1 . I work at a grocery store in Montreal's Plateau neighbourhood, which gets a lot of regulars. On March 12, the Quebec government announced to close all public places to stop the spread of the pandemic(流行病)of coronavirus.
The next day the store was the busiest I've ever seen. The six cash registers had to be kept open from 10 a. m. until close. It was nuts. I didn't have time to eat lunch, and whenever one of us on cash had to use the bathroom, we’d have to bring in a coworker off the floor to cover for us.
Since then, the atmosphere in the store has been different. Customers are mostly considerate, but whenever someone coughs or sneezes, everyone turns around to make sure that person sneezed into their elbow. I've even seen customers come in wearing some strange get-ups. One guy even came in with a plastic Walmart bag wrapped around his entire head, with a slit cut out for his eyes.
A lot of my coworkers have left to avoid a public-facing job during the pandemic. Grocery store workers across Canada are putting their health at risk every time they come in to work, but a lot of us are still making close to minimum wage. I realized that I feel more exhausted than normal even though I'm working the same hours.
There still have been some moments of kindness in the midst of the chaos. I've overheard people talking on the phone who sounded as though they were organizing grocery deliveries for those stuck at home. And this past weekend a very nice lady thanked us for continuing to work. I know everyone is worried, but it's uneless having the same scary conversations day after day. Instead, tell us a funny anecdote, or about Homething nice. We'll appreciate the distraction, and you'll make our day just a bit brighter.
1. What does the author intend to show by " It was nuts." in paragraph 2?| A．The goods were in short supply. |
| B．The store was having a big sale. |
| C．The cashiers complained about their work. |
| D．The locals rushed to do shopping like crazy. |
| A．They like to shop here in disguise. |
| B．They are panicky about the disease . |
| C．They are more friendly to each other. |
| D．They have taken proper preventive measures. |
| A．Optimistic. | B．Talented. | C．Ambitious. | D．Efficient. |
| A．It is not work but worry that kills |
| B．Helping others is helping ourselves |
| C．Moments of kindness shine in a time of chaos |
| D．Here is what it's like working in the pandemic |
2 . Communities across the world are starting to ban facial recognition technologies. The efforts are well intentioned, but banning facial recognition is the wrong way to fight against modern surveillance （监 视）.Generally, modern mass surveillance has three broad components: identification, correlation and discrimination.
Facial recognition is a technology that can be used to identify people without their consent. Once we are identified, the data about who we are and what we are doing can be correlated with other data. This might be movement data, which can be used to "follow” us as we move throughout our day. It can be purchasing data, Internet browsing data, or data about who we talk to via email or text. It might be data about our income, ethnicity, lifestyle, profession and interests. There is an entire industry of data brokers who make a living by selling our data without our consent.
It's not just that they know who we are; it's that they correlate what they know about us to create profiles about who we are and what our interests are. The whole purpose of this process is for companies to treat individuals differently. We are shown different ads on the Internet and receive different offers for credit cards. In the future, we might be treated differently when we walk into a store, just as we currently are when we visit websites.
It doesn't matter which technology is used to identify people. What's important is that we can be consistently identified over time. We might be completely anonymous （匿名的）in a system that uses unique cookies to track us as we browse the Internet, but the same process of correlation and discrimination still occurs.
Regulating this system means addressing all three steps of the process. A ban on facial recognition won't make any difference. The problem is that we are being identified without our knowledge or consent, and society needs rules about when that is permissible.
Similarly, we need rules about how our data can be combined with other data, and then bought and sold without our knowledge or consent. The data broker industry is almost entirely unregulated now. Reasonable laws would prevent the worst of their abuses.
Finally, we need better rules about when and how it is permissible for companies to discriminate. Discrimination based on protected characteristics like race and gender is already illegal, but those rules are ineffectual against the current technologies of surveillance and control. When people can be identified and their data correlated at a speed and scale previously unseen, we need new rules.
Today, facial recognition technologies are receiving the force of the tech backlash （抵制），but focusing on them misses the point. We need to have a serious conversation about all the technologies of identification, correlation and discrimination, and decide how much we want to be spied on and what sorts of influence we want them to have over our lives.
1. According to Para. 2, with facial recognition _______.| A．one’s lifestyle changes greatly |
| B．one's email content is disclosed |
| C．one's profiles are updated in time |
| D．one's personal information is released |
| A．discrimination based on new tech surveillance is illegal |
| B．different browsing data bring in different advertisements |
| C．using mobiles anonymously keeps us from being correlated |
| D．data brokers control the current technologies of surveillance |
| A．people's concern over their safety |
| B．the nature of the surveillance society |
| C．proper regulation of mass surveillance |
| D．the importance of identification technology |
| A．call for banning facial recognition technologies |
| B．advocate the urgent need for changes in related laws |
| C．inform readers of the disadvantages of facial recognition |
| D．evaluate three broad components in modem mass surveillance |
3 . As computers become all the more popular in China, Chinese people are increasingly relying on computer keyboards to input Chinese characters. But if they use the computer too much, they may end up forgetting the exact strokes（笔画）of each Chinese character when writing on paper. Experts suggest people, especially students, write by hand more.
Do you write by hand more or type more? In Beijing, students start using a computer as early as primary school(小学). And computer dependence is more wide-spread among university students. Almost all their assignments and essays are typed on a computer.
All the students interviewed say they usually use a computer.
It's faster and easier to correct if using a computer. And that's why computers are being applied more and more often to modern education. But when people are taking stock in computers increasingly, problems appear.
"When I'm writing with a pen, I find I often can't remember how to write a character, though I feel I’m familiar with it."
"I'm not in the mood(状态) to write when faced with a pen and paper."
Many students don't feel this is something to worry about. Now that it's more convenient and efficient to write on a computer, why bother to handwrite?
Many educators think differently. Shi Liwei , the headmaster of a famous primary school in the capital said "Chinese characters enjoy both practical and aesthetic(审美的) value. But those characters typed with computer keyboards only maintain their practical value. All the artistic beauty of the characters is lost. And handwriting contains the writer's emotion. Through one's handwriting, people can get to know one's thinking and personality. Beautiful writing will give people a better first impression of them"
To encourage students to handwrite more, many primary schools in Beijing have made writing classes compulsory(必修的)and in universities, some professors are asking students to hand in their homework and essays written by hand.
1. Which of the following can best serve as the title of the passage?| A．The Importance of Handwriting and Typing. |
| B．To Type or To Hand Write |
| C．Writing By Computer Will Replace Writing By Hand |
| D．Practical and Aesthetic Value of Chinese Characters. |
| A．they are usually asked to e-mail their Homework and Essays |
| B．they can correct the mistakes they make quickly and conveniently |
| C．they find it not easy to remember how to write a character |
| D．computers have become a trend and fashion in China. |
| A．Handwriting contains the writer's emotion. |
| B．The writer’s thinking and personality are shown in his or her handwriting, |
| C．Handwriting can impress people well and build one’s self-confidence |
| D．Chinese characters enjoy both practical and aesthetic value. |
| A．getting bored with | B．getting dependent on |
| C．becoming crazy about | D．getting curious about |
4 . Infectious diseases and associated deaths have reduced, but they remain a significant threat throughout the world. Infectious diseases outbreaks and the fear and panic that accompany them present various economic risks.
First, there are costs to the health system, both public and private, of medical treatment of the infected and of outbreak control. Concern over the spread of a relatively contained outbreak can lead to decreased trade. Travel and tourism to regions affected by outbreaks are also likely to decline. Some long-running outbreaks, such as HIV, prevent foreign direct investment.
The economic risks are large. It is estimated that the expected yearly cost of infectious diseases is at roughly $500 billion. Even when the health impact of an outbreak is relatively limited, its economic consequences can quickly become expanded. Liberia, for example, saw GDP growth decline 8 percentages from 2013 to 2014 during the Ebola outbreak in Africa.
The risk is complex, but policymakers have tools in response.
Investing in improved health care, supply of clean water, and better health systems can reduce the frequency of human contact with viruses. Investment in reliable disease monitoring in both human and animal populations is also critical. Within formal global watch systems, instead of discouraging reporting possible outbreaks, it may be beneficial to develop incentives for reporting suspected cases, as countries may reasonably fear the effects of such reporting on trade, tourism, and other economic outcomes. Informal monitoring systems, social media for example, which collect information from official reports, media reports, online discussions, and eyewitness observations, can also help national health systems and international responders get ahead of the outbreak news during the early stages. Cooperations for monitoring infectious diseases readiness at the national level provide information national governments can use to react timely to their outbreaks.
There is a significant market failure when it comes to vaccines (疫苗) against individual low-probability viruses that collectively are likely to cause panic. Given the low probability that any single vaccine of this type will be needed, high Research and Development (R&D) costs, and delayed returns, medical companies hesitate to invest in their development. However, responsible international corporations such as CFPI can overcome this market failure. Its goals include advancing candidate vaccines against specific low-probability, high-severity viruses through proof of concept to enable rapid clinical testing in the event of outbreaks. It also aims to fund development of institutional and technical platforms to speed R&D in response to outbreaks for which there are no vaccines.
Undoubtedly, humans and infectious viruses will coexist. However, we can take effective measures to manage the risk of the diseases. Joint action now at the local, national, and multinational levels can go a long way toward protecting our collective well-being in the future.
1. What does the underlined word ''incentives'' in Paragraph 5 probably mean?| A．Habits. | B．Opinions. |
| C．Arguments. | D．Rewards. |
| A．is able to predict the trend of the market |
| B．develops vaccines against infectious viruses |
| C．makes huge profits by selling general medicine |
| D．employs staff who graduate from famous universities |
| A．More importance should be attached to health care systems. |
| B．All-level cooperations are required to handle infectious diseases. |
| C．It will not be long before mankind thoroughly defeats the viruses. |
| D．Technologies hold the key to the settlement of medical problems. |
| A．Health Risks and Research of Infectious Diseases |
| B．Global Cooperation and Spread of Infectious Diseases |
| C．Economic Impact and Solutions of Infectious Diseases |
| D．Medical Service and Development of Infectious Diseases |
5 . Picture this: It’s 2003 and your family has just finished arguing over which Netflix movies to rent that week. Movies come in the mail and the family watch them throughout the week before sending them back and ordering new ones. Then, fast forward to 2008, and you have started to watch TV shows on Netflix’s new platform.
Now, let’s come to the present. You sit down and open up Netflix on your TV and scroll for a while. Then you flip over to Hulu to see if they have anything more interesting to offer. Then you check HBO GO. Finally, you check Disney+. Then you realize that you’re paying for four different streaming services, maybe more.
Let’s return to Netflix. More generally, streaming. There are over 100 video streaming services available, as well as quite a few music streaming, including Apple Music, YouTube Music, Google Play, and etc. The streaming world, at least to some, is on its way to getting out of control, with each service requiring its own monthly subscription. And that is just entertainment subscriptions. We haven’t even taken into account subscriptions like Microsoft Office, magazine subscriptions, and email newsletters. Subscriptions started out as a service of convenience, but now, the oversaturation may have become burdensome. The services believe customers will pay more to get the content they want. However, statistics show a growing frustration(失望) among consumers. With so many options, they find it harder than ever to make a decision on what to pick.
Not only does the oversaturation of streaming result in confusing navigation, it also creates a financial burden for the consumers. Let’s say if you want to watch Stranger Things , The Handmaid’s Tale , and Game of Thrones , which belong to three different services, you would have to pay nearly $50 a month to access all three of those services, meaning it’s not cheaper, and potentially more expensive, than cable.
People cut their cords and went the streaming route because it was simpler and cheaper. Now, it’s just as inconvenient and difficult as cable was, if not more so, and unless you’re limiting yourself to one service, it’s not cheaper. Streaming will survive because we’re in a Golden Age of Media and because each service is able to create high-quality originals. But Golden Ages don’t last, and bubbles tend to burst. Until the inevitable(不可避免的) day when some product or service proves streaming out of date, we must suffer the choices in front of us. The next time you are scrolling through Netflix, Hulu, or whatever, and the overchoice is killing you, maybe you should just go pick up a book instead.
1. What is mainly talked about in the first two paragraphs?| A．Social progress has promoted the quality of life in the past decade. |
| B．Changes in home entertainment have brought us more options. |
| C．Technology innovation results in different ways of relaxation. |
| D．Netflix has been developing its service patterns. |
| A．The large number of subscriptions. |
| B．The frustration caused by poor service. |
| C．The rapidly developing entertainment market. |
| D．The confusing navigation resulting from streaming. |
| A．enhance user satisfaction |
| B．increase energy consumption |
| C．raise entertainment costs |
| D．realize the resource sharing |
| A．the streaming service will have a bright future |
| B．reading has an advantage over streaming service |
| C．there will be some better service to replace streaming |
| D．nothing can end streaming services as long as media exists |
6 . Do You Have Enough Time?
Experiences are more likely than material goods to deliver happiness. But the fear of choosing to pursue the wrong experience, and therefore wasting valuable time, is something many of us feel deeply.
There's something funny to this-we have more free time now, but for a number of reasons, it doesn't feel that way.
In his book Spending Time, Daniel Hamermesh explains that while our lifetimes have gotten a bit longer-13% since 1960-our spending power has increased by 198%. “It makes it difficult to stuff all the things that we want and can now afford into our limited available time to purchase and to enjoy them over our lifetimes,” he writes.
Next, there's our cell-phone addiction. American adults spend around 3. 5 hours on their devices each day, trying to keep up with the emails, social media updates and 24/7 news. And much of our time is “contaminated time”-when we’re doing one thing but thinking about something else. It makes us think we're being productive, but really it just makes us feel more worn out.
Add to this the ever expanding options in today's experience economy. Think of all the pop-ups, plays, workshops and escape rooms you could go to tonight. No wonder many of us suffer from what psychologists call “time famine”. No wonder we're seeing books about attaining more of our time and letting go of cell phones, like Jenny Odell’s How to Do Nothing.
There've been calls to control the attention economy, but the factors that make us feel time-poor aren't going away anytime soon. Tech companies, for instance, may have built apps to tell you how much time you spend on your device, but their business models rely on your continued use.
As for me, I have characterized experiences as "rubbish food" or "superfood”. Rubbish? Spending too much time indoors on Facebook or TV, alone. Superfood? Getting offline and outside and doing things for or with others and staying active.
These experiences require that we actually take time off-not easy in a culture attaching so much importance to productivity. But researchers say sometimes it's about changing our thoughts of leisure activities. Harvard's Anat Keinan has found a helpful way: we're more likely to go camping if we acknowledge it will be good for our productivity at work. Similarly, we often choose uncollectable experiences that give us a story to tell, as we like to feel we're accomplishing something. Keinan has also argued that while we often feel good about ourselves by choosing work over leisure, in the long term we're likely to regret this, feeling we've missed out on “the pleasures of life.
Time is our least renewable resource. It's good for us to consider if we're using it wisely.
1. Which of the following statements can best explain “contaminated time" in paragraph 4?| A．Checking emails frequently. |
| B．Scanning Twitter while watching TV. |
| C．Looking up new words in the homework. |
| D．Keeping up with the social-media updates. |
| A．Our lifetimes have become longer than decades ago. |
| B．We're too addicted to our mobile phones. |
| C．Our spending power has sharply increased. |
| D．There are an increasing number of things for us to experience. |
| A．uselessness | B．value |
| C．management | D．shortage |
| A．cut down the eating of rubbish food and enjoy superfood more |
| B．experience something relaxing if it adds to our work performance |
| C．make wise use of time by choosing work over leisure activities |
| D．use a time-management app to know how we spend our time |
The endless choice gives birth to anxiety in people's lives.
People are having a debate about whether
Because deaf people can’t hear, they have special ways of communicating. For example, they can learn to understand what someone is saying by looking at the mouth of the speaker. This
10 . Weekly Round-up
1. What can you infer from News 1?
| A．Chinese tourists will not do any harm to wildlife from now on. |
| B．The tours are specially designed for Chinese to protect wildlife. |
| C．Many tourists in China have a strong sense of animal protection. |
| D．The tours make more tourists become interested in wild animals. |
| A．Most Chinese students will no longer go abroad for education. |
| B．Most Chinese students studying abroad plan to work in China. |
| C．Chinese students studying abroad can find jobs easily in China. |
| D．Chinese students studying abroad can get well-paid jobs in China. |
| A．227,086 Chinese learners have been to America to study languages |
| B．Chinese has become the most popular language in the United States |
| C．passengers are not allowed to drink or eat on the Beijing subway |
| D．passengers will be punished and fined if they eat or drink on the subway |
