Cars are becoming more and more technologically advanced. In the past decade, we have seen improvements in electric car technology and driverless cars. The latest advance comes from Mercedes-Benz. The luxury carmaker has unveiled a car that lets you use your mind to control certain things. The car giant unveiled its futuristic car at the IAA Mobility show in Munich earlier this week. The car is called Vision AVTR. The four capitalized letters at the end of its name are to make people think of the movie Avatar. This movie was about using the brain to connect with nature. A Mercedes spokesperson said the car would not be available for purchase any time soon. It is currently in the concept stage of production.
The sportswear company Nike gave its office workers a holiday to help them de-stress from life’s challenges and worries caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The clothing giant gave its employees a week-long mental health break. It closed its offices from August the 23rd to the 30th so that its employees could “enjoy additional time off to rest and recover”. Nike said it wanted to focus on helping to combat “burnout”. Nike’s senior manager of global marketing science Matt Marrazzo said: “Our senior leaders are all sending a clear message – take the time to unwind, de-stress and spend time with your loved ones. Do not work.” Nike’s retail stores are still open and store workers are working as usual.
The man expresses his opinion about the students having to pay for the health club. State his opinion, and explain the reasons he gives for holding that opinion.
Question 2 攻略
それでは、解答法を順を追って解説していきます
▮ リーディング
リーディングの内容は大学が新しい運動器具を導入したとか、
大学が新しい入学システムを開始したとか、なんらかの
「キャンパスでの変化」についてです。
そしてそれに対して2つの理由があります。
Read a short passage about a campus situation.
Health Club Fees
The university plans to charge a membership fee at its health club starting in January. The fee for using the facilities will be $20 per student. The university has made this decision in light of the deteriorating condition of the equipment and the poor state of the health club itself. Renovations will be made during the Christmas break. All fees will go toward the costs of renovation and the purchase of new equipment.
メモ取り Question 2 リーディング
リーディングの以下の要点をメモします。
・キャンパスでの変化
・変化の理由1
・変化の理由2
▮ リスニング
リスニングでは、リーディングの内容に関する男女の学生の会話で、
片方の学生がそれについて賛成か反対かを述べ、その理由を2つ挙げます。
Listen to a conversation about the same topic.
● スクリプト
W : Hey, Pete are you going to join the health club after Christmas?
M : If it were free, sure. But since it’s not, I guess I’m not.
W : It’s only twenty bucks.
M : Twenty bucks Is a lot of money to some people, Sue. These renovations and new equipment should be paid by the university.、We pay enough here already. They charge us for everything books, lab fees, photocopying, and late fees at the library. It’s too much.
W : Yeah, I guess so, but the health club really needs this. It’s in bad shape, and the equipment is ancient.
M : You know most of that equipment is less than two years old? I talked to a guy in the Athletic Department, and he said it was the football coach and team that pushed for the renovations. And they don’t have to pay since they are on a sports team.
W: No, that can’t be true. They won’t make us pay and have some others use it for free.
M: You’ll see. Wait until January. It’s not fair. If we pay. they-should pay also.
メモ取り Question 2 リスニング
内容は必ず1人の学生の意見と理由2つなので、これらの要点をメモします。
・学生の意見
・学生の理由1
・学生の理由2
▮ 質問と回答例
Question
The man expresses his opinion about the students having to pay for the health club. State his opinion, and explain the reasons he gives for holding that opinion.
Sample Response （回答例）
学生の意見 + 2つの理由 を述べます。
The man is not pleased that the students have to pay for admission to the school’s health club. (← Option) Even though the fee is small, he thinks it is a lot of money for him to
spend. Plus, he states that he doesn’t like the fact that the students have to pay
for things like books, late fees, and lab fees in addition to their tuition.
He feels that the school is charging them enough for lots of different things already. (←Reason 1) Finally, he believes that it is very unfair that members of the student body have to pay but members of the school’s sports teams do not,( ← Reason 2) especially because the football team and coach were the ones who wanted to have the changes made.
Scientists have discovered that street lights and other forms of artificial lighting could be behind a decline in insect populations. Researchers from the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology conducted studies on the number of insects living near sources of white light from light-emitting diodes (LEDs). The researchers said LEDs are responsible for disrupting insect behaviour and for causing a drop in their numbers. Lead researcher Douglas Boyes said the results of his study were “eye-opening”. He was surprised at the extent of the insect loss due to LEDs. He found a 47 per cent reduction in insect populations at hedgerow test sites and a 37 per cent reduction at roadside grassy areas.
There has been a relentless quest to find sustainable energy sources in the past decades. One source of energy that has thus far eluded scientists is nuclear fusion. This is the Holy Grail of clean energy. Generations of physicists have tried to replicate this reaction. Scientists in the USA say they recreated the power of the Sun for a minuscule fraction of a second. Powerful lasers blasted a tiny target to create a reaction. The burst lasted just 100 trillionths of a second, but it created 10 quadrillion watts of power. Ten quadrillion is equal to 1 followed by 16 zeros. The power the scientists created is the equivalent of 6 per cent of all the energy from the Sun hitting Earth’s surface at any given moment.
We hear about climate change pretty much every day now. We see pictures of floods, fires and heatwaves on TV news. Scientists have just announced that July was the hottest month ever recorded. The scientists are from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in the USA. A spokesperson from NOAA said: “July is typically the world’s warmest month of the year, but July 2021 outdid itself as the hottest July and hottest month ever.” NOAA said Earth’s land and ocean surface temperature in July was 0.93 degree Celsius higher than the 20th-century average of 15.8 degrees Celsius. The Northern Hemisphere was 1.54 degrees Celsius hotter than average.
