Your house may have an effect on your figure. experts say the way you design your home could play a role in whether you pack on the pounds or keep them off. You can make your environment work for you instead of against you. Here are some ways to turn your home into part of your diet plan.
Open the curtains and turn up the lights. Dark environments are more likely to encourage overeating, for people are often less self-conscious(难为情) when they’re in poorly lit places – and so more likely to eat lots of food. If your home doesn’t have enough window light, get more lamps and flood the place with brightness.
Mind the colors. Research suggests warm colors fuel our appetites. In one study, people who ate meals in a blue room consumed 33 percent less than those in a yellow or red room. Warm colors like yellow make food appear more appetizing, while cold colors make us less hungry. So when it’s time to repaint, go blue.
Don’t forget the clock – or the radio. People who eat slowly tend to consume about 70 fewer calories(卡路里) per meal than those who rush through their meals. Begin keeping track of the time, and try to make dinner last at 30 minutes. And while you’re at it, actually sit down to eat. If you need some help slowing down, turning on relaxing music. It makes you less likely to rush through a meal.
Downsize the dishes. Big serving bowls and plants can easily makes us fat. We eat about 22 percent more when using a 12-inch plate instead of a 10-inch plate. When we choose a large spoon over a smaller one, total intake(摄入) jumps by 14 percent. And we’ll pour about 30 percent more liquid into a short, wide glass than a tall, skinny glass.
1.The text is especially helpful for those who care about ____.
A.their home comforts B.their body shape
C.house buying D.healthy diets
2.A home environment in blue can help people ____.
A.digest food better B.reduce food intake
C.burn more calories D.regain their appetites
3.What are people advised to do at mealtimes?
A.Eat quickly. B.Play fast music
C.Use smaller spoons D.Turn down the lights
4.What can be a suitable title for the text?
A.Is Your House Making You Fat?
B.Ways of Serving Dinner
C. Effects of Self-Consciousness
D. Is Your Home Environment Relaxing?
Since around the later part of the 1950s, society started to realize that tobacco cigarettes caused health problems. As research progressed along with increasing numbers of people that developed lung cancer, emphysema, and other smoking related illnesses, cigarette smoking has become less accepted and popular. Unfortunately, the nicotine contained in cigarettes is one of the most addictive substances on the planet and makes quitting smoking one of the hardest things to do. In 2003, Chinese pharmacist, Hon Lik invented the electronic cigarette as a safer, and cleaner way to breathe in nicotine after his father, a heavy smoker, passed away from lung cancer attributed to smoking tobacco cigarettes.
Hon Lik applied for his first patent on the electronic cigarette in 2003 and afterwards introduced e-cigs to the Chinese market in the following year through his employer, Golden Dragon Holdings. Golden Dragon Holdings later changed the company’s name to “Ruyan” in order to better match the company’s name(Ruyan means “almost like smoke”)to the new product. Since the renaming, the Ruyan company has continued e-cigarette development and grown to be one of the largest global e-cig manufactures.
Dr.Sam Han, CEO of Cixi E-CIG Technology, Inc, Ltd. also has a number of e-cig related inventions, including four patents in the United States and two in China that are electronic cigarette and e-liquid technology related. Similar to Hon Lik’s father, Dr. Han was a heavy smoker for more than 40 years before beginning to work on electronic cigarette technologies in order to help himself and others make the shift to vapor smoking. Dr.Han continues to market and conduct R&D in e-cig related techonologies to this date.
After the successful deployment of Ruyan and Cixi E-CIG electronic cigarettes in China and Asia, the products started to be sold in significant quantities on the Internet.
1. How many years is it since the electronic cigarette was first invented according to the passage?
A. About 5 years. B. About 12 years.
C. About15 years. D. About 20 years.
2.What’s the direct reason why Hon Lik invented the electronic cigarette according to the passage ?
A. Tobacco cigarettes caused health problems.
B. Tobacco cigarettes were too expensive for customers to buy.
C. Quitting smoking became one of the hardest things to do.
D. His father died from lung cancer due to smoking tobacco cigarettes.
3.Since when have Chinese smokers have been able to buy Hon Lik’s electronic cigarettes according to the passage?
A. 2000. B. 2003. C. 2004. D. 2005.
4.What’s the correct order of the following events according to the passage?
①Hon Lik applied for his first patent on the electronic cigarette.
②Hon Lik’s father died from lung cancer because of smoking tobacco cigarettes.
③Hon Lik’s electronic cigarettes were introduced to the Chinese market.
④The name of the company Golden Dragon Holdings was changed to “Ruyan”.
A. ①③②④ B. ①④②③
C. ②④①③ D. ②①③④
There are probably no people on Earth who like to gossip as much as the British. If prying into (打探) other’s lives were an Olympic sport, then Team GB would surely take the gold medal.
And when the British can’t watch the lives of real people, they have another source of entertainment to fall back on—the soap opera. British soap operas are very different to US TV dramas. For one, they are normally longer running. The two most popular, Coronation Street and East-enders, have been running for 48 and 24 years respectively. Both are broadcast several times a week, so remarkably there have been more than 7,000 episodes of Coronation Street.
The most obvious difference is that, unlike US dramas, the British soap operas focus on the real world. There is little glamour (魅力), the stars are rarely rich, and they normally have boring jobs. Perhaps the appeal is that the lives of the characters often mirror the lives of the audience—but with some drama added. This means the viewer can relate to the characters and feel the pain and happiness they go through on the show.
Because these soap operas last for decades, the cast is ever changing. The shows rarely focus on one or two main characters. Like the real world, people come and go all the time. However, there are exceptions. Coronation Street’s William Roach, 76, has played the role of Ken Barlow since the very first episode of the show in 1960, and he is still a regular.
The choice of which soap opera you follow is often cultural: People from the north of British tend to watch Coronation Street as it is set in Manchester. People from the south generally prefer East-enders, which is set in the east of London. The show is generally considered grittier and is aimed at a younger audience.
1.What is the main difference between American dramas and British soap operas?
A. American dramas are longer.
B. British soap operas are longer.
C. American dramas deal with dangerous things.
D. British soap operas deal with real people.
2.Why do British people like to watch such operas?
A. They can find their own life from the operas.
B. They can enjoy the operas in their free time.
C. They can watch the operas for many years.
D. They care about the fate of the characters in the operas.
3. The underlined world “episodes” in the 2nd paragraph probably means ______.
A. plays B. pages
C. issues D. parts
4.One characteristic of British operas is that ______.
A. the characters play the same role for a long time.
B. the characters in the play often change
C. people don’t know what will happen next
D. there is only one or two characters in them
书面表达
请根据你对以下图画的理解，以“Deeds Should Match Words”为题，用英语写一篇作文。
你的作文应包括以下内容：
1. 简要描述该图的内容；
2. 概述你对该图中言行不一的现象的理解；
3. 举例说明该图对你的启示。
注意：
1. 可参照图画适当发挥；
2. 作文词数150左右；
3. 作文中不得提及有关考生个人身份的任何信息，如校名、人名等。
任务型阅读
请认真阅读下列短文，并根据所读内容在文章后表格中的空格里填入一个最恰当的单词。
注意：每个空格只填1个单词。请将答案写在答题卡上相应题号的横线上。
Deep reading, as opposed to superficial (shallow) reading we do on the Web, is an endangered practice, one we ought to take steps to preserve as we would a historic building or a significant work of art.
Recent research has illustrated that deep reading, characterized as a unique experience different kind from the mere understanding of words, is slow, immersive (沉浸的), rich in sensory detail and emotional and moral complexity. Although deep reading does not, strictly speaking, require a conventional book, the limits of the printed page are uniquely helpful to the deep reading experience. A book’s lack of hyperlinks (超链接), for example, frees the reader from making decisions—should I click on this link or not—allowing her to remain fully absorbed in the story.
That immersion is supported by the way the brain handles language rich in detail, indirect reference and figures of speech: by creating a mental representation that draws on the same brain regions that would be active if the scene were unfolding in real life. The emotional situations and moral dilemmas that are the material of literature are also vigorous (有活力的) exercise for the brain, driving us inside the heads of fictional characters and even, studies suggest, increasing our real-life capacity (能力) for recognition.
None of this is likely to happen when we’re browsing through a website. Although we call the activity by the same name, the deep reading of books and the information-driven reading we do on the Web are very different, both in the experience they produce and in the capacity they develop. A growing body of evidence suggests that online reading may be less satisfying, even for the “digital natives” to whom it is so familiar. Researchers reported that 39% of children and teens read daily using electronic devices, but only 28% read printed materials every day. Those who only read onscreen were three times less likely to say they enjoy reading very much and tell which book they like best. The study also found that young people who read daily only onscreen were nearly twice less likely to be above-average readers than those who read daily in print or both in print and onscreen.
All in all, the disappearance of deep reading would harm the intellectual and emotional development of generations growing up online, as well as the preservation of a critical part of our culture: the novels, poems and other kinds of literature that can be appreciated only by readers whose brains have been trained to understand them.
Passage outline | Supporting details |
The present situation about deep reading | ◆ As we are reading more on the Web, deep reading has a tendency to 1. . ◆ Like a historic building or a significant work of art, deep reading 2. our preservation. |
3. of deep reading | ◆ Deep reading4. complex emotional and moral experiences. ◆ Deep reading usually 5. from printed materials. ◆ Deep reading helps train a reader’s brain and make it more6. . ◆ Compared with online reading, deep reading can bring readers more 7. . ◆ Deep reading makes a bigger 8. in increasing readers’ reading ability. |
Conclusion | ◆ Without deep reading, generations in this digital world can’t develop well in emotion and9. . ◆ Without deep reading, people may be10. to appreciate literature. |
They don’t quite know how to cope with all the dam trouble they’ve got down in Hampden, Maine. And according to town manager Leslie Stanley, it doesn’t look as if things will improve any in the immediate future. “We’ve got a real annoying problem on our hands,” he says.
The annoyance began in late May. About three miles outside of town a group of beavers (河狸) built a dam near the mouth of a culvert (涵洞) that carries a stream under Canaan Road. Some 50 feet of roadway and several hundred feet of land on each side of the culvert were flooded. Stanley sent a road crew out to level the dam. The beavers rebuilt it. The crew tore it apart again. In fact, they tore it apart for ten mornings－and for ten straight nights the beavers rebuilt it.
On the eleventh day, the foreman tossed (扔) the problem back to the town manager. He, in turn, tossed it on to the local game warden (狩猎监督官). The warden, absorbed in beaver knowledge, moved quietly and carefully out one night and placed a petrol-soaked bag over the dam. (Any beaver expert will tell you the creatures just can’t tolerate petrol smell.)
In the morning the bag was found artistically woven (编织) into the dam.
The warden set out three steel traps that night. In the morning one was empty. The other two had been stolen by the beavers and used to strengthen the dam. The warden, cursing the state law against hunting beavers with firearms, got his traps back and set them out again and again. And every night the beavers stole them.
Town manager Stanley enlisted additional troops. He telephoned his police chief. Those beavers were breaking a state law against blocking up a natural watercourse. “Why aren’t you out there to uphold the law?” Stanley asked. “You’re the police chief. So remove them. Arrest them. Do something.”
Three mornings later, the police chief proudly announced the end of the dam. At 2:00 A.M., he said, he and a licensed dynamiter (炸药使用者) had blown it to small pieces. Stanley said he’d believe it when he saw it.
They drove out to the culvert and found a new dam already half-built. They also found the highway choked with mud and remains thrown up by the dynamite.
Stanley said maybe they should call in the Army Corps of Engineers. But the police chief’s faith in explosives was unshaken. He launched an all-out campaign，but the beavers always managed to have the holes plugged by the time the fire department appeared on the scene for its morning mop-up.
In time, the beavers tired of this nonsense and moved their dam “inside” the culvert－where it couldn’t be blown up without destroying the road too.
Stanley and his general staff held a council of war and agreed that fresh strategy was called for. Then they came up with an inspired idea. If we remove every branch of the dam by hand, we’ll force the beavers to go in search of new building material to replace what we’ve taken. Then we can place box traps along their runways and seized them.
The plan was completely approved. Moreover it worked. On July 30, town manager Stanley was able to announce that the beaver group had been trapped and removed to a remote wilderness area. And there was great joy in Hampden－until the middle of October, that is, when a group of young beavers was spotted swimming in the same waters from which its elders had recently been taken away.
But to make a long story short, the strategy that worked with the older beavers worked with the young ones too.
1.What was the annoying problem for the authorities in Hampden, Maine?
A. They failed to destroy the dam repeatedly built by the beavers.
B. They didn’t know who to send to deal with the dam trouble.
C. The beavers were building dams in every corner of the town.
D. The political situation in the town was becoming much worse.
2.What did the local game warden do?
A. He made steel traps to strengthen the dam.
B. He set out to hunt the beavers with firearms.
C. He learned a lot about the construction of the dam.
D. He used petrol-soaked bags to drive the beavers away.
3.Which is the correct order of the following events?
① The land on both sides of the culvert was flooded.
② The local leaders worked out a strategy.
③ The game warden set out steel traps.
④ The beavers rebuilt their dam inside the culvert.
⑤ The police chief used explosives to destroy the dam.
A. ①③②⑤④ B. ①③⑤④② C. ②①④③⑤ D. ②①⑤③④
4. The underline word “uphold” in Paragraph 6 probably means ________.
A. revise B. resist C. violate D. maintain
5. What can we learn about beavers from the passage?
A. The beavers seem to be stubborn about building dams.
B. The beavers are allowed to be killed when causing trouble.
C. The beavers can’t adapt themselves to living in wilderness.
D. The beavers finally returned to the culvert with their young.
