It was a Saturday morning as I prepared to take my eight-year-old son, David, to the aquarium. His eyes were widened with excitement, and he chattered non-stop about the sea creatures we would see, the sharks, the dolphins... We boarded the bus, and after a few stops, we made ourselves comfortably seated. David gazed out the window, watching the world go by with wonder.
The bus continued its route, and with each stop, it became increasingly crowded. Passengers of varying ages and backgrounds filled the seats. David and I were engaged in a light-hearted conversation about marine life, our anticipation and joy building with each passing minute.
As we approached a mid-route bus stop, an elderly lady boarded, her movements labored and her legs visibly unsteady. The bus was full, and for a moment, there was an obvious hesitation among the passengers, each perhaps weighing the social morals against their own comfort. The elderly lady seized her walking aid, swaying slightly with each lurch of the vehicle.
Noticing the elderly lady’s struggle, David made a decision. Without a moment’s hesitation, he rose from his seat. His small hand gestured towards the elderly lady. “You can sit here, ma'am,” he said, his voice clear and sincere. The elderly lady’s face transformed with a mixture of surprise and gratitude. “Oh, thank you, boy,” she said, her voice filling up with emotion. David then took her hand gently, helping her navigate through the crowd to the seat he had left for her. With the help of David, the lady eased herself into the seat, her relief evident. I felt pride welling up within me as I watched what David had done. Looking at David, who was standing now, I saw not just the playful child he was known to be, but the empathetic and considerate young man he was growing into.
注意：1.续写词数应为150个左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
As the bus rolled on, it was filled with renewed warmth among the passengers.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________That evening, as we returned home, I couldn’t help but reflect on the true treasure of the day.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________“WOW. I can’t believe how many people are showing up for this!” Dandelion Pinkley said. She stood in the wide parking lot of the E-Z Life Elephant Sanctuary, watching a lot of cars getting close. Her brother Doodlebug, their cousin Rudyard, and other kids were with her. All of them were ready to wash those cars.
The elephants who lived at E-Z Life had been saved. Now they enjoyed a safe home. And every clean car meant a few more dollars to support their well-being. So working the car wash was a great way to spend a summer day!
The first few cars parked. The drivers paid, and the kids got to work.
“My car is messy!” one driver said as she paid up.
“You’re not kidding.” Doodlebug said. He began washing it.
Nearby, Cousin Rudyard began shining the bumpers (保险杠) on a classic car. “Whoopee!” he shouted. “I love this car, and it’s perfect now!”
He turned to the next car, singing a funny elephant song along with some other kids. A few elephants began to come together at the wooden fence (栅栏).
“They’re happy,” Dandelion’s best friend, Tomiko, said.
“And look at the babies,” Dandelion said, as one put its trunk (象鼻) through the fence and waved at them. “We need to work faster, so we can get them more money!”
All the kids stepped up the action. For a while, it was a lot of fun. The car wash went perfectly. People drove up and paid their money. But the noise and the summer heat began to wear the young car washers down.
“I can’t take this too much longer,” Doodlebug said to his sister.
“I know,” Dandelion agreed, “but there are still so many cars waiting for a wash.” The line of cars seemed endless.
“I need a break,” Rudyard said.
“But we need to help the elephants!” Dandelion said, wanting nothing more than to take a rest. A second later she did.
“What’s the matter with you kids?” one driver complained (抱怨). “It’s only midmorning. You can’t stop working because of tiredness. You’re kids!”
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。
Doodlebug complained, but he started to work again.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________But before Dandelion reached the next car in line, the elephants had begun shooting water out their trunks and spraying (喷洒) each car clean.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________3 . Until recently, gravitational waves could have been the stuff of Einstein’s imagination. Before they were detected, these waves in space time existed only in the physicist’s general theory of relativity, as far as scientists knew. Now, researchers are on the hunt for more ways to detect the waves. “The study of gravitational waves is booming,” says astrophysicist Karan Jani of Vanderbilt University in Nashville. “This is just remarkable. No field I can think of in fundamental physics has seen progress this fast.”
Just as light comes in a variety of wavelengths, so do gravitational waves. Different wave lengths point to different types of origins of the universe and require different kinds of detectors. Gravitational waves with wavelengths of a few thousand kilometers—like those detected by the United States, Italy and Japan—come mostly from pairs of black holes 10 or so times the mass of the sun, or from collisions of dense cosmic blocks called neutron stars (中子星). These detectors could also spot waves from certain types of exploding stars and rapidly moving neutron stars.
In contrast, huge waves that span light-years are thought to be created by orbiting pairs of bigger black holes with masses billions of times that of the sun. In June, scientists reported the first strong evidence of these types of waves by turning the entire galaxy (星系) into a detector, watching how the waves make slight changes to the timing of regular blinks from neutron stars throughout the Milky Way.
Physicists now hope to dive into a vast, cosmic ocean of gravitational waves of all sorts of sizes. These waves could reveal new details about the secret lives of exotic objects such as black holes and unknown parts of the universe.
Physicist Jason Hogan of Stanford University thinks there are still a lot of gaps in the coverage of wavelengths. “But it makes sense to cover all the bases. Who knows what else we may find?” he says. The search for capturing the full complement of the universe’s gravitational waves exactly could take observatories out into the moon, to the atomic area and elsewhere.
1. What does Karan Jani think of the current study on gravitational waves?| A．It is rapid and pioneering. |
| B．It is slow but steadily increasing. |
| C．It is interrupted due to limited detectors. |
| D．It is progressing as fast as any other field. |
| A．The creation of different kinds of detectors. |
| B．Collisions of planets outside the solar system. |
| C．The presence of light in different wavelengths. |
| D．Activities involving black holes and neutron stars. |
| A．By analyzing sunlight. |
| B．By locating the new galaxy. |
| C．By using the whole galaxy as a tool. |
| D．By observing the sun’s regular movement. |
| A．It’ll exclude the atomic field. |
| B．It’ll focus exactly on the mapping of the galaxy. |
| C．It’ll require prioritizing certain wavelengths on the moon. |
| D．It’ll explore potential places to detect gravitational waves. |
4 . I used to tell my children that they were smart, because I was impressed by their rapid growth. I remember clearly watching my daughter figure out how to build a Lego house that would stand up on its own, and thinking: Look at this tiny architectural genius.
But decades of research now suggest that we should not tell our children they’re “smart” when they do impressive things. When I first heard it, I felt instinctively annoyed. But after I dug into the research, I was persuaded. It all goes back to something called “growth” mindset (心态), a term developed and popularized by Carol Dweck, a professor of psychology at Stanford. Professor Dweck believes that we can change our abilities through effort and strategy. The alternative to a growth mindset is a “fixed” mindset — the idea that our abilities are inborn and can’t be changed. When we praise our children for being “smart,” based on victories like doing well on a test, we’re unconsciously encouraging them to believe that if they do poorly or make mistakes, they’re not smart.
It’s not just what we say that matters, but how we tolerate our children’s failures. A 2016 study by Dweck showed that parents’ “failure mind-sets” affect their children more than their views on intelligence. In other words, if parents think that failure is shameful, their children are more likely to be afraid of making mistakes. The study concludes that everyone is actually a mixture of fixed and growth mindsets, continually evolving with experience. Whatever we say or don’t say to our kids, the key is to get them more comfortable with failures big or small.
It’s helpful for kids to understand that you make mistakes and learn how they happen. When you chat with them, you can describe what you learned, or how you strategized a solution. “You don’t have to deny you have negative emotional reactions,” Dweck said. “We, as a society, don’t do that enough because we feel embarrassed when we make mistakes.” But if we discuss our missteps more and explain how we overcame them, our children can learn to do the same.
1. What did the author initially think of the research’s advice?| A．Convincing. | B．Advanced. | C．Inaccessible. | D．Unacceptable. |
| A．smartness is the key to success |
| B．difficulties in daily life teach them a lot |
| C．their abilities can be improved through hard work |
| D．they are impressive due to their good grades on tests |
| A．Affect the children via their own experience. |
| B．Hide their negative feelings from children. |
| C．Remind children to avoid making mistakes. |
| D．Pay attention to develop children’s intelligence. |
| A．The effect of a fixed mindset on children. |
| B．“Being smart” doesn’t prepare kids for failure. |
| C．The importance of being smart in family interaction. |
| D．“Being smart” is the power of praising in children’s growth. |
5 . While socializing comes naturally for some, it can be a struggle for others. Shyness is a normal, common personality trait (特征).
Get Excited About A New Adventure
You may have been shy most of your life.
Pay Attention To Your Words
Practice Mindfulness (正念)
Mindfulness involves drawing your attention to the present and being aware of your thoughts, feelings, and surroundings.
Take Small Steps
Getting started can be the hardest part of learning how to be more social for those who are shy.
| A．If so, that’s a part of you that you’re used to |
| B．Sometimes the best path toward addressing a fear is exposure |
| C．Mindfulness can help reduce symptoms of social anxiety disorder |
| D．Taking time to tend to your appearance can make a big difference |
| E．How we communicate and characterize ourselves can be powerful |
| F．However, shyness can make it hard for people to connect with others and achieve their goals |
| G．But engaging with people doesn’t have to be practiced as an important work presentation |
Postcards from the World
While the sun washed over the grass of my grandmother’s front garden, I sank into one of her armchairs familiar to me. Life, as I knew it, had changed. My beloved grandmother, my Nanny, as a ”parent“ in the absence of my father, had cancer. It was terminal (晚期的).
As she watched Getaway, a Sunday afternoon TV program, she remarked to me that she’d never left Australia and that now she never would. Seeing her restricted to ”travel" by watching TV, I swallowed the sadness that came with knowing that chapters of her life were to be left unwritten.
At work, feeling helpless, I wiped tables and took orders and thought. Hard. The Saturday afternoon lunch rush was not enough to stop me from my thoughts. Collapsed with growing sorrow, I was reminded of the power of Facebook and the collective strength of human sympathy. I raced from the end of my shift to ask strangers on the Internet for help.
My Nanny Del has cancer. It’s terminal and she will never see the world. Please send her postcards so she can see the world from her armchair. I can offer nothing but gratitude.
I resolved not to breathe a word of this; if nothing came, I couldn’t bear to carry her disappointment along with my own. . And if something should wander into our humble little letterbox, I vould consider it a blessing and embrace it gratefully.
Days turned to weeks: Nothing. And Nanny’s health declined rapidly. I was trying to balance my full-time study, babysitting and waiting tables with the tiring responsibility of caring for my grandmother. As I helped Nanny in the early hours of those mornings, she would chat to me, sometimes reflections of her lifetime, and other times, the disturbance caused by medication. She seldom talked about her regret of being unable to travel, but I was still hoping for something.
注意：1. 续写词数应为150个左右;
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
One afternoon, about six weeks after my Facebook post, a travel-worn postcard arrived in our letterbox.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________My dreams of armchair travels became a reality.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________In a small town, there lived a young elementary school student named Timmy, whose lateness had become his worst trait (特点) in his school.
Every school morning, he struggled to get out of bed, often finding himself rushing through breakfast and forgetting important things like his homework or lunchbox. Meanwhile, his classmates would glance at the empty seat beside them, exchanging knowing looks as the clock ticked pa st the start of the class. When Timmy finally arrived, he would often find himself the center of attention, and his cheeks red with embarrassment as he apologised. Deep down, Timmy felt a growing sense of discomfort and shame about his habitual lateness. His teachers and classmates were concerned about the effect of his constant lateness on his studies.
One day, Timmy’s class teacher, Mrs. Johnson, decided to solve the issue. She approached Timmy with a gentle smile, “Timmy, can we talk about something important?”
Timmy looked up and replied, a bit nervous, “Sure, Mrs. Johnson.”
She crouched (蹲下) down to his level, speaking softly but seriously and sincerely, “I’ve noticed you’ve been late for class quite often. Do you know being on time is very important?”
Timmy lowered his head and said, “Yes, but...”
Mrs. Johnson continued, “Being on time helps you not miss out on your lessons. It’s also about respect for your classmates and me. When you’re late, it can disrupt (打乱) the whole class. We all miss you when you’re not here on time.”
Timmy nodded and said, a look of understanding on his face, “I didn’t realize it was affecting everyone. I’ll try to be better, Mrs. Johnson. But I have difficulty waking up and getting out of bed. Every morning when my alarm clock sounded, I hit the snooze (小睡) button, just 10 more minutes. Then 10 minutes later, another 10 minutes. That’s why I am always late for school.”
“Don’t worry. We’re all here to help you,” Mrs. Johnson said, offering a comforting smile.
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。
After the talk, Mrs. Johnson, along with Timmy’s classmates, came up with a plan to help him.
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Soon Timmy’s change was obvious.
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8 . Hiring processes can be thought of as a battle between integrity and dishonesty. You might imagine this is a simple fight between truth-seeking firms and self-promoting candidates, and to a certain extent it is. But companies themselves are prone (有倾向的) to bend reality out of shape in ways that are self-defeating.
Start with the obvious wrongdoers: job applicants. When it comes to writing the resume (简历), they tend to massage (美化) reality into the most appealing shape possible. Everyone beyond a certain level of experience is a transformational leader personally responsible for generating millions income; the world economy would be about 15 times bigger than it actually is if all such claims were true. The average British spends four and a half hours a day watching TV and online videos. But each average job candidate is an enthusiast for public welfare, using their spare time only for worthy purposes, like volunteering in soup kitchens.
But the tendency to stretch the truth infects companies as well as applicants. The typical firm will write a job description that invariably describes the work environment as fast-paced and innovative, and then lays out a set of improbable requirements for the “ideal candidate”, someone who almost by definition does not exist. Sometimes, the requirements include an ability to go back and change the course of history.
Too few firms offer an accurate account of what a position actually involves in their job previews, which are supposed to give prospective employees a genuine sense of the negatives and positives of the job, as well as a clear idea of the company’s corporate culture. One effective strategy is to lay out in text or video, what a typical day in the role would look like.
Such honesty can be its own reward. Research has long suggested that realistic job previews lead to lower turnover and higher employee satisfaction. A paper in 2011 by David Eamest of Towson University and his co-authors concluded that favourable perceptions of the organisation’s honesty are the best explanation for why. So a process designed to uncover the truth about job applicants would run a lot more smoothly if firms were also honest about themselves.
1. Why are “leader” and “enthusiast” mentioned in paragraph 2?| A．To present a rule. | B．To clarify a fact. |
| C．To make a comparison. | D．To explain a phenomenon. |
| A．Overstate. | B．Overturn. | C．Overlook. | D．Overestimate. |
| A．They show a position as it is. | B．They are made either in text or video. |
| C．They are favorable for bigger firms. | D．They mainly contain negatives of a job. |
| A．Pains and gains of employees. | B．How to get the lying out of hiring. |
| C．How to be more appealing in hiring. | D．A wrestle between applicants and companies. |
We had finally decided to skip our traditional family dinner and participate in Manhattan’s Thanksgiving Day Parade with our five-year-old daughter, Kerry. We never expected what Kerry would get from the experience, or how it would affect our lives for years to come.
We caught the early train from Poughkeepsie to Grand Central along with hundreds of other excited people. Like many other families, we packed a small backpack with sliced turkey sandwiches and juice boxes. Eating in New York City is expensive. Kerry was wide-eyed. This was not an ordinary outing with Mom and Dad.
As the train pulled into the station, everyone rose and anxiously waited to get off. We headed towards the parade route along Fifth Avenue. As we walked up to the entrance to the station, Kerry spotted a homeless woman sitting in the shadows. The woman was invisible to all except my curious daughter.
“What’s that?” she asked. Linda and I looked at each other, unable to know how to explain such an unexpected question, something very different from the happy scene that we were about to join. Before that, we had discussed how we would explain topics about love and death. But homelessness? We weren’t prepared. We gave a simple and honest explanation, so that we could continue going to the parade.
The following year, we decided to attend the parade again. So the night before Thanksgiving Day, we went to buy sliced turkey for sandwiches. Again, Kerry surprised us. “Can we bring some sandwiches for those people?” she asked. We knew immediately whom she meant. How could we refuse? More importantly, why would we refuse? This was a golden opportunity to honor Kerry’s sense of charity. Our six-year-old daughter was teaching us an important lesson.
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。
That night, we prepared and packed two-dozen sandwiches into our backpack.
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We were moved by Kerry’s action of kindness on Thanksgiving Day.
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When I think of the word perfect, I think of something only a few can achieve, like high beauty standards, the super-smart girl in my class, or anything that I can compare myself to.
For a few weeks now, I have been noticing this one girl who is in a few of my middle school classes. She has fabulous long dark brown hair, big eyes, and the most beautiful face. She always wears the prettiest outfits and seems to be the most popular girl in school, at least in my point of view. It seems like she has a perfect life, lots of friends, all As (全A), and everything anyone could ever want.
One day, I was in language arts talking to my teacher about one of the upcoming tests, when I saw the girl staring at me in this strange way. I immediately started to get panicked and think, “Why is she looking at me? Did I do something wrong? Is my hair messed up?”
When the class was dismissed and everyone was rushing to their next class, she caught up to me and said, “I just thought you should know, I think you are really pretty.” I replied, “Oh my god, thank you!” I then watched her as she walked away and thought, “She thinks I am pretty?”
The whole day, I ended up thinking about one thing. That was, “Why does she think that?” After thinking about that topic in my head through each second of the day, I met her again in the class.
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。
Paragraph 1:
When I was considering whether to say hello with her, she
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Paragraph 2:
I looked at myself with a big smile.
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