江苏省连云港市东海县2021-2022学年高二下学期期中考试...

The Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022 closed on February 20. More than an event, the Games are also for exchanging goodwill and friendship. The design details of various elements such as the medals, emblem(图案) and mascots(吉祥物) serve this purpose. Let's take a look at these Chinese elements through the designs.

Medals

The front side of the Winter Olympic medals was based on the ancient Chinese jade concentric circle pendants, with five rings representing "the unity of heaven and earth and the unity of people's hearts". The opposite side of the medals was inspired from a piece of Chinese jadeware(玉器) called "Bi", a double jade disc with a round hole in the center.

Emblem

Inspired by the Chinese character "冬" for "winter", the upper part of the emblem resembles a skater and its lower part a skier. The ribbon-like decoration in between mainly symbolizes the host country's rolling mountains, Games venues, ski courses and skating rinks.

The blue color in the emblem represents dreams, the future and the purity of ice and snow, while red and yellow—the colors of China's national flag – present passion, youth and vitality.

Mascots

Bing Dwen Dwen, the cute mascot of the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022, attracts attention with the panda's full-body "shell" made out of ice. The inspiration came from traditional Chinese snack "ice-sugar gourd," (tanghulu), while the shell also resembles a space suit—embracing new technologies for a future of countless possibilities. "Bing" is the Chinese character for ice, which symbolizes purity and toughness. Dwen Dwen is a common nickname in China for children that suggests they are lovely, healthy and clever.

To this paper-cutting artist, Shi Qinling, scissors are like what brushes are to painters, or what pens are to writers. Always having a pair of scissors on her also allows her to create art whenever inspiration hits. "Some people like to pen their feelings in diaries. I prefer to cut them out," says the 35-year-old, who is currently working at the Fenglin community cultural activity center in Shanghai.

Shi developed an interest in handicraft(手工艺) when she was a child who often found herself alone at home. Out of boredom, she would play with paper, folding and cutting them into different shapes. This interest later developed into a passion, one that she decided to pursue by majoring in arts and crafts design during her time in university.

After graduation, however, she found herself working at a ship design company as she was unsure about what she wanted to do with her future. About a year later, the Shanghai Arts and Crafts Research Institute offered her a position in their paper-cutting department. Realizing that she still had a love for the craft, she switched her career.

In 2010, she started learning paper-cutting from Xi Xiaoqin, the national inheritor(继承人) of the intangible cultural heritage(非物质文化) for paper-cutting. Three years later, one of her works, The Fighting Fish, won third place at the Baihua Cup, a competition for Chinese arts and crafts. Six years later, Shi was named a Shanghai paper-cutting inheritor and become the city's "youngest inheritor" of the paper-cutting heritage.

In May 2020, as the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic swept Texas, I went to an Austin nature store and bought several bird feeders. Various birds, drawn by seed and other food, came soon afterward. I wasn't alone. Feeders have long been a popular way to connect with nature and draw in native or nonnative species. But over the past two years, bird feeding has suddenly increased in popularity.

The benefits of all of this supplying have tended to go unquestioned. After all, habitat destruction from human activity is a leading cause of bird population declines, so feeding birds seems like an obvious way to help make up for that loss. But a recent review paper raises a troubling possibility: bird feeding could be reshaping some local environments. "If you're throwing millions of tons of additional nonnatural resources into an environment, you're going to get massive, massive impacts," says lead study author Jack Shutt, a conservation ecologist at Manchester Metropolitan University in England. "And they're not always going to be the ones that you're expecting."

Bird feeding carries a few well-recognized risks. The first among them is disease spread. In 2005 scientists concluded that shared feeders in the U.K. may have helped dove trichomoniasis(滴虫病) jump into European Greenfinches, as a result, it killed up to half a million birds. In the U.S., trichomoniasis outbreaks connected with dirty feeders are common bird killers. "You've got different species pecking(啄食) at the same bit of plastic, which is covered in various bird bodily liquid," says study co-author Alexander Lees, an bird expert at Manchester Metropolitan University. "It's a cause of disaster."

What's necessary, Lees says, is taking the potential impacts seriously enough to carry out further study, which would allow experts to make much more recommendations about where to feed and where to avoid it. Such studies could also help researchers make targeted recommendations about what sorts of food to offer.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, buffoonery(滑稽) was one of few careers acceptable for women to pursue in the Middle Age. And it was not uncommon for women to enjoy this career.

However, in the 17th century, comedians were forced to society's edge as their tendency to truth-telling was no longer tolerated among high society and women, bearing the weight of gender prejudice, were seldom among this career.

This slowly began to change in the mid-19th century when women began to enter the workforce and, in the circus(马戏表演) industry, a growing minority of female performers were employed. They promoted the industry's "New Woman" movement which introduced female performers into the traditionally male stage.

In 1895, among the women breaking the prejudice was Josephine Williams or "Lady Evetta" called the "The Only Lady Clown(小丑)".

Williams told The New York Times: "I believe that a woman can do anything for a living that a man can do and do it just as well as a man. All my people laughed at me when I told them that I was going on stage as a clown. But they do not laugh now."

Despite her being optimistic, the article concluded: "The men in the clown business rather enjoy Miss Williams' odd performances but they do not regard her as a serious competitor or believe that any other women are likely to follow her example."

How wrong they were. In the 1970s, French-born Annie Fratellini opened the circus school Académie Fratellini encouraged by her film-making husband Pierre Etaix.

Fratellini's Auguste was recognizable as the clown familiar today. Her unique make-up was made up of a big red nose, tears, a black mouth and shiny decorations fixed to her eyes. When asked whether the character she acted was male or female, she insisted that "clowns have no gender".

In modern times, most people feel stressed the majority of the time. Our stress comes from work, family, responsibilities, relationships, and the fast pace of life.

 According to a study, reading just 6 minutes per day can lower pressure by 68%. Researchers analyzed cortisol levels(皮质醇水平) and heart rates of participants before observing how they responded to different tasks.

This included listening to music (61%), having a cup of tea or coffee (54%), and taking a walk (42%). They also found that playing video games lowered stress levels by 21%, but increased heart rate.

"Losing yourself in a book is the best relaxation," Dr. David Lewis, researcher, and neuropsychologist(神经心理学家) said. " You can escape from the worries and stresses of the everyday world through reading."

 If you mostly read the news, you will likely feel even more stressed due to the harmful content. However, if you read about light-hearted positive topics such as how to start a garden or how the planets affect our moods, you will notice a decrease in stress.

You may not think reading books can really change your life that much. Reading can do more than reduce stress and make us happier. Let's spend more time reading than we do on our smart phones.

Bilibili star, Zhao Hongcheng, uses her platform to promote greater understanding of the lives and needs of disabled people.

According to the1 data from the China Disabled Persons' Federation, as of February 2020, the total number of disabled people in China reached 85 million,2

6.21 percent of the country's total population.

Compared to most people with disabilities, Zhao is3.

Born in 1990, a4has been part of Zhao's life since she was 1 year old due to the aftereffects of a disease. However, it did not stop her from completing her5and graduate studies before becoming a6worker in Shanghai.

Her childhood was relatively7thanks to the support of her parents. They attached great importance to her education, so she8completed her studies. Zhao9in English at a university in Hunan province and later pursued a master's degree in English literature at a university in Shanghai.

After graduating, Zhao was10by e-commerce giant Alibaba in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province. She spent the next five years working in the Internet industry as a product manager.

In 2019, the rising popularity of short videos11Zhao.

She felt that she should make some videos of what she12in her daily life. If it went well, it could give people with disabilities references and suggestions, and if not,13 it would draw people's attention to related issues.

After her fourth video spread widely on the Internet, she14to make short videos and, in 2021, became a full-time content creator on Bilibili.

And now, as a video content creator who has over 84,000 followers on the video-sharing platform Bilibili, Zhao wants to be a15between the disabled and the rest of society.

 While some communities are pessimistic about the exchange between languages, there are also other communities that readily welcome (borrow) words. English, especially, (base) on a mix of Latin, Greek and Germanic languages. The English-speaking community does not hesitate about absorbing foreign words into (it) daily vocabulary.

 In fact, there have never been any formal (academy) restrictions on new borrowed words. Borrowing words allows the language (continue) to develop, (enable) the community to have  more efficient language which makes it possible for them to share their experiences with new-found ease. It is also through those words  novel ideas are spread and different (belief) are exchanged more conveniently and quickly.

For better or for worse, the tendency to borrow words has never gone out of style. The more international and globalized the world (become), the more language characteristics will be shared between nations and cultures.

1）写信目的；

2）个人优势；

3）你的愿望。

（参考词汇：第五届花博会the Fifth Flora Exposition）

注意：

1）写作词数应为80左右；

2）请按如下格式在答题纸的相应位置作答。

I wanted everyone's praise and acceptance, but I was my own toughest critic. After I graduated from high school and moved out on my own, I began to put pressure on myself to succeed in the adult world. Meanwhile, I was feeling very inadequate and unsuccessful.

I had always been a thin-to-average sized person. But suddenly, I was convinced that I was overweight. In my mind, I was FAT! I began to control my food by trying to diet, but nothing seemed to work. I slowly cut back on what I ate each day. With every portion I didn't finish or meal I skipped, I told myself that I was succeeding, and in turn, I felt good about myself—attractive, strong, successful, almost super-human. I could do something others couldn't: I could go without food. It made me feel special, and that I was better than everyone else.

People around me began to notice my weight loss. At first they weren't alarmed; maybe some were even envious. But then the comments held a tone of concern. "You're losing too much weight." "Elisa, you're so thin." "You look sick." "You'll die if you keep this up." All their words only pleased me that I was on the right path, getting closer to "perfection".

I cut back on my food more and more, until a typical day consisted of half a teaspoon of nonfat yogurt and coffee in the morning, and a cup of grapes at night. It even got to the point where I no longer went out with my friends. I couldn't—if I went to dinner, what would I eat? I avoided their phone calls. If they wanted to go to the movies or just hang out at home, I couldn't be there—what if food was around?

My poor nutrition began to cause me to lose sleep. I found it hard to concentrate on my work or to focus on anything for any length of time. I was pushing myself harder and harder at the gym, struggling to burn the calories that I hadn't even eaten. My friends tried to help me but I denied that I had a problem.

注意：

1）续写词数应为150左右；

2）请按如下格式在答题纸的相应位置作答。