1 . The rate of childhood obesity in the U.S. has tripled over the past 50 years. But what this trend means for children’s long-term health, and what to do about it (if anything), is not so clear.
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) made waves this year by recommending that doctors put obese kids as young as two years old on intensive, family-oriented lifestyle and behavior plans.
Yet the lifestyle programs the AAP recommends are expensive, inaccessible to most children and hard to maintain — and the guidelines acknowledge these barriers. Few weight-loss drugs have been approved for older children, although many are used off-label.
Rather than fixating on numbers on a scale, the U.S. and countries with similar trends should focus on an underlying truth: we need to invest in more and safer places for children to play where they can move and run around, climb and jump, ride and skate.
According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans, children between ages six and 17 should get at least an hour of moderate to intense physical activity every day. Yet only 21 to 28 percent of U.S. kids meet this target, two government-sponsored surveys found. The nonprofit Active Healthy Kids Global Alliance evaluates physical activity in American children, and in 2022 the group gave the U.S. a grade of D–.
Why is it so hard to get kids moving? In addition to fewer opportunities at school, researchers cite increased screen time, changing norms around letting kids play outdoors unsupervised, and a lack of safe places for them to play outside the home.
New York City, for example, had 2,067 public playgrounds as of 2019 — a “meager” amount for its large population, according to a report from the city comptroller — and inspectors found hazardous equipment at one quarter of them. In Los Angeles in 2015, only 33 percent of youths lived within walking distance of a park, according to the L.A. Neighborhood Land Trust. Lower-income neighborhoods tend to have the fewest public play spaces, despite often having a high population density.
Kids everywhere need more places to play: trails, skate parks and climbing walls, gardens and ball fields, bike paths and basketball courts. Vigorous public funding to build and keep up these areas is crucial, but other options such as shared-use agreements can make unused spaces available to the public.
A.Moving more may not prevent a child from becoming overweight, but studies show clearly that it helps both physical and mental health. |
B.And although rural areas have more undeveloped outdoor space, they often lack playgrounds, tracks and exercise facilities |
C.A lack of safe places for them to play outside the home also contributes to kids obesity. |
D.It also suggested prescribing weight-loss drugs to children 12 and older and surgery to teens 13 and older. |
E.Increased screen time and changing norms around letting kids play outdoors are unsupervised. |
F.They have significant side effects for both kids and adults. |
2 . Running is often tiring and a lot of hard work, but nothing beats the feeling you get after finishing a long workout around the track.
But while it’s long been believed that endorphins (内啡肽) —chemicals in the body that cause happiness—are behind the so-called “runner’s high”, a study suggested that there may be more to this phenomenon than we previously knew.
According to a recent study published by a group of scientists from several German universities, a group of chemicals called endocannabinoids (内源性大麻素) may actually be responsible for this familiar great feeling.
To test this theory, the scientists turned to mice. Both mice and humans release high levels of endorphins and endocannabinoids after exercise. After exercising on running wheels, the mice seemed happy and relaxed and displayed no signs of anxiety. But after being given a drug to block their endorphins, the mice’s behavior didn’t seem to change. However, when their endocannabinoids were blocked with a different drug, their runners’ high symptoms seemed to fade.
“The long-held notion of endorphins being responsible for the runner’s high is false. Endorphins are effective pain relievers, but only when it comes to the pain in your body and muscles you feel after working out,” Patrick Lucas Austin wrote on science blog Lifchacker.
Similar studies are yet to be carried out on humans, but it’s already known that exercise is a highly effective way to get rid of stress or anxiety. The UK’s National Health Service even prescribes (开药 方) exercise to patients who are suffering from depression. “Being depressed can leave you feeling low in energy, which might put you off being more active. Regular exercise can improve your mood if you have depression, and its especially useful for people with mild to moderate (中等的) depression,” it wrote on its website.
It seems like nothing can beat that feeling we get after a good workout, even if we don’t fully understand where it comes from. At least if we’re feeling down, we know that all we have to do is to put on our running shoes.
1. What did scientists from German universities recently discover?A.Working out is a highly effective way to treat depression. |
B.The runner’s high could be caused by endocannabinoids. |
C.Endorphins may contribute to one’s high spirits after running. |
D.The level of endorphins and endocannabinoids could affect one’s mood. |
A.To find what reduces the runner’s high symptoms. |
B.To see the specific symptoms of the runner’s high. |
C.To identify what is responsible for the runner’s high. |
D.To test what influences the level of endocannabinoids released. |
A.Effect. | B.Goal. | C.Opinion. | D.Question |
A.They can help ease depression symptoms. |
B.They are the best way to treat depression. |
C.They only work for those with serious depression. |
D.They can help people completely recover from depression. |
3 . Sportsmen in the running races of the Olympics are great athletes, but even the slow runners of the running world — joggers in the park — have good health. A study out this week in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology finds that even 5 to 10 minutes a day of slow running is enough to extend life by several years, compared with not running at all.
The new study focused on a group of more than 55, 000 men and women aged 18 to 100. About a quarter of them were runners. Over 15 years, those who ran just 50 minutes a week or fewer at a slow speed were less likely to die from either cardiovascular (心血管的) disease or other causes, compared with those who didn’t run at all.
The study suggests relatively low efforts are necessary to benefit from jogging, but it can be better to exercise more often. “A little bit is good but a little more is probably better,” says Dr. Aaron Baggish. A 2013 study in Denmark suggested that the secret of maximum longevity is up to 2. 5 hours of running a week.
Although running can make you less likely to have cardiovascular disease, it doesn’t entirely take the risk away from you. “There is no question that the healthier you are and the more exercise you do, the longer you’ll live and the better your quality of life will be,” Dr. Baggish says. “But it doesn’t mean you’ll never get sick.”
“Many long-term runners do not run because they want to live longer,” Dr. Baggish notes. “They run because it makes them feel better every day.”
For these runners, the cost of feeling good can be injuries, so Dr. Baggish supports the value of what he calls “active rest.” His belief, not supported by any recent research, is that it’s a good idea to spend 25% of exercise time over the course of a year running at a slow speed or doing other activities like swimming or biking.
1. What does the new study mainly show us?A.The best way to run. | B.The best time to run. |
C.The importance of running. | D.The popularity of running. |
A.It can result from running often. | B.It’s not completely preventable. |
C.It’s not so serious as most people think. | D.It can be treated by some kind of exercise. |
A.Staying active all the time. | B.Swimming more, run less. |
C.Having a big rest after doing sports. | D.Taking a little light exercise. |
A.Health. | B.Business. | C.Society. | D.Medicine. |
4 . There are many ways to travel within a city. We can walk, cycle, or take a bus. But no matter which way we travel, we have to follow the route (线路) the city planners laid down for us.
Parkour practitioners (跑酷爱好者), however, see the city in a completely different way. To them, there are no designed routes. There are no walls and no stairs — they jump, climb, roll and crawl to move across, through, over and under anything that they find in their path. The city is their playground.
The International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) has noticed that this activity is drawing more and more people to it — there are 100, 000 people taking part in parkour today in the UK alone, according to The Guardian — and how it is helpful for people to be much stronger: It trains coordination and balance. So the FIG is thinking about recognizing parkour as a new sport and adding it to the Olympics by 2024.
But parkour practitioners themselves don’t seem to be happy with the idea. They see parkour as “a lifestyle”, wrote the website NextSportStar. “It’s a competition against the conditions rather than just a sport.”
Indeed, many do parkour just to “escape the daily routine and experience the city in different ways”, wrote reporter Oli Mould on The Conversation. They see parkour as a way to express themselves through relaxing moves and creative routes while freeing themselves from the pressure.
It’s great that the FIG wants to develop a new sport and stay close to a new cultural form. But it would be greater if they knew that not everything in life is a competition.
1. How do the parkour practitioners do parkour?A.They plan the way themselves. |
B.They move on as they wish. |
C.They run faster than others. |
D.They follow certain routes. |
A.It’s a special way of life. |
B.It draws their attention. |
C.It helps balance people’s life. |
D.It’s good for people to keep healthy. |
A.It is more exciting than other sports. |
B.It is worth adding to the sporting event. |
C.It is more a lifestyle than a competition. |
D.It encourages people to challenge themselves. |
A.Parkour practitioners |
B.Making the city their own |
C.Training in a different way |
D.A new sports competition |
5 . Online training is one of the fastest growing parts of the fitness industry. If you’re considering joining the online fitness community, consider these benefits and drawbacks.
One of the most popular reasons for working out following an online video is that it offers ultimate convenience. No need to roll out of bed at 5 a. m. to attend that 6 a. m. boot camp class, which may end up being full when you arrive.
Online training also has broad offerings. When you head online, you have instructors from around the globe, all ready and willing to help you master your favorite moves.
All these are undoubtedly positive-online training provides fitness resources to general consumers wherever they are, without requiring access to a gym or fitness studio.
Very few online fitness programs enable the instructor to see you, check your form, and offer corrections based on your performance.
A.Another is the price. |
B.But it’s not without problems. |
C.The same goes for different types of exercise. |
D.However, online personal training isn’t for everyone. |
E.Instead, you can turn it on at home at your convenience. |
F.That being said, online workouts aren’t perfect when it comes to safety. |
G.This means you could perform exercises wrongly, or even unsafely, without knowing it. |
6 . Some people prefer to have a bite to eat before hitting the gym, known as a fed workout. Others would like to wait until after exercising to refuel their bodies, called a fasted workout.
If you want energy and strength for an ideal workout, you need fuel. A fed workout will provide your body with power. Eating before exercise may help you sustain longer sessions and lift heavier weights.
Many fitness enthusiasts are not on board with this idea. They report feeling sick and inactive while trying to exercise after eating. With a fasted workout, you may not get the usual indigestion. Experts for fasted workouts further claim that eating afterwards makes your body use its fat reserves for energy, meaning you will burn more fat.
Deciding when to eat for an ideal workout is a personal choice. Both fasted workouts and fed activities have their benefits and shortcomings.
A.However, a fasted workout might not work for you. |
B.How your body will respond is based on your workout intensity. |
C.These benefits can result in burning more fat and shaping a slimmer body. |
D.To eat or not to eat, that is the question on many fitness enthusiasts’ minds. |
E.Think thoroughly and discuss with your fitness instructor before taking a choice. |
F.Knowing what to eat for an ideal workout is just as important as knowing when to eat. |
G.A person doing a 30-minute session a day may not have a problem with fasted workouts. |
7 . As race season approaches, many runners have the same goal: go faster. But in a study published in the journal Current Biology, researchers show that speeding up might require us to resist our natural biology. By combining data from runners monitored in a lab along with 37,000 runs recorded on wearable fitness trackers, scientists have found that humans’ natural tendency is to run at a speed that conserves caloric loss—something that racers seeking to shave time off their miles will have to get over.
The research group have been studying the mechanics of running in labs for 15 years but hadn’t gotten a chance to study running in the wild before. “We joined the two datasets to gain new insights and combine the more messy wearable data with the gold standard lab experiments to learn about how people run out,” says co-author Jennifer Hicks.
What surprised the team was the consistency they found across the combined datasets. “We had assumed earlier that people ran faster for shorter distances and then would slow their pace for longer distances,” says first author Jessica Selinger. But this wasn’t the case. Most of the runners analyzed stuck with the same speed, whether they were going for a short run or a long one over ten kilometers.
From an evolutionary (进化) standpoint, it makes sense that people would run at the speed that uses the least amount of energy. This caloric conservation is something that has been observed across the animal kingdom. But humans’ reasons for running have changed, and if the goal is speed, there are some tricks runners can use.
Listening to music with a faster pace has been shown to help speed up stride (步伐) frequency, which increases running speed. In addition, picking faster running partners can give you a boost.
Hicks hopes that having large pools of fitness data from wearables will help researchers gain insights about populations. “You can look at connections with the built environment and access to leisure resources and start to layer all of that data to really understand how to improve physical activity and health more broadly,” says Hicks.
1. What do the racers have to overcome during the race?A.Energy consumption. | B.Muscle loss. |
C.Weakness of humanity. | D.Lack of nutrients. |
A.People would run in the wild rather than in labs. |
B.People adjust their speeds to different distances. |
C.People run at a constant speed regardless of distance. |
D.People possess enormous potential for running faster. |
A.To offer tips on speed increase. |
B.To evaluate the advantages of running. |
C.To explain the importance of fast running. |
D.To reveal the change in human running goals. |
A.Unclear. | B.Critical. | C.Doubtful. | D.Favorable. |
8 . Even light activity such as housework might help to keep the brain young, researchers say, adding to a growing body of evidence that, when it comes to exercise, every little helps.
Writing in the journal Jama Network Open, the international team of researchers report how they came to their findings by studying at least three days of activity-tracker data from 2,354 middle-aged adults from the US, together with the participants' brain scans.
From the latter, the researchers worked out individuals' brain volume, a measure linked to ageing: about 0.2% of the volume of the brain is lost every year after the age of 60. Loss or shrinkage (萎缩) of brain tissue is linked to dementia (痴呆), Spartano noted.
After taking into account factors including sex, smoking status and age, the team found that every extra hour of light physical activity per day was linked to 0.22% greater brain volume, equal to just over a year's less brain ageing. What's more, those who took at least 10,000 steps a day had a 0.35% greater brain volume than those who took, on average, fewer than 5,000 steps a day—equivalent to 1.75 years' less brain ageing.
However, the study has limitations. It used mainly white participants, and cannot prove cause and effect. The authors add that not all time spent sedentary is necessarily "bad" for the brain—particularly if people are engaged in a task that takes a lot of thinking.
Dr James Pickett, head of research at Alzheimer's Society, said, "Don't worry if you're not hill-running, but find something you enjoy and do it regularly, because we know that what's good for the heart is good for the head."
1. What can be inferred from the statistics in Paragraphs 3&4?A.Loss of brain tissue is linked to disease. |
B.Light physical activity raises the brain volume. |
C.Taking 10000 steps per day is best for our brain. |
D.Light physical activity slows down the brain ageing. |
A.Sitting. | B.Walking. | C.Sleeping. | D.Working. |
A.Doubtful. | B.Supportive. | C.Objective. | D.Indifferent. |
A.Regular exercise makes you happy. |
B.The more exercise, the better. |
C.Doing what you like regularly is beneficial. |
D.Light physical activities are the best. |
9 . Physical education, or PE, isn’t required for all high school students. In some schools, it isn’t offered for some different reasons. But should high school students have physical education? The answer is certainly “yes”.
Today many people don’t do sports. But as is known to all. doing sports is very important for an adult. Teaching teens the importance of a healthy lifestyle and making fitness plans now can help teens put exercise in the first place as an adult.
High school isn’t that easy. Many students are under a lot of stress. Stress can be harmful to a student’s studies and life. Doing sports can help them deal with stress better, helping them live a happier life at school.
The American Heart Association says that 10 million kids and teens suffer from obesity (肥胖). Teens should get 60 minutes of physical activity per day to control their weight and to help their bones get stronger. The increase in activities that don’t get teens to move around, such as computer games, means many teens don’t get their required exercise. PE classes act as a public health measure (措施) to encourage physical activities and help teens have healthy weights.
Not doing sports increases teens’ hazard of developing many diseases. An active lifestyle offers a good way of protection from these health problems. As much as 75 percent of health-care spending goes toward treating medical conditions that can be prevented by lifestyle changes, according to the American College of Sports Medicine.
According to the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition (PCFSN), students who performed five hours of physical activities each week improved their academic (学业的) performance. Students from programs with no physical activity, who used the extra time for classroom study, did not perform better on tests than those who gave up some study time in support of physical education.
1. According to Paragraph 2, what does physical education in high school mean?A.Making teens attach importance to ęxercise later. |
B.Removing the stress faced by teens at school. |
C.Getting teens to encourage adults to exercise. |
D.Helping teens learn to make good plans |
A.Happiness. | B.Risk. | C.Safety. | D.Sadness. |
A.means making students choose between sports and studies |
B.helps students make good use of all their time |
C.means students adjust to their studies better |
D.helps students do better in their studies |
A.Why high school students should receive physical education. |
B.Why some schools consider physical education important. |
C.How schools can help students love doing sports. |
D.How high school students can live a better life. |
10 . What is the best sport for your body type?
Just because someone has dreamt of playing football from childhood does not mean it is the best sport for him or her. Finding the sport your body is best suited to can make a big difference to how much you enjoy it and how good at it you are.
A person with an ectomorph body type is tall and slim with little fat or muscle. This person has narrow shoulders and hips, and thin arms and legs. Ectomorphs have difficulty putting on weight because of a fast metabolism (新陈代谢).
Mesomorph body types are the typical image of an athlete. Their arms and legs are muscular and they have broad shoulders and narrow hips. Mesomorphs can put on or lose weight easily and build muscle quickly.
A person who is an endomorph naturally carries more body fat. They are often short, with a high waist, and well developed upper arms and thighs.
It is important to note that the three body types are extremes. No one is 100% ectomorph or completely endomorph.
A.Everyone is a bit of a mix |
B.If you want to be a world champion |
C.If a person with this body type is very tall |
D.A person with this body type has more choice of sports |
E.For the same reason, it takes them longer to build muscle |
F.While it may seem that an endomorph will not be very athletic |
G.Endomorphs must work a little harder to maintain a perfect body weight |