1 . Great work is work that makes a difference in people’s lives, writes David Sturt, Executive Vice President of the O.C. Tanner Institute, in his book Great Work: How to Make a Difference People Love. Sturt insists, however, that great work is not just for surgeons or special-needs educators or the founders of organizations trying to eliminate poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. The central theme of Great Work, according to Sturt, is that anyone can make a difference in any job. It’s not the nature of the job, but what you do with the job that counts. As proof, Sturt tells the story of a remarkable hospital cleaner named Moses.
In a building filled with doctors and nurses doing great life-saving work, Moses the cleaner makes a difference. Whenever he enters a room, especially a room with a sick child, he engages both patients and parents with his optimism and calm, introducing himself to the child and, Sturt writes, speaking “little comments about light and sunshine and making things clean.” He comments on any progress he sees day by day (“you’re sitting up today, that’s good.”) Moses is no doctor and doesn’t pretend to be, but he has witnessed hundreds of sick children recovering from painful surgery, and parents take comfort from his encouraging words. For Matt and Mindi, whose son McKay was born with only half of a heart, Moses became a close friend. As Sturt explains, “Moses took his innate (与生俱来的) talents (his sensitivity) and his practical wisdom (from years of hospital experience) and combined them into a powerful form of patient and family support that changed the critical-care experience for Mindi, Matt and little McKay.”
How do people like Moses do great work when so many people just work? That was the central question raised by Sturt and his team at the O.C. Tanner Institute, a consulting company specialized in employee recognition and rewards system.
O.C. Tanner launched an exhaustive Great Work study that included surveys to 200 senior executives, a further set of surveys to 1,000 managers and employees working on projects, an in-depth qualitative study of 1.7 million accounts of award-winning work (in the form of nominations (提名) for awards from corporations around the world), and one-on-one interviews with 200 difference makers. The results of the study revealed that those who do great work refuse to be defeated by the constraints of their jobs and are especially able to reframe their jobs: they don’t view their jobs as a list of tasks and responsibilities but see their jobs as opportunities to make a difference. No matter, as Moses so ably exemplifies (例证), what that job may be.
1. According to Sturt, which of the following is TRUE?| A．It’s not the nature of the job, but what you do that makes a difference. |
| B．Anyone in the world is responsible to delete poverty and change the world. |
| C．Anyone can make a difference in people’s lives no matter what kind of job he does. |
| D．Surgeons, special-needs educators and founders of organizations can succeed more easily. |
| A．By keeping optimistic and calm when facing patients and their parents at hospital. |
| B．By showing his special gift and working experience when working at hospital. |
| C．By showing his sympathy and kindness to patients when entering their rooms. |
| D．By pretending to be a doctor or nurse when entering a room with a sick child. |
| A．demands | B．advantages | C．disadvantages | D．limitations |
| A．Great work is work that makes a difference in people’s lives no matter what you do. |
| B．If a boss has trouble recognizing his employees, he can ask O. C. Tanner for advice. |
| C．Moses makes a difference through his sensitivity and his practical wisdom. |
| D．Those who do great work are never defeated by others or their jobs themselves. |
2 . There are many colors in nature. But do you think that a color has weight? I think you'll say "no". But I'm afraid you are wrong. If you don't believe it, you may do a small experiment.
First, put two objects with the same weight into two boxes. Then cover the boxes. Third, wrap one box with a red piece of paper, the other one with 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 weights in man's mind. That is to say, every color has its own weight in our mind.
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 kind of light with a certain wavelength（波长）. It reaches our brain through sense organs.
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, you like blue and hate red. If you stay in a room with red windows, wallpaper 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. And if a person walks out of a blue room and into a red room, his temperature will rise. That means our body temperature will change with different colors.
1. What can we know from the experiment?| A．The two boxes have the same weight. |
| B．Colors can change the weight of an object. |
| C．The red paper is heavier than the white paper. |
| D．Colors have different weights in people's mind. |
| A．The meal of colors is changeable. |
| B．People can sense the light from colors. |
| C．People can smell the colors through the nose. |
| D．All the colors have the same smell for the blind. |
| A．White color is heavier than red color. |
| B．People nay get ill if they refuse the colors they don't like. |
| C．People can stay longer in red rooms than in blue rooms. |
| D．People's body temperature will change with different colors. |
| A．short novel | B．news report |
| C．science report | D．advertisement |
