1 . While English is getting more important in our schools, Chinese has become popular among foreign kids. But Chinese can be more difficult to learn. At least 16-year-old Piao Chenglong thinks so. “English is easier for me. Chinese characters (汉字) have too many strokes (笔画),” said Piao. “But I want to learn it. I want to study at Beijing University when I grow up.” Piao is from Korea. He came to China in 2008.
In Korea, there are more than 300, 000 Chinese learners like Piao. Some Korean students begin to learn to write the language on their first day at school. To help students learn Chinese, Korea holds speaking competitions for high school students every year.
Chinese isn’t just popular in Korea. People from all the world want to learn it. The Ministry of Education of China says that nearly 130 million people from 85 countries are learning Chinese. This number will be increasing to 800 million in the coming years.
In America, Chinese is the second most popular foreign language after Spanish. Some American middle schools have Chinese classes. Students learn to make jiaozi and tie Chinese knots (中国结). Some even try to write and draw in the Chinese way!
People want to learn Chinese because China is becoming such an important country. Foreign countries want to understand China better to help them with business. The Chinese government is also helping the world learn Chinese. It has sent more than 200 Chinese teachers to more than 60 countries in the world. Many more Confucius Institutes (孔子学院) will be set up in the world. These institutes will teach Chinese to foreign students.
1. Which of the following is the topic sentence for the text?| A．Chinese has become popular among foreign kids. |
| B．Chinese can be more difficult to learn. |
| C．In America, Chinese is the second most popular foreign language after Spanish. |
| D．Students learn to make jiaozi and tie Chinese knots. |
| A．China. | B．America. | C．Korea. | D．Spain. |
| A．making jiaozi |
| B．writing and drawing in the Chinese way |
| C．tying Chinese knots |
| D．singing Chinese songs |
| A．Because Chinese is getting more important in their schools. |
| B．Because Chinese characters have too many strokes. |
| C．Because the number of people learning Chinese will be 800 million. |
| D．Because China is becoming more and more important in the world. |
2 . 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 |
3 . Is there a single word that motivates us more than “weekend”? It’s like the promise of a sweet holiday following what seems like long-time exhaustion. It’s the spring in our step that gets bouncier with each passing day — until by Friday, we’re practically bumping our heads against the ceiling.
The trouble is that the weekend is a rip-off. You think you’re getting 48 hours of unconditional downtime, but reality takes a discount. In fact, it takes most of Sunday. That’s when anxiety comes creeping in and another countdown begins: 12 hours until Monday. Sure, the weekend is free time. But the mounting stress of an incoming Monday can ease any joy you might get from a Sunday evening.
That feeling is so common among the Monday-to-Friday crowd that there’s even more than one name for it: the Sunday Scaries, or Sunday Fear Syndrome. Going from a countdown to the weekend to a countdown to Monday can be difficult. Even monster.com — a website that specializes in binding humans to the Monday-to-Friday cycle — admits it’s a problem. In a survey, Monster found that 76% of Americans have “really had” Sunday night blues.
For most people, Sunday is no holiday at all. It may all come down to the same problem: We can’t stop thinking about tomorrow. Even worse, we may develop some downright unhealthy coping strategies for that transition from weekends to Monday. Some might resists — staying up late, milking every minute of a fleeting Sunday in the form of mind-numbing distractions.
But why should Monday cast such a long and fearful shadow on our lives? Maybe it’s because the counter is reset and the weekend, or happiness, seems at furthest point. If, like most of us, you have a tolerable job, but don’t much like the whole idea of working, there are plenty of ways to make Mondays a little less stressful. Most importantly, don’t leave any unsettled Friday business hanging over the weekend. So, clear the decks and tie up loose ends.
1. What do we know about the weekend in Paragraph 2?| A．It is hard-earned. |
| B．It doesn’t bring joy as expected. |
| C．It adds to people’s anxiety and stress. |
| D．It provides good time to relax. |
| A．To clarify a question. | B．To show its popularity. |
| C．To provides an illustration. | D．To support his idea. |
| A．Tolerant. | B．Conservative. | C．Unwise. | D．Practical. |
| A．Why People Are Stressed Out on Fridays |
| B．Why Monday Takes a Bite out of Sunday |
| C．Why a Countdown to the Weekend Is Difficult |
| D．Why Monday Casts a Fearful Shadow on Our Lives |
4 . My phone was an extension of myself. I couldn’t go anywhere
When I was watching TV shows or movies and there was a boring part, I
I have welcomed silence into my life with open arms and am enjoying the increased
As much as having a smartphone was
| A．through | B．without | C．despite | D．upon |
| A．updates | B．instructions | C．assessments | D．decisions |
| A．symbol | B．responsibility | C．reality | D．addiction |
| A．conscious | B．shameful | C．foolish | D．random |
| A．sell | B．pull | C．throw | D．mind |
| A．avoided | B．denied | C．missed | D．allowed |
| A．assist | B．improve | C．associate | D．occupy |
| A．requests | B．thoughts | C．directions | D．comments |
| A．instead of | B．regardless of | C．but for | D．apart from |
| A．creativity | B．productivity | C．knowledge | D．independence |
| A．routine | B．necessity | C．loneliness | D．temptation |
| A．genuine | B．grateful | C．direct | D．desperate |
| A．naturally | B．certainly | C．seemingly | D．gradually |
| A．wonder | B．imagination | C．interest | D．authenticity |
| A．depressive | B．comfortable | C．stressful | D．boring |
5 . In a video from Visit Iceland, a crew is seen working on making a horse-sized keyboard out of massive blocks of wood. The keyboard is then put outside against the gorgeous scenery for the typing horses to reply to emails. Unsurprisingly, the replies are nonsense, with examples listed as “bpnisi. // hihaihf＝. sf”. “OutHorse Your Email” is Iceland’s latest stunt (噱头) to promote tourism. Visitors can choose a trained horse to type responses to their work emails when they are on holiday.
Due to the pandemic, many workers have transitioned to remote working, finding that the lines between their work and personal lives have become blurred. A survey conducted by Visit Iceland revealed that 59% of people globally now feel as if their boss, colleagues, and customers expect them to reply when on holiday and 41% of people check their work emails between one and four times a day when on holiday. That’s why Iceland is assigning emails to its horses, asking them to make replies.
“When visitors travel to Iceland, we want them to fully experience everything our nation has to offer, from breathtaking surroundings to endless landscapes," said the head of Visit Iceland. "Our OutHorse Your Email service lets them do just that. With our world-first service, we hope to appeal to people to disconnect and take a well-deserved, uninterrupted break.”
Since “OutHorse Your Email” service was launched, it has got a lot of attention from the Internet. “Is it a ridiculous tourism stunt? Sure. But it indeed encourages me to enjoy my trip wholeheartedly,” said Thom Dunn, an online user from Canada. Hunter Boyce from the USA also made a comment, “The service sounds interesting, but I don’t want to drive my boss mad or be fired.”
1. What can we know about the typing horses?| A．They are trained to reply to emails. |
| B．They type meaningful emails. |
| C．They reply to emails in famous scenic spots. |
| D．They work with a common keyboard. |
| A．Unclear. |
| B．Unimportant. |
| C．Controllable. |
| D．Adjustable. |
| A．To reduce people’s pressure. |
| B．To fight against the pandemic. |
| C．To encourage undisturbed trips. |
| D．To improve visitors’ work efficiency. |
| A．Ambiguous. |
| B．Negative. |
| C．Favourable. |
| D．Indifferent. |
6 . Popularization has in some cases changed the original meaning of emotional intelligence. Many people now misunderstand emotional intelligence as almost everything desirable in a person’s makeup that cannot be measured by an IQ test, such as character, motivation, confidence, mental stability, optimism and “people skills.” Research has shown that emotional skills may contribute to some of these qualities, but most of them move far beyond skill-based emotional intelligence.
We prefer to describe emotional intelligence as a specific set of skills that can be used for either good or bad purposes. The ability to accurately understand how others are feeling may be used by a doctor to find how best to help her patients, while a cheater might use it to control potential victims. Being emotionally intelligent does not necessarily make one a moral person.
Although popular beliefs regarding emotional intelligence run far ahead of what research can reasonably support, the overall effects of the publicity have been more beneficial than harmful. The most positive aspect of this popularization is a new and much needed emphasis (重视) on emotion by employers, educators and others interested in promoting social well-being. The popularization of emotional intelligence has helped both the public and researchers re-evaluate the functionality of emotions and how they serve people adaptively in everyday life.
Although the continuing popular appeal of emotional intelligence is desirable, we hope that such attention will excite a greater interest in the scientific and scholarly study of emotion. It is our hope that in coming decades, advances in science will offer new perspectives (视角) from which to study how people manage their lives. Emotional intelligence, with its focus on both head and heart, may serve to point us in the right direction.
1. What is a common misunderstanding of emotional intelligence?| A．It can be measured by an IQ test. |
| B．It helps to exercise a person’s mind. |
| C．It includes a set of emotional skills. |
| D．It refers to a person’s positive qualities. |
| A．To explain a rule. |
| B．To clarify a concept. |
| C．To present a fact. |
| D．To make a prediction. |
| A．Favorable. |
| B．Intolerant. |
| C．Doubtful. |
| D．Unclear. |
| A．Emotional intelligence is emphasized by all the people. |
| B．People who are highly emotionally intelligent are honourable persons. |
| C．The research we do at present cannot reasonably support popular beliefs of emotional intelligence. |
| D．Emotional intelligence contribute a lot to the qualities like character, motivation, confidence and so on. |
| A．Its appeal to the public. |
| B．Expectations for future studies. |
| C．Its practical application. |
| D．Scientists with new perspectives. |
7 . Since the first Earth Day in 1970, Americans have gotten a lot “greener” toward the environment. “We didn’t know at that time there even was an environment, let alone that there was a problem with it,” says Bruce Anderson, president of Earth Day USA.
But what began as nothing important in public affairs has grown into a social movement .Business people, political leaders, university professors, and especially millions of grass-roots Americans are taking part in the movement. “The understanding has increased many， many times,” says Gaylord Nelson, the former governor from Wisconsin, who thought up the first. According to US government reports, emissions (排放)from cars and trucks have dropped from 10.3 million tons a year to 5.5 tons .The number of cities producing CO beyond the standard has been reduced from 40 to 9. Although serious problems still remain and need to be dealt with, the world is a safer and healthier place. A kind of “Green thinking” has become part of practices.
Great improvement has been achieved. In 1988 there were only 600 recycling programs; today in 1995 there are about 6,600. Advanced lights, motors, and building designs have helped save a lot of energy and therefore prevented pollution.
Twenty –five years ago, there were hardly any education programs for environment. Today, it’s hard to find a public school, university, or law school that does not have such a kind of program. “Until we do that, nothing else will change!” says Bruce Anderson.
1. According to Anderson, before 1970, Americans had little idea about ___.| A．the social movement | B．recycling techniques |
| C．environmental problems | D．the importance of Earth Day |
| A．The grass –roots level. | B．The business circle. |
| C．Government officials. | D．University professors. |
| A．They have cut car emissions to the lowest. |
| B．They have settled their environmental problems. |
| C．They have lowered their CO levels in forty cities. |
| D．They have reduced pollution through effective measures. |
| A．Education. | B．Planning |
| C．Green living | D．CO reduction |
Did you grow up in one culture, your parents came from another, and you are now living in a
The term “third-culture kid”
Yet many
9 . In our modern world, when something wears out, we throw it away and buy a new one. The
How did we
Another cause is our
Our appetite for new products also
All around the world, we can see the
Maybe there is another way out. We need to repair our possessions
| A．key | B．reason | C．project | D．problem |
| A．gifts | B．rubbish | C．debt | D．products |
| A．face | B．become | C．observe | D．change |
| A．hide | B．control | C．replace | D．withdraw |
| A．Thanks to | B．As to | C．Except for | D．Regardless of |
| A．safe | B．funny | C．cheap | D．powerful |
| A．love | B．lack | C．prevention | D．division |
| A．sensitive | B．kind | C．brave | D．busy |
| A．ways | B．places | C．jobs | D．friends |
| A．donate | B．receive | C．produce | D．preserve |
| A．adapts | B．returns | C．responds | D．contributes |
| A．tired of | B．addicted to | C．worried about | D．ashamed for |
| A．newer | B．stronger | C．higher | D．larger |
| A．pick up | B．pay for | C．hold onto | D．throw away |
| A．advantages | B．purposes | C．functions | D．consequences |
| A．show | B．record | C．decrease | D．measure |
| A．technology | B．environment | C．consumers | D．brands |
| A．However | B．Otherwise | C．Therefore | D．Meanwhile |
| A．by | B．in favour of | C．after | D．instead of |
| A．spending | B．collecting | C．repairing | D．advertising |
10 . Humans have long known that being in nature is good for the mind and body. From indigenous (本土的) adolescents completing the adult ceremony in the wild to modern East Asian cultures taking “forest baths”, many have looked to nature as a place for healing and personal growth. But the question still remains. How can nature make it?
There is no doubt that being in nature reduces the physiological symptoms of stress in our bodies. What this means is that we are less likely to be anxious and fearful in nature, and therefore we can be more open to other people and creative patterns of thought. Also, nature often leads to awe, wonder and respect, all these emotions facilitating everything from physical to mental health. There is also some evidence that exposure to nature impacts the brain. Viewing natural beauty makes specific reward circuits in the brain associated with dopamine release, a chemical that gives us a sense of purpose, joy and energy to pursue our goals.
But, regrettably, people seem to be spending less time outdoors and less time in nature than before. It is also clear that, in the past 30 years, people’s levels of stress and sense of “busyness” have risen dramatically. These joint forces have led environmental writer Richard Louv to coin the term “Nature Deficit Disorder”—a form of suffering that comes from a sense of disconnection from nature and its powers.
Perhaps we should take note and try a course corrective. The 19th century philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote about nature, “There I feel that nothing can befall me in life—no disgrace, no calamity.” The science speaks to Emerson’s intuition. It’s time to realize that nature is more than just a material resource. It’s also a pathway to human health and happiness.
1. Why are “indigenous adolescents” and “modern East Asian cultures” mentioned in paragraph 1?| A．To clarify a viewpoint. | B．To answer the question below. |
| C．To present the natural scenery. | D．To show the cultural differences. |
| A．Restricting. | B．Exposing. | C．Promoting. | D．Covering. |
| A．Uneasy. | B．Indifferent. | C．Humorous. | D．Proud. |
| A．Is It Time to Challenge Yourself in Nature? |
| B．Do You Know Nature Is a Material Resource? |
| C．Why Do We Care about the Natural Environment? |
| D．What Can Happen When We Connect with Nature? |
