1 . The topic “slash youth”, referring to those refusing to be defined or bound by just one personal identity and choosing to undertake multiple careers, has fueled heated debate on social media. On Douban, a Chinese social networking platform, the topic has attracted about 11,000posts and has been viewed over 400 million times. China’s young people are keen to share their slash youth stories online, presenting themselves as multiple and sometimes distinct identities, such as a nurse and model, a teacher and stand-up comedian, and an engineer and musician.
Xing Eryang, a 31-year-old female resident in Beijing, founded the Douban topic in 2021.While staying diligent about her daytime work, she is developing her hobbies, including stand-up comedy and vlogging, into secondary careers during her spare time. And she is amazed to find her “slash life” philosophy followed by so many of her peers.
Weiheng, a 26-year-old woman in Guangzhou, and Tang Yuhan, a 27-year-old man in Xuancheng city, Anhui province, are both participants in the topic, with their stories earning thousands of likes so far. The two are both musicians in their spare time, even though they are thousands of miles apart and have different jobs in media and finance. Their passion for music has grown since college and they didn’t abandon their enthusiasm, even after entering the workplace.
Their reaction showed the gap between the young and former generations. “My parents used to say, ‘music cannot earn you money’, so the band thing was regarded as a waste of time. However, we want to pursue whatever we love and are willing to pay for it.” says Weiheng.
“The ‘slash life’ mania(狂热)shows that, along with China’s economic development, our society is becoming more and more diversified and inclusive, and it welcomes everyone’s self-fulfillment,” says Shi Yanrong, an associate researcher from Tianjin Academy of Social Sciences. “Young people no longer have to rely on work and money for their sense of self-worth. They tend to practice a carpe diem(活在当下)philosophy and create their own identities.”
1. What are “slash youth” more likely to do?| A．Create a topic on Douban. |
| B．Take diverse occupations. |
| C．Become a stand-up comedian. |
| D．Share their own stories online. |
| A．Other young people’s positive response. |
| B．Hobbies developed while working. |
| C．The growing social networking platform. |
| D．Thousands of likes earned on Douban. |
| A．They sent their stories online to gain more funds. |
| B．They shared similar interests in both their hobbies and jobs. |
| C．They never lost passion for music even if they had to quit college. |
| D．They stuck with their dream despite the older generation’s opinion. |
| A．Doubtful. | B．Supportive. |
| C．Unfavorable. | D．Indifferent. |
2 . Once the choice of royal household, the watermelon has gained popularity rapidly over the years, and an online grocer reported that the fruit’s sales on the platform had increased sixfold from 2020 to 2022, resulting in increasingly high demand for watermelon quality testers.
Lee, 32, is extremely busy in the summer months. Just by holding the watermelon near his ear and knocking on the surface with his fingers, Lee says, he can tell by the sound if the fruit is ripe enough to be eaten or not. He works for a rural cooperative set up by a group of watermelon farmers, and puts thousands of watermelons through the “knock test” daily, before they are shipped to downtown warehouses where the platform sources its supplies.
The practice of knocking on watermelons to determine their ripeness can be found across cultures. In China, it is considered a national habit. Smart buyers tap on the fruit before purchase to ensure their money is well-spent. Some buyers knock on the fruit despite not knowing what the hollow sound means just to negotiate a better deal from the seller.
As fruit sales have moved to online platforms in a big way, those who make a living by checking the quality of the fruits with their fingers are much in demand. Lee is one among the growing group. Their task is to conduct knock tests on behalf of e-buyers and ensure that the fruits selected to be sold online are uniform in size and quality.
Lee, who was once an award-winning soccer player, now describes himself as a “goalkeeper for watermelons”. He quit soccer about four years ago and learned about melon-knocking as an emerging profession and decided to become an apprentice(学徒) to an experienced farmer.
After a year’s trial and error, Lee worked independently as a quality checker. “It is a highly demanding task. During the apprenticeship, I often cracked open melons to confirm my judgment. There are just no shortcuts, ” he said.
1. What is the main purpose of the text?| A．To introduce an emerging profession. |
| B．To describe Lee’s career transformation. |
| C．To discuss the importance of fruit quality testers. |
| D．To explain the cultural role of watermelon-knocking. |
| A．The popularity of watermelons. | B．The big harvest of watermelons. |
| C．An increase in watermelon prices. | D．A rapid rise in online watermelon sales. |
| A．He was once an award-winning soccer player. |
| B．He dreams of being a professional melon-knocker. |
| C．He was taught by an experienced watermelon farmer. |
| D．He ensures that customers enjoy watermelons of quality. |
| A．Seeing is believing. | B．Every man has his value. |
| C．Great efforts and practice matter. | D．Excellence can be found in any profession. |
3 . How many bosses could rely on their employees threatening to quit in mass if they were abruptly forced out? Sam Altman received such a show of support from more than 700 staff after he was fired from Open AI that he was swiftly restored to his position by the board. But this level of loyalty is not typical and may not always be a good thing.
Management experts say staff who are loyal to their employer are inclined to invest more time and effort in their jobs, helping to create an engaged and higher performing workplace. In turn they receive promotions and pay rises. They have a greater sense of belonging and potentially a longer career at the same organisation. But it is not all rosy. People who are too loyal are more likely to take actions that are deemed wrong to keep their jobs and protect their employer, according to a 2021 academic paper. They might overlook wrongdoing and be less likely to expose corruption. Loyalty is sometimes seen as such a force for good that it can be used to justify bad behavior.
Often companies and senior bosses are the real winner a of employee loyalty. Research led by Matthew Stanley at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business published this year, found that managers were more likely to exploit loyal individuals. Stanley recruited almost 1,400 managers to read about a fictional 29-year-old employee called John, who worked for a company that was trying to keep costs down. They had to decide how willing they would be to ask John to work longer hours and take on more work without more pay. Researchers created various situations including labelling John as loyal versus other traits such as honest and fair. Managers were more willing to ask loyal John to take on the burden of unpaid work.
However, Consultancy Gallup’s latest state of the workplace report showed that half of the 122, 416 employees who took part in a global survey were looking out for new work. “You can’t guarantee anyone will stick around these days,” says a consultant who advises boards. This is particularly true of younger generations. They trust their bosses less and are not as patient when it comes to career progression, seeing little benefit in keeping their heads down and following orders if they do not see results quickly.
1. What does the author want to say by mentioning Sam Altman in Paragraph 1?| A．Open AI’s staff loyalty is quite high. |
| B．Staff loyalty’s rosy side in the work. |
| C．Sam Altman could count on his employees. |
| D．This level of loyalty is not always good. |
| A．Through global surveys concerning a fictional employee named John. |
| B．By creating different situations to ask John ta take on more unpaid work. |
| C．By asking managers to make decisions about work arrangements of John. |
| D．By recruiting managers to read fiction about work traits like loyal and honest. |
| A．Loyalty can be used by management to exploit employees. |
| B．Younger generations are more patient towards their employers. |
| C．Employees who are loyal are more likely to report wrongdoing. |
| D．Loyalty to an employer always leads to a positive work environment. |
| A．How Job Loyalty Affects the Work Environment? |
| B．Why Staff Loyalty is Not Always a Good Thing? |
| C．Are Loyal Employees More Likely to be Promoted? |
| D．Does Work Loyalty Help Career Progress More Quickly? |
4 . It’s not easy to find a job. Many jobs have age or experience requirements that you might not meet. On top of that, you need to juggle(应付)schoolwork, extracurriculars, and your social life. Fortunately, there are still some good jobs for you to start gaining working experience.
Tutor
Straight-A student? Then a job as a tutor(家庭教师)might be the best option for you. Helping younger students with their homework is a great way to put what you’ve studied to good use and make some extra money. One of the easiest ways to show that you’re qualified to teach other students is by listing your GPA(Grade Point Average) on your tutor resume.
Dog Walker
Love dogs? Then a position as a dog walker is the perfect fit for you. Dog walking requires no work experience and has flexible hours. However, you may need to do some shadowing or an interview before people trust you with their pets.
Delivery Driver
If you’re 16+ years old and have a driver’s license, you could try working as a delivery driver. Driving is a great way to gain relevant experience and show future employers that you’re responsible and work well under pressure.
Call Center Representative
If you don’t mind talking on the phone, then a job as a call center worker is a good choice for you. Working as a call center representative can even teach you some useful customer service skills that will help your career later on. To land a job at a call center, highlight your customer service and interpersonal skills on your resume.
1. Who are the passage intended for?| A．Parents. | B．Teachers. | C．Students. | D．Employers. |
| A．Relevant experience. | B．Timely homework completion. |
| C．Flexible time schedule. | D．Impressive academic performance. |
| A．Tutor. | B．Dog walker. |
| C．Delivery driver. | D．Call center representative. |
5 . At 98, Dick Van Dyke still sings with his group, The Vantastix, and still makes it all look easy. When asked how important it is that he’s having fun when he’s doing it, Van Dyke replied, “My whole career has relied on that. It’s such a blessing to find a way of making a living that you love. I feel so sorry for people who hate their job. I look forward to going to work every morning!”
And some of his work helped define a generation. Take “The Dick Van Dyke Show”; it ran for five years on CBS, and it was such a hit that they’re bringing it back. This week, CBS aired a two-hour tribute (致敬), “Dick Van Dyke, 98 Years of Magic”, and for the occasion, they recreated the original Dick Van Dyke Show” set, down to that well-known sofa.
Early in his career Van Dyke was quoted as saying he only wanted to make films his children could watch. That got the attention of Walt Disney, who promptly cast him in “Mary Poppins”. And his next few films were equally family-friendly, like “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang,” which happened to have been co-written by James Bond creator Ian Fleming. From then on, Van Dyke was almost always assigned to play the good guy, though he claims to have missed out on a choice part: “Yeah, I could have been James Bond. When Sean Connery left, the producer said, ‘Would you like to be the next Bond?’ I said, ‘Have you heard my British accent?’ That’s a true story!”
It seems that in show biz the true legends never stop. In an interview from 2017 with his friends, Van Dyke described what it was like hitting 90: “People are more afraid of aging than they are of death these days. And I want to say that remain young in heart and there’s a lot of good living to do.”
1. What can we infer from Dyke’s reply in Paragraph 1?| A．He enjoys his job. | B．He hates morning work. |
| C．He sees his job as a burden. | D．He prefers leisure to work. |
| A．They created a new set for his show. |
| B．They bought a famous sofa for him. |
| C．They made a special program for him. |
| D．They invited young generation to watch his show. |
| A．His films are rarely family-friendly. |
| B．His films are only made for his children. |
| C．Van Dyke was always playing the good guy. |
| D．Van Dyke had the chance to play James Bond. |
| A．Forever Young. | B．Work Comes First. |
| C．Always Have Fun. | D．Legends Are Timeless. |
6 . A walk around the workplace is also a trip back in time. The office is where colleagues meet, work and bond. But it is also a time capsule, a place where the traces of historic patterns of working are visible everywhere. The pandemic has heightened this sense of office as a dig site for corporate archaeologists.
The most obvious object is the landline phone(固定电话), a reminder of the days when mobility meant being able to stand up and keep talking. Long after people have junked them in their personal lives - less than 15% of Americans aged between 25 and 34 had one at home in the second half of 2021- landline phones survive in offices.
There might be good reasons for its persistence: they offer a more secure and stable connection than mobile phones, and no one worries that they are about to run out of battery. In practice, the habit of using them was definitely lost during the pandemic. Now they sit on desk after desk, rows of buttons unpressed, ring tones unheard.
Landline phones were already well on their way out before covid-19 struck. Whiteboard charts have suffered a swifter reverse. These objects signal a particular type of pain- people physically crowded together into a room while a manager sketches a graph with a marker pen and points meaningfully to the top-right-hand corner, giving requirements never to be satisfied. This manager is still making graphs but is now much more likely to use a PowerPoint. The crowd is still being tortured but is now much more likely to be watching on the screen. The office still has whiteboards, but they are left in corners and the charts on them are slowly yellowing.
Real archaeologists need tools and time to do their painstaking work: brushes, shovels and picks. Corporate archaeology is easier: you just need eyes and a memory of how things used to be. But you also need to be quick as more and more work places are revamped for the post-pandemic era. Now its time to take a careful look around the office: you may see something that will soon seem outdated.
1. Why does the author refer to the office as a time capsule?| A．You can travel back in time in the office. |
| B．You can dig out what has been buried for years in the office. |
| C．You can easily find some old-fashioned practices in the office. |
| D．You can work with archaeologists to study the history in the office. |
| A．Whiteboard charts went useless due to new technologies. |
| B．More employees prefer online meetings to physical gatherings. |
| C．Landline phones still exist in offices because they don’t need batteries. |
| D．Many employees show a negative attitude to some routine work in companies. |
| A．Transformed. | B．Abandoned. |
| C．Discovered. | D．Reserved. |
| A．The Impact of Pandemic on Workplace | B．The Archaeology of the Office |
| C．Why Landline Phones Went Outdated? | D．The History of Old-fashioned Objects |
7 . Career coaches provide a series of services, from helping you figure out what you want to do to exploring chances for career growth.
Know what type of professional you need to hire.
Try sample lessons to find the right one. Most coaches offer free sample lessons, which help you get to know their styles clearly. You may need a coach with career experiences, or you may need one who offers life advice. If you aren’t sure what you want, ask questions.
Consider cost, and make contact. Coaching fees are not the same. Some coaches charge more for polishing resumes, while others include that in the overall price.
| A．Make sure you have a well-designed resume. |
| B．You need to understand what you’re receiving for the expense. |
| C．Career coaches also provide services for your personal training. |
| D．Thus, you can assess whether the coach understands your needs. |
| E．Engaging with a career coach requires an investment of time and money. |
| F．Know which services you need and be open to services you don't know you need. |
| G．Career coaches can help you decide how to make full use of your professional potential. |
8 . I was 68 when I first stepped on stage as a standup comedian in 2003. I’d never set foot in a comedy club before. I’ve always been a performer - I’ve worked as a singer, actor and musician - but all that came to an end after 9/11. I live in New York, and we watched the twin towers fall from my apartment building. For a year afterwards, nobody wanted to go out or be entertained.
It was then that I started to think about comedy. I realised people needed to laugh, to enjoy themselves again, and thought that with a little training I could do it. I took a few classes, tried to work out a routine, and finally plucked up the courage to get up on stage. That first time was terrifying. I had no idea what the audience would make of me.
In New York, comedians are typically young men with beards. It’s hard enough to break through as a woman, even harder as someone old enough to be their grandmother. As I stepped on stage that first time, people laughed nervously. They were clearly surprised to see me. I introduced myself, stated my age and tried my first joke. There was silence. But by the time I got to the third line, people were properly laughing, I was addicted.
Now my sets differ. I might be on stage for 10 minutes in front of a dozen people, or my one-woman show is a full hour in front of a crowd of 100. Even today, I’m nervous before I step out. My first line is, “Hello, everybody. I’m 88 and three-quarters years old. I’m telling you that in case I don’t make it all the way through the show.” Then people laugh and I relax.
After a show, people young and old come up to me, saying what an inspiration I am. They say they want to be as active as me when they reach my age. I’m pleased I can show that as an older person you don’t need to take a back seat in life.
I’ve no intention of stopping comedy. I’m taking all these pills, trying to stay alive, and I hope to still be performing when I’m 100. My goal is to still be up there making people laugh. It’s hard work, but it stops me being bored. I’d only be playing golf otherwise
1. What made the writer take up comedy?| A．She wanted to overcome her fears | B．She wanted to brighten others’ lives |
| C．She was unwilling to quit performing | D．She wanted to work out a routine |
| A．To show the challenge she was facing |
| B．To explain her attraction to the job |
| C．To illustrate her special advantage |
| D．To describe her new friends in comedy |
| A．She now performs before larger audiences |
| B．She no longer feels nervous before performances |
| C．She remains on the stage for a longer time |
| D．She has learned to make a joke of her age |
| A．Age is just a number |
| B．Advancing years bring greater wisdom |
| C．Old age means a chance to sit back |
| D．Being elderly means you have to slow down |
9 . You may feel your backbreaking and low-paid part-time summer job isn’t worth you effort.
When landing a job, you’ll put yourself into unfamiliar territory and learn how to survive and develop there.
Hanging around all summer is a great way to relax, but it won’t contribute to your time management skill.
Chances are that your social circle is comprised of people in your age group. However, in a job, you’ll work with diverse groups of people, from whom you’ll learn varying viewpoints and experiences.
| A．Working will, though. |
| B．But such jobs uplift willpower |
| C．Not sure of your future profession? |
| D．Does a summer job help with college? |
| E．Actually, its added bonuses go beyond your wallet. |
| F．There’re various confidence-boosting challenges to overcome |
| G．You can develop friendships and increase your visibility as well |
10 . Martin was returning to work in his London office after spending two weeks with his brother in New York. He was coming back with a heavy heart. It was not just that it was the end of a wonderful holiday; it was not just that he invariably suffered badly from jet lag(时差); it was that Monday morning always began with a team meeting and , over the months, he had grown to hate them.
Martin was aware that colleagues approached these meetings with hidden agenda（会议议 程）; they indulged in(沉溺于）game playing ; and he knew that people were not being honest and open. The meetings themselves were bad enough---there was all the moaning afterwards at the meeting like “I could have improved on that idea, but I wasn’t going to say.”
As this morning’s meeting began, Martin prepared himself for the usual dullness and boredom. But, as the meeting progressed, he became aware of a strange background noise. At first, he thought that he was still hearing the engine noise from the aircraft that had brought him back to London. But as he concentrated on the noise, it became a little clearer.
He realized, to his amazement, that he could actually hear what they were thinking at the same time as they were speaking. What surprised him, even more than the acquisition of this strange power, was that he discovered that what people were saying was not really what they were thinking. They were not making clear their reservations. They were not supporting views which they thought might be popular. They were not contributing their new insights. They were not volunteering their new ideas.
Martin found it impossible not to respond to his new knowledge. So he started to make gentle interventions (干涉), based more on what he could hear his colleagues thinking than on what he could hear them saying. “So, John, are you really saying.....” “Susan, do you really think that?” “Tom, have you got an idea on how we could take this forward?” They looked at him, puzzled. In truth, he felt rather proud of his newly -acquired talent.
As the meeting progressed, it was clear to him that each member of the meeting was learning how to hear the thoughts of the others. The game playing started to fall away; people started to speak more directly; views became better understood; the atmosphere became more open and trusting.
The meeting ended. As people left the room, Martin found that he could still hear what they were thinking. “That was the best meeting we’ve ever had.” “All meetings should be like that,” “ In future, I’m going to say what I think.”
1. It is known from the first paragraph that Martin_____.| A．just came back from his business trip in New York |
| B．was found to suffer from a serious heart disease during the trip |
| C．had a good time during his fortnight’s stay in New York |
| D．didn’t like his work in his London office |
| A．Because it had to be held every Monday morning. |
| B．Because he was tired of hosting such a meeting |
| C．Because he couldn’t control the meeting that was out of order. |
| D．Because the meeting atmosphere wasn’t open and trusting. |
| A．still hear the engine noise of the plane though he was back |
| B．clearly hear what the members of the meeting were saying |
| C．actually control the thoughts of the members of the meeting |
| D．express what the meeting members were thinking based on their words and their thoughts |
| A．Martin made people say what they were thinking immediately the meeting began. |
| B．Martin was angry at the dullness of the meeting at the beginning of the meeting.. |
| C．Martin led people to express their real thoughts with the meeting progressing. |
| D．Many members of the meeting played games and told lies at the meeting all the time. |
| A．I was thinking of making a suggestion ---but I couldn’t be bothered. |
| B．I have got an idea on how we could take this forward. I think we should... |
| C．The usual people say the usual things, so I have no other new ideas. |
| D．I could have imagined on that idea, but I wasn’t going to say. |
