问答题 Read carefully the following excerpt

问答题5. 冰桶挑战和慈善 The Ice Bucket Challenge is an activity involving dumping a bucket of ice water on someone's head to promote awareness of the disease ALS. However, people have different attitudes towards the challenge. Look at the following picture carefully and write your response in about 200 words, in which you should describe the drawing briefly, interpret its intended meaning and give your comments. Marks will be awarded for content relevance, content sufficiency, organization and language quality. Failure to follow the above instructions may result in a loss of marks.

问答题《复合题被拆开情况》 Global Use of English. Reasons for global use of English—globalization: international process of 【T1】________ 【T1】________—【T2】________of English in the process 【T2】________. Reactions to g

问答题1. Poetry is an art form which uses the beauty and rhythm of language to produce emotions in a reader. As an ancient art form, poetry is deemed by someone as something inappropriate for pupils. Is it really the case? The following are the supporters' and opponents' opinions. Read carefully the opinions from both sides and write your response in NO LESS THAN 200 words, in which you should first summarize briefly the opinions from both sides and give your view on the issue. Marks will be awarded for content relevance, content sufficiency, organization, language quality. Failure to follow the above instructions may result in a loss of marks. YES NO The greatest poets write about adult experi-ences, e.g, love, work, history, politics, solitude etc. As a result great poetry requires an adult mind to grasp its full meaning and teaching it in schools means that students develop a disliking for poetry before they are even fully capable of appreciating it. For teachers, it is also difficult to teach be-cause poetry can have multiple meanings. If the kids can't really understand what the teacher is trying to get across, then no educational goal is achieved and therefore poetry will remain of little worth in the classroom. According to a report published recently, a great number of pupils in China are struggling af-ter starting secondary school and 3 out of 10 pupils are not malting enough progress in Chinese. If pupils are not making the required progress in basic Chinese then it is difficult to understand the motivation behind teaching complex poetry. While great poetry may deal with adult experiences there is poetry that targets a younger audience and methods available to teach this type of poetry. Children's poetry, for instance, is not complex or dark in subject matter and uses very regular rhythm and rhyme schemes, which young students will enjoy. If age-appropriate poetry is taught in schools then it gives young people the chance to develop an appreciation for poetry and its various techniques. This means that in later years young people will have the skills necessary to properly understand great poetry. Poetry should not be seen as something that one studies after learning Chinese but should, instead, be seen as a way to help students grasp the Chinese language. Many aspects of Chinese are improved through the study of poetry.

问答题《复合题被拆开情况》 How to Assess a Graduate SchoolGeneral criteria to follow in choosing a proper graduate school: Reputation• examine whether the school is one of the best• check its【T1】________• note school

问答题 Listen to the following passage

问答题《复合题被拆开情况》PASSAGE THREE《问题》：What does the italicized part in Para. 2 suggest?

问答题《复合题被拆开情况》PASSAGE ONE《问题》：Give a title for the passage.

问答题. SECTION A MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS In this section there are three passages followed by ten multiple choice questions. For each multiple choice question, there are four suggested answers marked A, B, C and D. Choose the one that you think is the best answer and mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET TWO. Passage One (1) Mr. Foster was left in the Decanting Room. The D. H. C. and his students stepped into the nearest lift and were carried up to the fifth floor. (2) INFANT NURSERIES. NEO-PAVLOVIAN CONDITIONING ROOMS, announced the noticeboard. (3) The Director opened a door. They were in a large bare room, very bright and sunny; for the whole of the southern wall was a single window. Half a dozen nurses, trousered and jacketed in the regulation white viscose-linen uniform, their hair aseptically (无菌地；清洁地) hidden under white caps, were engaged in setting out bowls of roses in a long row across the floor. Big bowls, packed tight with blossom. Thousands of petals, ripe-blown and silkily smooth, like the cheeks of innumerable little cherubs, but of cherubs, in that bright light, not exclusively pink and Aryan, but also luminously Chinese, also Mexican, also apoplectic with too much blowing of celestial trumpets, also pale as death, pale with the posthumous (死后的；遗腹的) whiteness of marble. (4) The nurses stiffened to attention as the D. H.C. came in. (5) "Set out the books," he said curtly. (6) In silence the nurses obeyed his command. Between the rose bowls the books were duly set out—a row of nursery quartos opened invitingly each at some gaily colored image of beast or fish or bird. (7) "Now bring in the children." (8) They hurried out of the room and returned in a minute or two, each pushing a kind of tall dumb-waiter laden, on all its four wire-netted shelves, with eight-month-old babies, all exactly alike (a Bokanovsky Group, it was evident) and all (since their caste was Delta) dressed in khaki. (9) "Put them down on the floor." (10) The infants were unloaded. (11) "Now turn them so that they can see the flowers and books." (12) Turned, the babies at once fell silent, then began to crawl towards those clusters of sleek colors, those shapes so gay and brilliant on the white pages. As they approached, the sun came out of a momentary eclipse behind a cloud. The roses flamed up as though with a sudden passion from within; a new and profound significance seemed to suffuse the shining pages of the books. From the ranks of the crawling babies came little squeals of excitement, gurgles and twitterings of pleasure. (13) The Director rubbed his hands. "Excellent!" he said. "It might almost have been done on purpose." (14) The swiftest crawlers were already at their goal. Small hands reached out uncertainly, touched, grasped, unpetaling the transfigured roses, crumpling the illuminated pages of the books. The Director waited until all were happily busy. (15) Then, "Watch carefully," he said. And, lifting his hand, he gave the signal. (16) The Head Nurse, who was standing by a switchboard at the other end of the room, pressed down a little lever. (17) There was a violent explosion. Shriller and ever shriller, a siren shrieked. Alarm bells maddeningly sounded. (18) The children startled, screamed; their faces were distorted with terror. (19) "And now," the Director shouted (for the noise was deafening), "now we proceed to rub in the lesson with a mild electric shock." (20) He waved his hand again, and the Head Nurse pressed a second lever. The screaming of the babies suddenly changed its tone. There was something desperate, almost insane, about the sharp spasmodic (痉挛的；间歇性的) yelps to which they now gave utterance. Their little bodies twitched and stiffened; their limbs moved jerkily as if to the tug of unseen wires. (21) "We can electrify that whole strip of floor," bawled the Director in explanation. "But that's enough," he signaled to the nurse. (22) The explosions ceased, the bells stopped ringing, the shriek of the siren died down from tone to tone into silence. The stiffly twitching bodies relaxed, and what had become the sob and yelp of infant maniacs broadened out once more into a normal howl of ordinary terror. (23) "Offer them the flowers and the books again." (24) The nurses obeyed; but at the approach of the roses, at the mere sight of those gaily-colored images of pussy and cock-a-doodle-doo and baa-baa black sheep, the infants shrank away in horror, the volume of their howling suddenly increased. (25) "Observe," said the Director triumphantly, "observe." (26) Books and loud noises, flowers and electric shocks—already in the infant mind these couples were compromisingly linked; and after two hundred repetitions of the same or a similar lesson would be wedded indissolubly. What man has joined, nature is powerless to put asunder. (27) "They'll grow up with what the psychologists used to call an 'instinctive' hatred of books and flowers. Reflexes unalterably conditioned. They'll be safe from books and botany all their lives." The Director turned to his nurses. "Take them away again." (28) Still yelling, the khaki babies were loaded on to their dumb-waiters and wheeled out, leaving behind them the smell of sour milk and a most welcome silence. Passage Two (1) When Kelly Dilworth applied for a Discover card in July, she was happy to learn that her spending limit was $13,000—a level most card companies don't offer unless a customer is in the highest credit tier. Then she found out the card's annual percentage rate (APR) was 21.24 percent, a level that used to be reserved for people with shabby credit. (2) Like most credit card companies, Discover didn't reveal to Dilworth what her APR would be until after it had issued her card. Dilworth notes she could just cancel the card, but that would likely temporarily hurt her credit score, which is well above 700. Instead, she says, she's keeping the card for its travel rewards. "It's becoming a lot harder to find a regular credit card with a good interest rate," she says, "even if you have good credit." She doesn't understand, however, why financial institutions are increasingly offering loads of credit but tying it to high APRs—while refusing to offer less extreme options. (3) Dilworth isn't the only one who's puzzled. While US interest rates remain below 1 percent, some of the same financial institutions allowed to borrow money from the government at historic lows are quietly jacking up rates on even people with commendable credit. This summer, the lowest available APRs offered on new credit cards topped 15 percent on average, marking a five-year high, according to CreditCards.com. With the Federal Reserve signaling plans to raise interest rates going into next year, experts believe credit card companies will follow, as they did last December. (4) While credit card APRs are expected to rise with future rate hikes, they did not plunge with US mortgages and other types of loans when the Fed slashed its rates to nearly zero during the financial crisis. This is partly because, in 2009, Congress introduced a law to restrict the card industry's payment and fee practices, says James Chessen, chief economist for the American Bankers Association. To compensate, card issuers found other ways to profit, by either boosting existing rates or refusing to lower rates on new cards. (5) For the average American credit card user, these higher rates are already having an effect: The debt of those carrying balances has risen every quarter since early 2015 and, as of this spring, the average household carrying credit card debt owed more than $16,000—the highest level on record since Congress enacted (制定；颁布) the credit card reform act. (6) But rising APRs will hurt millennials (千禧一代) the most. They tend to have shorter credit histories and mountains of student loan debt—factors that can weigh heavily on their credit rating, leading to higher interest rates and potentially hurting their ability to pay off monthly balances. (7) Dilworth says wider spreads have been proliferating over the past few years, with the lowest available rates hardly budging and the upper limits creeping inexorably higher. As she points out, there are legal limits on certain card fees, but there is no limit on APRs. No one knows who, if anyone, is being offered the lowest interest rates, Dilworth says, because the credit card industry doesn't need to report that information. "It's really a transparency (透明度) issue," she says. "What people are really paying and their APR levels, no one knows that. Not even the Federal Reserve." (8) The upshot? Millennials, who make up the largest population segment in US history, are abandoning credit cards, according to Princeton Survey Research Associates International, a New Jersey consultancy. In a study this year of more than 1,000 people aged 18 to 29—many of whom came of age during the 2008-2009 financial crisis—only 33 percent reported using credit cards. By contrast, 55 percent of those surveyed aged 30 to 49 carded cards, while more than 60 percent of those aged 50 and up carded them. If credit card companies can't win over millennials, experts say it could very well erode their long-term earnings potential. (9) To make up for lost growth, credit card companies could further raise rates on everyone else. But that approach has pitfalls. In its latest monthly complaints report, the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau noted that one of the biggest gripes from credit card users is that the industry isn't fair or transparent enough in calculating and assigning APRs. If climbing interest rates are any measure of customer ire—and card companies don't offer more visibility in their decision-making—the number of complaints is likely to rise. Passage Three (1) The robots in movies and science fiction books that rise up to take over the world generally are able to do so because we have placed them in charge of missiles, defense systems and other military technology. (2) We never see a disgruntled (不满的；不高兴的), order-taking bot working at McDonald's or Domino's cast off its virtual hairnet to gain sentience and overthrow its fast-food overlord. But fast food, along with shipping warehouses, has become a hotbed for robots and other automated technology. McDonald's has been testing ordering kiosks, Domino's has numerous ways to place an order that do not involve talking with a human being, and Starbucks has used technology to shift employees away from order taking to put them into production. It may not be a fantastic utopia where Rosie from The Jetsons does our laundry, but robot/automated technology has clearly infiltrated (潜入；渗入) fast food. (3) It's not a question of whether automation will come; it's one of whether it will make stores more efficient or allow them to get rid of human workers. Starbucks, for example, has used automation to allow it to move workers into making drinks rather than taking orders, but it has not yet cut its workforce in any meaningful way. (4) CollegeRecruiter.com's Steven Rothberg, whose company works to find jobs for students and college graduates, believes that fast-food robots are coming, but he does not think they will supplant traditional workers. "Many of the students and some of the recent grads who use our site are employed by fast food restaurants," he said. "There's no doubt that automation will continue to impact the number and types of jobs in fast food restaurants but I don't buy the argument that automated methods will replace human workers in fast food restaurants. Just look at banks. Have ATMs reduced the need for human tellers? Absolutely. But have ATMs come close to eliminating the need for human tellers? Absolutely not." (5) Timothy Carone, an IT professor, believes that automation will happen in restaurants, but not quickly or necessarily to the detriment (伤害；危害) of flesh-and-blood workers. The professor does believe that the path toward robot workers will be a slow one. He said that the idea that restaurants are automating due to labor costs is only partially true. (6) "Automation would occur at much lower labor costs than exist today or in the future but automation costs money," he said, noting that the expense will lower over time. "Whether a restaurant becomes partially or fully automated should depend on its customers and locations. Fast-food franchises located anywhere are finding their customers value automation. Restaurants at airports or similar locations that provide a captive audience but no loyalty except for brand loyalty will find automation necessary and valued by customers—faster is better." (7) Donald Mazzela, a board member of the nonprofit National Robotics Education Foundation, said his group has been looking at the issue of robots in restaurants for three years, noting that robotic interaction is being taught in culinary (厨房的；烹调用的) and hospitality courses throughout the world. "In our latest study, we estimate the average fast food establishment will switch 1.2 workers from counter service to other tasks as remote order taking, delivery by robotic applications grow," he wrote. (8) He expects the tipping point will be by 2020. The industry, he explained, needs time to educate customers, but that will happen, he said, because the benefits are simply too strong. He cited machines counting change, sensors, and other tools making inventory (库存；清单) more precise and the ability to relay orders directly to the prep area as a way to decrease waste. It's going to be a gradual change, but it's going to happen, Mazzela wrote. (9) A change is coming and Fred Goff, CEO of Jobcase, a social media platform helping workers without college degrees find meaningful jobs, believes workers should embrace it. He said that robots will perform some jobs typically done by humans, but that will also create opportunity for flesh-and-blood workers. "Concerns about technology displacing jobs has been a constant Luddite theme throughout the Information Revolution, and in fact since the Industrial Revolution," he wrote. Goff explained in his email that in a broad sense technology tends to create more opportunity than it displaces. (10) "It is not to be feared, but it must be managed," he wrote. "The challenge—and opportunity—for workers is for people to take control of their own work-life and navigate the positive impacts so that they aren't overwhelmed by the negative impacts of technological progress. Keep open to change and keep moving forward."1. The nurses prepared flowers and books in order to ______. (Passage One)

问答题1. Read carefully the following excerpt on search engine arguments in the UK, and then write your response in NO LESS THAN 200 words, in which you should: ●Summarize the main message of the excerpt, and then ●Comment on whether search engines is helpful for reaching useful information or not. You should support yourself with information from the excerpt. Marks will be awarded for content relevance, content sufficiency, organization and language quality. Failure to follow the above instructions may result in a loss of marks. Is Google Making Us Sick? It always began the same way—an ache, say, or stomach pains while strolling across campus to her dorm. Soon enough, Emma Murray, a first-year psychology student at McGill University in Montreal, would open her laptop, type her symptom into Google and read and read and read. She'd switch between medical websites—Mayo Clinic, MedlinePlus, WebMD. When, after clicking through endless symptom checklists, every sensation seemed a death sentence—she'd stop. But she couldn't sleep. According to Statistics Canada, nearly 65 per cent of Canadians use the Internet to search for health information. Some studies suggest, however, that the onslaught of advice may put one in 20 of those Googlers at risk of becoming "cyberchondriacs"—people obsessed with the idea of being stricken by diseases they find online. While the Internet can be a useful misconception-clearing tool, the nature of search results—where the highest-ranked sites are a measure of attention paid to those particular pages—can also make it easy to find the most dire, and least probable, explanation for your symptoms.

问答题1. Read carefully the following excerpt on international tourism argument in the USA, and then write your response in NO LESS THAN 200 words, in which you should: Summarize the main message of the excerpt, and then Comment on whether international tourism is beneficial or not. You should support yourself with information from the excerpt. Marks will be awarded for content relevance, content sufficiency, organization and language quality. Failure to follow the above instructions may result in a loss of marks. Is international tourism beneficial? News has reported that Australia tourism has experienced significant growth across a number of Asian markets with China remaining Australia's biggest market outside of New Zealand, the latest International Visitor Survey (IVS) showed. Trade and Investment Minister Andrew Robb on Wednesday welcomed the results, saying tourism industry is vital in providing jobs for the Australians. "Tourism is Australia's largest services export. The jobs of over 929,000 Australians are linked to tourism and the Coalition Government is committed to supporting tourism as a key job creation industry," Robb said. "These latest figures show that China is still Australia's largest market, outside of New Zealand, with Chinese visitors increasing their expenditure in the Australian economy to 5.1 billion AU dollars (4.73 billion U.S. dollars), while we also remain very competitive in the challenging United States tourism market," he said. However, with the booming of such overseas tourism, visitor behaviours can have a detrimental effect on the quality of life of the host community. For example, crowding and congestion, drugs and alcohol problems, prostitution and increased crime levels can occur. Tourism can even infringe on human rights, with locals being displaced from their land to make way for new hotels or barred from beaches. Interaction with tourists can also lead to an erosion of traditional cultures and values.

问答题5. Read carefully the following excerpt and then write your response in NO LESS THAN 200 words, in which you should: ● summarize the main message of the excerpt, and then ● comment on whether daigou will prosper among students abroad. You can support yourself with information from the excerpt. Marks will be awarded for content relevance, content sufficiency, organization and language quality. Failure to follow the above instructions may result in a loss of marks. The Demand for Overseas Products in China Gives Students Abroad Part-time Jobs A high demand for overseas luxury goods in China has laid the ground for Chinese students studying overseas to make a small business by selling the goods to China, says an investigation from the People's Daily on Monday. A simple search on Taobao.com, one of the most popular online shopping sites in China, shows numerous sellers listed as daigou, in Chinese. They live across the world, mostly in Europe, North America and Asia selling products like cosmetics, garments, luxury products and milk powder. Another surprising platform in China for selling online is WeChat. Unlike Taobao, it is not traditionally a sales platform, but a social media platform. Already connected to friends, family members and schoolmates back home in China through WeChat, Chinese students abroad can use these connections to spread the product information. Liu Xiaomin (not real name) is an exchange student in Italy's Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore and frequently sells products online. She said that at least 3 of her 10 classmates from China who study with her buy cosmetics and luxuries to sell back home. The high demand for overseas luxury goods in China has opened up an opportunity for these students, many who find they can not only add to life experience, widen social circles, but also make a side income. Liu Xiaomin says she easily makes a part-time job with the work, earning 2,500 yuan ($370) a month. Liu Zeming (not real name), a Chinese student in Germany, sells German pens and wants to make a career out of this business when he graduates.

问答题 Read carefully the following excerpt and then write your response in NO LESS THAN 200 WORDS, in which you should: 1 summarize the study results, and then 2 comment on the relationship between lonelin

问答题6. 学校教育：传统科目VS实用科目 Studies with "hot" degrees like computer science or finance are more likely to get a job than students with a "cold" degree like geography. Should universities give priority to practical or traditional courses? Write a composition of about 200 words on the following topic: Should Universities Give Priority to Practical Courses for Students? You are to write in three parts: In the first part, state specifically what your idea is. In the second part, provide one or two reasons to support your idea OR describe your idea. In the last part, bring what you have written to a natural conclusion or a summary. Marks will be awarded for content relevance, content sufficiency, organization and language quality. Failure to follow the above instructions may result in a loss of marks.

问答题 Listen to the following passage

问答题1. The Internet Bars have been on the top of many kids' list of leisure activities. Look at the following picture carefully and write your response in about 200 words, in which you should start with a brief description of the picture, explain its intended meaning, and give your view on the issue. Marks will be awarded for content relevance, content sufficiency, organization, language quality. Failure to follow the above instructions may result in a loss of marks.

问答题6. Read carefully the following excerpt on luxury life of Chinese international students, and then write your response in NO LESS THAN 200 words, in which you should: ● summarize the main message of the excerpt, and then ● comment on whether international students should buy luxury cars. You should support yourself with information from the excerpt. Marks will be awarded for content relevance, content sufficiency, organization and language quality. Failure to follow the above instructions may result in a loss of marks. A Lust for Speed: Young, Rich and Chinese in Rural America The latest obsession for China's "Great Gatsby generation" in the US? They come to study but they also spend big on luxury cars. When Michael Kwan moved to the US from Hong Kong in 2012 to attend university his parents provided him with a generous budget for living expenses. The amount was far above what he needed at the rural Midwestern campus of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, so Kwan used the excess cash to purchase an $80,000 Cadillac Escalade. The idea was to "have a huge car and fit in with American culture," he said. But Kwan quickly found himself entrenched in a secretive group of about a dozen luxury car owners on campus, all of whom were from mainland China and drove much smaller sports cars such as Nissan GT-Rs and BMW M5s. Lin, a student from the mainland of China, said that while American students might view luxury cars as an expensive folly, Chinese students see them as the bargain of a lifetime. "What if I told you that if you moved abroad you could buy a Ferrari for half or even a third of the price back home? What would you do?" he asked. "You'd buy that Ferrari because it it's a huge discount and a once in a lifetime chance to experience a car you might never afford otherwise."

问答题. Section A MULTIPLE-CHOICE QUESTIONS In this section there are several passages followed by ten multiple-choice questions. For each multiple-choice question, there are four suggested answers marked A, B, C and D. Choose the one that you think is the best answer and mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET TWO. Passage One (1) Mr. Foster was left in the Decanting Room. The D. H.C. and his students stepped into the nearest lift and were carried up to the fifth floor. (2) INFANT NURSERIES. NEO-PAVLOVIAN CONDITIONING ROOMS, announced the noticeboard. (3) The Director opened a door. They were in a large bare room, very bright and sunny; for the whole of the southern wail was a single window. Half a dozen nurses, trousered and jacketed in the regulation white viscose-linen uniform, their hair aseptically (无菌地；清洁地) hidden under white caps, were engaged in setting out bowls of roses in a long row across the floor. Big bowls, packed tight with blossom. Thousands of petals, ripe-blown and silkily smooth, like the cheeks of innumerable little cherubs, but of cherubs, in that bright light, not exclusively pink and Aryan, but also luminously Chinese, also Mexican, also apoplectic with too much blowing of celestial trumpets, also pale as death, pale with the posthumous (死后的；遗腹的) whiteness of marble. (4) The nurses stiffened to attention as the D. H. C. came in. (5) "Set out the books," he said curtly. (6) In silence the nurses obeyed his command. Between the rose bowls the books were duly set out—a row of nursery quartos opened invitingly each at some gaily colored image of beast or fish or bird. (7) "Now bring in the children." (8) They hurried out of the room and returned in a minute or two, each pushing a kind of tall dumb-waiter laden, on all its four wire-netted shelves, with eight-month-old babies, all exactly alike (a Bokanovsky Group, it was evident) and all (since their caste was Delta) dressed in khaki. (9) "Put them down on the floor." (10) The infants were unloaded. (11) "Now turn them so that they can see the flowers and books." (12) Turned, the babies at once fell silent, then began to crawl towards those clusters of sleek colors, those shapes so gay and brilliant on the white pages. As they approached, the sun came out of a momentary eclipse behind a cloud. The roses flamed up as though with a sudden passion from within; a new and profound significance seemed to suffuse the shining pages of the books. From the ranks of the crawling babies came little squeals of excitement, gurgles and twitterings of pleasure. (13) The Director rubbed his hands. "Excellent!" he said. "It might almost have been done on purpose." (14) The swiftest crawlers were already at their goal. Small hands reached out uncertainly, touched, grasped, unpetaling the transfigured roses, crumpling the illuminated pages of the books. The Director waited until all were happily busy. (15) Then, "Watch carefully," he said. And, lifting his hand, he gave the signal. (16) The Head Nurse, who was standing by a switchboard at the other end of the room, pressed down a little lever. (17) There was a violent explosion. Shriller and ever shriller, a siren shrieked. Alarm bells maddeningly sounded. (18) The children startled, screamed; their faces were distorted with terror. (19) "And now," the Director shouted (for the noise was deafening), "now we proceed to rub in the lesson with a mild electric shock." (20) He waved his hand again, and the Head Nurse pressed a second lever. The screaming of the babies suddenly changed its tone. There was something desperate, almost insane, about the sharp spasmodic (痉挛的; 间歇性的) yelps to which they now gave utterance. Their little bodies twitched and stiffened; their limbs moved jerkily as if to the tug of unseen wires. (21) "We can electrify that whole strip of floor," bawled the Director in explanation. "But that's enough," he signaled to the nurse. (22) The explosions ceased, the bells stopped ringing, the shriek of the siren died down from tone to tone into silence. The stiffly twitching bodies relaxed, and what had become the sob and yelp of infant maniacs broadened out once more into a normal howl of ordinary terror. (23) "Offer them the flowers and the books again." (24) The nurses obeyed; but at the approach of the roses, at the mere sight of those gaily-colored images of pussy and cock-a-doodle-doo and baa-baa black sheep, the infants shrank away in horror, the volume of their howling suddenly increased. (25) "Observe," said the Director triumphantly, "observe." (26) Books and loud noises, flowers and electric shocks—already in the infant mind these couples were compromisingly linked; and after two hundred repetitions of the same or a similar lesson would be wedded indissolubly. What man has joined, nature is powerless to put asunder. (27) "They'll grow up with what the psychologists used to call an 'instinctive' hatred of books and flowers. Reflexes unalterably conditioned. They'll be safe from books and botany all their lives." The Director turned to his nurses. "Take them away again." (28) Still yelling, the khaki babies were loaded on to their dumb-waiters and wheeled out, leaving behind them the smell of sour milk and a most welcome silence. (本文选自Brave New World) Passage Two (1) Not every self-driving car company is a hi-tech unicorn eager to disrupt the status quo. The latest firm to invite journalists to experience its autonomous technology is the epitome of traditional car manufacturing: Ford. (2) On its sprawling campus in Dearborn, Michigan, the century-old company is trying its hardest to look and act like a new startup. In March, Ford launched a subsidiary called Ford Smart Mobility (FSM) to develop in-car connectivity, ride-sharing and autonomous technologies. FSM is designed to compete like a startup, with the aim of translating Ford's decade of work in autonomous systems into real products. At its first public autonomous vehicle demos, young engineers and entrepreneurs were enthused about reinventing our traffic-clogged cities. (3) "We're rethinking our entire business model," said Mark Fields, Ford's CEO. "It's no longer about how many vehicles we can sell. It's about what services we can provide. We understand that the world has changed from a mindset of owning vehicles to one of owning and sharing them." That has led to some quirky (稀奇古怪的) investments, such as Ford's acquisition last week of a San Francisco-based crowdsharing shuttle bus startup called Chariot, and a partnership to provide the city with thousands of human-powered bikes for a ride-sharing scheme. (4) But while Ford's car sales are fairly healthy today, Fields foresees a world transformed by driverless cars, Uber and climate change. "You could argue that in major cities, vehicle density will drop because of automated vehicles and congestion charges. Some cities might even outlaw personal use of vehicles." One of Ford's strategies to cope with this is to accelerate its efforts towards a fully autonomous car. Fields now says Ford will have a completely self-driving car, without a steering wheel, an accelerator or pedals, in production by 2021. It will initially be used only for robotic taxi services in restricted urban areas but should be available for consumers to purchase by the middle of the decade. (5) Ford's newfound confidence in self-driving cars comes just as the technology's pioneers are struggling to mature beyond this same gee-whiz enthusiasm. Google's self-driving project, perennially (永久地) poised to be spun out into a separate company, recently lost key members, while Apple is rumored to have laid off dozens of engineers and scaled back its ambitious plans to build its own autonomous vehicle. (6) But other rivals still seem years ahead of Ford. Uber is beginning a driverless taxi pilot in Pittsburgh this week (albeit with a human safety driver), and startup Nutonomy is already offering robotic taxi rides in Singapore. To judge by Monday's demos, on the other hand, Ford's self-driving Fusions are still spooked (惊吓) by bushes growing too close to the road and paralyzed with indecision when confronted with pedestrians who may or may not be about to step off the pavement. (7) Its fleet of development cars, currently just 10 strong, looks thin compared with Google's dozens of cars operating across the U.S., or the thousands of autopilot-enabled Teslas gathering millions of miles of real-world data monthly. Ford aims to have 30 autonomous Fusions by the end of the year, and about 100 by the end of 2017. (8) But although Ford may appear to be lagging behind, it has been working quietly behind the scenes. Several self-driving startups, including Uber, Faraday Future and Autonomous Stuff, are already using Ford Fusions (or its near equivalent, the Lincoln MKZ) to develop their own technologies. "It's the absolute best vehicle right now for testing self-driving," says Bobby Hambrick, CEO of Autonomous Stuff, a company developing retro-fit automated driving kits. "There are no other carmakers that are so open to work through third parties like us." (9) Fields also points to the multinational's competencies in building and selling vehicles. "We've been working on autonomous vehicles for over 10 years," he said. "And for 100 years, we've built high-volume product with quality and affordability." (10) Fields finished his keynote address by predicting that autonomous vehicles will have as big an impact on society as Henry Ford's moving assembly line did a century ago. He will be hoping that Ford will still be around to celebrate the centenary of the autonomous car. (本文选自The Guardian) Passage Three (1) Dr. Leonard Bailey turns 74 in August, but as chief of surgery for Loma Linda University's Children's Hospital, he still puts in 60-hour weeks, starting at 6:30 every morning. The pioneering heart surgeon performed the world's first successful infant-to-infant heart transplant and has done hundreds of transplants for the tiniest of babies. "There's no reason to stop. If you're constantly thinking new thoughts and dealing with new problems, it refreshes your brain cells and makes new connections." (2) A June report by the Pew Research Center found that the percentage of retirement-age Americans who remain in the workforce has dramatically increased, climbing from 12.8 percent in 2000 to 18.8 percent this year. (3) Several factors are driving this trend. Some of it is financial—the Great Recession of 2008 ripped a big chunk out of retirement savings, and fewer employees these days have fixed pensions, so many people have little choice but to keep working. But others are like Bailey—educated professionals who aren't ready to be cast aside. (4) There's also a shift in attitudes toward retirement, probably because we're in the midst of the most significant demographic (人口统计学的) change in history. Up until the 20th century, fewer than half of all Americans reached age 50, but by midcentury, more than 88 million Americans will be over 65, according to U.S. government projections, which has triggered worries that caring for these oldsters could drain societal resources and bankrupt the health care system. But many experts believe horror stories of greedy geezers (怪老头) guzzling (狂饮；暴食) scarce resources miss the fact that many of today's seniors are healthier, better educated and more productive than previous generations—and want to keep working. (5) While some employers worry about aging workers' diminished capacities, rising health care costs and their unfamiliarity with new tech tools, some companies are already finding innovative ways to accommodate an aging workforce. They've launched programs that range from mentoring programs that pair up experienced veterans with younger colleagues to phased-in retirement plans that allow people to work flexibly or on part-time schedules. These programs let companies capitalize on the legions of workers in their 60s who'd miss the camaraderie and the paycheck but not the hectic pace that comes with a full-time job. (6) There are good reasons for companies to do this. Older workers are more loyal and stay on the job longer than their younger counterparts. This reduces turnover and minimizes costs for hiring and training replacements. Older employees also have a depth of experience, contacts and skills, which often means they can come up to speed faster than the youngsters, and they can be more adept at navigating in the corporate world. (7) The staff at Michelin, the tire manufacturer in the U. S. is practically geriatric: Nearly 40 percent of their 16,000 employees are over 50, and most of them have been with the company for two decades or more. They range from flextime, compressed work schedules and job-sharing to telecommuting and phased retirement programs. And Michelin's not just holding on to its white-collar professionals; it puts just as much effort into retaining skilled tradespeople—the automation experts, electricians and technical support staffers who maintain production on the factory floor. "These are the hardest jobs to fill because so few have this kind of expertise," says Stafford, Michelin's executive vice president of human resources. "Manufacturing companies are all facing these kinds of shortages today." (8) MEI Technologies, an aerospace and technology company, actively recruits retirees, targeting former NASA engineers and retired military people to work on a project basis during rush periods. "Work flows have peaks and valleys, and this on-call workforce helps us meet customer needs," says Sandra Stanford, director of human resources at MEI Technologies. (9) Even in the notoriously youth-oriented tech world, some companies are crafting corporate benefits to keep and attract older workers. At NerdWallet, a financial information website headquartered in San Francisco, nearly a third of the writing and editing staff is 50 or older. "I want the best talent, I want a mix of it, and we're highly selective of who we hire," says Maggie Leung, the company's senior director of content. (10) Leung says she aggressively recruited Phil Reed in his mid-60s, who's been writing about cars for more than two decades, telecommutes from Long Beach, California. "There were times I felt conscious of my age," recalls Reed, who normally does weekly video conferences with his boss and colleagues. "But I was pleased to find that there were quite a few editors in their 40s and 50s, and it wasn't just a startup with kids running around. Originally, I had planned to retire in a couple of years. But I like being involved and being part of a team. ff things keep up like this, why would I retire?" (本文选自Newsweek)1. The nurses prepared flowers and books in order to ______.(Passage One)

问答题 What can education bring us

问答题6. Every now and then we hear news about poisonous food, such as tainted milk powder, illegal food additives, and illegal cooking oil, which pose great danger to people's health. Give your ideas of cracking down on poisonous food. Write on ANSWER SHEET THREE a composition of about 200 words on the following topic: My Ideas of Cracking down on Poisonous Food You are to write in three parts. In the first part, state specifically what your opinion is. In the second part, provide one or two reasons to support your idea OR describe your idea. In the last part, bring what you have written to a natural conclusion or a summary. Marks will be awarded for content, organization, grammar and appropriateness. Failure to follow the instructions may result in a loss of marks.