbole said. And, some people in Abeokuta were very much against this non-traditional method of farming. “It took a lot of effort to change people's minds about aeroponics,” said Ogbole.
In Nigeria, about 30 million hectares（公顷）of farmland is being used, instead of the 78.5 million hectares required for food security. Violent conflicts and desertification are the top reasons why the farmland is being lost. And only 49 percent of the land is rich. Besides, most farmers do not have the technical knowledge to increase productivity. They are also in need of high-quality seeds to guarantee better harvests.
For now, technologically skilled farmers like Samson Ogbole are offering a new way forward.
1. What is special about aeroponics? .| A．Crops are not grown in soil. | B．Crops can grow all by themselves |
| C．Crops without roots can grow well. | D．Crops can grow well without water. |
| A．Because there are not many farmers there. |
| B．Because there isn't plenty of rich land there. |
| C．Because many farmers there are terribly violent. |
| D．Because farmers there are thirsty for farming techniques. |
| A．Reduce the cost of farming. | B．Produce crops of higher quality. |
| C．Grow crops whenever they like. | D．Keep crops fresh for a longer period. |
| A．A new method of growing crops |
| B．Ways to turn deserts into rich land |
| C．Techniques for developing high-quality seeds |
| D．The importance of fighting against worldwide hunger |
4 . At the foot of the Tianmu Mountain in Zhejiang，a homestay (民宿)is attracting travelers from far and wide, which has won architectural (建筑学的) medal at the 2021 German iF Design Awards.
The owners of the homestay are a couple in their late 30s who decided to return to their hometown three years ago. Li Xiumei used to be in charge of a division at a company in Hangzhou, and her husband was a sales director. It was an ordinary situation where Li’s husband was on business trips a lot and Li worked overtime on weekends. City life sometimes is not easy.
In 2018, they quit jobs and went back to Dongtianmu village, which lies in a forest of bamboo. The first time they drove into the village was one late afternoon. The cooking smoke was rising from the foot of the mountain, which gave them a very different feeling form the city.
The homestay was built beside her husband’s old countryside house. The old house is preserved (保留)，while a brand-new building was built on its side and the whole site is made up of for courtyards. It has been updated to have a hall, a tea room, a kitchen, a dining room. Japanese cherry trees are planted in the east courtyard. A swimming pool is placed in the west courtyard, with a bar located on one side.
Li and her husband love gardening and music, and their new home gives them enough space to continue their interests and relax in the heart of nature. Li wants to share the quiet country life, so she makes her new home a homestay. In 2019, the homestay became an online hit after guests shared their experiences on social media. “The longer I stay here, the more I feel it was the right choice to come back, and this is more meaningful than making money,” Li says.
1. How did Li feel about city life?| A．Satisfied. | B．Tired. | C．Attractive. | D．Noisy. |
| A．It is ancient and broken. | B．It can hold many guests. |
| C．It has been rebuilt by the couple. | D．It must have been carefully designed. |
| A．Continuing their music dream. | B．Staying at the old house. |
| C．Living in the countryside. | D．Developing the economy of cities. |
增加：在缺词处加一个漏字符号（∧），并在其下面写出该加的词。
删除：把多余的词用斜线（＼）划掉。
修改：在错的词下划一横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。
注意：1. 每处错误及其修改均仅限一词；
2. 只允许修改10处，多者（从第11处起）不计分。
Having taught English in an senior high school for 26 years, my teacher has developed the habit of trying to make his students to get good marks in exams. But some textbooks who include dozens of mistakes will have a seriously bad influence in students. Since he's found out over 30 real mistakes in your last 3 textbooks nothing, I firm believe that he can still find out other mistakes in your next textbook for free. Wishing us to use good textbooks than before, he's willing to proofread（校对）it before it was printed. Frankly spoken, my honest and responsible teacher has no intention of looking down upon you textbooks.
6 . For the first time in more than 60 years, firearms and motor vehicles are killing Americans at an identical rate, according to new death data. The death rate for both firearms and motor vehicles stands at 10.3 deaths per 100,000 people. The result was produced primarily by a sharp drop in the rate of motor vehicle deaths since 1950, while over the same period, gun deaths rose.
The steady decline in motor vehicle deaths can be attributed to (归因于) a combination of improved technology and smarter regulation. The federal government commanded the presence of seat belts in the 1960s. The 1970s brought anti-lock brakes. The 1980s brought an increased focus on drunk driving and seat belt use. Airbags came along in the 1990s. More recent years have seen demands on electronic stability systems, increased penalties (惩罚) for careless driving and other improved technology used to meet safety requirements.
However, the history of American gun control regulation has been more erratic (不稳定的). Restrictions past in earlier times have been undone recently. Technological advances, like smart-gun technology that prevents people other than the owner from firing a gun, have been blocked by opposition from the National Rifle Association of America and many gun owners.
The result? The gun death rate is slightly higher than before. Particularly annoying is that there may be ways to improve gun safety and reduce firearm deaths. But innovations (创新) in gun safety are hard to come by, in large part because of Congress’s longstanding ban on many types of federal government research. The ban badly affects academic researchers. One well-known researcher, Garen Wintemute of the University of California at Davis, had to donate $1 million of his own money to keep his research going. He clearly tells his students not to join the field because of the severe difficulties that researchers face in obtaining funding and publishing their results.
Gun deaths and vehicle deaths are in many ways two different problems. Gun deaths are typically on purpose, but motor vehicle deaths are usually accidental. And cars are much more complicated machines than guns. Still, we’ve been able to make driving much safer. We could potentially do the same with guns.
1. What does the new death data reveal?| A．Gun deaths once experienced a sharp drop in 1950. |
| B．About 10 out of 10,000 people died of gun accidents. |
| C．Motor vehicle deaths have slightly declined since 1950. |
| D．Guns are now killing as many people as cars in the U.S. |
| A．By stating facts. | B．By using figures. | C．By giving instructions. | D．By making comparisons. |
| A．Give up his gun research. | B．Donate $1 million to his university. |
| C．Support Congress’s ban on gun research. | D．Discourage students from following his research. |
| A．Gun safety could be guaranteed. | B．Guns are as complicated as cars. |
| C．Car driving is much easier than before. | D．Car accidents tend to be caused deliberately. |
7 . A competition making up Versailles literature was launched on Sina Weibo recently. So what is Versailles literature?
Actually, the term has nothing to do with the French palace nor with literature. It came from The Rose of Versailles, a Japanese manga series about aristocratic life at the palace of Versailles in France in the late 18th century, and was coined by a Chinese influencer earlier this year. Known as humblebragging, it is a boast disguised as a complaint. “I have too many houses. How can I decide which one to decorate?” and “I thought I lost weight this morning. So disappointed when I realized it was because I took off the huge diamond ring my boyfriend gave me last night” are some examples of Versailles literature. The intention is to show off — usually things of materialistic values, yet one ought to pretend that’s not the point.
As the 19th century English author Jane Austen famously wrote, “Nothing is more deceitful than the appearance of humility.” The psychology behind humblebragging is to be recognized for one’s successes and be liked by others at the same time, according to scholars. In her article titled Why do people hate humblebragging? published in Psychology Today, psychologist Dr. Susan Krauss Whitbourne at the University of Massachusetts Amherst noted that humblebragging is a “strategy in pursuit of respect” because it draws attention to one’s accomplishments in a circuitous way.
However, studies on social media users show that humblebragging as a self-promotion strategy does not work. In the essay Humblebragging: A distinct and ineffective self-presentation strategy, the University of North Carolina researcher Ovul Sezer and Harvard University scholars Francesca Gino and Michael Norton concluded from their research that humblebraggers are perceived more negatively than straight braggers due to the former’s insincerity. “The critical factor differentiating the two groups of people is sincerity. People don’t like braggers, but they at least see them as more sincere than humblebraggers,” said Francesca Gino.
So, how can we annoy humblebraggers back? “Just pretend you don’t get whatever it is they try to show off,” a netizen advised. “And respond with genuine sympathy for their complaints.”
1. Which of the following statements is typical of “Versailles literature”?| A．You know who my father is? My father is Li Gang. |
| B．Got five offers to date. I’m at a loss which to choose. |
| C．It’s a headache how to make my son tidy up his room regularly. |
| D．I’m fed up with living in the countryside with no shopping malls around. |
| A．To win others’ sympathy. | B．To earn others’ admiration. |
| C．To show his/her sincerity. | D．To mask his / her complaint. |
| A．Indirect. | B．Straightforward. | C．Ambiguous. | D．Double-edged. |
| A．Braggers are relatively more sincere than humblebraggers. |
| B．Humblebragging is an artificial appearance of being humble. |
| C．To respond with real sympathy will discourage humblebraggers. |
| D．If you want to be perceived positively, try to use Versailles literature. |
8 . We humans like to conquer.
For the same reason that soccer players want to hold the World Cup trophy(奖杯)and tennis players crave a Grand Slam win, mountaineers dream of reaching the highest peak on the planet-Mount Qomolangma, which towers about 8, 844 meters above sea level.
"Everybody wants to stand on top of the world, "Mirza Ali from Pakistan who had just "Conquered" Mount Qomolangma, told the Los Angeles Times.
However, this desire to conquer has become so strong that we have begun to travel in the wrong direction.
During this year's climbing season-from March to May-at least 11 climbers died in the Himalayas, making it one of the worst seasons on record. And the fact that many of the climbers were inexperienced is one of the major factors(因素)contributing to the tragedy, according to USA Today
"They don't train very hard. They underestimate(低估)Qomolangma, " Jangbu Sherpa, who has been working as a guide on Mount Qomolangmasince2006, told NBC News "There are lots of climbers who just want to check the box so that they can say they've been to the top of the world. "
This ignorant attitude of climbers also leads to other problems-apart from putting their own lives at risk, of course. According to Huff Post, the mountain's cleaning group collected 12 tons of trash- including food wrappers(包装袋), and oxygen tanks-left behind this climbing season. This once holy(神圣的)and peaceful corner of the world has, as The Atlantic reporter Margret Grebowics put it, "lost its magic".
Perhaps what we should do now is restore meaning to the activity itself-real meaning. And for Alison Levine, a US mountaineer who reached the summit(山顶)of Mount Qomolangma in 2010, the meaning doesn't come with the summit itself, but with everything that led her up to it.
"When I did make it to the summit, what I realized is that standing on top of a mountain doesn't change you and doesn't change the world, "Levine told the NPR. "It’s really about the journey. The journey is the most important thing on any mountain. "
It's true that we humans like to conquer. But the first step of conquering anything is probably to learn to conquer our own greed(贪婪) and ignorance.
1. What does the underlined word “crave” in Paragraph 2 mean?_________| A．be positive about |
| B．be likely to win |
| C．have no interest in |
| D．have a strong desire for |
| A．Climbers left tons of trash behind while climbing Qomolangma. |
| B．This year's climbing season is one of the worst seasons on record. |
| C．The best time to climb Qomolangma this year was from March to May. |
| D．Not having professional equipment caused the climbing tragedy this year. |
| A．The journey to reach the top. |
| B．The spirit to conquer the top. |
| C．Being on top of the world. |
| D．Being able to change the world. |
| A．Critical. | B．Positive. | C．Encouraging. | D．Ashamed |
9 . For me personally, I could write for days about many different situations where adversity(逆境)
We had a glass studio, which was located 50 feet from our home. A couple of years ago we experienced an
We had a partner come in to help us try to
Here we were in the middle of winter with our studio collapsed. We couldn’t work as we had almost
We picked the
| A．prevented | B．influenced | C．damaged | D．promoted |
| A．suffer | B．win | C．escape | D．work |
| A．awkward | B．awesome | C．awful | D．agreeable |
| A．size | B．weight | C．height | D．temperature |
| A．destroyed | B．limited | C．pressed | D．struck |
| A．Although | B．Unless | C．Before | D．When |
| A．worthwhile | B．challenging | C．rewarding | D．annoying |
| A．examine | B．test | C．repair | D．secure |
| A．showed | B．arranged | C．piled | D．presented |
| A．conduct | B．predict | C．instruct | D．quit |
| A．approached | B．cleared | C．crossed | D．comforted |
| A．easier | B．former | C．further | D．latter |
| A．redesigned | B．evaluated | C．organized | D．preserved |
| A．desperately | B．previously | C．eventually | D．hopefully |
| A．aware of | B．concerned about | C．cautious about | D．faced with |
10 . While markets suffered recession, a number of groups enjoyed record growth.Here we list some of the top 100 company winners in a bad year.
1.Xiaomi Corporation
Sector: Technology HQ: Beijing, China
Huawei’s horrible year has been a windfall (意外之财) for China’s other big smartphone makers.With Washington’s Huawei sanctions (制裁) forcing Android users to turn to Xiaomi’s devices, it has risen above Apple to take third place in global smartphone market share.Its stock was added to Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index and it crossed the $100bn market cap mark last month.
2.Pinduoduo
Sector: E-commerce HQ: Shanghai, China
The e-commerce group’s rise was accelerated by the pandemic as hundreds of millions of Chinese shoppers turned to their smartphones rather than malls.The economic downturn raised demand for Pinduoduo’s extremely cheap goods with sales up 70 percent in the first nine months of the year.It also came closer to profitability as it set strict rules in discounts, and an antitrust investigation into its chief competitor Alibaba also helped.
3.Meituan
Sector: E-commerce HQ: Beijing, China
China’s “everything app” was hit hard by lockdown, as authorities closed restaurants and consumers shied away from food delivery.But Meituan bounced back in the second half of 2020 with growth at its food delivery business making up for declining travel sales.Investors are betting better days lie ahead — it now boasts 477m annual users.
4.Tesla
Sector: Automotive HQ: Palo Alto, US
Some thought Tesla’s $75bn valuation (估价) at the start of 2020 was looking impossible.By the time it entered the S&P 500 in December, it was almost nine times higher — more than the next seven car-makers combined.Tesla is expected to have produced about 500,000 cars over the year.But the industry shift to electric vehicles is unquestioned and investors believe its technology is years ahead of the competition.
1. What was Xiaomi’s original rank in global smartphone market share?| A．2nd | B．3rd | C．4th | D．5th |
| A．The economic downturn | B．Alibaba’s being investigated |
| C．Its strict rules in discounts | D．People’s avoidance of food delivery |
| A．core technology | B．economical products |
| C．the creativity | D．cooperation with others |
