假设你是红星中学高三学生李华，请给你同班的美国留学生Jim写一封电子邮件，邀请他周末到学校对面刚开业的文化中心去做义工。内容包括：
1. 目的和意义；
2. 时间、地点和内容；
3. 请求回复。
注意：1. 词数不少于50；
2. 开头和结尾已给出，不计入总词数。
Dear Jim,
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Yours,
Li Hua
A Diet Without Enough Protein Can Cause Depression
Depression is a condition so common, the World Health Organization (WHO) calls it “a leading cause of disability.”
Difficulty in falling asleep, loss of appetite, and loss of ability to concentrate are just a few of the other effects of depression. WHO estimates that worldwide, at any one time, 350 million people suffer from the condition. While life events such as the loss of a spouse or a job may create a happening of depression, many cases come from within and are not caused by a life event.
Now scientists are working on a new aspect of cure: nutrition. 1. The Indian Journal of Psychiartry reports that both before and during a happening of depression, those with the condition will show a “poor appetite…” 2. Many cases of depression, if not most cases, affect those who don’t eat properly.
So what does protein have to do with all this? It all comes down to amino acids (氨基酸). Proteins are made up of amino acids, chemicals known as the “building blocks of life.” There are 20 different amino acids. 3.
Both the human brain and nervous system use amino acids as a substance that creates a signal from one brain cell to another or one nerve cell to another, thus relaying information between the cells. What the final result then? 4.
Since amino acids make up protein, a diet which lacks in protein will cause weaker communication between the brain cells. This lessens the signal being sent from one brain cell to the next during a thought. 5. This is why depression can often express itself as anger or aggression.
A. The ultimate effect is how we think.
B. Don't ruin your appetite by eating between meals.
C. Skipping meals itself can create a depressed mood.
D. A new research suggests that nutrition can lessen some of the risks of depression.
E. India is perhaps the world’s leader in researching the connection between diet and depression.
F. Many of them are made by the human body, but nine others, the “essential” amino acids, must be eaten in one’s diet.
G. The process can lead to twisted signals, which can not only lead to depression, but also, according to many scientists, aggression.
The Secret to Happiness
A new report makes it clear that when it comes to the life satisfaction of UK citizens, the ball is in the government’s court. For some time, sensible people have been arguing that governments need to focus less on economic growth and more on the wellbeing（幸福）of citizens. Be careful what you wish for.
In response to this demand, from 2011 David Cameron instructed the Office for National Statistics to gather data on people’s self-reported happiness and life satisfaction. Little practical good has come from this so far, but a new report by George Bangham for the Resolution Foundation is one of the best attempts to make useful sense of the data. He concludes: “The best prospects for policymakers targeting future increases in national wellbeing lie in raising job quality, raising incomes, particularly at the lower end, and policies to improve security in the housing market.”
The age correlation（相关）turns out to be certainly linked to politics, despite the fact that no political party can make a difference to your date of birth. The happiness of pensioners is not just a function of their age, but of policy. On average, 70-year-old boomers today are the most affluent retirees in history, often owning their own homes and in receipt of generous pensions. People of 70 are not going to be as content in 30 or 40 years’ time if they are unable to retire, don’t own their homes and have small incomes.
However, there is one respect in which teens and recent retirees are remarkably similar. Compared to other age groups, they tend to inhabit a sweet spot of having high degrees of freedom. The typical 16-year-old has new freedoms without ever having had any serious responsibilities. The typical 70-year-old, having experienced a lifetime of work and family duties, has a very different kind of freedom, one born from relief.
Besides，it should not surprise us to find that people tend to be happier when they have fewer worries. But this, too, has important political implications. If the government is really interested in raising overall national happiness, it has to make sure as many citizens as possible feel secure in their health, their housing and their incomes. Different states’ records in achieving this is one important reason why Nordic countries repeatedly score highly in international life satisfaction surveys and North America underperforms relative to its GDP.
Whichever way you look at it, there is no escaping the conclusion that increasing wellbeing across society requires joined-up, long-term policy efforts. This is exactly what the Resolution Foundation recommends.
1.What can be conveyed from the sentence “the ball is in the government’s court” in Paragraph 1?
A. The government officials are fond of playing ball games.
B. The government determines national happiness.
C. The government makes citizens feel happy.
D. The government is in a ball game.
2.What does the underlined word “affluent” in Paragraph 3 probably mean?
A. Responsible. B. Careful.
C. Honest. D. Rich.
3.According to the author, the secret to happiness is freedom and _________.
A. income B. health
C. security D. destiny
4.What is the author’s attitude to the function of government on national happiness?
A. Negative. B. Positive.
C. Doubtful. D. Unsatisfactory.
Learning New Vocabulary during Deep Sleep
Sleeping time is sometimes considered unproductive time. This raises the question whether the time spent asleep could be used more productively, e.g. for learning a new language? Up-to-now sleep research focused on the stabilization and strengthening of memories that had been formed during wakefulness. However, learning during sleep has rarely been examined. There is enough evidence for wake-learned information undergoing a revision by replay in the sleeping brain. The replay during sleep strengthens the still weak memory and leaves the newly acquired information in the pre-existing store of knowledge.
If re-play during sleep improves the storage of wake-learned information, then first-play, i.e. the initial processing of new information, should also be possible during sleep.
The research group of Katharina Henke examined whether a sleeping person is able to form new semantic（语义的）associations between played foreign words and translation words during the brain cells’ active states, the so-called “Up-states.” It turned out to be that what they thought was reasonable. When we reach deep sleep stages, our brain cells progressively coordinate their activity. During deep sleep, the brain cells are commonly active for a brief period of time before they jointly enter into a state of brief inactivity. The active state is called “Up-state” and the inactive state “Down-state”. The two states alternate（交替）about every half-second.
New evidence for sleep-learning challenges current theories of sleep and theories of memory. The concept of sleep that we are separated from the physical environment is no longer reasonable. "It’s false that complex learning be impossible during deep sleep," says Simon Ruch, co-first-author. "In how far and with what consequences deep sleep can be applied for the acquisition of new information will be a topic of research in upcoming years," says Katharina Henke.
The research group of Katharina Henke is part of the Interfaculty Research Cooperation (IRC). Thirteen research groups in medicine, biology and psychology are part of the IRC. The aim of these research groups is to gain a better understanding of the mechanisms（原理）involved in sleep and consciousness.
1.Which of the followings haven’t sleep researchers achieved so far?
A. People can learn vocabulary during deep sleep.
B. Memories can be stable and strong during sleep.
C. Wake-learned information can appear in the sleeping brain.
D. Re-play during sleep improves the storage of wake-learned information.
2.What can be inferred from Paragraph 3?
A. “Up-state” and “Down-state” appear in turn during deep sleep.
B. “Up-states” is another name for the brain cells’ active states.
C. Semantic associations are important for language learning.
D. The brain cells’ active states are central for sleep-learning.
3.What will researchers do within several years according to the passage?
A. Make study in the following fields such as medicine and biology.
B. Separate us from the physical environment.
C. Apply deep sleep for information learning.
D. Discover the concept of sleep.
4.What is the main purpose of the passage?
A. To introduce a new way of vocabulary learning.
B. To gain a better understanding of the mechanisms.
C. To challenge current theories of sleep and theories of memory.
D. To explain the possibility of vocabulary learning during deep sleep.
Losing a wallet is one of those careless acts most of us have come across, at some point or the other in our lives. While most of us tend to move on after mourning over the lost necessities, there are a few lucky ones who get them back, with the help of the police or the generosity of the person who finds it.
And then there is Hunter Shamatt, who not only got back his wallet but with some added happiness that was tagged along!
Hunter was on his way to attend his sister’s wedding on a Las Vegas-bound flight when he realized that he has misplaced his wallet, sometime during the journey. Hunter’s family reached out to the Frontier flight to enquire if someone had handed it over to them. Unfortunately, there was no sign of the missing wallet.
But wait. The story was far from over. Just a week after Hunter’s sister’s wedding, he received a package in his mail. And guess what? There was his wallet! Surprisingly, the wallet was not the only thing that was inside the package. It also had a handwritten note for Hunter which turned out to be a bonus! The piece of paper read,
“Hunter, Found this on a Frontier flight from Omaha to Denver — row 12, seat F wedged between the seat and wall. Thought you might want it back. All the best.
P.S. I rounded your cash up to an even $100, so you could celebrate getting your wallet back. HAVE FUN!!!”
Moved by the touching gesture, Hunter’s mom, Jeannie Shamatt, decided to write a post on Facebook giving a detailed description of the incident. She also urged everyone to share the post as she would like to meet and greet the person behind the act of kindness, personally.
Now, thanks to the astonishing power of social media, the post finally reached the man behind the note. The man was identified as Todd Brown and it was one of his co-workers who made sure Jeannie Shamatt’s post reaches his colleague. Jeannie turned to Facebook again to thank Brown and his family for restoring her faith in humanity.
“I try to teach my children to do the right things in life, help people when you can regardless of the outcome. This story is more about restoring faith in people than anything. We hear a lot of bad news but not enough good news. I personally want to thank Todd Brown and his wife for restoring faith that there are amazing people out there.”
1.How did Hunter Shamatt get his wallet back?
A. Todd Brown sent it back.
B. The police mailed it back.
C. He found the wallet by himself.
D. The Frontier flight helped him get it back.
2.What things were found in the package?
A. A wallet and a tag. B. A wallet and a note.
C. A note and a tag. D. A mail and a tag.
3.How did Hunter’s mom feel after receiving the package?
A. Touched. B. Uninterested.
C. Satisfied. D. Confused.
4.What does the author intend to convey?
A. Friendship. B. Freedom.
C. Kindness. D. Justice.
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1.Which magazine will you subscribe if you want to send a gift to a 5-year-old girl?
A. Taste of Home. B. Popular Science.
C. Disney Princess. D. National Geographic Kids.
2.What is SPECIAL about National Geographic Kids?
A. It combines fun with learning.
B. There are articles about scientific discoveries.
C. Kids can learn science, technology, and the animal kingdom.
D. It is a publication about what is popular in the world of science.
3.Where can you find the passage?
A. A newspaper. B. A guidebook.
C. A magazine. D. A website.
