1 . Rubbish of all kinds is piling up in landfill and polluting our rivers and oceans. A more recent addition to the list of things we discard is e-waste — electronic items that are broken and not recycled. A UN report claims the 50 million tonnes of e-waste produced every year will more than double to 110 million tonnes by 2050, making it the fastest growing waste stream in the world. Now ways are being found to give it a new life.
There’s a growing trend for repair events and clubs which could be part of a solution to the growing amount of electrical and electronic garbage. The BBC visited a Restart Project in London, which is one of the many found around the world. One of its volunteers, Francesco Calo said, “This project allows you to reduce waste, lengthen the life of objects, and it helps people who cannot afford to get rid of items that have developed a fault. ”
Electronics consist of materials like plastic, metals, chemicals and glass. As many electrical items contain valuable metals, another idea is e-waste mining. An experiment at the University of New South Wales includes extracting (提取) these materials from electronic items. It’s thought that doing this could be more profitable than traditional mining. With phones typically containing as many as 60 components, this could be part of the solution to our appetite for new technology.
These projects make total sense — collections of e-waste for recycling are not progressing or even decreasing according to Ruediger Kuehr of the United Nations University. And in countries where there are no recycling laws, much of it is got rid of. However, the European Union, for example, is trying to settle the problem by insisting business firms have to make appliances longer-lasting and have to supply spare parts for machines for up to 10 years.
1. What does the underlined word “discard” in Paragraph 1 mean?| A．throw away | B．take apart |
| C．make the best of | D．put together |
| A．Collect electronic garbage. | B．Use their electronics longer. |
| C．Buy good-quality electronics. | D．Get jobs in recycling companies. |
| A．Hard plastic. | B．Precious metals. |
| C．Toughened glass. | D．Various chemicals. |
| A．Improving recycling process. | B．Replacing spare parts timely. |
| C．Using electronics permanently. | D．Making e-waste recycling laws. |
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 2002 to 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．Family traditions. | B．Financial reports. |
| C．Public opinions. | D．Published statistics. |
| A．A rising trend of living in the UK. | B．Conflicts between generations. |
| C．A housing problem in Britain. | D．Lifestyles in different countries. |
1. 简述你校食堂餐桌浪费现象；
2. 提出解决办法；
3. 倡议共同行动。
注意：1. 可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯；
2. 词数100左右（开头已经给出，但不计入总词数)。
参考词汇：节约 thrift； 光盘行动 “Clean Your Plate” campaign
Dear fellow students,
I am Li Hua, president of the Student Union.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The Student Union
赞成(45%) | 反对(50%) | 没有发表意见(5%) |
| 1.很多人只是聊天或玩电子游戏，浪费时间； 2.很多网站内容不适合学生。 | 1.上网是现代化的交流方式； 2.查阅信息，上网校，收发电子邮件等。 | 征求编辑的意见 |
1.可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯；
2.词数：100词(开头语已为你写好，但不计入总数)。
Dear Editor,
Some students go to the net bars near our school almost every day.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Yours sincerely,
Li Hua
采访内容:
1.你或你身边的人在日常生活中使用移动支付的情况；
2.移动支付带来的好处
3.你的看法。
参考词汇: 微信: Wechat 支付宝: Alipay 二维码: QR code
注意:1.词数120左右;
2.可适当增加细节，以使行文连贯
Dear Jenny,
How is your survey on mobile payment going？ ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Yours faithfully
Li Hua
6 . How important is fish farming? Very. Although it's an ancient business, the rise of aquaculture has been one of the biggest revolutions in food supply over the past half century.
Aquaculture has made fish more affordable for consumers around the world, popularizing the consumption of what used to be expensive, and easing the pressure on hard-pressed wild stocks. Aquaculture also has many clear environmental benefits: compared with other ways of growing animal protein, it uses little or no land, and has low greenhouse emissions. And while the world has traditionally had a bad record of regulating wild fishing, fish farming generally occurs within the boundaries of governments, meaning it should, in theory, be much easier to ensure that good practices are upheld.
Crowding large numbers of fish into limited spaces means that waste products, including waste, uneaten food and dead fish, are poured into the surrounding waters, polluting them. Besides, the pesticides and drugs used to treat conditions that upset fish in concentrated numbers can also affect local wildlife. Many farmed fish are fed on other fish, so the industry also puts pressure on wild stocks：about a fifth of all caught fish, some 18 million tonnes, is used for fish oil and fishmeal production. There is also the problem of fish escaping, with potentially dangerous effects on surrounding ecosystems.
In 2018 the Scottish Parliament’s environment committee published a report into the fish farming industry’s environmental effects, stating that key problems simply hadn’t been tackled, and that the Scottish government’s plan to double salmon output by 2030 could cause“irrecoverable damage”to ecosystems. Since then, protections have been toughened. There is now more pressure from regulators to situate farms in remote, deep-water locations. Meanwhile, though, catches of Scottish wild salmon have fallen to their lowest level since records began in 1952. “There are good reasons for fish farming and real dangers to it as well. ”concludes an official. “The question is how to make it work. ”
1. How has fish farming benefited people?| A．It has many clear environmental effects. |
| B．It can monitor the wild fish in 1imited areas. |
| C．It makes it easier for more people to consume fish. |
| D．It’s easier for the government to make fish product. |
| A．The reasons for fish farming. | B．The downsides of aquaculture. |
| C．The development of sea exploring. | D．The effects on surrounding ecosystems. |
| A．The massive fish farming may damage ecosystems. |
| B．The problems of fish farming are likely to be solved. |
| C．The fish farming industry has no effect on environment. |
| D．The Scottish government plans to double fish output now. |
| A．Objective. | B．Doubtful. | C．Critical. | D．Disapproving. |
7 . Modeste Traore has lived his whole life near Lake Wegnia, in the Sahel area of Mali. The lake’s fish have provided him with a way to earn money to support his extended family. How-ever, because he can’t catch enough fish to feed his family, he now raises farm animals. But as temperatures rise, evaporation increases, making the body of water shrinks. Studies have linked rising temperatures on Earth’s surface to climate change.
The lake is shrinking, so are the chances of his children becoming fishermen. “If things go on like this, I don’t think our children can become fishermen like us. They will have to choose other jobs,” the 56-year-old Traore said. “During the rainy season, there is a lot of water but as soon as it’s over, there is no water left in the lake. We are fishermen. I don’t think our children will be,” he said.
Lake Wegnia is in the Sahel region of Koulikoro, around 120 kilometers north of Mali’s capital, Bamako. Some 12,000 people, including fishermen and farmers, depend on it for food, water and employment. But the lake has shrunk by 20 percent since 2017.
The UN expects temperatures there to increase 1.5 times higher than the average increase worldwide. UN officials note that the flooding and a severe lack of rainfall can cause problems in the Sahel: Food insecurity, the fight over farmland and the fast population growth can lead to conflict.
Aid group is leading the Eco-Lac Wegnia project. The group is working to improve water management and fight the effects of global warming. Moussa Savagodo is Eco-Lac Wegnia’s local representative. He says that failing to make changes quickly can mean the lake will disappear completely in less than 5 years.
People in the rural areas Wegnia and Kononi-Sirakoro have planted 56,000 trees in the past two years. And they are better controlling their water by building stone barriers to help the soil keep the rain that does fall. The progress and international official support are not enough for them, however. More and more people are turning to other agriculture.
1. How did Traore work to support his family in the past?| A．By fishing. | B．By raising farm animals. |
| C．By taking charge of the lake. | D．By working as an environmentalist. |
| A．A lot of farmland will form. |
| B．The rainy season will end early. |
| C．Many fishermen will flee their homes. |
| D．The later generation will change their careers. |
| A．Drought and flood will directly cause conflict. |
| B．Reducing population is a way to protect the lake. |
| C．Water management makes no difference to the lake. |
| D．The rise in temperature will cause water resource problems. |
| A．The local officials. | B．The Aid group members. |
| C．The villagers. | D．The representatives. |
Chinese has overtaken French, Spanish and German to become one of the most popular foreign languages for job seekers in the UK. Research shows graduates in Chinese earn
“I had a lot of friends on other courses
Hannah describes her course as "majorly intense”,
“Most of my friends admitted to crying in the first week oweing
“The degree is
Hannah went to look for a job in Shanghai, where she found more employment
9 . Hardware in general, and smartphones in particular, have become a huge environmental and health problem in the Global South' s landfill sites(垃圾填埋场).
Electronic waste(e-waste) currently takes up 5 percent of all global waste, and it is set to increase rapidly as more of us own more than one smartphone, laptop and power bank. They end up in places like Agbogbloshie on the outskirts of Ghana's capital, Accra.It is the biggest e-waste dump in the world, where 10,000 informal workers walk through tons of abandoned goods as part of an informal recycling process.They risk their health searching for the precious metals that are found in abandoned smartphones.
But Agbogbloshie should not exist. The Basel Convention, a 1989 treaty aims to prevent developed nations from unauthorized dumping of e-waste in less developed countries. The E-waste industry, however, circumvents the regulations by exporting e-waste labelled as “secondhand goods” to poor countries like Ghana, knowing full well that it is heading for a landfill site.
A recent report found Agbogbloshie contained some of the most dangerous chemicals.This is not surprising: smartphones contain chemicals like mercury(水银), lead and even arsenic (砷 ) Reportedly, one egg from a free-range chicken in Agbogbloshie contained a certain chemical which can cause cancer and damage the immune system at a level that's about 220 times greater than a limit set by the European Food Safety Authority(EFSA), Most worryingly, these poisonous chemicals are free to pollute the broader soil and water system. This should concern us all, since some of Ghana's top exports are cocoa and nuts.
Some governments have started to take responsibility for their consumers' waste.For example, Germany has started a project that includes a sustainable recycling system at Agbogbloshie, along with a health clinic for workers.However, governments cannot solve the problem alone, as there is am almost limitless consumer demand for hardware, especially when governments’ green policies are focused on issues like climate change.
Only the manufacturers can fix this.A more economically sustainable and politically possible solution is through encouraging hardware manufacturers to make the repair, reuse and recycling of hardware profitable, or at least cost-neutral.
1. What can we infer from paragraph2?| A．Electronic products need improving urgently. |
| B．Electronic waste is too complex to get fully recycled. |
| C．Electronic waste requires more landfill sites across Ghana. |
| D．Electronic pollution is a burning question in Agbogbloshie. |
| A．Tightens |
| B．Abolishes |
| C．Avoids |
| D．Follows |
| A．The violation of EFSA’s standard |
| B．The lack of diversity in Ghana s exports. |
| C．The damage to chickens immune system |
| D．The threat of polluted food around the world |
| A．Manufacturers' developing a sustainable hardware economy. |
| B．Governments' adjusting their green policies about e-waste. |
| C．Reducing customers' demands for electronic products. |
| D．Letting governments take on the main responsibility. |
10 . People think that smartphones and laptops are evidence of progress. A certain amount of online searching, for instance, can be good for your brain, and there are apps that can promote brain function. Yet tech advancements also come with some unintended consequences.
Studies have shown that blue-enriched light from electronic things like smartphones can disturb the body’s internal clock and makes it impossible for you to stick to a proper sleep schedule. Losing sleep has negative effects on your brain, such as bad moods, decreased focus and problems with memory.
Technology makes it much easier to get distracted, for example, you step away from an important project to check your smartphone. Teens, in particular, are more distracted than ever. A recent survey of 2,400 teachers found that most educators feel students are more distracted than previous generations. Some 64 percent agreed with the idea that today’s digital technologies do more to distract students than to help them academically.
And technology makes people much more forgetful than they used to be. The new generation are actually more likely to forget what day it is or where they put their keys than people over the age of 55, according to a Trending Machine survey. In a press release for the survey, Jo Patricia, a doctor, said technology was to blame. “This is a population that has grown up multitasking using technology, often accompanied by lack of sleep, which results in high levels of forgetfulness,” she said.
People who rely on GPS to get around have less activity in the hippocampus, an area of the brain involved in both memory and direction. A study from the University of London even found that taxi drivers had a more developed hippocampus than non-taxi drivers — because they are so accustomed to using spatial memory, rather than relying on GPS.
Now that you’re probably terrified of the effects of technology, let us remind you that you do have the power to prevent it. Just log off every once in a while！
1. How does digital technology affect students according to teachers?| A．It upsets the new generation. |
| B．It makes students more forgetful. |
| C．It takes the students’ attention away. |
| D．It fails to aid students with their lessons. |
| A．They mainly rely on GPS. |
| B．They do more mental exercise. |
| C．They use spatial memory more. |
| D．They have a better sense of balance. |
| A．Negative. | B．Objective. | C．Optimistic. | D．Conservative. |
| A．Surveys conducted in school. |
| B．Apps used to promote memory. |
| C．Progress made in electronic products. |
| D．Harmful effects brought by digital technology. |
