It so happened that one morning I bought a newspaper and read the advertisement about an expedition to the South Pole with the great Sir Ernest Shackleton—this was the adventure that I had been dreaming of. Overjoyed, I applied to join the expedition, only to be turned down by Shackleton. But I was so enthusiastic that I secretly went aboard his ship and hid in a small cupboard. Unfortunately, three days later I was discovered. Since Shackleton did not want to turn back, he offered me a job and assigned me to be a steward serving meals for twenty-eight men.
The journey had not been easy. Approaching Antarctica, we got stuck in the ice and saw the ship get crushed by the ice. When the ship sank, our hearts sank with it. Before we abandoned the ship, Shackleton calmly called us together and told us to rescue our most essential supplies. We were not allowed to take most of our personal belongings, and Shackleton himself threw away all his gold. We had to camp on the ice of Elephant Island and managed to survive. But spring was coming, and the ice would soon begin to melt.
We had been struggling for days, but things on Elephant Island were going from bad to worse. We had to be crowded together under one of our boats on the rocky shore of this miserable place. It was cold and windy, and the island had no plants. Sometimes we were only able to catch a seal or a penguin to eat. Otherwise, there was no food. Soon after we arrived, Shackleton left us to find help on South Georgia Island, 1,320 kilometres away—the voyage was too dangerous and difficult for all of us to make it in our small boats. If Shackleton failed, we wouldn’t have any hope of rescue as no one else knew that we were here. We watched worried and hopefully as Shackleton and the boat sailed away from Elephant Island.
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。
Now we had to face the adversity without Shackleton.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________It was four months later that rescuers finally arrived.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________What my father wore embarrassed me! I wanted him to dress like a doctor or lawyer, but he always dressed like my father, getting up before dawn every day to make breakfast for my mother and me.
We lived in South Texas, where my father worked as a repairman. He often wore a pair of jeans and a shirt, keeping his pencils, glasses and wrenches (扳手) in his breast pocket. His boots were those with steel toes that made them difficult to pull off his feet, which I sometimes helped him with when he returned from repairing cars — his job that also shamed me.
I blamed the way he dressed. I felt that my classmates laughed at me because they’d seen him mowing lawns (修剪草坪) in cut-off jeans and black boots. My classmates’ families paid men to beautify their lawns, while their fathers travelled in the bay wearing lemon-yellow sweaters and expensive shoes.
He preferred clothes that allowed him the freedom to move under cars. So even when taking part in a school trip with me, he was dressed in his repairman’s suit. On the school bus to the campsite, all students on the bus happily chatted with their parents except me, who lowered the head, avoiding spotting my classmates’ mocking glance (讥笑的眼光) or hearing their jokes, which I thought was about nothing else but what my father wore.
I regretted telling my parents the school trip, and I was very angry why my mother had no spare time while my father happened to have a vacation. But my father failed to read my mind. He was very happy, whistling a tune along the way.
Though my father didn’t sense my bad mood, the school bus seemed as sad as I was. It drove more and more slowly and finally it stopped on the roadside. The driver got out to check the bus but found nothing wrong. Students and parents on the bus began to whisper about what was happening, worried that the delay might spoil the journey.
注意：
1.续写词数应为150 左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卷的相应位置作答。
When others were complaining, my father stood up.
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The school bus restarted and everyone cheered.
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Eight-year-old Lily never played with dolls or ordered pizza on Saturday nights like her friends. Instead, after school, she sat by her mother, Stella, and helped her knit sweaters and caps because that was how they made a living.
When Lily was five, her father, Adam, died of cancer. Stella was an orphan, and Adam’s family refused to help them, so Stella and Lily were on their own. “God rewards those who are kind and brave. We’ll be alright, honey,” Stella told Lily every night before going to bed.
After Adam’s death, Stella struggled to make a living and lived in a tent in a parking lot with Lily. Their previous landlord had increased the rent, and Stella couldn’t afford it. In fact, she hadn’t been able to pay the rent for three months before the landlord eventually kicked them out.
One day, Lily was walking home from school when she felt somebody was following her. She got scared and was about to run away when she heard a sad “woof” behind her. Lily turned around to see a crying sick dog, muddy and completely wet in dirty water, looking around anxiously. He was looking at her with sad eyes.
“Are—are you hungry?” Lily asked him, and he let out a slight woof as if he understood what she said. Lily sat down and began petting him. “Listen, dog, you look sick, and mommy and I don’t have enough money. We can’t take you to a vet. I am sorry I can’t help you!”
But when the dog began crying in her lap, Lily’s heart melted. “Don’t be sad, silly! Mommy says we should be brave. OK, let’s get you home,” she said, “But I don’t think mommy will let you stay there.” Lily brought the dog to the tent, although she and Stella couldn’t afford another mouth to feed.
In the beginning Stella was against keeping him. A month later, she couldn’t imagine her life without him. She named him Sam, and he followed them everywhere they went and never left his place without permission. Moreover, he kept Stella company when Lily would be in school.
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。
But one morning, Lily and Stella found Sam was nowhere to be seen.
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The next day, Sam came back, followed by a man.
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1. 故事的简要介绍；
2. 你的感悟和体会。
注意：
1. 词数100左右；
2. 开头和结尾已给出，不计入总词数。
It’s never too late to mend
Once upon a time, there was a man who kept several sheep. One morning, he found one of his sheep was missing. After checking the pen carefully, he discovered a hole in the wall of the pen. It turned out that a wolf had broken into the pen and stolen his sheep.
His neighbor advised, “You should fix the pen and cover the hole right away.” But he rejected, “The sheep has already lost. It’s no use fixing it now.” However, the next morning, he found another sheep missing. The wolf stole the sheep through the hole again!
He regretted not taking the neighbor’s advice and began to cover the hole immediately. From then on, no more sheep was stolen.
Good morning, everyone. I’m Li Hua
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Thank you for listening!
When I was young, my father was quiet and seldom talked to me, so we were not so close. The times I loved most were the special moments we had together. To this day, I still hold those memories dear. When I had a son, I was always worried that my absence might have an impact on his future life and that I might miss all his milestones since I travelled a lot. I knew how important it was for a boy to have his father near. I decided that if I couldn’t be with my son as often as possible, I would make every effort to create special moments for us.
When my son was five, I was sent to the branch in Shanghai, which meant I had to be away from my family for nearly a year. The hardest time for me was the summer and winter vacations when my son was out of school and families could get together doing something fun. To ease the separation, we kept writing letters to share any precious moments in our life. In one letter home, I promised my son that we would make a lantern together and sign up for the community lantern design competition on the Lantern Festival.
Everywhere I went on business, I would pick up things for our lantern adventure and send them to him. I bought a couple of handbooks on how to DIY a lantern, and I sent those on. I found special bamboo for the frame. I sent him one piece at a time, carefully packed. When I was in Hangzhou, I found the most beautiful silk with gold threads woven through it. Perfect lantern material. I sent it home. I found a golden Chinese knot that could be attached to the bottom of the lantern. I sent that home, along with some auspicious cloud(祥云) paper-cuttings that would serve as splendid decorations. Then I was on my way home.
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。
I arrived home at night and couldn’t wait to see my son.
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Then, the lantern design competition finally arrived.
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Dusty, the Wonder Dog
When I was a kid, my godparents, Uncle Nell and Aunt Frances, brought me a four-month-old puppy. She was half German shepherd，half collie. As her pink tongue tickled(挠痒)my face with wet licks,it was love at first hug.
My family named the puppy Dusty. Although I wanted to lay sole claim to her affection,in a family of seven kids, no one lays permanent claim to the family pet.
Dusty was our dog, not “my” dog. We soon realized that she had the patience of Buddha. My baby sister often transformed Dusty’s warm fur into a nap-time pillow-falling asleep on the rug. Like a protective mother, Dusty waited-without moving-until my sister woke.
Dusty doubled as a school crossing guard, too. Monday through Friday she’d walk us kids two blocks to St. Patrick’s Parochial, looking both ways to check for traffic before allowing us to cross the street. We’d wave good-bye as we entered the door, knowing Dusty would be waiting at the school door to claim us at the close of the school day.
Of all the contributions Dusty made to our family, one incident stands out far and above all others. Late one night Dusty rushed to my parents’ bedroom. She barked and barked. When she got no response, Dusty raced upstairs to my bedroom and my brothers’ bedroom and barked again and again. When she failed to fully wake us, she flew back down the steps and retimed to my parents’ room. Finally, she got Mom’s attention.
“What are you doing, Dusty?” Mom snapped, still halfway in dreamland. Dusty persisted. Finally my mother gave in. “Okay, what is it?”
Dusty whined(哀嚎)and rushed out of Mom’s room. Thinking the dog needed to be let out to relieve herself, my mother followed Dusty to the front door.
When Mom opened the door to let her out, Dusty tore across the street, not stopping to do her business as my mother had assumed. Then she discovered what Dusty already knew.
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。
The house across the street, where my best friend Marianne lived, was on fire.
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However,my mother refused to take all the credit(赞扬).
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Sam was a junior high school student. He lived in a community in Charlotte and usually had little exposure to country life. So much of what he knew about plants came from text-books. Sam was a kind-hearted person. He longed for a chance to explore nature and he wanted to do his part to beautify the world.
Finally, the opportunity came. On Arbor Day (植树节), his class organized a trip to a local village to plant trees. Sam was excited about it and couldn’t wait to tell his mom the good news. So the next day, Sam and his mom went to buy some tools for planting trees, including a shovel(铲), a bucket, gloves and so on.
On the day of the event, Sam and his classmates arrived early at the starting point. It was a beautiful day and everyone looked particularly happy. With the tools in hand, Sam got into the bus with everyone else and headed off to their destination.
As soon as they reached the village, all the students were divided into three teams by their teacher. One team was responsible for planting the trees, one team for shovelling the soil and one team for watering the trees. At the teacher’s command, everyone started to do their job.
However, it was the first time that many of the students had taken part in planting trees, so they had no idea about how to start. Of course, Sam was one of them. Fortunately, their teacher was a middle-aged man from the countryside who had some knowledge of planting trees. In order to set an example to the students, the teacher started to plant trees himself. After watching the teacher plant the trees, everyone also became busy. Before long, they planted hundreds of trees. Sam watched very carefully, not wanting to miss any of the details. Finally, Sam learned how to plant trees by himself and felt happy.
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。
A few days later, a storm damaged some young trees in the community.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________The neighbours praised Sam for what he had done.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________That school year God blessed me with two trusted children—Tom and Mary. Whenever I went out for training, programs or personal matters, I left everything to them.
However, the peace was ruined when one day I lost one thousand pesos (比索) in my bag. I always kept my wallet near me. I only chose my trusted students to get near my things. I kept the door of my office closed every time I went for my classes. My spine trembled upon my seeing my money was no longer there. I scanned my wallet, my secret pocket and everything in my room. But all my attempts were in vain.
I was angry. That morning before my class ended, I appealed to everyone to help me catch the “thief”. At 4:00 in the afternoon that day, I reminded them about my warning of returning my money before investigation took place. Then suddenly, a boy called Larry said, “Miss, look at the paper on the floor!”
My heart beat wildly when I saw the crumpled paper which I thought useless. I replied to them immediately upon holding the paper. “Yes, here it is!” I showed it to them. They urged me to open the paper. I opened it and to my surprise, I saw the one thousand pesos! I felt relieved. Then, a letter appeared among the banknotes.
“Miss, I am sorry that I stole the money. I returned it. Do not tell my classmates that I returned the money and do not mention anything about it in class, because it hurts me. Thank you, Miss. But I can’t tell you why I stole your money.”
Oh my God! My brain flashed the handwriting of my trusted boy—the “thief”. I was sure this was Tom’s handwriting.
注意：1. 续写的词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡相应位置作答。
The next day, I called Tom to my office.
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We went to the hospital and saw Mary’s mother.
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The frightening day of our diving test was here. Our parents thought we were lucky to have an Olympic-size swimming pool at the school. My mom stressed that the swimming pool was one of the best in our city. But I didn’t feel happy about it at all. Instead, I felt afraid of the swimming pool. It was mainly because I was terribly shy.
I was so shy that I always sat at the back of the room in class so I’d not be called upon to read. As for the present physical education class each Monday morning, I would work my way to the back of the line forming at the diving board so I would not have to practice the dives.
Now, it was another Monday morning - the morning of our diving test. My blood ran cold when the teacher Ms. Robbins announced that we would be graded for our final on the most difficult dive- the jackknife. And she added, “This diving test is important. The one who fails has to spare time in the following Monday mornings to practice diving in this swimming pool and attend this test again.”
My body kept shaking with fear as the line to the scary diving board shortened. As I watched, each student seemed to perform the challenging dive effortlessly. And shortly I would have to attempt something that I had never even practiced before.
Then I remembered someone telling me that when you picture yourself doing a skill over and over, it’s just as effective as physically practicing that skill. So I watched carefully as each classmate jumped at the end of the board once, added a jump for height, folded their body in half to reach for their toes, and finally straightened out like an arrow for going into the water. After carefully watching for a while, I was actually in a state of surprise, because all of a sudden I realized that it was possible for me to perform these four steps of diving.
Eventually all classmates except me finished jumping. The teacher announced that it was my turn.
注意：1. 续与词数应为150左右；2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
With my heart knocking wildly, I walked down the diving board towards its end.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Knowing I failed, I climbed out of the pool, embarrassed.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________As I walked along the sidewalk in front of Surplus Unlimited, a car that was about to change my life had just turned onto Route 82 from the CVS parking lot. I looked up and noticed the elderly couple in the car heading toward me. As the car rolled past, the driver suddenly collapsed against the steering wheel (方向盘) right in front of my eyes. His wife stared blankly out of the passenger side window. She was unaware that her car was now rolling—without a conscious driver—down the center of a busy road.
I began to jog alongside the moving car. My mind assessed the situation. Somebody needed to stop that car!
I reached forward, but there was nothing to grab. I pounded on her window. She looked confused. “Roll down the window!” I yelled, gesturing wildly. With the window down, I was able to grab the doorframe. I pulled hard against the force of the moving vehicle. On the far side of the car, the traffic streamed by in the opposite direction. Cars passed one after another. Nobody slowed down. Nobody seemed to notice.
Thankfully, the driver’s foot must have slipped off the gas pedal (踏板) when he lost consciousness. I kept pulling, and the car began to slow.
Just then, a woman appeared from behind me. She ran alongside the driver side door. She opened the door and as the car was slowing, she managed to shift it out of “Drive”. A joyful “We did it!” feeling swept over me.
But the car was now stopped in the center lane (车道) with traffic still moving in both directions around us and we need to help this man. Quickly! The woman called 911 while I checked his vital signs. He was not breathing. He had no pulse. He had about five minutes until he was dead. CPR was needed in to time.
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。
Thoughts started running through my mind.
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In an instant, the man from the black SUV was standing beside me and said, “I am a doctor.”
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