Đề thi THPT Quốc gia môn Tiếng Anh năm 2016 (Đề chính thức)

Though called by sweet-sounding names like Firinga or Katrina, tropical cyclones are huge rotating storms 200 to 2,000 kilometres wide with winds that blow at speeds of more than 100 kilometres per hour (kph). Weather professionals know them as tropical cyclones, but they are called hurricanes in the Caribbean Sea, typhoons in the Pacific Ocean, and cyclones in Indian Ocean. They occur in both the northern and southern hemispheres. Large ones have destroyed cities and killed hundreds of thousands of people.

Tropical cyclones begin over water that is warmer than 27 degrees Celcius (80 degrees Fahrenheit) slightly north or south of the earth’s equator. Warm, humid air full of water vapour moves upward. The earth’s rotation causes the growing storm to start to rotate around its centre (called the eye). At a certain height, the water vapour condenses, changing to liquid and releasing heat. The heat draws more air and water vapour upward, creating a cycle as air and water vapour rise and liquid water falls. If the cycle speeds up until winds reach 118 kilometres per hour, the strom qualifies as a tropical cyclone.

More deaths in tropical cyclones are caused by storm surge. This is a rise in sea level, sometimes seven metres or more, caused by the storm pushing against the ocean’s surface. Storm surge was to blame for the flooding of New Orleans in 2005. The storm surge of Cyclone Nargis in 2008 in Myanmar pushed sea water nearly four metres deep some 40 kilometres inland, resulting in many deaths.

It has never been easy to forecast a tropical cyclone accurately. The goal is to know when and where the next tropical cyclone will form. “And we can’t really do that yet,” says David Nolan, a weather researcher from the University of Miami. The direction and strength of tropical cyclones are also difficult to predict, even with computer assistance. In fact, long-term forecasts are poor, small differences in the combination of weather factors lead to very different storms. More accurate forecasting could help people decide to evacuate when a storm is on the way.

Thanks to our modern lifestyle, with more and more time spent sitting down in front of computers than ever before, the (43)......of overweight people is at a new high. As people frantically search for a solution (44)......this problem, they often try some of popular fad diets being offered. Many people see fad diets (45)......harmless ways of losing weight, and they are grateful to have them. Unfortunately, not only don’t fad diets usually (46)......the trick, they can actually be dangerous for your health.

Although permanent weight loss is the (47)......, few are able to achieve it. Experts estimate that 95 percent of dieters return to their starting weight, or even (48)......weight. While reckless use of fad diets can bring some (49)......results, long-term results are very rare.

(50)......, people who are fed up with the difficulties of changing their eating habits often turn to fad diets. (51)......being moderate, fad diets involve extreme dietary changes. They advise eating only one type of food, or they prohibit other types of foods entirely. This results in a situation (52)......a person’s body doesn’t get all the vitamins and other things that it needs to stay healthy.

Adapted from “Active Skills For Reading: Book 3” by Neil J. Anderson

The concept of urban agriculture may conjure up images of rooftop, backyard or community gardens scattered among downtown city streets and surrounding neighborhoods. But in the Seattle area, and within and beyond the Puget Sound region, it means a great deal more. “Urban agriculture doesn’t necessarily equate to production that occurs only in a metropolitan urban area,’’ says Jason Niebler, who directs the Sustainable Agriculture Education (SAgE) Initiative at Seattle Central Community College. “It means we are providing for growing population food needs from surrounding rural landscapes, as well as from the core urban landscape.’’

Picture a series of concentric circles, with an urban core that produces some food at varying capacities, surrounded by a series of outlying rings of small farms that become increasingly more rural with distance. The hope is that such land use planning, from the inner core to the outer rings, will encourage local ecologically sound sustainable food production. This, in turn, will create local jobs and decrease reliance on distant food products that originate from petroleum intensive large scale farms.

That’s the idea behind SAgE, believed to be the nation’s first metropolitan-based community college sustainable agriculture program that emphasizes farming practices across diverse landscape types from urban centers to surrounding rural environs. “It’s small scale agriculture with an urban focus,’’ Niebler says. “Any urban population, large or small, can practice sustainable agriculture, improve food security and protect the environment, which ultimately results in resilient food systems and communities.”

SAgE is a part of the National Science Foundation’s Advanced Technological Education (ATE) Program, which is providing the project with $157,375 over two years. ATE’s goal is to support projects that strengthen the skills of technicians who work in industries regarded as vital to the nation’s prosperity and security. The support largely goes to community colleges that work in partnership with universities, secondary school, business and industry, as well as government agencies, which design and implement model workforce initiatives.

The SAgE project focuses on the environmental, socioeconomic, political and cultural issues related to sustainable food systems within Puget Sound watersheds through student and community education and research, and technological innovation. The curriculum offers courses that cover such issues as agricultural ecology, urban food systems, food politics and ethics, soil science, sustainable food production and technology, the integration of food and forests, and career opportunities.

“We’ve created a curriculum that is fundamental in nature, addressing the principles of sustainable agriculture and what a food system is - how it functions both locally and globally,” Niebler says. “These courses are challenging, robust and inspirational. One of the really wonderful things about them is that we offer service learning opportunities, where students volunteer a portion of their time to working with local partner organizations. They can do a research project, or a service learning option. The ideal would be to prompt students into careers that involve sustainable practices in an urban agriculture setting.”