- 00:00:39 - report 1
- 00:02:48 - report 2
- 00:04:47 - report 3
- 00:07:26 - c1
Writing
Directions: Suppose the university newspaper is inviting submissions from the students for its coming edition on how to enrich students’ knowledge of traditional Chinese culture. You are now to write an essay for submission. You will have 30 minutes to write the essay. You should write at least 120 words but no more than 180 words.
How to Enrich Students’ Knowledge of Traditional Chinese Culture
Traditional Chinese culture is a valuable treasure that deserves greater attention from young people. To help students gain a deeper understanding of it, universities can take several effective measures.
First, more courses and lectures on traditional culture should be offered. Topics such as Chinese literature, calligraphy, traditional festivals, and philosophy can broaden students’ horizons and increase their cultural awareness. Second, universities can organize cultural activities, including paper-cutting workshops, Chinese painting exhibitions, and traditional music performances. These activities allow students to experience culture in an engaging and practical way.
In addition, modern technology can be used to promote traditional culture. Online platforms, short videos, and digital museums make cultural knowledge more accessible and appealing to students.
By combining education, practice, and technology, universities can create a rich cultural environment and inspire students to appreciate and preserve the excellent traditions of Chinese culture.
Listening
Across the U.S., families are looking to the winter with fear as energy costs soar.
[I]if the value, amount or level of sth soars, it rises very quickly 急升；猛增 SYN rocket
soaring costs/prices/temperatures
猛增的成本；飞涨的物价；骤升的温度
Unemployment has soared to 18%.
失业率猛升到了 18%。
A number of factors are creating a bad situation: Global energy consumption is up, but supplies have been reduced.
to or at a higher level 向（或在）较高水平；加大；增高
[1] The Energy Department projects heating bills will jump 28% this winter for those who rely on natural gas. Natural gas is used by nearly half of U.S. households for heat. Heating oil is projected to be 27% higher and electricity 10% higher.
the process of supplying heat to a room or building; a system used to do this 供暖；供暖系统；暖气设备
Who turned the heating off?
谁把暖气关掉了？
What type of heating do you have?
你们用什么供暖？
a gas heating system
燃气供暖系统
heating bills
暖气账单
That comes against inflation rates that accelerated last month with consumer prices growing 6.6%. That’s the fastest pace in four decades.
be / come (up) against sb / sth, to have to deal with a difficult opponent or problem
必须面对某人/某事:
You see, this is what we’re up against – the suppliers just aren’t reliable.
你瞧，这就是我们遇到的难题，供应商就是靠不住。
In this specific phrasing, “up” is omitted
The pain will be especially acute in parts of the country that heavily rely on heating oil to keep homes warm. It’s projected to cost more than 1 billion in funding to Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, bringing the total to 8 billion.
[3]Many Americans think they make healthy food choices,but they may be viewing their diet too optimistically. That’s the main finding of a new study by researchers at the U.S.Department of Agriculture in Stoneville, Mississippi. The study aimed to identify disconnects between how healthily Americans think they eat and how they actually do. For the study, the researchers asked participants to rate their diet as excellent, very good, good, fair or poor. Folks also completed 24-hour food questionnaires. Then, the researchers compared answers to see how well responses to the two exercises matched up. Of more than 9,700 people, roughly 85 percent were off base when asked to rate the quality of their diet, and almost all overestimated how healthy it was.[4]Those who rated their diet as poor tended to be far more accurate. Their rating match that of the researchers more than nine times out of ten.
Their rating match the rating of the researchers more than nine times out of ten.
[5]It was a heartwarming moment that dozens of Indian rescuers rallied together to use a crane in order to save an elephant trapped at the bottom of a 20-foot well.The massive rescue effort took place last week close to an army camp. The elephant wandered out of the jungle and fell into the well.The army officers heard a noise coming from the well and realized an elephant was trapped deep inside.[6]The officers then threw in some food for the creature and called the local forest department for help. Video of the rescue operation shows how the team used a crane to lift up the huge animal out of the well and onto the back of a truck. It was then taken to an examining room for evaluation of any injuries.[7]The elephant was kept under close supervision for a few days before it was successfully released back into the wild.
conversation 1
READING
If we care about plastic waste, why won’t we stop drinking bottled water?
We have all seen the damage plastic waste is doing around the world, but sales of bottled water have continued to grow.
A) For all the innovation and choice that define the food and drink industries, if you want to make money, you could do a lot worse than fill a bottle with water and sell it. A litre of tap water, the stuff we have cleverly piped into our homes, costs less than half a penny. A litre of bottled water can cost well over a pound, especially for something fancy that has been sucked through a mountain.
[T]~ sth (+ adv./prep.)to send water, gas, oil, etc. through a pipe from one place to another 用管道输送
to pipe oil across the desert
用管子把石油输送过沙漠
Water is piped from the reservoir to the city.
水用管子从水库输送到城市。
sucks: [T] to take liquid, air, etc. out of sth 抽吸；抽取
~ sth + adv./prep.
The pump sucks air out through the valve.
气泵通过阀门把空气抽出去。
~ sth + adj.
Greenfly can literally suck a plant dry.
蚜虫真能把一株植物吸干。
Bottled water is considerably more expensive than tap water.
lively → livelier
yet: despite what has just been said 但是；然而 SYN nevertheless
It’s a small car, yet it’s surprisingly spacious.
这辆汽车不大，然而却出奇地宽敞。
He has a good job, and yet he never seems to have any money.
他有份好工作，然而他却好像总也没有钱。
B) Yet the bottled water market is livelier than ever. It defies our increasing awareness of the harm plastics do to the environment and a broader, growing sense that something has to change. Sales in the UK were worth a record £558.4 million this past year, an increase of 7%, according to the latest figures from the market analyst Kantar. Separate data from other analysts show that last year the British consumed more than 2.2 billion litres of bottled water, including “take-home” and “on-the-go” products. That’s an annual rise in volume of 8.5%.
- Sales of bottled water in Britain hit a record high last year even though people are increasingly aware that plastics are environmentally unfriendly.
C) Environmental campaigners are struggling to understand why nations blessed with clean tap water grow only fonder of the bottle. “It’s very surprising to me,” says Sam Chetan-Walsh, a political adviser at Greenpeace and campaigner against ocean plastic. “Public awareness has never been higher, but the message is not quite reaching all the people it needs to.” Where it is heard, the message is causing concern. Plastic water bottles require oceans of fossil fuels to make and ship. Additionally, single-use plastics of all types are polluting our cities and seas. Numerous documentaries have shown how plastic is ultimately killing wildlife.
D) Moves against various plastics have gathered pace, from shopping bags to straws and plastic-lined coffee cups. Chetan Walsh argues that bottled water is different because the alternatives are so obvious. “If a product that is so nakedly unnecessary can exist then the whole system is failing,” he says.
[T] ~ sthto increase in speed, force, etc. 增加（速度、力量等）
The truck gathered speed.
卡车加快了速度。
During the 1980s the green movement gathered momentum.
20 世纪 80 年代期间，绿色运动的势头开始增强。
Thousands of these machines are gathering dust (= not being used) in stockrooms.
数千台这样的机器都尘封在仓库里。
E) Hope is not entirely out of reach. The rate of growth has begun to ease (sales were up 7% in the year, compared with 8%
in the previous year).
F) But even if large numbers of people are quitting bottled water because of care for the environment, others are taking it up. The introduction of the “sugar tax” on juices and soda drinks has pushed more people to bottled water, while health awareness has boosted its desirability. Tap water consumption is growing at roughly the same pace (UK consumers still drink almost three times as much tap water as bottled water).
G) So the plastic tide only creeps higher. The industry is quick to point out that all its bottles are recyclable. “But collection rates are, at the most generous estimates, 56%, so the actual recycling rate will be lower than that,” Chetan-Walsh says. And while bottles may be recyclable, very few are made of recycled plastic. One water bottle company launched recycled halflitre “eco” bottles alongside its standard bottles. Another has pledged to use only recycled plastic across its range by 2025. Chetan-Walsh believes in a ban on single-use bottles. Bans do exist in some places. Organisers of a famous music festival announced that water bottles will not be sold this summer. San Francisco has banned them from city property and events. Last year, the UK government set out plans to ban single-use plastic from its estate.
H) Water bottlers, unsurprisingly, don’t support bans. But they raise concerns about health rather than profit margins. Last month one chief executive of a water bottling company said that bans would “result in greater consumption of sugary drinks, adding to all the health dangers of obesity, diabetes and tooth decay”. Kinvara Carey, general manager of an association of the biggest bottled water manufacturers, cites a survey in which people were asked what they would do if bottled water were not available. “Forty-four per cent would buy another drink which is not great, 14% would go without, and 4.5% said they would find a fountain.” she says. “The choice is important.”
I) What if fountains were more numerous, and tap water more clearly available in cafes, restaurants and elsewhere? Dozens of fountains are being installed in London. There are similar initiatives elsewhere. Before plastic and the marketing that made people think they needed bottled water in the first place, fountains were an urban fixture. Greenpeace, among others, is also pushing for a “deposit return” scheme. This would mean tax on bottled water would be refunded to customers who returned
the plastic for recycling.
J) Even if bottled water sales are growing slightly more slowly, the industry is racing to adapt to changing concerns and tastes. Flavoured water is booming: sales of the sparkling variety shot up by 20%, according to the latest analyst data, Meanwhile,international water brands, as well as a range of new companies, are selling High-end reusable bottles. And if you must fill them with tap water, why not add flavouring?
K) As the owner of multiple sugary drink brands and bottled water, PepsiCo is facing challenges on health and environmental fronts. Last year, the company bought SodaStream (a drinks company that sells machines for making tap water bubbly and then consumers add flavours) for $3.2 billion. It also launched a range of fancy bottles that work with tap water and flavour packets. The bottle is reusable. The packets? Not so much, and, yes, they are made of plastic, although the company invites users to post them back for recycling.
L) As is so often the case, clever marketing can beat reason; awareness is rarely enough. “There is always this kind of slip between concern, intent and changed behaviour,” says Giles Quick an analyst of bottled water. “The best example is five a day, the recommendation to have at least five portions of fruit and vegetables every day. Almost everyone is aware of this, but something like 15% of us achieve it.” Unless a far-reaching bottle ban does come into force, it will be up to consumers to not only demand change, but to act themselves.
Scientists have known that depriving adult mice of vision can increase the sensitivity of individual neurons (神经元) in the part of the brain devoted to hearing. New research from biologists at the University of Maryland 26 L revealed that sight deprivation also changes the way brain cells 27 P interact with one another, shifting the mice’s sensitivity to different frequencies. “This study 28 H reinforces what we are learning about how manipulating vision can have a significant effect on the ability of an animal to hear long after the window for auditory (听觉的) learning was thought to have closed said Patrick Kanold, senior author of the study.
It was once thought that the sensory regions of the brain were not 31 J adaptable after a critical period in childhood. This is why children learn languages much more 32 G readily than adults. Kanold’s earlier research disproved this idea by showing that depriving adult mice of vision for a short period increased the sensitivity of individual neurons in the auditory cortex (皮质), which is devoted to hearing.
Young brains wire themselves according to the sounds they hear frequently, assigning areas of the auditory cortex to specific frequencies based on what they are used to hearing. The researchers found that in adult mice, a week in the dark also changed the 34 C distribution of space to different frequencies.
“We don’t know why we are seeing these patterns,” Kanold said. “We speculate that it may have to do with what the mice are paying attention to while they are in the dark.”
As a university student I’ve come to realise just how little I know about money. I’ve come to the brutal realisation that Australia’s youth are being done a great disservice by not receiving any consistent financial education.
Diving headfirst into the crash course of starting university, I’ve quickly tried to get myself up to speed with the financial terms of the modern era to help manage my personal finances.
I’ve read some financial education books, done some online learning, and have spoken to my nearest and dearest for their pearls of financial wisdom.
There are undoubtedly hundreds of great resources out there for those wishing to improve their financial literacy, but while I was researching, I still kept wishing that I didn’t have to play catch-up with the money world. I felt that I was sailing the financial seas with no skills and no life jacket!
However, after talking to my friends who felt the same, I quickly realised that it wasn’t my ignorance but the lack of financial education in our schooling system that is leaving high schoolers seriously behind in the modern world of money.
Let’s compare a theoretical financial education subject to the standard compulsory English class. On average, English may not be the most popular subject, but it’s consistently on the schedule throughout high school, with all students graduating fluent in English.
A financial education subject should do just the same. It shouldn’t be just a one-day event but a course integrated throughout the whole of high school that would allow students to gradually expand their financial literacy, and would prevent the need for a ‘catch up’ phase once we’re out on our own after graduation.
In the same way that learning a language or new skills takes time, building financial skills requires practice and years to gradually accumulate bits and pieces of knowledge.
Giving young people the opportunity to become familiar with the world of money would provide them with a great advantage to enter adulthood with confidence and security so that they are able to manage their own money and look after themselves.
to be responsible for sth bad 对（坏事）负有责任
If anyone’s to blame, it’s me.
如果有人该承担责任，那就是我。
Which driver was to blame for the accident?
哪个司机是此次事故的肇事者？
- What did the author realise after talking to his friends?
A) They were as keen as he was on financial matters.
B) The schooling system was to blame for his trouble. schooling system应该为他的麻烦负责
C) High schoolers knew nothing about the modern financial world.
D) Financial courses were as unpopular as compulsory English classes.
Chocolates save us from many things, especially emotional distress. They comfort us in times of trouble, calming down a racing heart by channeling happy calories inside us. We all have faith in chocolates to delight us in an instant!
faith: [U] ~ (in sb/sth)trust in sb’s ability or knowledge; trust that sb/sth will do what has been promised 信任；相信；信心
I have great faith in you—I know you’ll do well.
我对你有信心，我知道你会干好的。
We’ve lost faith in the government’s promises.
我们不再相信政府的承诺。
Her friend’s kindness has restored her faith in human nature.
朋友的善意使她恢复了对人性的信心。
He has blind faith (= unreasonable trust) in doctors’ ability to find a cure.
他盲目相信医生有妙手回春的能力。
Recently, chocolate lovers were heartbroken as scientists claimed that they can become extinct by 2050! But hey, we have some happy news for you. Scientists can still help save chocolates from dying out! If you are not aware as to why scientists made the statement about the death of this wonderful thing, let us tell you the facts. Chocolate trees, whose seeds are used to make chocolate, grow in the tropical plant world and require very specific weather conditions to prosper.
Now, fifty percent of the world’s cocoa (可可) beans come from two countries in West Africa: Cote d’Ivoire and Ghana. Scientists believe that both of these countries will experience a 3.8F temperature increase by 2050 due to global warming, endangering the cacao (可可树) farms in the rainforests. These farms will then have to be shifted to cooler mountainous areas, which are the natural habitat of wildlife. This will lead to some tough decisions: whether to grow chocolate or save wildlife.
Unfortunately, the crisis of global warming has already had a serious negative impact on cacao farms’ yields, leading to the prices of chocolates skyrocketing.
Scientists, however, are trying to find a long-term and eco-friendly solution to this problem! They are trying to modify the species with a gene-editing technology, which will transform the seedlings into a species that survives even in a drier and warmer climate.
According to a report by The Business Insider, in the University of California’s new bio-sciences building, tiny green cacao seedlings are lined up in refrigerated greenhouses for a new experiment by using a technology called CRISPR. By manipulating the DNA of plants, this technology is already being used across the world to make plants tougher and cheaper. Similarly, in this unconventional experiment, scientists will make tiny, precise changes to the DNA of the seedlings to make the cocoa crops survive in warmer and drier climates.
Translation
近年来，中国新能源汽车产业发展迅速。目前，中国新能源汽车年产量已高达近千万辆，占全球市场份额超过60%，出口量不断创出新高。中国政府通过加大资金投入和政策引导，鼓励新能源汽车企业进行技术创新，不断提高产品在市场上的竞争力。中国新能源汽车产业的发展不仅有力推动了国内经济发展，也为全球新能源利用和环境保护做出了积极贡献。
,million = 1 000 000， billion, 1 000 000 000
In recent years, the industries of China’s new energy car develops rapidly. At present, the yield of the new energy cars reached about 1 billion, making up 60 percent above of the whole price nationwide so that the amount of exporting is increasing. Through expanding the investment and introducing policies, the Chinese government fosters new energy car enterprises to make innovative products, to reinforce the competency of the products. The development of the new energy car industries not only promotes the economy but also makes vigorous contributions to the global new-energy usage and the protection of the environment.
making up 60 percent of the global market
ai:
In recent years, China’s new energy vehicle (NEV) industry has developed rapidly. At present, China’s annual production of new energy vehicles has reached nearly 10 million units, accounting for more than 60% of the global market share, and its export volume continues to hit new highs.
(business 商业) a single item of the type of product that a company sells 一件（商品）；单位
The company sold 5 million units of the new smartphone. （这家公司卖出了500万部新款智能手机。）
Housing units （【经济学/统计学词汇】套住宅 / 间房屋）
By increasing financial investment and providing policy support, the Chinese government encourages new energy vehicle enterprises to carry out technological innovation and continuously improve the market competitiveness of their products.
The development of China’s new energy vehicle industry has not only strongly promoted domestic economic growth but has also made positive contributions to the global utilization of clean energy and environmental protection.