1 . Travel is like a box of chocolates: you never know what you’re going to get, especially when using a mystery box plane ticket. Earlier this year, mystery box travel purchases increased and became trendy among China’s young people. In normal trips, people often plan their vacations well in advance. After buying a mystery box at a low price — usually 100 or 200 yuan — however, the travelers using this method will select their departure airport and receive several destination options to choose from. After the destination is decided, their trip begins.
Liao Liangyu, 16, has turned his eagerness to go on a mystery box trip into reality. He took a mystery box trip to Changsha with a couple of friends months ago. Right before their departure, a friend told Liao that Changsha was a super hyped-up (被炒作的) Internet sensation (网红). But he still decided to go and see it for himself.
“My biggest discovery is that Changsha is a city full of contrasts,” Liao explained to China Daily. “You can see skyscraper (摩天大楼) and old houses in the same view.”
Since the destination options include many less popular cities, travel mystery boxes also bring energy and economic benefits to these destinations. For example, Dehong city is a beautiful city in Yunnan province, yet has few visitors due to a lack of promotion. Following its inclusion as a mystery box travel destination, however, it has gained a lot of attention and is now thought of as a solid location for tourism.
But even so, a large number of people feel disappointed with travel mystery boxes because they can encounter many problems after purchasing one, such as inappropriate travel time, sudden flight cancellations, or even challenges with refunds. Su Weili from Ctrip suggested in an interview with Haibao News that visitors should choose reliable platforms and sign contracts to guarantee their interests.
1. What is the appeal of mystery box travel?| A．Traveling with like-minded strangers. |
| B．Unplanned traveling at a low cost. |
| C．Fixed routes to choose from. |
| D．Popular destinations to visit. |
| A．He regretted traveling with his friends. |
| B．He felt Changsha didn’t deserve its fame. |
| C．He disliked the unpredictability. |
| D．He discovered something unexpected. |
| A．They help these places better known. |
| B．They often cause overcrowding. |
| C．They lead to environmental problems. |
| D．They enrich local people’s lives. |
| A．Reliable platforms to buy travel mystery boxes. |
| B．Various mystery box travel options available. |
| C．Potential issues related to travel mystery boxes. |
| D．Mystery box travel regulations and policies. |
2 . In early December, the US broke a terrible new record:38mass shootings in a single year, in which 203 people have died. This beat the previous record of 36 mass shootings, according to The Guardian. But why is there so much gun violence in the US? Although the issue is complicated, there are three big reasons: too many guns, weak gun laws and loopholes (漏洞), and cultural factors.
The US has a lot of guns –120.5guns for every 100 Americans, according to a 2017 survey. In other words, there are more guns than people in the US. This makes it easier for people to get guns.
Although US federal law says certain people can’t buy guns, it’s still fairly easy for Americans to buy them anyway, said Vox. A big part of this is loopholes in gun sales. In the US, when you buy a gun from a licensed shop or at a gun show, they have to check your background. But if you buy from a private seller, they don’t have to do that. Even in those cases where a background check is made, it can only take up to three days at most. If the seller does not receive a clear answer within three days, the seller can still sell the gun, reported CGTN.
The US also has a unique gun culture, influenced by the Second Amendment(第二修正案) of the US Constitution. Some people believe it gives them special rights, making them refuse to give up their guns for the greater good.
Despite these challenges, around 60 percent of Americans think gun violence is a big problem and want stricter gun laws, a 2022 Pew Research Center study said. But it’s unclear if US lawmakers, who listen to powerful gun groups like the National Rifle Association or Gun Owners of America, will make changes.
1. What are the main reasons for increasing gun violence in the US?a. the high ownership of guns b. the weak laws on buying guns
c. the light punishment on gun violence d. the right to have guns in the minds of Americans
| A．abc | B．abd | C．acd | D．bcd |
| A．won’t have any chance to buy guns | B．can purchase guns with a special license |
| C．can purchase guns from private sellers | D．can buy guns by showing their background |
| A．meaningless | B．costly | C．tough | D．possible |
A． | B． |
C． | D． |
1. 支持者的观点；
2. 反对者的观点；
3. 你的观点。
注意：
1. 写作词数应为80左右；
2. 不要出现真实的姓名和校名。
Whether to Study at Home or Abroad
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4 . People, especially adults, have every reason to be concerned about the impact addictive screens make on social skills among youngsters. Recently, researchers compared teachers’ and parents’ evaluation of children who started kindergarten in 1998 — six years before Facebook was launched — with that of those who began school in 2010, when the first iPad was released.
The idea for the study was inspired several years ago when Downey, lead author of the study, had an argument at a pizza restaurant with his son, Nick, about whether social skills had been suffering among the new generation of youngsters. “Nick asked me how I knew that. And that was when I realized there really wasn’t any solid evidence,” Downey said. So Downey, with his colleagues, decided to investigate.
For their study, they used data from the Barly Childhood Longitudinal Study (ECLS), which is run by the National Center for Educational Statistics. The ECLS followed children from kindergarten to fifth grade. The researchers compared data on the children who began kindergarten in 1998 (19,150 students) with that on those beginning kindergarten in 2010 (13,400 students). Results showed that children’s social skills did not decline between the 1998 and 2010 groups. And similar patterns remained as the children progressed to fifth grade. Even children within the two groups who had the heaviest exposure to screens showed similar development in social skills compared to those little screen exposure.
While Downey was initially surprised to see that time spent on screens didn’t affect social skills, he really shouldn’t have been. “There is a tendency for every generation at my age to start to have concerns about the younger generation. It is an old story,” he said. These worries often involve “moral panic” over new technology. Adults are concerned when technological change starts to erode traditional relationships, particularly the parent-child relationship.
New generations are learning that having good social relationships means being able to communicate successfully both face to face and online. “You have to know how to communicate by email, on Facebook and Twitter, as well as face to face. We just looked at face-to-face social skills in this study, but future studies should look at digital social skills as well.” Downey said.
1. What drove Downey to conduct the study?| A．To argue his friend down. | B．To build kids’ social skills. |
| C．To liberate kids from addictive devices. | D．To seek definite proof for his viewpoint. |
| A．They confirmed his previous belief. |
| B．They showed the impact of social media. |
| C．They totally disagreed with his assumption. |
| D．They got him more worried about younger generations’ social skills. |
| A．Enhance. | B．Damage. | C．Boost. | D．Prohibit. |
| A．As for new generations’ social skills, it’s necessary to readjust assessments. |
| B．It’s urgent to minimize the use of digital devices among young people. |
| C．Face-to-face exchanges may give way to online communication someday. |
| D．Unlike the old, youngsters are better at communicating in the Digital Age. |
内容包括：
1、描述现象；
2、表达自己的观点及理由。
注意：词数100词左右。
China—a Hot Destination for Studying Abroad
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________6 . They say the average person makes 35,000 decisions a day. Yet in her new book, How Woman Decide, Therese Huston explores a widespread phenomenon that many women fail to notice. “There’s a huge double standard when it comes to how men and women are viewed as decision-makers,” explains Therese, a psychologist from Seattle University. Therese decided to write the book after looking at her bookshelf: At one end, there were bestselling books about how to be a clever decision-maker — all written by men and featuring interviews with men like athletes. At the other end were books aimed at women on gaining leadership skills and confidence.
“Once those women are at the table, will their decisions be taken as seriously as men’s?” Therese wondered. “Men are respected as decision-makers more than women, especially in the workplace, largely because there’s this cultural belief that women are unable to make smart choices at work.”
So, Therese set out to pick apart the stereotypes to see what scientific research had found. “Scientific research shows that men and women struggle with decision-making equally. The only disadvantage I found was that during the teenage years — teenage girls are more indecisive than teenage boys. Otherwise, there’s little difference between the genders.”
However, there are some differences. “Women are more collaborative,” says Therese. “A female boss is more likely to ask the opinions of those around her when making a choice. Women ask for input, which helps make better decisions. However, this is often seen as a weakness rather than a strength.”
Therese also found that during times of stress, men and women make different choices, and the outcomes are often better when women are involved.
Study after study backs this view up. Neuroscientists Mara Mather and Nicole Lighthall from the University of Southern California studied the way men and women make decisions and found that in times of stress, they react very differently.
During their study, which involved playing a virtual gambling game, they found that when the females became stressed, they made smart decisions — quitting while they were ahead or taking safe bets. But when the men became stressed, they did the opposite, risking everything for a slim chance of a big win.
1. Therese Huston wrote the book How women Decide because she finds that ____________.| A．Women are less respected as decision makers. |
| B．Women are not equally treated in workplaces. |
| C．Women are unable to make smart choices. |
| D．Women are poor at making big decisions. |
| A．Men can make quicker decisions than women. |
| B．Women easily get stressed when making decisions. |
| C．Women are likely to ask for input when making decisions. |
| D．Teenage girls are less able to make decisions than teenage boys. |
| A．Women show less confidence in times of stress. |
| B．Men tend to make risky decisions in times of stress. |
| C．Men demonstrate great bravery in times of stress. |
| D．Women quit making decisions when ahead in games. |
| A．Women are brilliant as decision makers. |
| B．Men are weaker in making smart decisions. |
| C．We should give up all cultural beliefs about gender. |
| D．Great difference exists between the two genders in decision-making. |
7 . Everywhere I look, there are new buildings under construction. The neighborhoods that I knew as a boy, filled with beautiful old buildings, have mostly disappeared, and in their place, modern, high-rise buildings have appeared. There is good reason for this. Residents want all the conveniences of modern living. However, how can our children understand and maintain their cultural identity if we erase so much of the physical evidence of it?
The arguments for preserving historic buildings are not simply about an emotional attachment to the past. There are also good economic arguments in favour of preservation. The renovation (修缮) and preservation of historic districts can become an economic engine, drawing tourists and small businesses to the area. For example, in Dubai, the historic Al Bastikiya district draws thousands of tourists every year from all over the world. It also attracts local residents, eager to learn about their city's past.
Some have argued that historic preservation is too expensive, but many recent projects have demonstrated that this is not necessarily the case. In fact, renovation of an existing structure for adaptive reuse can cost about £40 per square metre less than even the most basic new construction, while preserving the beauty of the original building. And, although it is often claimed that old buildings have a more significant environmental footprint than new construction because they aren’t very energy efficient, architects and environmental experts maintain that the greenest building is the one that is already built. New construction almost always has a more serious environmental impact (影响) because it requires the use of all-new materials that must be transported, often over long distances, instead of recycled materials that are already on site. We recycle so many other things. We can and should recycle buildings, too.
Historic preservation is an option that opens many possibilities; demolition (拆毁), in contrast, is irreversible. Once these treasures are lost, they are lost forever, an important link in our heritage that can never be recovered.
1. What drives people to replace old buildings with new ones?| A．Their dislike of old buildings. | B．Their pride in cultural identity. |
| C．Their concern about young generations. | D．Their desire for modern comforts. |
| A．Historic renovation costs much money. |
| B．Local governments support small businesses. |
| C．Historic preservation brings economic benefits. |
| D．International tourism promises economic recovery. |
| A．It uses green materials. | B．It damages architectural beauty. |
| C．It reduces enviromental impact. | D．It worries environmental experts. |
| A．Positive. | B．Doubtful. | C．Disapproving. | D．Objective. |
8 . Street Art is a very popular form of art that is spreading quickly all over the world. You can find it on buildings, sidewalks, street signs and trash cans. Even art museums and galleries are collecting the work of street artists.
Art experts claim that the movement began in New York in the 1960s.
One well-known New York street artist is Swoon. She cuts out paper images of people and puts them on walls or sets them up on sidewalks.
In today’s world, the Internet has a big influence on street art.
| A．There are various forms of street art. |
| B．Street art has become a global culture. |
| C．Street artists do their work for some reason. |
| D．Swoon didn’t start her career as a street artist. |
| E．It was considered as a very new popular form of culture. |
| F．Artists can show their pictures to people all over the world. |
| G．Young adults sprayed (喷洒) words and other images on walls and trains. |
9 . In this day and age we live in, our life is taken over by technology. We can’t imagine our life without it, and listening to stories that my mom tells about how she grew up without the Internet or cell phones sounds like a nightmare to me.
Though technology is wonderful and we are used to it and have no desire to be without it, it can be a good idea to sometimes just unplug (拔掉) from it all. Have you ever woken up in the morning just to see you have actually replied to a message to which the reply either doesn’t make sense or you can’t even remember that you did reply? This can be one of the signs that you are allowing technology to take over your life.
It can be very difficult to pull yourself away from the technology and you will feel you are going to be separated from the things or people around and miss a lot, but is it really so bad to at least get away from it at night and make sure you get a good night’s rest? You may feel you don’t need a lot of sleep, but at the end of the day you are making it difficult to concentrate the next day.
So let’s pack away the technology for a few hours at night—you only have to make a few small changes. Turn off your cell phone and switch off your computer at night when you go to bed. If you feel you will use your phone during the night, charge your phone in another room.
Make enough sleep a priority and feel and look good the next day. You may think it is a really silly idea to be without a cell phone or a computer during the night, but once you do it a few times and you get enough sleep and feel refreshed the following day, you will understand why it is a good idea and will try and unplug more times.
1. Why does the author mention his mom’s stories?| A．To show life without the Internet. | B．To introduce the topic of the text. |
| C．To compare two generations’ life. | D．To analyze the effects of cell phones. |
| A．Carefree. | B．Sleepy. | C．Disconnected. | D．Comfortable. |
| A．Something important. | B．Something interesting. |
| C．Something amusing. | D．Something disturbing. |
| A．Sleep is the most important thing in our life. |
| B．It is silly without cell phones or computers. |
| C．We should try to switch off our electronic products for one night. |
| D．Turning off electronic products at night makes us energetic in daytime. |
10 . Schools need to give students all the tools they need to navigate the world when they graduate. Besides teaching the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic, teaching about mindfulness, and mental health are important life skills for young people to have. The state of Florida agrees.
Now, public schools in Florida have been required to teach five or more hours about mental health for students in grades 6 — 12. This new directive was approved by the Florida Board of Education in July and is being carried out as a potential lifesaver.
The new curriculum requires students to learn about the symptoms of mental illness and where to find help if they are feeling depressed or have other issues and even teaches the adolescents how to help their friends and classmates if they see them struggling.
“We know that 50 percent of all mental illness cases begin by age 14, so we are being active in our commitment to provide our kids with the necessary tools to see them through their successes and challenges. Providing mental health instruction is another important step forward in supporting our families,” Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran said.
Florida is the third state, following New York and Virginia in 2020, to pass laws that require mental health education in schools. According to CNN, the New York law updated the health curriculum to include mental health for elementary, middle and high school students. The Virginia law required that mental health education be provided for 9th and 10th graders.
These three states in the US are taking bold steps to help youth deal with the intricacy of life as they grow from adolescents into adults. It is a confusing world they face and giving them the tools to navigate it safely is essential. Mental health is something that should be taught in schools in all the US and across the globe.
1. What does Richard Corcoran intend to stress in paragraph 4?| A．The effect of mental illness cases. |
| B．The content of the health curriculum. |
| C．The step of mental health instruction. |
| D．The importance of mental health education. |
| A．A technology report. |
| B．A natural science magazine. |
| C．An educational website. |
| D．A government document. |
