1 . Sarah was not an early riser. But what made the annoying early morning hours bearable was the comforting smell of fresh coffee floating in the air. Her favorite coffee shop was just a few minutes away from her apartment.
One sunny morning, Sarah rushed to get dressed. Having a job interview, she felt anxious, afraid to be late. She grabbed her car key, dashed out of the door and made her way to her familiar coffee shop as usual. As she joined the line of cars at the drive-through, the smell of roasted coffee beans and the thought of the first taste of coffee were her little daily luxury. The line inched forward, and soon, Sarah found herself at the drive-through window. She reached for her purse to pay, but before she could hand over her credit card, the coffee shop assistant smiled and said, “Your coffee has been covered by the car ahead of you.” Sarah was taken aback. “Really?” she asked, feeling astonished and grateful. The assistant nodded. The unexpected act of kindness put a smile on her face, making her upcoming interview feel a little relaxing.
As she exited the drive-through, Sarah glanced in her rear view mirror (后视镜) at the next car approaching the coffee shop window. An idea began to come into her mind. Maybe she could do the same and brighten someone else’s morning. She decided to return to the coffee shop. Inside, she approached the cashier and said, “I’d like to pay for the coffee of the person in the car behind me.” The assistant smiled and nodded again.
As Sarah eventually left the coffee shop, Sarah couldn’t help but wonder how the next driver would react. A wave of satisfaction washed over Sarah as she witnessed the continuation of the coffee chain. She knew she had just initiated a chain of generosity and kindness.
1. What can we learn about Sarah from the first two paragraphs?| A．She led a life of luxury. | B．She used to get up early. |
| C．She was nervous about the interview. | D．She was new to the coffee shop. |
| A．To find out who paid for her coffee. | B．To order herself another cup of coffee. |
| C．To see what was exactly happening there. | D．To buy coffee for the driver behind her. |
| A．Ambitious. | B．Content. | C．Awkward. | D．Suspicious. |
| A．A chain of coffee shops. | B．An unforgettable interview. |
| C．The kindness from an assistant. | D．The power of paying it forward. |
An exhibition titled Symbiosis of the Chinese Zodiac (生肖) opened at the Tocumen International Airport in Panama on Dec 19 and would run until Jan 20.
Sally Huang,
The exhibition
The lead institution applying for the project was Beijing Normal University,
The opening ceremony was joined by representatives from both countries, such as the Chinese ambassador to Panama and the vice-minister of culture in Panama.
The ambassador expressed some
1. 时间、地点；
2. 注意事项。
注意：1. 词数80左右；
2. 可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯。
Boys and girls,
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The English Club,
May 26th, 2021
4 . The temperature was rising to 90 degrees on Tuesday in the hills of the Delaware Water Gap National Recreational Area, when Lexie Daniel and her friends saw a heroic act of kindness to save a dog’s life.
Lexie and her fellow hikers met a man whose dog was seriously overheated. Even though they donated (捐赠) their water, they were afraid it wouldn’t be enough to save the pup, after seeing how much the dog was already struggling.
“The owner brought along a huge jug, but no water seemed to be helping,” Lexie told GNN.
Too tired to carry the dog himself, the loving owner called the park rangers as soon as possible. Supervisory Park Ranger Kris Salapek soon found them on the trail (追踪). Kris then lifted the huge dog onto his shoulders and carried him down the mountain. “It was a long distance-a couple miles down a difficult rocky path,” says Lexie.
When they reached the stream, Kris laid him in the water as he knelt beside him and poured water on him. The ranger then picked him back up over his shoulders and walked all the way back down to the street for about an hour.
Lexie’s cousin Tori Matyola said, “The owner hiked down ahead of the ranger so that once he got down the mountain he had the car ready to take him straight to the vet. The dog was looking a little better by the time he got to the car and picking up his head.”
When she got home, Lexie, a pediatric (小儿科的) nurse from Hackettstown, New Jersey, posted the good deed on Facebook and it went viral with 35,000 people sharing the post and showing admiration for the ranger.
“This is a HERO,” Lexie wrote. “We are so lucky to have rangers like this who put animals before themselves. This ranger deserves recognition and a standing ovation (列队鼓掌) for his bravery, selflessness, and strength.”
1. What were Lexie and her fellow hikers worried about?| A．The dog’s struggle for more water. | B．The dog’s lack of water to keep alive. |
| C．The owner’s unability to feed his dog. | D．The owner’s tiredness to carry the dog. |
| A．It was tough. | B．It was simple. | C．It was unbelievable. | D．It was unexpected. |
| A．To clean it. | B．To feed it. | C．To cool it. | D．To relax it. |
| A．Her appreciation to Kris. | B．Her relief of the dog’s recovery. |
| C．The ranger’s example set to people. | D．The ranger’s experience of saving the dog. |
My darling grandma has a collection of photo albums kept over several decades. I enjoyed joking with grandma about her preferred old-fashioned method of photo storage, but I know that these albums are precious for her. They are the records of our family and our identity.
One day while examining one of grandma’s albums, I came across photos of my mother and her brother as children in Disney World in the 1980’s. Grandma looked thoughtful and smiled. “Your mother and your uncle had such an amazing time,” she said. “I’m glad I was able to make that vacation happen for them. Every child should visit Disney at least once and just get to be a kid... happy and carefree.” As I continued examining the photos, I noticed something which didn’t sit right with me. In every photo my grandmother was in, she was smiling in an unsettled, half-hearted way where her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. When I asked her about it, she gently closed the album and said, “Oh, now enough of these old photos. Let’s talk about what we’re going to do for Christmas next month.”
That evening, I quietly asked my mother about the photos and the family trip to Disneyland. Mom breathed out. She explained that my grandparents were constantly fighting and that they had been having problems in their marriage. “I think that was probably the last trip we took together as a family before they separated,” Mom said. “Your grandma was so sad the entire week we were there, but she did everything she could to make sure your uncle and I had a great experience. We had been begging to go to Disney for so long. She organized the entire trip for our pleasure. I’m sure it was all physically and emotionally tiring for her.”
That night I turned restlessly in my bed thinking about the devotion my grandmother had for her children and about how even today she continues to put the needs of everyone in our family above her own. Grandma does so much for her children and grandchildren every day.
注意：1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Shouldn’t we do something for her?
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________We pulled over at Disney World, which surprised my grandma.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________6 . Dolphins. That’s how I got into trouble. My family were eating dinner when I
All night I thought about what Maggie had said. Was she
So for this New Year’s Resolution, I
Several days later, I was in the regular supermarket. The check-out clerk was a sour woman who rarely said anything apart from the
| A．tore | B．put | C．brought | D．picked |
| A．like | B．name | C．draw | D．share |
| A．alive | B．next | C．dangerous | D．past |
| A．screamed | B．rose | C．froze | D．laughed |
| A．cold | B．broad | C．bony | D．tense |
| A．pessimistic | B．reliable | C．right | D．guilty |
| A．greedy | B．ridiculous | C．rigid | D．mean |
| A．set aside | B．put up with | C．make fun of | D．take down |
| A．decided | B．agreed | C．pretended | D．guessed |
| A．arguments | B．comments | C．jokes | D．plans |
| A．kind | B．blind | C．humble | D．plain |
| A．controlled | B．required | C．interrupted | D．teased |
| A．assistance | B．information | C．response | D．suggestion |
| A．felt | B．behaved | C．arose | D．fought |
| A．clearer | B．tougher | C．milder | D．lighter |
7 . The Greek philosopher Heraclitus taught that you can’t step into the same river twice, for you aren’t the same person at each visit, and the water is ever flowing. It is a powerful way to represent the reality of impermanence: Everything is always changing.
Many people have tense relationships with change. They deny it, resist it or attempt to control it- the result of which is almost always some combination of stress, anxiety, and burnout. It doesn’t have to be that way.
A concept called allostasis can help. Developed in the late 1980s by a neuroscientist, Peter Sterling, and a biologist, Joseph Eyer, allostasis is defined as “stability through change,” elegantly showing the concept’s double meaning: The way to stay stable through the process of change is by changing, at least to some extent.
The river of change has been flowing mercilessly, and it shows no signs of letting up. Societally, we’ve gone through a pandemic (大流行病), its economic decline and the widespread adoption of social media, the combination of which has shifted how we live and work. In our personal lives, we continue to do what we have always done: relocate, start jobs, quit jobs, change jobs, get promoted, experience illness, get married, have children, retire and on and on.
Finding ways in this river requires both ruggedness and flexibility. To be rugged is to be tough and determined, to know your core values and what you stand for. To be flexible is to actively respond to changing circumstances, to adapt and bend easily without breaking, to grow and even change your mind. Put these qualities together and the result is a great endurance, one that helps you maintain your strong core even in fragile moments. It allows you to step into allostasis’s cycle of order, disorder and reorder — which is, of course, one and the same with stepping into Heraclitus’s river —and to chart it skillfully and whenever possible, to your own benefit.
1. What do we know about allostasis?| A．It is a contradictory concept. | B．It tends to focus on change. |
| C．It advocates dynamic stability. | D．It claims absolute adaptability. |
| A．Being pumped. | B．Slowing down. | C．Getting polluted. | D．Rising up. |
| A．Popularity. | B．Confidence. | C．Recognition. | D．Perseverance. |
| A．Say No to Stability | B．Stop Resisting Change |
| C．Fight for Flexibility | D．Balance Life and Work |
8 . Growing up in suburbia, yard work was punishment. I’d take almost anything else. I didn’t like being outside, and I especially didn’t like bugs or dirt.
When I left home at 17 with a backpack of belongings, I figured my gardening days were behind me. There were no yards to work in—only concrete! The concrete jungle that awaited me seemed like a welcome escape from the outdoor chores that had once felt like a sentence.
It wasn’t until my mid-20s that I, thinking it was the adult thing to do, brought home a small daisy (雏菊) in a pot to put on my fire escape. Less than 24 hours later, a squirrel (松鼠) arrived and dragged it away, pot and all. That’s New York for you! I took it as a sign and didn’t try any more plants in that apartment.
When I married, my wife and I bought a house in outer Brooklyn. There was enough room to have a garden if we wanted one. We decided to see if we could grow anything, mostly for the novelty factor. Much to my surprise, digging in the dirt felt like fun and totally not a chore! In the early mornings, I would bend down to inspect the soil waiting for the plants to appear. Watering at dusk, I whispered to the baby plants, expecting them to keep growing. The plants kept the neighborhood squirrels fed and provided a place for bumblebees to nap. I felt a rush of power and excitement.
As the flowers and vegetables bloomed, I noticed something in me was growing as well. Since running away from home as a teenager, I’ve always done my best to build a shelter for myself wherever I was living. I hung pictures on the walls. I built new holiday traditions with friends. I painted the walls bright colors. But it always felt like maybe that deep connection to a particular space was missing. In gardening, I finally found this new layer of depth. I guess you could say I was putting down roots.
There is an inspiring, self-care practice in the time and energy it takes to plant, water, and wait and wait to see if the magic happens. It’s the act of growing that I find the sweetest.
What are you growing?
1. How does the author interpret his departure at 17?| A．As a necessary step for growth. | B．As a great relief. |
| C．As an escape from social expectations. | D．As a bittersweet transition. |
| A．There was a shift in his perspective. | B．He regarded a squirrel as a bad sign. |
| C．He began to miss the days before 17. | D．A sense of responsibility grew in him. |
| A．A colorful life. | B．Friends’ respect. |
| C．Creative ideas. | D．A sense of belonging. |
| A．their own sources of growth | B．the importance of gardening |
| C．the output of the growing plants | D．their favorite flowers and vegetables |
1. When will the swim classes begin?
| A．On May 1st. | B．On April 30th. | C．On April 29th. |
| A．10. | B．15. | C．20. |
| A．Those who have no Level 3 certificate. |
| B．Those who want to pass the skill level test quickly. |
| C．Those who have never attended Community Pool classes. |
| A．The speaker. | B．The instructors. | C．The local community. |
Not so long ago, most people didn’t know who Shelly Ann Francis Pryce was going to become. She was just an average high school athlete. There was every indication that she was just another American teenager without much of a future. However, one person wants to change this. Stephen Francis observed then eighteen-year-old Shelly Ann at a track meet and was convinced that he had seen the beginning of true greatness. Her times were not exactly impressive, but even so, he sensed there was something trying to get out. He decided to offer Shelly-Ann a place in his very strict training seasons. Their cooperation quickly produced results, and a few years later at Jamaica’s Olympic games in early 2008, Shelly Ann, who at that time only ranked number 70 in the world, beat Jamaica’s unchallenged queen of the sprint (短跑).
“Where did she come from?” asked an astonished sprinting world, before concluding that she must be one of those one-hit wonders that spring up from time to time, only to disappear again without signs. But Shelly-Ann was to prove that she was anything but a one-hit wonder. At the Beijing Olympic she swept away any doubts about her ability to perform consistently by becoming the first Jamaican woman ever to win the 100 meters Olympic gold.
Shelly Ann is a little woman with a big smile. Her journey to becoming the fastest woman on earth has been anything but smooth and effortless. She grew up in one of Jamaica’s toughest inner-city communities known as Water house, one of the poorest communities in Jamaica. Sometimes her family didn’t have enough to eat. She ran at the school championships barefooted because she couldn’t afford shoes. Her mother Maxime had been an athlete herself as a young girl but, like so many other girls in Water house, had to stop after she had her first baby. Maxime’s early entry into the adult world with its responsibilities gave her the determination to ensure that her kids would not end up in Water house’s roundabout of poverty. One of the first things Maxime used to do with Shelly-Ann was taking her to the track, and she was ready to sacrifice (牺牲) everything.
注意：1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在相应位置作答。
It didn’t take long for Shelly Ann to meet her mother’s expectations.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________But Shelly Ann’s victory was far greater than that.
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