【推荐1】I had just delivered a memorized speech that I had labored over for months, and I was about to learn how the experts judged my performance. The polite audience leaned forward in their folding chairs. Silence fell across the room and the drum rolled in my mind.

The contest organizer announced the third-place winner. Alas, the name was not mine. Then the second, and once again it was not me. At last, the moment of truth came. Either I was about to be bathed in the warmth of victory or regretted the last several months spent preparing. While neither of these came to pass, my heart just sank.

Losing is a part of life, but it was an indescribable depression to drive 200 miles round trip, get up early on a freezing Saturday morning, and yet still finish fourth out of four contestants. After Lincoln lost the 1858 Illinois Senate race, he reportedly said, “I felt like the 12-year-old boy who stubbed his toe. I was too big to cry and it hurt too bad to laugh.” Oh yeah, I could relate.

Months before the contest, I had spent hours in front of a computer and in libraries doing research for the Lincoln Bicentennial Speech Contest. As I read through several biographies, one idea stood out: Lincoln was handed many sound defeats, but he never allowed them to permanently stop his spirit or ambition. I thought “failing successfully” was a very appropriate topic, given the many letdowns Lincoln experienced, and so this became the title of my speech.

Never mind the lost prize money and praise — I did gain a new perspective. Through learning about Lincoln, I discovered that I could fail successfully. Now, whenever I’m faced with a failure, I remember what Lincoln said after his unsuccessful 1854 Senate race, “The path was worn and slippery. My foot slipped from under me, knocking the other out of the way, but I recovered and said to myself, ‘It’s a slip and not a fall.’”

【推荐3】Successful people are the center of any hot discussion. Actually any successful individual is flesh and blood just like you.     1     It's the small differences that help them stick out from the rest.

1.Ordinary people dream of a better future，while successful people create a better future.

We all want to live a better life: more happiness，more freedom and better health.     2     However，the average person will focus on dreaming，while the successful one spares no efforts to create that dreamy future.

2.     3    

Everyone has doubts and negative thoughts once in a while. It's just human nature and the way our brains function. Many people accept these thoughts as truths and let them control their lives. On the contrary，great people are conscious of the impact their thoughts have，and try to influence their thinking to make it work for them.

3.Ordinary people prefer short-term satisfaction，while successful people choose long-term rewards.

Do you know anyone who hates to be rewarded？Neither do we.     4     In the era in which we are taught to praise comfort over anything else，it's easy to settle for instant pleasure. However，successful people recognize that oftentimes you need to wait to experience the true pleasure.

4.Ordinary people praise overabundance（过多），while successful people praise limitation（限制）.

A kind of person loves to gather wealth.     5     However，one of the features of truly successful people is that they can limit a lot of things in order to focus on the ones that are actually important.

【推荐1】While most high school students spend most of their time worrying about who likes who, and different relationships between their classmates, I choose to focus on my school lessons and sports.

When I was young, my mother encouraged me to develop and keep friendship with boys in order to build strong relationships. But she told me not to risk a good friendship with a boy with the title of boyfriend. It's indeed a wise choice to stay friends with those of the opposite gender（性别）.In my opinion, even though some high school relationships might continue after graduation, the probability of them lasting much longer is so slim（微小的）that there really is not a point to it.

Firstly you have to think about such a question whether it is possible to hurt both of you, or even hurt both of your future husbands or wives. My second point is that you still can date if you hope marriage could possibly follow. Except this, there really is not any other reason for dating. Some students desire relationships for a chance to be romantic. While these are nice to have, there are many more important things at this point in our lives.

The titles of boyfriend and girlfriend put too much stress on a relationship between high school students. Just staying as common friends may be the best choice for us. I do advise we should deal with it in a proper way and follow our teachers' advice if necessary.

【推荐2】Too many people want others to be their friends, but they don’t give friendship back. That is why some friendship doesn’t last long. To have a friend, you must learn to be one. You must learn to treat your friend the way you want your friend to treat you. Learning to be good friend means learning three rules: be honest; be generous; be understanding.

Honesty is where a good friendship starts. Friends must be able to trust one another. If you do not tell the truth, people usually find out. If a friend finds out that you haven’t been honest, you may lose the friend’s trust. Good friends always count on one another to speak and act honestly.

Generosity means sharing and sharing makes a friendship grow. You do not have to give your lunch money or your clothes. Naturally you will want to share your ideas and feelings. These can be very valuable to friend. They tell your friend what is important to you. By sharing them, you help your friend know better.

Sooner or later everyone needs understanding and help with a problem. Something may go wrong at school. Talking about the problem can make it easier to solve. Turning to a friend can be a first step in solving the problem. So to be a friend you must listen and understand. You must try to put yourself in your friend’s place so you can understand the problem better.

No two friendships are ever exactly alike. But all true friendships have three thinks in common. If you plan to keep your friends, you must practice honesty, generosity and understanding.

【推荐3】If you’re one of the people who find it difficult to make small talk at parties, it may be because you’re asking the wrong questions, experts said.

For example, while the question "What do you do? "is a classic conversation starter，it may lead to an embarrassing moment if your conversation partner is unemployed or simply doesn’t want to talk about work.

Instead of “What do you do?”, try asking "What keeps you busy?"expert Daniel Post Senning said. That way, the question applies to people whether or not they have traditional jobs.

As it turns out, Senning considers work life one of the most intimate(私密的) conversation topics, right up there with family, health, and finance. Slightly less intimate topics include politics and dating, while the safest topics to discuss include sports, weather and pop culture.

Meanwhile, in other countries, the "What do you do? " question could even be taken as offensive (冒犯的). In France,for example, "They will be offended, believing you’ re trying to put them into a box, "culture writer Julie Barlow said. “And they just don’t think it’s interesting to work for a living. There are other things they’d much rather talk about.”

But other than rephrasing(改述) the question, there are plenty of other strategies you can use to start meaningful conversations with strangers.

For one, it helps to ask your conversation partner open-ended questions, which prompt(引起)more detailed answers than yes-or-no questions. A question like "Did you have a good weekend? "will get a less thought-provoking (发人深思的) response than “What was the best part of your weekend?”

Communication expert Yasmin Sara Merchant also recommends preparing a few conversation topics in advance related to the event, like "How do you know the host? "or “What is your connection to this event?”

【推荐2】Professor Heinz Wolff, who has died aged 89, was a bioengineering pioneer. He established the discipline, named it and, in a 60-year career, made significant contributions to medical research. But to the British public, he was best known as the dotty scientist who fronted The Great Egg Race, a BBC show in which colour-coded teams were set engineering challenges (the first was to transport an egg in a vehicle powered by rubber bands). With his trademark bow tie, half-moon glasses and Mittel-European accent, he looked really like Professor Branestawn, as described by W. Heath Robinson. Yet while he cheerfully exploited his reputation as a “peculiar egghead”, he was very serious about his work and inspired thousands of young people to consider scientific careers.

Born in Berlin in 1928, Heinz Wolff was the son of Jewish parents. His mother died in 1938, and the next year the family fled. They arrived in Britain on the day war was declared. “We really cut it rather fine,” he said on Desert Island Discs in 1998. After leaving school, he worked as a technician at the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford, where he invented a machine to count red blood cells, and then at the National Institute for Medical Research’s pneumoconiosis research unit in Cardiff, where he designed a means of measuring dust levels in coal miners. He went on to study at University College London and graduated with a first in physics and physiology. Then, in 1983, he founded the Institute for Bioengineering at Brunel University. His particular interest was in technologies to improve the lives of older people, but he was also heavily involved in space research and worked as an adviser to the European Space Agency.

Wolff had made his first appearance on TV on Panorama in 1966, encouraging Richard Dimbleby to swallow a “radio pill”. On The Great Egg Race, which ran from 1979, his task was to get opponent teams representing organizations such as the chemical company ICI. Challenges included building a hovercraft from a lawnmower, and inventing a bicycle that could ride on water. Marks were awarded for entertainment value and technical accomplishment. The show ended in the mid-1980s, but Wolff continued to judge scientific competitions, on TV and elsewhere. A natural entertainer with an inexhaustible curiosity about the world, he said he’d be happy to dress up as a clown if it got children interested in science.

【推荐3】In high school I was very shy, content to hang around with my small group of friends and to concentrate on my courses. I was quickly labeled a "brain." I did so well that by the end of senior year I had perfect grades and enough college credits to give up an entire quarter of coursework.

But in early June of senior year, the principal called me into his office. He asked me to give a speech at graduation. I was surprised to look at him, my heart thumping. This was the reward for my hard work? I murmured something and fled the office, blaming myself for staying away from physics, a subject sure to have broken up my perfect record.

I finally agreed to a compromise. I would share the honor with five other students. I agreed to introduce my friend Judy, who would then give her own, full-length speech.

Graduation day soon arrived, I’d been practicing my speech for days, and I had it memorized. The first half hour of the ceremony passed in a blur, and then my moment came. My name was announced. I managed to reach the stage without falling down. I faced my classmates. My voice trembled a little, but mostly it was clear and strong. But within seconds, I was done and heading back to my seat. I accomplished something I’d never dreamed of — I spoke in front of hundreds of people.

Although I didn’t realize it at the time, the successful completion of that speech gave me the confidence to take part in class at college, to give oral reports, and to eventually break free of my shyness. I never would have chosen to give a speech at graduation — or ever. But I’m glad I did. I no longer hesitate when I’m faced with the prospect of doing something I feared. I know it may very well turn out to be one of my shining moments.