【推荐1】Signs of Healthy Friendships

Once in a while it’s helpful to see if your friendship is as healthy as it can be. You might get used to a friendship over time to the point where you don’t see the room for improvement. And since great friendships are priceless, you should always surround yourself with the kind of people who will lift your spirits, make you laugh, and remind(提醒) you that you are loved.     1     Here are characteristics that strong friendships share.

    2    

Friends make you feel comfortable with yourself, so you don’t need to act like someone you’re not. Your friends know your shortcomings and love you anyway. You are perhaps the “best version” of yourself when you’re with your friends.

A healthy friendship includes plenty of gentle honesty. True friends won’t pretend(假装) just to avoid an argument.     3    . As a result, you’ll know where you stand with your friends and won’t be afraid to share your true opinions.

They argue in a healthy way.

One of the biggest misunderstandings about good friends is that they never fight. But let’s face it: everyone fights.       4    In fact, voicing your opinions freely will cause you to disagree from time to time and that’s okay.

Healthy friendships mean you can be friends with someone else, too.

    5    That’s why great friends will improve your relationship yet still encourage you to meet people and try new things without them. A healthy friendship means that sometimes the two of you spend time apart, and that’s okay.

A．Even if you have the best friend, it doesn’t hurt to expand your social circle.

B．In a positive friendship, your friends won’t lie to you, and they won’t hurt your feelings either.

C．With an unhealthy friendship, you know clearly that something is “off”.

D．Arguing isn’t unhealthy.

E．Good friends lose touch with each other from time to time.

F．Good friends are real and honest with each other.

G．Is your friendship as healthy as it can be?

【推荐2】A new study of 8,000 young people in the journal of Health and Social Behavior shows that although love can make grown-ups live healthily and happily, it is a bad thing for young people. Puppy love (早恋) may bring trouble for young people and can cause depression (沮丧). The study shows that girls become more depressed than boys，and young girls are the worst of all.

The possible reason for the connection between love and higher risk of depression for girls is “loss of self”. According to the study，even though boys would say “lose themselves in a romantic (浪漫的) relationship”, this “loss of self” is much more likely to cause depression when it happens to girls. Young girls who have romantic relationships usually like hiding their feelings and opinions. They won’t tell that to their parents.

Dr. Marianm Kaufman, who works on young people problems, says 15% to 20% of young people will have depression during their growing. Trying romance often causes the depression. She advises kids not to jump into romance too early. During growing up，it is important for young people to build strong friendship and a strong sense of self. She also suggests the parents should encourage their kids to keep close to their friends，attend more interesting school activities and spend enough time with family.

Parents should watch for their children’s eating or mood changes. If they see some，they need to give help. The good news is that the connection between romance and depression seems to become weak with age. Love will always make us feel young，but only maturity (成熟) gives us a chance to avoid its bad side effects.

1. What’s the main idea of the passage?

A．Puppy love may bring young people depression.

B．Parents should agree to their children’s love.

C．Romance is a two-edged sword for grown-ups.

D．Romance is good for young people.

2. Who are most likely to become depressed?

A．Young people who have a strong sense of self.

B．Young boys whose parents watch for their behavior.

C．Careless parents whose children are deep in love.

D．Young girls who always hide their feelings and opinions.

3. According to the passage, the author ________ puppy love.

A．is for	B．is against
C．is not interested in	D．thinks highly of

4. Dr. Marianm Kaufman does NOT suggest parents’encouraging their kids to ________.

A．chat more on line

B．keep close to their friends

C．attend more interesting activities

D．spend more time with their family

【推荐3】Sometimes meeting friends can be confusing, especially when you suddenly find yourself in a new school or for whatever reason totally without friends.     1     However, it might be challenging to others. If you have trouble meeting new people, the following suggestions are sure to inspire you.

    2     Perhaps the best way to meet new friends is when you’re getting outside your comfort zone and doing something new. Getting involved in a new hobby, and taking a class that makes you broaden your mind, or something else are all good ways to connect with someone new. First of all, in this way you’ll be meeting new people who you never expected before.     3     A new class or project will automatically help you feel you are open to learning and conversation.

Volunteering. Volunteering is a good thing to do all the way around. It helps build your self-esteem, it forces you to connect with others, and it gets you outside of your normal routine.     4     You’ll meet passionate people who can show you a different side of things.

Joining a book club. If you are into books and authors, there are several great ways to connect with new people. One of them is by joining a book group. I joined a book group that I wouldn’t “normally” have joined. It helped me read books that I would not have picked out myself and communicate with different people.     5    

A．Doing new things.

B．Joining a new club.

C．Making new friends can come easy to some people.

D．Why not make friends while you help someone else?

E．There have been some very nice surprises this way for me.

F．Then you’ll be in the mood (心情) to experience something special.

G．But you can connect with others from several organizations and websites.

【推荐2】It is rightly said one can share any secret with a true friend. He may know your deepest fears and weaknesses and yet will never take advantage of you. However, keeping a friend’s secrets to yourself and not telling the world is what makes the bond grow strong and last forever. You need to develop trust and mutual (互相的) understanding before you start sharing secrets with each other. With friends, secret talks never seem to end and it can get really amusing to know what has been going on in your friend’s mind.

There is a certain time in life especially from the teenage years when one starts having a personal periphery (界限) in life and parents are excluded (排斥) from it. It is because there are certain things that they can’t understand and we can’t discuss with them. That is when friends become the best secret sharers. They are the ones to whom one reveals one’s feelings and best kept secrets.

It is a general belief that only girls share secrets. But boys have their own secrets that they discuss with only closest friends. The secret talks can range (变化) from relationships, talks about fights with parents, secret activities and anything that is not supposed to be known to others! If you think secrets are limited to only teenagers, get your facts right! Secrets can be shared at any age and there is no hard and fast rule that secrets are shared only among youngsters.

Sharing secrets with a friend is not just fun, but it also helps to develop a lasting trust in one another. Sometimes, sharing secrets will tell you more about the person. You will come to know whether your friend is reliable and trustworthy and whether it is worth sharing your secrets with them. You can call it a test of friendship.

1. What is an advantage of sharing secrets with a friend?

A．It helps a lot in your study.

B．It leads you to a carefree life.

C．It makes you popular with other people.

D．It contributes to a long-term mutual belief.

2. What does Paragraph 2 mainly try to show?

A．Parents are always the best people to share secrets with.

B．Teenagers prefer to share secrets with their friends.

C．Parents should build trust with teenagers.

D．Teenagers grow to be independent.

3. The underlined word “reveals” in paragraph 2 can be best replaced by ______.

A．proves	B．tells
C．gets	D．holds

4. What can be learned about sharing secrets?

A．It’s limited to girls.

B．It follows strict rules.

C．It can happen at any age.

D．It does harm to a strong bond.

【推荐3】You're out to dinner. The food is delicious and the service is fine. You decide to leave a big fat tip. Why? The answer may not be as simple as you think.

Tipping, psychologists have found, is not just about service. Instead, studies have shown that tipping can be affected by psychological reactions to a series of different factors from the waiter's choice of words, to how they carry themselves while taking orders, to the billl's total.

Even how much waiters remind customers of themselves can determine how much change they pocket by the end of the night.

“Studies before have shown that mimicry （模仿）brings into positive feelings for the mimicker, "wrote Rick van Baaren, a social psychology professor. "These studies show that people who are being mimicked become more generous toward the person who mimicks.

So Rick van Baaren divided 59 waiters into two groups. He requested that half serve with a phrase such as, "Coming up!" Those in the other half were instructed to repeat the orders and preferences back to the customers. Rick van Baaren then compared their takehome pay. The results were clear-it pays to mimic your customer. The copycat （模仿者）waiters earned almost double the amount of tips to the other group.

Leonard Green and Joel Myerson, psychologists at Washington University in St Louis, found the generosity of a tipper may be limited by his bill. After research on the 1,000 tips left for waiters, cabdrivers, hair stylists, they found tip percentages in these three areas dropped as customers' bills went up. In fact, tip percentages appear to plateau （稳定期）when bills topped $100 and a bill for $200 made the worker gain no bigger percentage tip than a bill for $100.

"That's also a point of tipping," Green says. "You have to give a little extra to the cabdriver for being there to pick you up and something to the waiter for being there to serve you. If they weren't there, you'd never get any service. So part of the idea of a tip is for just being there."

1. Besides service, how many other fectors（因素）affecting the customers' tipping are mentioned in the passage?

A．1	B．2
C．3	D．4

2. These studies show that              .

A．tipping can be affected by physical reactions to many different waiters

B．the mimic waiters can get almost twice as much money as those who don't mimick others

C．people who are being mimicked usually tip less to the person who mimics them

D．mimicry makes the mimicker feel bad

3. According to the passage, which of the following will be likely to show the right change of the tip percentages?

A．	B．
C．	D．

4. We know from the passage that the writer seems to            .

A．object to Mr Green's idea about tipping

B．think part of Mr Green's explanation is reasonable

C．support the opinions of Mr Green and Rick van Baaren about tipping

D．give his generous tip to waiters very often

【推荐1】Researchers found that compared with young people who spent much of their free time in front of TV sets, those who were physically active often had higher self-respect, better grades and were less likely to have risky behavior like taking drugs, smoking, or drinking. The findings, based on a national survey of nearly 12, 000 middle and high school students, were published in a journal（期刊）.

“Across the board, children who engaged in any kind of activity were better off than kids who watched a lot of TV,” said study co-author(合著者) professor Penny Gordon Larsen of the University of North Carolina.

Other studies have linked certain content of television programs, such as violence and sex, to children’s behavior. But beyond this issue, Gordon Larsen said that kids who spend hours watching TV” miss opportunities” to develop skills, learn teamwork and have other experiences that their more active peers(同辈) benefit(受益) from

That doesn’t mean, however, that kids have to be on the football team. The study found that some activities like skating and skateboard(滑板)——which adults sometimes frown upon——were also related to better self-respect and less risk-taking.

That skaters were better behaved than TV-watchers might come as a surprise to some adults who consider these teens to be bad, according to Gordon Larsen. Skateboarding is forbidden in many public areas, and some communities(社区) disagree to build skating parks. But if kids who like to skate have nowhere to do it, “ it’s a shame,” said Gordon Larsen.

Not only should parents encourage their kids to engage（参与） in the physical activities they enjoy, she said, but schools and communities should also do more to create opportunities for children to be active.

1. From the passage we know that______?

A．physically active kids get into less trouble

B．more skating parks are being built.

C．kids who spend hours watching TV benefit a lot

D．kids who have nowhere to skate tend to take drugs.

2. If your kid is a football player, he is more likely to ______

A．get into the habit of smoking or drinking.	B．develop teamwork spirit.
C．have risky behaviors.	D．fail in the schoolwork.

3. This passage is mainly written to ______            .

A．offer some information to teachers and parents.

B．persuade kids not to watch a lot of TV.

C．urge the public to help children be active.

D．show the author’s concern about children’s growth.

4. What the underlined sentence “ which adults sometimes frown upon?” in the 4^th paragraph mean?

A．Some adults don’t understand the sports.

B．Some adults are impatient with kids.

C．Adults consider it dangerous to go skating or skateboarding

D．Some adults think them related to bad behaviors.

5. It can be inferred from the passage that ______?

A．kids are not expected to be active by some parents

B．professor Penny is a famous writer and journalist.

C．Skateboarding is popular in schools and communities.

D．kids are not encouraged to join the football team.

【推荐2】When you're surfing the Internet on your laptop from your dorm or home, do you know your personal details are being gathered secretly? And would you be surprised to know the information may be sold cheaply to advertisers and marketers?
According to an investigation by The Wall Street Journal, all it takes is a tiny file in a computer－a single code consisting of a long series of numbers and letters－to record the computer user's age, gender, location, favorite movies and hobbies.
The newspaper reports that Lotame Solutions Inc., a New York company, uses an advanced software called “beacon” to capture what people are typing on a website.
Lotame packages that data into profiles (个人资料) about individuals, only without their names, and sells the profiles to companies seeking customers. Batches of such data may be sold for a few dollars.
The Wall Street Journal survey discovered that spying on Internet users is one of the fastest­growing businesses on the World Wide Web.
The “cookie”－a tiny text file put on your PC by websites or marketing firms which might be used to remember your preferences for one site, or to track you across many sites is already old news. There are new and more complex tools such as “beacon” which scan in real time what people are doing on a webpage. These beacons instantly assess the Internet user's location, income, shopping interests and even medical conditions.
Millions of Internet users around the world also face unprecedented (空前的) threats. Private, sensitive, personal and business information is being gathered and sold without their knowledge.
Companies insist the information they gather is anonymous(匿名的) and the data is used harmlessly. But the technology has grown so powerful that even some of the biggest websites in the US don't know that they were installing intrusive files on visitors' computers. These include MSN.com and Yahoo.com.
Next time you visit a webpage and find an ad banner advertising something you've been planning to buy, don't be amazed that your computer can read your mind.
1. The purpose of the passage is to ______.

A．introduce a tiny file in a computer－a single code

B．show how your individual information was let out when you surf the Internet

C．show how to protect your privacy

D．introduce a sophisticated software called “beacon”

2. All of the following statements are not true EXCEPT ______.

A．Lotame sells the profiles about individuals to companies seeking customers with their age, gender, location, hobbies and names

B．spying on Internet users is the fastest­growing business on the World Wide Web

C．some of the biggest websites in the US know they were installing intrusive files on visitors' computers

D．a tiny file in a computer－a single code consisting of a long series of numbers and letters can record the user's information

3. What’s the writer’s attitude to the issue?

A．neutral

B．optimistic

C．worried

D．indifferent

【推荐1】Anyone who commutes (通勤) by car knows that traffic jams are an unavoidable part of life. But humans are not alone in facing potential backups.

Ants also commute—between their nest and sources of food. The survival of their colonies depends on doing this efficiently.

When humans commute, there’s a point at which cars become dense (稠密) enough to slow down the flow of traffic, causing jam. Motsch, a mathematician in Arizona State University, and his colleagues wanted to know if ants on the move could also get stuck. So they regulated traffic density by constructing bridges of various widths between a colony of Argentine ants and a source of food. Then they waited and watched. “The goal was to try to find out at what point they are going to have a traffic jam.” said Sebastien Motsch.

But it appears that that never happened. They always managed to avoid traffic jam. The flow of ants did increase at the beginning as ants started to fill the bridge and then levelled off at high densities. But it never slowed down or stopped, even when the bridge was nearly filled with ants.

The researchers then took a closer look at how the behaviour of individual ants impacted traffic as a whole. And they found that when ants sense overcrowding, they adjust their speeds and avoid entering high-density areas, which prevents jams. These behaviours may be promoted by pheromones, chemicals that tell other ants where a trail is. The ants also manage to avoid colliding (碰撞) with each other at high densities, which could really slow them down. The study is in the journal eLife.

Can ants help us solve our own traffic problems? Not likely, says Motsch. That’s because when it comes to getting from point A to point B as fast as possible, human drivers put their own goals first. Individual ants have to be more cooperative in order to feed the colony. But the research could be useful in improving traffic flow for self-driving cars, which can be designed to be less like selfish humans—and more like ants.

1. What does the underlined word “this” in para.2 refer to?

A．Surviving.	B．Commuting.
C．Finding food.	D．Avoiding jams.

2. How did the researchers control the traffic density of the commuting ants?

A．By finding out the dense points.	B．Through closer observation.
C．By controlling the widths of their path.	D．By regulating their numbers.

3. According to the research, ants can avoid traffic jams mainly because ________.

A．they follow a special route.

B．they level off at high densities.

C．they never stop or slow down on the way.

D．they depend on their natural chemicals to adjust their speeds.

4. What is the best title of the passage?

A．Traffic jams.	B．Unavoidable? Not for ants!
C．Survival of an ant colony.	D．Difference between human and ants.

【推荐3】Many teenagers feel that the most important people in their lives are their friends. They believe that their family members don't know them as well as their friends do. In large families, it is quite often for brothers and sisters to fight with each other and then they can only go to their friends for some ideas.

It is very important for teenagers to have one good friend or a group of friends. Even when they are not with their friends, they usually spend a lot of time talking among themselves on the phone. This communication is very important in children's growing up, because friends can discuss something. These things are difficult to tell their family members.

However, parents often try to choose their children's friends for them. Some parents may even stop their children from meeting their good friends. Have you ever thought of the following questions?

1.Who chooses your friends?

2.Do you choose your friends or your friends choose you?

3.Have you got a good friend your parents don't like?

Your answers are welcome.

1. When teenagers have something difficult to tell their parents, they usually_______.

A．stay alone at home	B．fight with their parents
C．discuss it with their friends	D．go to their brothers and sisters for help

2. The sentence “Your answers are welcome." means _______.

A．you are welcome to discuss the questions with us

B．we've got no idea, so your answers are welcome

C．your answers are always right

D．you can give us all the right answers

3. Which of the following is the writer's attitude?

A．Parents should choose friends for their children.

B．Children should choose everything they like.

C．Parents should understand their children better.

D．Teenagers should only go to their friends for help.

4. Part of the purpose of this passage(短文) is to ________.

A．give information for the parents to make their own judgment (判断)

B．give advice to children who want to choose their friends

C．help parents to find better friends for their children

D．get some information from many readers