1 . Twenty years ago, I was invited to join a poker game made up of all middle-aged men. That game became an essential part of my life and it evolved with the group. We used to start at 7 p. m. with wine and play until 2 a. m. Now there is no wine, and we quit before midnight. The smoke of cigarettes is long gone. The food is better—over two decades we’ve gone from chips to homemade vegetable salad. All of these win favor with my wife when I go to play poker.

When the pandemic (疫情) arrived, we switched to online games. We downloaded a poker app on our phones and looked at those nine boxes containing our heads on our computer screens. The app dealt with all nine players at the same time, so the online version was much faster. Despite the efficiency, the app presented problems. It took all our concentration to keep track, on multiple screens, of what was going on with the game. The conversation didn’t really happen. It felt like any online poker game, the kind played with strangers. So I hated this way of playing.

When we finally met each other for our live game after a two-year break, we were excited. However, at our poker game, we learned one of our guys died of cancer without telling any of us he was sick. Actually, we once found Bert looked a bit thin and a bit tired. Then he was gone. According to Robin Dunbar, an evolutionary psychologist at Oxford University, men are less likely to discuss their personal affairs and opinions directly and honestly. It’s the reason why men are more likely to have mental problems.

So friendships with women are the perfect complement to male friendships. I have a wife to confide in (向……透露秘密), and a few female friends I regularly meet for lunch. I’m just really glad to have both types of friendships. I can meet my female friends for a nice lunch and a glass of wine. Then head off to poker.

1. Why does the author’s wife support him in playing poker?

A．It can make the author more intelligent.	B．It can make the author more relaxed.
C．The author’s lifestyle becomes healthier.	D．The author’s social skills become better.

2. Why did the author hate playing poker online?

A．The process of playing was slow.	B．Players always faced technical problems.
C．Players seldom interacted with each other.	D．The game was often interrupted by strangers.

3. Why are men more likely to have mental problems?

A．Men are less sociable.	B．Men are less open-minded.
C．Men are less emotional.	D．Men are less outspoken.

4. How does the author feel about his social relationships?

A．Confused.

B．Disappointed.

C．Upset.

D．Satisfied.

2 . People who keep chickens as pets or barnyard animals tend to be quite passionate about them. Similar to those who keep cats and dogs as animal friends, chicken owners love to spoil their little ones. If that means building tiny amusement parks to keep them happy, then that’s exactly what they will do.

Chickens have more personality than many people give them credit for. Like humans, chickens love to have fun, explore, and just kind of check stuff out.

What happens if chickens get bored?

Bored chickens tend to engage in bad behaviors. These can include pecking at and fighting with one another and pulling out each other’s feathers.

Part of keeping and caring for chickens (or any animal for that matter) includes making sure they have everything they need to be happy. That includes entertainment and things to keep their days interesting.

One method is to hang up a piece of cabbage. Not only does this keep the chickens entertained, but it also gives them a healthy source of nourishment.

There is another fun toy you can build for your chickens, and all you need is some old bicycle tires. Chicken merry-go-rounds are about to become all the rage (风靡一时) in chicken society. To do this, all you need to do is remove the wheel from a bike. Then lay the wheel out over top something so the chickens are able to spin and ride on top. The chickens seem to know how to jump right on and go for a ride. They might not react like a human on a rollercoaster (过山车), but their behavior tends to show it is an enjoyable experience for them. The wheels can be spread out through your garden, backyard, or wherever your chickens like to roam. They help make their days more interesting, fun, and unique!

1. What’s the purpose of hanging up a piece of cabbage?

A．To feed chickens.	B．To train chickens.
C．To amuse chickens.	D．To punish chickens.

2. What does the word underlined in the last paragraph mean?

A．Hatch.	B．Rest.
C．Gather.	D．Wander.

3. What can be a suitable title for the text?

A．A New Pet	B．Chickens’ Beautiful Life
C．People’s Friends	D．Harmonious Coexistence

4. Where is the text probably from?

A．A magazine.	B．A biography.
C．A diary.	D．A novel.

3 . Flinging brightly coloured objects around a screen at high speed is not what computers’ central processing units were designed for. So manufacturers of arcade machines invented the graphics-processing unit (GPU), a set of circuits to handle video games’ visuals in parallel to the work done by the central processor. The GPU’s ability to speed up complex tasks has since found wider uses: video editing, cryptocurrency mining and most recently, the training of artificial intelligence.

AI is now disrupting the industry that helped bring it into being. Every part of entertainment stands to be affected by generative AI, which digests inputs of text, image, audio or video to create new outputs of the same. But the games business will change the most, argues Andreessen Horowitz, a venture-capital (VC) firm. Games interactivity requires them to be stuffed with laboriously designed content: consider the 30 square miles of landscape or 60 hours of music in “Red Dead Redemption 2”, a recent cowboy adventure. Enlisting AI assistants to churn it out could drastically shrink timescales and budgets.

AI represents an “explosion of opportunity” and could drastically change the landscape of game development. Making a game is already easier than it was: nearly 13,000 titles were published last year on Steam, a games platform, almost double the number in 2017. Gaming may soon resemble the music and video industries in which most new content on Spotify or YouTube is user-generated. One games executive predicts that small firms will be the quickest to work out what new genres are made possible by AI. Last month Raja Koduri, an executive at Intel, left the chip maker to found an AI-gaming startup.

Don’t count the big studios out, though. If they can release half a dozen high-quality titles a year instead of a couple, it might chip away at the hit-driven nature of their business, says Josh Chapman of Konvoy, a gaming focused VC firm. A world of more choices also favors those with big marketing budgets. And the giants may have better answers to the mounting copyright questions around AI. If generative models have to be trained on data to which the developer has the rights, those with big back-catalogues will be better placed than startups. Trent Kaniuga, an artist who has worked on games like “Fortnite”, said last month that several clients had updated their contracts to ban AI-generated art.

If the lawyers don’t intervene, unions might. Studios diplomatically refer to AI assistants as “co-pilots”, not replacements for humans.

1. The original purpose behind the invention of the graphics-processing unit (GPU) was to ________.

A．speed up complex tasks in video editing and cryptocurrency mining

B．assist in the developing and training of artificial intelligence

C．disrupt the industry and create new outputs using generative AI

D．offload game visual tasks from the central processor

2. How might the rise of AI-gaming startups affect the development of the gaming industry?

A．It contributes to the growth of user-generated content.

B．It facilitates blockbuster dependency on big studios.

C．It decreases collaboration between different stakeholders in the industry.

D．It may help to consolidate the gaming market under major corporations.

3. What can be inferred about the role of artificial intelligence in gaming?

A．AI favors the businesses with small marketing budgets.

B．AI is expected to simplify game development processes.

C．AI allows startups to gain an edge over big firms with authorized data.

D．AI assistants may serve as human substitutes for studios.

4. What is this passage mainly about?

A．The evolution of graphics-processing units (GPUs).

B．The impact of generative AI on the gaming industry.

C．The societal significance of graphics-processing units (GPUs).

D．The challenges generative AI presents to gaming studios.

4 . 听下面一段对话，回答以下小题。
1. Why is the man sad?

A．He lost his phone.

B．He didn’t pass his test.

C．He could not get past a level in a game.

2. When does the woman usually play video games?

A．At work.

B．On her way to school.

C．At home with her friends.

3. What game does the woman recommend to the man?

A．Super Mario Brothers.

B．Angry Birds.

C．Pac-Man.

4. How does the man feel about the woman’s recommendation?

A．Excited.

B．Annoyed.

C．Uninterested.

5 . 听下面一段较长对话，回答以下小题。

1. How is the man feeling at the start of the conversation?

A．Doubtful.

B．Stressed.

C．Confident.

2. Where will the party be held?

A．In an apartment.

B．In a classroom.

C．In a gym.

3. How long will the party last?

A．For 4 hours.

B．For 3 hours.

C．For 2 hours.

4. What was the man’s favorite game as a child?

A．“Sleeping Lions”.

B．“Pass the Parcel”.

C．“Musical Statues”.

6 . Here’s an idyllic scene: a small village where the sun always shines crops always grow and your friends drop by to sweep your yard to the sound of guitar music. Animals do what they are told there is no disease and lending folks a helping hand makes you richer and wiser. Welcome to Farm Ville --- current population 69m and rising fast.

“It reminds me of my childhood,” says one player, Lia Curran, 37, a chemist from London. “Right now I’m growing wheat and poinsettia, I’ve got a small orchard and I’m keeping some chickens and some cows. I like having the animals. It’s comfortable.”

Curran’s young animals, however, are nothing more than a collection of computer-controlled cartoons. Farm Ville is an online computer game built into the social networking site Facebook and is described by its players as “addictive”. Launched last June by Zynga Game Network, Farm Ville now has more players than Twiter’s entire user base --- or more than the population of the UK. The players are largely women over the age of 35.

Jenny Glyn, 33, a London housewife, started playing in September. “I had a look at a friend’s farm and was hooked” she says. “My first motivation was to overtake her, but I did that pretty quickly. Now there’s something satisfying about growing crops.”

Farm Ville intellectually unites the worlds of social networking and gaming. Players are given a patch of ground with six fields, “cash”, a few seeds and a plough and have to build up wealth, skills and neighbors to create bigger, better, richer farms.

Inviting your online friends to play means you earn more and get free gifts; you rise rapidly through the first levels but once hooked have to work harder and harder with no final level or goal in sight. “It’s very moreish,” says Curran. She hasn’t yet paid real-world money to advance in the game, but her friends do. One buys extra virtual currency at the exchange rate of $240 (￡145) in Farm Ville for $40 (￡24) in the real world.

“I’d expanded on Farm Ville as much as I could, but I just wanted a pond and some bushes and trees around it,” says the woman, who is too embarrassed to be named. “I didn’t tell my husband I’d paid real money because he’d think I’m mad. But then he did keep me waiting in the car outside our house while he harvested his raspberries.”

Brian Dudley, chief executive at Broadway Lodge, an addiction treatment centre, warns that this sort of obsessive play can lead to an addiction as severe as gambling.

1. What does Curran do in the passage?

A．She is a player.	B．She is a farmer who grows wheat and poinsettia.
C．She is a chemist.	D．She is a housewife who raises chickens and cows.

2. By Farm Ville the writer means ________.

A．an addictive farm on which live 69 million farmers

B．a London housewife’s farm

C．an online computer game built into the social networking site

D．a farm on which people grow real crops and play as well

3. In the last but one paragraph the husband kept the woman waiting outside ________.

A．because he was angry at his wife’s being mad about the farm

B．because he himself was busy with his farm

C．in order to punish his wife for her having paid real money

D．so that his wife would wake up from her addiction to the farm

4. According to the passage which of the following is NOT true?

A．The population of the UK is less than 69 million.

B．This sort of obsessive play can cause very severe addiction.

C．Once hooked one has to make greater efforts to reach a higher level.

D．Up till now nobody has yet paid real-world money to advance in the play.

7 . “The opposite of play isn’t work; it’s depression,” says play researcher Stuart Brown. “The adult-play shortage is becoming a public health crisis.” Play may appear insignificant, but recent studies indicate it may be as essential as the need for sleep. Playfulness helps some young animals learn to master their bodies and their environments — and once they do, most stop playing as adults.

“Adult play promotes qualities that we humans could use more of,” says Jeff Harry, a play consultant. Unfortunately, social standards restrain (抑制) our urge to let loose. “Being a playful adult is really disapproved in our society,” he says. “You don’t want people to think that you’re childish.”

“It hasn’t always been this way,” says Peter Gray, a play researcher at Boston University. When Gray reviewed descriptions of the last remaining hunter-gatherer tribes, he noticed that they were often described as “good-humored” and “joyful”. “What we would call work — hunting and gathering — was fun,” he says. “Generally speaking, we like to do the things that are necessary for our survival. Humans took one giant step away from fun when we started planting crops. Then we invented factories and lost sight of play entirely,” Gray adds.

We may be able to reverse this situation, says Harry. As we fully make the transition to a knowledge-based economy, work and play are beginning to merge (合并) again. Some of today’s most successful companies, such as Google and Apple, were started by people tinkering (小修补) in their garages.

“Play is all about looking at a tough world with creativity and optimism,” Brown says. He goes so far as to declare that “adult play is necessary for our survival as a species”.

The next time I’m caught playing, I know exactly what I’ll say, “I am not wasting time, or acting immature. I’m playing for the benefit of all humanity. You’re welcome.”

1. Why does Stuart Brown consider adult play essential?

A．It promotes creativity.	B．It battles depression.
C．It facilitates cooperation.	D．It improves adaptivity.

2. What societal factor restrains adult play according to Jeff Harry?

A．Fear of judgment from others.	B．Lack of sufficient time for leisure.
C．Cultural emphasis on personal values.	D．Pressure from work-related responsibilities

3. Which statement will Peter Gray agree with according to Paragraph 3?

A．Adult play contributes positively to work.

B．Social attitudes toward play regularly shift.

C．Humans initially found joy in survival activities.

D．Industrialization closely connected work and play.

4. What is the purpose of the text?

A．To stress the significance of adult play.	B．To discuss the evolution of work and play.
C．To advocate playfulness in modern businesses.	D．To explore the impact of adult play on depression.

8 . 阅读下面短文，在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。

In recent years, the traditional Chinese card game of guandan     1    (welcome)by Chinese business people. Now, it is even being introduced to children     2    (improve)their soft skills.

According to local media reports,     3     local education group in Yichang, central Hubei province, is planning to add guandan to its curriculum for primary students     4     has already given each student their own pack of cards to practice with during the upcoming winter break.

Guandan,     5     literally means “throwing eggs,” is played by four people split(分成)into two teams using two decks of cards. Both teams take turns throwing out their cards in     6    (vary) set combinations, with the goal of shedding(去除) all their cards before the other team.

The name comes from the Chinese word for “egg”     7    (have)the same pronunciation as“bomb.” An     8    (estimate)140 million people play the game in China, which originates from the eastern Jiangsu province.

Gao Zhenghua, party secretary of Tianwen Education Group, told local media outlet Hubei Daily that the game will improve students’ “thinking ability,     9    (adaptable), resourcefulness, and teamwork skills.”

However, guandan's increasing associations     10     social networking among business people have also raised concerns that the game is inappropriate for children to play at an early age.

9 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。

1. What is the main topic of the article?

A．The popularity of online games.

B．The disappearance of traditional games.

C．The benefits of traditional games.

D．The differences between old and new games.

2. What did the teachers find out when they asked their students to write articles about games they knew?

A．More than half of the students wrote about outdoor games.

B．Most of the students wrote about traditional games.

C．Only a few students wrote about traditional games.

D．More than half of the students wrote about online games.

3. What does the educationist think about traditional games?

A．They are not as popular as modern games.

B．They are more popular than modern games.

C．They are easy to learn and play.

D．They are more difficult to learn and play than modern games.

4. What is the example of a jump rope game?

A．Rubber band jumping.

B．Hide-and-seek.

C．Teamwork game.

D．Long jump.

5. What is the situation with primary school students today?

A．They prefer to spend their breaks in the classroom.

B．They don’t have any studies to do.

C．They know how to play traditional games.

D．They don’t know how to play traditional games.

10 . 阅读下面短文，在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。

Despite being 75 years old, Chai Tixia’s expertise in Jianzi is truly impressive. With quick kicks, he effortlessly sends the Jianzi into the air and gracefully guides it to land    1     (gentle) on his head.

Jianzi,    2     game that dates back to the Han Dynasty, is surprisingly simple: players must keep the Jianzi in the air,    3     (use) any part of their body except their hands and arms. However, to master this game    4     (require) a lot of practice.

While enjoyed throughout China, Jianzi     5     (describe) by Chai as an important aspect of hutong culture. The narrow alleyways, situated within Beijing’s inner city, provide the setting for the game’s    6     (popular). Each mormning, Chai and his fellow hutong residents gather for their shared passion for Jianzi.

Chai’s spirited matches with his neighbors have a big audience     7     (draw) to the artistry and excitement of the game. The onlookers who watch them playing with great athleticism are amazed at     8     Chai and his fellow players can achieve.

Having practiced Jianzi for over 30 years, Chai cherishes the physical and social     9     (benefit) the game brings. Engaging in lively matches with his neighbors energizes his body, enhances his flexibility,     10     promotes unity within the community. Through Jianzi, Chai harvests not only health but a sense of belonging and friendship.