English teenagers are to receive compulsory (必修的) cooking lessons in schools. The idea is to encourage healthy eating to fight the country’s increasing obesity (肥胖 )rate. It’s feared that basic cooking and food preparation skills are being lost as parents turn to pre-prepared convenience foods.
Cooking was once regarded as an important part of education in England---even if it was mainly aimed at girls. In recent decades cooking has progressively become a minor activity in schools. In many cases the schools themselves have given up cooking meals in kitchens in the schools. But the rising level of obesity has led to a rethink about the food that children are given and the skills they should be taught.
“What I want is to teach young people how to do basic, simple recipes like a tomato sauce, a bolognaise, a simple curry, a stir-fry---which they can use now at home and then in their later life”, said Ed Balls, the minister responsible for schools.
The new lessons are due to start in September, but some schools without kitchens will be given longer to adapt. There is also likely to be a shortage of teachers with the right skills, since the trend has been to teach food technology rather than practical cooking. Also the compulsory lessons for hands on cooking will only be one hour a week for one term. But the well-known cookery writer, Pru Leith, believes it will be worth it.
“If we’d done this thirty years ago we might not have the crisis we’ve got now about obesity and lack of knowledge about food and so on. Every child should know how to cook, not just so that they’ll be healthy, but because it’s a life skill which is a real pleasure”.
The renewed interest in cooking is primarily a response to the level of obesity in Britain which is among the highest in Europe, and according to government figures half of all Britons will be obese in 25 years if current trends are not stopped.
小題1:The passage mainly talks about
.
| A．the reason for obesity | B．the lost cooking skills |
| C．the healthy eating | D．the compulsory cooking classes |
小題2:Which of the following is NOT the purpose for English teenagers to receive cooking lessons?
| A．To encourage teenagers to eat healthy food. |
| B．To reduce the country’s increasing obesity rate. |
| C．To stop parents from turning to pre-prepared convenience foods. |
| D．To prevent basic cooking and food preparation skills from being lost. |
小題3:In what way will cooking lessons benefit the students?
| A．They will be healthy and enjoy the pleasure of such a life skill as well. |
| B．They will be able to do some basic, simple recipes like a tomato sauce. |
| C．They will be able to make food experiments with the knowledge and skills. |
| D．They will be able to control the level of obesity in the whole country. |
小題4:The well-known cookery writer, Pru Leith, thinks it
to offer compulsory cooking lessons in schools.
| A．difficult | B．necessary | C．funny | D．timely |
小題5:It can be inferred from the passage that
.
| A．cooking has always been an important part of school education in England |
| B．the obesity rate in Britain has been rapidly growing in recent decades |
| C．English teenagers will have their cooking lessons twice a week for one year |
| D．the students will pay a lot of money to the school for the |
