1 . We live in a town with three beaches. There are two parts less than 10 minutes’ walk from home where neighborhood children gather to play. However, what my children want to do after school is pick up a screen — any screen — and stare at it for hours. They are not alone. Today’s children spend an average of four and a half hours a day looking at screens, split between watching television and using the Internet.
In the past few years, an increasing number of people and organisations have begun coming up with plans to counter this trend. A couple of years ago film-maker David Bond realised that his children, then aged five and three, were attached to screens to the point where he was able to say “chocolate” into his three-year-old son’s ear without getting a response. He realised that something needed to change, and, being a London media type, appointed himself “marketing director from Nature”. He documented his journey as he set about treating nature as a brand to be marketed to young people. The result was Project Wild Thing, a film which charts the birth of the World Network, a group of organisations with the common goal of getting children out into nature.
“Just five more minutes outdoors can make a difference,” David Bond says. “There is a lot of really interesting evidence which seems to be suggesting that if children are inspired up to the age of seven, then being outdoors will be on habit for life.” His own children have got into the habit of playing outside now: “We just send them out into the garden and tell them not to come back in for a while.”
Summer is upon us. There is an amazing world out there, and it needs our children as much as they need it. Let us get them out and let them play.
1. What is the problem with the author’s children?| A．They often annoy their neighbours. | B．They are tired of doing their homework. |
| C．They have no friends to play with | D．They stay in front of screens for too long. |
| A．By making a documentary film. | B．By organizing outdoor activities. |
| C．By advertising in London media. | D．By creating a network of friends. |
| A．records | B．predicts | C．delays | D．confirms |
| A．Let Children Have Fun | B．Young Children Need More Free Time |
| C．Market Nature to Children | D．David Bond: A Role Model for Children |
2 . With the young unable to afford to leave home and the old at risk of isolation(孤独), more families are choosing to live together.
The doorway to peace and quiet, for Nick Bright at least, leads straight to his mother-in-law, she lives on the ground floor, while he lives upstairs with his wife and their two daughters.
Four years ago they all moved into a three-storey Victorian house in Bristol - one of a growing number of multigenerational families in the UK living together under the same roof. They share a front door and a washing machine, but Rita Whitehead has her own kitchen, bathroom, bedroom and living room on the ground floor.
“We floated the idea to my mum of sharing at a house,” says Kathryn Whitehead. Rita cuts in: “We spoke more with Nick because I think it’s a big thing for Nick to live with his mother-in-law.”
And what does Nick think? “From my standpoint, it all seems to work very well. Would I recommend it? Yes, I think I would.”
It’s hard to tell exactly how many people agree with him, but research indicates that the numbers have been rising for some time. Official reports suggest that the number of households with three generations living together had risen from 325,000 in 2001to 419,000 in 2013.
Other varieties of multigenerational family are more common. Some people live with their elderly parents; many more adult children are returning to the family home, if they ever left. It is said that about 20% of 25-34-year-olds live with their parents, compared with 16% in 1991.The total number of all multigenerational households in Britain is thought to be about 1.8 million.
Stories like that are more common in parts of the world where multigenerational living is more firmly rooted. In India, particularly outside cities, young women are expected to move in with their husband’s family when they get married.
1. Who mainly uses the ground floor in the Victorian house in Bristol?| A．Nick. | B．Rita. | C．Kathryn | D．The daughters. |
| A．Positive. | B．Carefree. | C．Tolerant. | D．Unwilling. |
| A．Family traditions. | B．Financial reports. | C．Published statistics. | D．Public opinions. |
| A．Lifestyles in different countries. | B．Conflicts between generations. |
| C．A housing problem in Britain. | D．A rising trend of living in the UK. |
3 . We’ve all been there: in a lift, in line at the bank or on an airplane, surrounded by people who are, like us, deeply focused on their smartphones or, worse, struggling with the uncomfortable silence.
What’s the problem? It’s possible that we all have compromised conversational intelligence. It’s more likely that none of us start a conversation because it’s awkward and challenging, or we think it’s annoying and unnecessary. But the next time you find yourself among strangers, consider that small talk is worth the trouble. Experts say it’s an invaluable social practice that results in big benefits.
Dismissing small talk as unimportant is easy, but we can’t forget that deep relationships wouldn’t
even exist if it weren’t for casual conversation. Small talk is the grease(润滑剂) for social communication, says Bernardo Carducci, director of the Shyness Research Institute at Indiana University Southeast. ＂Almost every great love story and each big business deal begins with small talk,＂ he explains. ＂The key to successful small talk is learning how to connect with others, not just communicate with them.＂
In a 2014 study, Elizabeth Dunn, associate professor of psychology at UBC, invited people on their way into a coffee shop. One group was asked to seek out an interaction(互动) with its waiter; the other, to speak only when necessary. The results showed that those who chatted with their server reported significantly higher positive feelings and a better coffee shop experience. ＂It’s not that talking to the waiter is better than talking to your husband,＂ says Dunn. ＂But interactions with peripheral(边缘的) members of our social network matter for our well-being also.＂
Dunn believes that people who reach out to strangers feel a significantly greater sense of belonging, a bond with others. Carducci believes developing such a sense of belonging starts with small talk. ＂Small talk is the basis of good manners,＂ he says.
1. What phenomenon is described in the first paragraph?| A．Addiction to smartphones. |
| B．Inappropriate behaviours in public places. |
| C．Absence of communication between strangers. |
| D．Impatience with slow service. |
| A．Showing good manners. | B．Relating to other people. |
| C．Focusing on a topic. | D．Making business deals. |
| A．It improves family relationships. | B．It raises people’s confidence. |
| C．It matters as much as a formal talk. | D．It makes people feel good. |
| A．Conversation Counts | B．Ways of Making Small Talk |
| C．Benefits of Small Talk | D．Uncomfortable Silence |
4 . In the days before the Internet, critical thinking was the most important skill of informed citizens. But in the digital age, according to Anastasia Kozyreva, a psychologist at the Max Planck Institute of Human Development, and her colleagues, an even more important skill is critical ignoring.
As the researchers point out, we live in an attention economy where content producers on the Internet compete for our attention. They attract us with a lot of emotional and eye-catching stories while providing little useful information, so they can expose us to profit-generating advertisements. Therefore,we are no longer customers but products, and each link we click is a sale of our time and attention. Toprotect ourselves from this, Kozyreva advocates for learning the skill of critical ignoring, in which readers intentionally control their information environment to reduce exposure to false and low-quality information.
According to Kozyreva, critical ignoring comprises three strategies. The first is to design ourenvironments, which involves the removal of low-quality yet hard-to-resist information from around. Successful dieters need to keep unhealthy food out of their homes. Likewise, we need to set up a digital environment where attention-grabbing items are kept out of sight. As with dieting, if one tries to bank onwillpower not to click eye-catching “news”, he’ll surely fail. So, it’s better to just keep them out of sightto begin with.
The next is to evaluate the reliability of information, whose purpose is to protect you from false and misleading information. It can be realized by checking the source in the mainstream news agencies which have their reputations for being trustworthy.
The last goes by the phrase “do not feed the trolls.” Trolls are actors who internationally spread false and hurtful information online to cause harm. It may be appealing to respond to them to set the facts straight, but trolls just care about annoying others rather than facts. So, it’s best not to reward their bad behaviour with our attention.
By sharpening our critical ignoring skills in these ways, we can make the most of the Internet while avoiding falling victim to those who try to control our attention, time, and minds.
1. What can we learn about the attention economy from paragraph 2?| A．It offers little information. | B．It features depressing stories. |
| C．It saves time for Internet users. | D．It seeks profits from each click. |
| A．To discuss the quality of information |
| B．To prove the benefits of healthy food. |
| C．To show the importance of environments. |
| D．To explain the effectiveness of willpower. |
| A．Reveal their intention. | B．Turn a deaf ear to them. |
| C．Correct their behaviour. | D．Send hard facts to them. |
| A．Reasons for critical thinking in the attention economy. |
| B．Practising the skill of critical ignoring in the digital age. |
| C．Maximizing the benefits of critical ignoring on the Internet. |
| D．Strategies of abandoning critical thinking for Internet users |
5 . Social media is taking over our lives: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and now, TikTok. These social media platforms have changed from a way to stay connected to an industry where even kids can make money off their posts. While this may seem like another opportunistic innovation, it’s really full of hidden false realities.
The median income (中位收入) recorded in the United States of America was about $63,000 in 2018. TikTokers can make anywhere from $50,000 to $150,000 for a TikTok brand partnership, and TikTokers with over a million followers can make up to $30,000 a month—$360,000 a year. They are making more than the average person trying to feed their family and keep a roof over their heads simply by posting a 15-second video.
This is mad in more ways than one. Not only is it an overpaid “job”, it promotes undeserved admiration from viewers and a false sense of reality. Many of these famous TikTokers are still teens and the effects of fame at such an early stage in life might cause issues later in life, such as mental illness. Teens between the ages of 13 and 17 make up 27% of TikTok viewers, who can be easily influenced by what they are watching. They can put a false sense of self-value into who they look up to and what they represent: money, fame, being considered conventionally attractive.
While TikTok has become a great tool for marketing, it’s important to understand how this content affects young viewers. If we’re constantly consuming content that shows us all we need to do to be successful is be conventionally attractive and post a 15-second video featuring a new dance, it will challenge our knowledge of what really makes someone successful and will in turn affect our individual work ethnics (伦理). What about the people who miss birthdays and family holidays due to their jobs and aren’t getting paid nearly as much as these TikTokers?
Richard Colyer, president and creator of Metaphor, Inc, had his own view on this issue. “It sounds great that kids can make money for doing the latest dance moves in a 15-second video, but we should feed the minds of kids and not just their bank accounts. TikTok can be great if used properly. Money alone is not good; technology alone is not good and connectedness can be bad if it is only online.”
Again, as a fellow consumer of TikTok, I do enjoy the app when I have some time to kill and need a good laugh. I’m not against someone making a living on entertainment, but what does getting famous by posting a 15-second video teach young people?
1. What does the underlined word “this” in Paragraph 1 refer to?| A．Social networking. |
| B．A job offered by TikTok. |
| C．Making money on social media. |
| D．Staying connected to the Internet. |
| A．TikTokers can hardly make ends meet. |
| B．Social media platforms like TikTok can make people overpaid. |
| C．Teens are wise to make a huge amount of money from TikTok. |
| D．TikTokers earn such a high income that they can support their family. |
| A．They are likely to develop false values. |
| B．They tend to live an adult life too soon. |
| C．They are forced to pay for certain services. |
| D．They may stop believing other social media. |
| A．Contents of videos need checking before their release online. |
| B．We have a responsibility to supply teens with food for thought. |
| C．Young TikTokers should be banned from opening bank accounts. |
| D．Money and technology can be good if used properly by TikTokers. |
6 . In 1970s, a psychologist named J. P. Guilford conducted a famous study of creativity known as the nine-dot puzzle (九点谜题). He challenged research subjects to connect all nine dots using just four straight lines without lifting their pencils from the page. All the participants limited the possible solutions to those within the imaginary square. Only 20 percent managed to break out of the confinement (束缚) and continue their lines in the white space surrounding the dots.
The fact that 80 percent of the participants were effectively blinded by the boundaries of the square led Guilford to jump to the sweeping conclusion that creativity requires you to go outside the box. The idea went viral. Overnight, it seemed that creativity experts everywhere were teaching managers how to think outside the box. The concept enjoyed such strong popularity that no one bothered to check the facts. No one, that is, before two different research teams-Clarke Burnham with Kenneth Davis, and Joseph Alba with Robert Weisberg-ran another experiment.
Both teams followed the same way of dividing participants into two groups. The first group was given the same instructions as the participants in Guilford’s experiment. The second group was told that the solution required the lines to be drawn outside the imaginary box. Guess what? Only 25 percent solved the puzzle. In statistical terms, this 5 percent improvement is insignificant as this could be called sampling error.
Let’s look a little more closely at the surprising result. Solving this problem requires people to literally think outside the box. Yet participants’ performance was not improved even when they were given specific instructions to do so. That is, direct and clear instructions to think outside the box did not help. That this advice is useless should effectively have killed off the much widely spread — and therefore, much more dangerous — metaphor (比喻) that out-of-the-box thinking boosts creativity. After all, with one simple yet brilliant experiment, researchers had proven that the conceptual link between thinking outside the box and creativity was a misunderstanding.
1. What did the nine-dot puzzle study focus on?| A．Visual perception. |
| B．Thinking patterns. |
| C．Practical experience. |
| D．Theoretical knowledge. |
| A．To test the catchy concept. |
| B．To contradict the initial idea. |
| C．To collect supporting evidence |
| D．To identify the underlying logic. |
| A．Groundless. | B．Inspiring. | C．Fruitless. | D．Revealing. |
| A．Puzzle Solving: A Key To Creativity |
| B．Thinking Outside the Box: A Misguided Idea |
| C．Nine-Dot Puzzle: A Magic Test |
| D．Creative Thinking: We Fell For The Trap |
7 . “Shuan Q” is a meme(网络流行语)which can be used as a popular way to say “I’m speechless” with a matching emoji(表情包)at ached behind. No-one can deny the power of the Internet. Some believe it makes language weaker but some see a brighter side, believing it makes online communication easier between strangers.
An elementary school teacher in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, says that the evolution of Internet slang is not all fun and carefree. From his daily observations, he believes the “geographic boundary” between Internet slang and formal language is disappearing. On many occasions, the composition she has received from pupil have been flooded with abbreviated slangs(网络梗).
During last year’s Two Sessions, several representatives put forward proposals such as “regulating online language” and “banning vulgar(粗俗)words”, specifically to address this issue, expressing the need to reduce online language misuse and strengthen the protection of Chinese.
However, many experts and scholars of linguistics and communication including Feng Zhiwei disagree. Feng, believes that Internet language is a natural product of the dynamic development of language, and it is not necessary to ban it.
1. What made the meme “Shuan Q” become popular?| A．The power of internet | B．The protection of Chinese |
| C．Geographic boundary | D．Strangers’s communication |
| A．They are formal. | B．They are funny and carefree. |
| C．They are flooded among pupils. | D．They were supported by all people. |
| A．They are natural. | B．They are misused. |
| C．They should be banned. | D．They are disappearing. |
| A．Doubtful | B．Objective | C．Indifferent | D．Favorable |
8 . 假定你是校学生会主席李华，最近发现不少同学沉迷于购买盲盒。请给校英文报写一封 倡议书，号召理性消费，内容包括:
1.陈述所观察到的现象:
2.提出建议并给出理由。
参考词汇: 盲盒blind boxes
注意:
1.写作词数应为80左右:
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Dear fellow students,
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The Students’ Union
9 . Science reporting on climate change does lead Americans to adopt more accurate beliefs and support government action on the issue, but these gains are fragile, a new study suggests. Researchers found that these accurate beliefs fade quickly when people are exposed to coverage skeptical of climate change.
“It is not the case that the American public does not respond to scientifically informed reporting when they are exposed to it,” said Thomas Wood, associate professor of political science at the Ohio State University. “But even truly accurate science reporting recedes from people’s frame of reference very quickly.”
Results showed that accurate science reporting didn’t persuade only politicians and people who initially rejected human-caused climate change also had their opinions shifted by reading accurate articles. The study involved 2,898 online participants who participated in four waves of the experiment during the fall of 2020.
In the first wave, they all read authentic articles in the popular media that provided information reflecting the seientifie views on climate change. In the second and third waves, they read either another scientific article, an opinion article that was skeptical of climate science, or an article on an unrelated subjeet. In the fourth wave, the participants simply were asked their beliefs about the science of climate change and their policy attitudes.
To rate participants’ scientific understanding. the researchers asked after each wave if they believed that climate change is happening and has a human cause. To measure their attitudes, researchers asked participants if they favored government action on climate change and if they favored renewable energy.
“What we found suggests that people need to hear the same accurate messages about climate change again and again. If they only hear it once, it recedes very quickly,” Wood said. It was significant that accurate reporting had positive effects on all groups, including those who originally rejected climate change. But it was even more encouraging that it affected attitudes.
1. What does the underlined word “recedes” in paragraph 2 mean?| A．Increases. | B．Graduates. | C．Disappears. | D．Strikes. |
| A．The research object. | B．The research result. |
| C．The research purpose. | D．The research procedure. |
| A．To survey the government’s satisfaction rate. |
| B．To make an assessment on their attitudes. |
| C．To teach them scientific understanding. |
| D．To measure action on climate change. |
| A．Science Report Of Climate Change Can Affect Minds |
| B．Online Participants Joined In A Four-Wave Experiment |
| C．Accurate Science Reporting Don’t Persuade Only Politicians |
| D．People Should Hear Accurate Messages About Climate Change |
10 . Eventually, the changes that will strengthen stepfamilies will likely come from shifts in cultural prejudices. Such change is slow, but there are signs that some movement along this line is beginning to take place. For instance, Roger Coleman, a clergyman in Kansas City, Mo., performs marriage ceremonies specifically designed to include children when a parent remarries. In years of officiating second marriages, he says, he became keenly aware of the confusion and insecurities of the children, and the ceremony — which includes a special medal worn by the child — aims to celebrate the “new family” and move the church beyond mere criticism of divorce. This year, Coleman says, over 10,000 families across the country will use the medal in their remarriage ceremony.
Similar changes are occurring in public schools around the country. One of the difficulties for stepfamilies is that schools and other public institutions have typically not recognized the stepparent as a valid parent; school registration forms, field trip permission slips, health emergency information — none of these required or acknowledged the stepparent. The message, whether intended or not, has been that only biological parents count. It’s a message that the stepparent and stepchild internalize, worsening what’s often an already difficult relationship, and one which the larger community takes as another sign that stepfamilies are not legally recognized in American society. Through the efforts of the Step-family Association of America and other advocates, schools around the country have begun changing their policies to acknowledge the increasingly important role of stepparents.
Change is also evident in a marketplace eager to exploit this wide social trend. In a particularly American sign of the times, the Hallmark greeting card company, is about to launch a line of cards devoted entirely to non- traditional families. The cards never use the word “step”, but most of the “Ties That Bind” line is clearly aimed at people who have come together by remarriage rather than biology — or, as one card puts it, “Thrown together without being asked, no chance of escape.” Some are straightforward (“There are so many different types and ways to be a family today”), while others are more indirect (“It’s like at a puzzle where the pieces aren’t where they used to be”). But all are aimed at the vast and growing market of people who don’t identify with the old definitions of family, and who are finding ways to make their new families work. Who knows — soon there may even be a card Tori La Londe can send to her former husband’s former mother-in-law.
1. The marriage ceremonies performed by Roger Coleman _________.| A．always make children feel confused and insecure |
| B．are more romantic than any other marriage ceremony |
| C．are designed to include some children to create an exciting atmosphere |
| D．are arranged to let children attend their parent’s remarriage ceremonies |
| A．biological parents are irreplaceable in the growth of a child |
| B．stepparents are no substitute for the biological ones |
| C．traditional views on the family structure still persist |
| D．efforts are made to facilitate the present situation |
| A．Businesses can benefit more from new patterns of families |
| B．People begin to be open to different new definitions of family |
| C．Sending cards is a good way to tie the bond of the family |
| D．Ex-husband’s ex-mother-in-law plays an important role in the family |
| A．The increasingly important role of stepparents. |
| B．The practical ways to strengthen the stepfamilies. |
| C．The difficulties that are facing the stepfamilies. |
| D．People’s gradual recognition towards stepfamilies. |
