A boy lost his arms in an accident. Since then, he has had to ________ his younger brother. Except for writing with his toes, he was ________ to do anything else. As the two brothers grew up together, they had their own problems and would often quarrel (争吵). Then one day, his younger brother went away and lived ________. The boy was heart-broken and didn’t know what to do.

A ________ thing happened to a girl. One night the girl was ________ dinner when it caused a fire. The fire took her hands away. ________ her elder sister wanted to take care of her, she refused. At school, she studied hard. She learned to be self-reliant (自力更生的). “I am lucky. Though my arms are broken, my heart can still fly,” she once wrote.

One day, the boy and the girl were both ________ to a TV program. The boy told the TV host about his uncertain (不确定的) future, while the girl was full of hope for her life. They were both asked to ________ something on a piece of paper with their   toes. The boy wrote: My younger brother’s arms are my arms. While the girl wrote: Broken wings, flying heart.

They had both ________ the same hard times, but their different attitudes determined(决定) the nature of their lives. It is true that ________ is unpredictable (不可预知的). Disasters can strike at any time. How you deal with the misfortune (不幸) when you are faced with it is the test of your personalities.

Taking online classes is becoming increasingly popular, but students have different opinions about it.

There are many colors in nature. But do you know if a color has weight? I think you’ll say “no”. But I am afraid you are wrong. If you don’t believe, you may do a small experiment.

First, put two objects with the same weight into two boxes. Then cover the box. Third, wrap one box with a red piece of paper, the other with a white piece of paper. OK. Now hold the boxes with your hand one by one. It is certain that you will think the red one is a little heavier.

Why do you think so? A scientist found that different colors   have   different weight in a man’s mind. So he did many tests and at last he got the result. That is to say, every color has its own weight in our mind and their order is the same. The heaviest color is red, then blue, green, orange, yellow and white.

The scientist told us that colors also have smell. Can you smell the color? Of course not. Then why did the scientist say so? That is because every color stands for a kind of light with a certain wavelength. It reaches our brain through sense organs ( 感觉器官).

According to this discovery, scientists say that people accept the colors they like, and refuse the colors they hate. So your body and mind will be healthy by using the colors you like. Or you’ll be nervous or even get ill. For example, if you stay in a   room with red windows, wallpapers and furniture for two hours, you’ll feel you have been there for four hours. But if the room is blue, you’ll feel you have been there for only an hour. Another example, if a person walks out of a red room and into a blue room, his temperature will fall. That means our body temperature will change with different colors.

Babies don’t learn to talk just from hearing sounds. They are lip (嘴唇) readers too. It happens during the period when a baby’s babbling (咿呀声) slowly changes from unclear voices into that first “mama” or “dada”. The babies have to find out how to shape their lips to make that particular sound they are hearing, according to developmental psychologist David Lewkowicz of Florida Atlantic University, who led the study.

Clearly it doesn’t take them too long to understand the movements that match basic sounds. By their first birthdays, babies start changing back to look you in the eye again. It offers more evidence that quality face-time with babies is very important for speech development more than, say, turning on the latest baby DVD.

But Lewkowicz went a step further. He and his student Amy Hansen Tift tested nearly 180 babies, groups of them at ages 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12 months. How? They showed videos of a woman speaking in English or French to babies of English speakers.   They found   that when   the speaker used English, the 4-month-old   babies gazed (凝视) mostly into her eyes. The 6-month-old babies spent equal amounts (数量) of time looking at the eyes and the mouth. The 8-month-old babies and 10-month-old babies studied mostly the mouth. At 12 months, attention started changing back toward the speaker’s eyes.

But what happened when these babies are used to English heard French? The 12-month-old babies studied the mouth longer, just like younger babies. They needed the extra information to understand the unfamiliar sounds. That fits with research into bilingualism (双语) that shows babies’ brains adjust (调整) themselves to tell the differences between the sounds of their native language over other languages in the first year of life.

The continued lip reading shows the l-year-old babies clearly still are fit for learning. Babies are so hard to study, says Duke University cognitive scientist Greg Appelbaum, who found the research so fantastic that he wants to know more.

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Now students’ English handwriting gets worse and worse. That makes their teachers feel worried. Is your English handwriting beautiful? If not, here are four steps that really work!

◆Use paper that has lines

Using paper that has lines can keep you writing straight when you write English words or sentences. Those lines on the paper can help you to write words in the right size. Be sure to fill the lined space completely. And make sure those capital letters (大写字母) are written properly.

◆Slow down

If your writing is hard to read, try slowing down a little. For some kids, going slower makes the handwriting clear. If you write too fast, it’s hard for you to stop where you should, and even worse, you may make more mistakes.

◆ Hold your pencil right

When you hold your pencil the correct way, writing is much easier. Some kids press down really hard when they write. That makes the handwriting not nice. Try to relax yourself and don’t hold the pencil so hard. Let your writing appear nice and clean. If you do so, people will guess you are a student with a good habit.

◆Draw more pictures

Drawing can improve your handwriting. You need to use the skills to control your pencil better when you are drawing pictures. Even though you have no chance to draw at school, you can practice by yourself at home.

Handwriting is very important. Imagine you are a world-famous movie star or a well-known sports player, what do you do when your fans run up to you? Give them your autographs, of course!

2020 is the Year of the R    66     in China. I remember when I was a kid, my family once took me to a Chinese restaurant back in the US. There was a paper placemat ( 餐具垫 ) with pictures of the 12 animal s    67     on it. It led us to laughs when we learned my aunt is a rat.

We laughed, b    68     in the American culture, rats are animals of very low status ( 地位 ). They eat garbage and carry diseases, so we think they are d    69    . Rats are also sneaky (鬼鬼祟祟), so we don’t think we can believe them. Calling someone a rat is a serious insult ( 辱 骂 ). It m    70     he or she will betray ( 背叛 ) your trust.

As a kid, this caused me to feel bad for people b    71     in the Year of the Rat. I wondered if Chinese children would be laughed at for their animal signs.

Then I did some research and found that although Chinese people also see rats as dirty animals, they added them to the animal signs for a r    72    .

According to what I found, rats are considered thrifty (勤俭的) and practical by Chinese people. These are qualities that can bring people wealth. They are also able to have a lot of   b    73    , and this makes them a symbol of   good luck-traditionally,   Chinese people would like to have large families with many children. Rats are believed to be smart, t    74    . Sneaky animals must be clever.

You see, human culture is interesting. There are always d    75     ways to look at the same thing!

76. 假设你是 Tom，想推荐你们班的班长 David 做学生会主席，请根据下列内容写一封推荐信。内容提示见下表:

I am writing to recommend our monitor David as the chairperson of our school.

I think David is the most suitable person to be the chairperson. We hope that you can agree.

Yours sincerely,

Tom