Though traveling is not a big deal for me today, before my trip to the mountains, I used to be a homebody. I had friends to hang out with, several hobbies, and I felt completely comfortable spending weeks or even months in my hometown — or sometimes even on my block — without going anywhere. All my demands of novelty were satisfied by the Discovery and National Geographic channels, and I seriously thought there was no difference between seeing something on the TV and with one’s own eyes.
The situation changed when one day David, my best friend who always has a couple of colorful bugs in his head (or, in other words, was always carrying out several crazy plans at once), walked into my room and declared his disgust (厌恶) for civilization. I will not describe how he managed to persuade me to join him on his journey to the Rocky Mountains; all I will say is that we departed in five days. This was my first time in the mountains, so I was turning my head in all directions. Unfortunately, the weather was foggy most of the time, and the higher we got into the mountains, the worse the visibility was.
Even despite this fact, I still enjoyed the hike — I felt like I was Bear Grylls, whose show I used to watch with excitement: in the wild, with food and water in my backpack, carrying a flashlight and a knife. On the first day, we were making our way along the foothills; but the next day, we started to climb on one of the peaks. Though it was not that steep and high, I was still excited. I regularly hastened, and because of that, I ran out of energy long before we got to the top; David, on the other hand, was more well-paced.
When we finally got to the top, nothing had changed. The same fog was covering the surroundings, and even though I was filled with positive emotions, I felt disappointed, because I counted on seeing the view from above and perhaps being able to take some photos.
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。
We spent a couple of hours on the top, and decided to turn back.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Seeing all this scenery with my own eyes was truly an eye-opening experience for me.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________“Jennifer, do you hike?” Karen said to me. “Yes, I hike,” I replied. Karen’s slim figure and sun-kissed cheeks suggested she was a regular hiker.
“Great, do you want to come with us tomorrow? We will meet in front of Bobbie’s house at 6:30 before it is too hot, and we will go over to Thunderbird Mountain. It is about three miles in total. Does that sound OK?”
Three miles. I wasn’t sure how long that was, partly because I didn’t actually hike. I was somewhat familiar with the area where they planned to go, but our family had just moved from Oregon to Arizona. I walked our dog around the neighbourhood all the time before we moved here. But I wasn’t sure if I had gone three miles. Being new to town and excited about an invitation from women I wanted to befriend, I accepted, saying, “Sure. That sounds great. We all benefit from hiking.”
When this hiking conversation among my new friends occurred, I was at a monthly dinner for moms in my new neighborhood. The group was four women in their forties, all with high-school kids, jobs, a fondness for reading and music and tricks for simplifying work-life.
I was honored to be invited since making friends in my forties in a new town wasn’t easy. After this re-location for my husband’s career, making friends wasn’t as simple for me as it was for him. He came to the community for a full-time position at a busy university. Our teenaged son and daughter immediately plugged into school through sports and clubs. I was enormously grateful for the ease of the transition for my family, but nervous for myself. So, while at the monthly ladies’ gathering, when hiking came up, I just played along, wanting to try something new.
The next day, I got up early and carefully selected comfortable hiking clothes. When I arrived at the designated friend’s driveway a little early, Karen was standing there waiting. “Hey, Jennifer, I’m glad that you can come to hike,” she said cheerfully and hugged me. When the others joined us, we started walking. I was sweaty and a little out of breath before we even started going uphill.
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。
“So, where did you hike in Oregon?” one of them asked, offering me a bottle of water.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________By accepting the invitation to hike that day, I received a lot.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________As we stepped off the plane in Pucón, the lively atmosphere of the town immediately lifted our spirits after the long flight from New York.
The contrast between the freezing Big Apple and the warmth of Pucón was striking. The climate was delightful, which was a welcome change from the busy New York City.
“Feel that?” my friend said proudly, bathed in the gentle sunshine. “This is what I call a vacation!”
Our guide, Herman, was waiting for us with a broad smile. His English was limited, but his enthusiasm was boundless. He greeted us with heartiness, “Welcome to Pucón! I have everything ready for you.”
We spent our first day settling into the luxurious house he had arranged for us. The unique design of the house deeply attracted us. The house was a combination of modern luxury and traditional charm, neat and tidy, with tall windows framing the greenery outside.
Herman insisted on taking care of our every need. He would not even let us lift a finger in the house, which was above and beyond his duties.
One evening, as we wandered along the beach, the sky transformed into a canvas (画布) of rich colors. We were placed in a world of wonder. My friend turned to me, eyes sparkling, and said,“This is why we travel, isn’t it? Moments like these make everything else fade away.”
As we planned to go to another town to admire the unique architecture, something unexpected happened. I got a fever.
Our explorations were cut short. Lying in bed, I could hear my friend pacing outside my room, worried. And our travel plans were put on hold as there was no choice but to rest in the hope that I would recover soon.
The next morning, my fever worsened. Being new to the area and struggling with the language barrier, we felt helpless.
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。
Just then, Herman appeared.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________With Herman’s help, I began to recover.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________I was doing homework with my friend Ollie at his home when he randomly started scribbling (乱画) a fish. But not just any fish. This fish was riding a skateboard and blowing a bubble that said “I’d rather be skating!”I laughed and drew a sea star saying “Quit fooling around and get to work!”
Just then, Ollie’s grandma Abuela and her friend Mr. Goldberg came into the kitchen. Mr. Goldberg was in charge of the local animal shelter. Abuela poured their tea and inquired about how things were going at the animal shelter. Mr. Goldberg sighed, shaking his head. He explained that not enough people were adopting pets, resulting in too many animals without homes.
Overhearing the conversation, Ollie offered to adopt some excitedly. But Abuela said that one noisy parrot was plenty for this house.
“Blue isn’t noisy,” defended Ollie. “He’s just musical.”
“I’d have a whole farm full of animals if I could,” I said. “But my parents say two cats and a hamster (仓鼠) are enough.”
Mr. Goldberg said he kept trying to attract people to adopt animals, but found it hard to get people’s attention these days. Ollie drew a sad whale, and I wrote the words “Please adopt me” in the shape of a whale spout (喷水). Mr. Goldberg took a look at our drawings and made favorable comments on them, saying that these clever talking animals just might grab people’s attention. And he asked us if we were willing to design a poster for his animal shelter, a proposal we happily accepted. We decided to draw some ideas on our own and meet up again the next afternoon.
That night, when I was sitting in the living room brainstorming ideas for the poster, my little brother brought in our hamster, Mr. Nibbles, to give him a little run-around time. He made a hamster playground out of couch pillows and Mr. Nibbles began to run around merrily.
Suddenly, an idea formed in my mind.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________We decided to make both Mr. Nibbles and Blue the stars of the poster.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________The basketball court was filled with eager students and cheerleaders were waving their pompoms at the stands. Excited cheers could be heard from all sides of the court. My teammates and I got fully prepared for our basketball competition. Our hearts were pounding in expectation of the competition ahead.
“And let’s all welcome the Blue Team!” the emcee (主持人) announced through the microphone. All of us marched in proudly as everyone cheered at the top of their lungs. “And welcome the Red Team!” the emcee announced, and the Red Team came in. We were astonished to see that the Red Team was filled with tall and strong members! We were trembling with fear as we walked slowly towards the centre of the court. As we were short of teammates, our confidence in winning wavered (减弱).
The judge threw the ball and the other team quickly caught it! The ball danced between their hands. Our defence seemed to be in slow motion compared to the Red Team’s swiftness. Soon, the other team scored!
We were losing the match as time passed. To make matters worse, our star player, Tom, even tripped and fell, hurting his ankle! We were losing hope as our best player was gone. Just then, our captain called for a time-out. On the bench, our captain announced that this would be his last match. “Come on! Don’t give up! I want to win one last trophy (奖杯) before I quit. Let’s do it!” he insisted, giving us a wide smile. Hearing this, our team held our fists tightly. We were focused on winning this match and making our captain proud! The judge threw the ball once more. I jumped as high as I could and caught the ball. I ran as fast as lightning and scored. Our opponents were nervous but they still scored a few goals to catch up. A few minutes later, we were neck to neck, locked in a tie.
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。
Whoever scored this one goal would win the competition!
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________The crowd erupted into deafening applause.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________内容包括：
1. 情况介绍；
2. 你的评论；
3. 你的建议。
| 总体情况 | 利用周末做家务的中小学生占91.50% | |||
| 技能比例 | 打扫卫生 | 洗碗 | 烹调 | 做农活 |
| 85.50% | 81.60% | 36.80% | 22.2% | |
1. 写作词数应为80左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
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In our weekly staff meeting, our editor Ashley was not pleased with the quality of our reporting. “Our readership is way down. We need better stories for this Thursday’s school newspaper. Does anybody have any ideas?” she said.
I handed her my article about our basketball team beating Deerfield High School the previous night by one point. “Sports stories are fun,” she said, “but not good enough for the front page. We need something to really get people ‘s attention.”
After our meeting, we left the newsroom together and heard someone screaming, “Perry is missing!” Perry was a big red parrot and had been our school mascot (吉祥物) for ten years. He played an important role in students’ lives, both in and out of class. He had also been a constant presence at school events, inspiring a sense of unity among students.
Everyone gathered around Perry’s empty cage, heartbroken. Suddenly, a student from the crowd came over and showed me a photo. “You’re a reporter for the school paper, right? I happened to take this yesterday,” he said. In the photo was a Deerfield High School basketball player with something large hidden under his shirt around the size of a parrot.
“He must have stolen Perry to get back at us for winning the game!” Ashley cried. We hurried back to the newsroom, agreeing to run the photo on the front page with the headline “Deerfeld Stole Perry.” “This is just the story we need. Everyone will read it,” Ashley said confidently.
After she left, I took a closer look at the photo. The clock in the background read 4:15 pm, but our game against Deerfield hadn’t started until 4:30 pm. Why would the boy have taken Perry before we even played? An uneasy feeling came over me that we might have falsely accused someone.
I went to Perry’s usual caretaker to ask if he knew Perry was missing. ”He’s not missing. He’s retired. He’s ready for some quieter days,“ he said. Learning the truth, I immediately told Ashley and suggested writing a story to say goodbye to Perry.
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。
To my surprise, Ashley insisted on reporting the “Deerfield Stole Perry” story.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________On Thursday, the paper came out with the headline “Bye-Bye, Perry” on the front page.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Johnny and his two younger sisters were very poor. They lived in a very old block of flats in the crowded part of the city. They had no father. Their mother went to work from morning till late evening, as a cleaning lady in many rich houses. Therefore, Johnny had to stay at home and look after his sisters.
Sometimes on a sunny day,he would take them to the nearby park. He had to be very careful when they crossed roads. Not having any pocket money, they could not buy chips or drinks. They had to be satisfied with sandwiches as a treat that Johnny made.
One day, after they had finished their sandwiches, Johnny’s youngest sister Mary looked at other well-dressed children nearby, who seemed to be on a picnic with their parents, eating all kinds of chips, cakes and many other goodies. Mary’s mouth was watering, and very much more, when their parents brought each of the five children huge ice-cream cones from the ice cream trundle cart (移动贩卖车) nearby. “I wish we had some money to buy cones,” she said eagerly. Johnny looked at her with sadness in his eyes. “You know we don’t have money for these expensive things,” he said. “Mom works hard for what we have.”
There was silence after that. As the children sat with sad faces, the ice cream man went past them with his trundle cart. They were sitting on a bench on a little grassy hill, which sloped (倾斜) gently down the path. The trundle cart had a hard time not running away downhill, as the ice cream man held on tightly to the handles, trying to break the speed. It so happened that suddenly a little boy of two ran in front of the cart following a flying balloon.
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。
He did not see the cart coming downhill, but Johnny did.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Hearing the screams of the child, the anxious parents came running over.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________It was a beautiful sunny morning in early summer, when the world seemed full of sunlight and new green leaves. I was in a good mood as my parents had just given me $300 for my daily expenses during the week that they would be away in Mexico to visit my mother’s sick grandfather. I was extremely overjoyed, thinking hard about the things I could do with the money. If I survived on bread and butter the whole week, I would have an unexpected windfall of $ 200 to buy the latest Kobe Bryant basketball shoes! What a terrific idea!
As usual, the physical education class was thrilling. I felt most at case on the basketball court. After playing several fierce games, I could hardly catch my breath as I headed back towards the classroom, sweaty and exhausted. When I entered, I found my classmates gathered around Steven’s desk as he searched through his books and some other personal items anxiously. Steven had always been popular. Not only was he intelligent and well-mannered, but he also came from a well-off family. And he shared everything he had with us.
Right away, I learned Steven had lost the money he would donate to a children’s welfare institute that afternoon. Then I informed Miss Jones, the class teacher. She rushed over immediately and organized a search around the classroom. We stood by our desks and emptied the contents of our schoolbags onto the desk for inspection.
It was my turn. As Miss Jones took out the $ 300 from my wallet, the class fell into a shock. I didn’t know the amount lost was exactly $ 300 until then. I kept proving my innocence, but in vain. Miss Jones confiscated (没收) the $ 300 and decided I was getting kicked out of the school. I stayed home alone the whole week, living only on bread. I felt wronged, angry, and loss of self-esteem.
注意：1.续写词数应为150个左右；
2.按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Finally, my parents returned home and talked with me.
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Miss Jones had just accepted my parents’ advice when Steven came.
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Billy, a salvage (沉船打捞) diver, hunts for unique items that might have historical value During one of his dives earlier this year, he found a sealed bottle containing a handwritten message, which would turn out to have treasured emotional value for a couple 200miles away, who suffered the loss of a son.
Billy first spotted the green glass bottle floating above a sunken boat. It turned on his curiosity because it appeared to contain a letter. Billy took back the floating bottle, then gently removed the enclosed letter with sticks. He allowed the wrinkled and damp paper to dry out. Once dried, he and his boss, Brad, attempted to reconstruct the remaining pieces of the letter, written in the handwriting of a child. They could make out the name, the year and the location: Dahl; 1989; Oxford, Mississippi.
Touched by the letter and the child’s adventurous spirit, Billy and Brad set out to return the keepsake (纪念品) to its rightful owner. “It really just fueled us to go and say, Let’s go find this guy because this is kind of like-minded,” said Brad.
Billy and Brad stayed late that day to contact local schools, searching for clues. That search didn’t result in a match. However, the note remained on their minds and they decided to continue their search using social media. They posted a picture of the note on social media, which instantly generated interest. Others shared the story widely, and it took on a life of its own.
The news of the mysterious message in a bottle soon made its way to Eric and Melanie Dahl, a couple 200 miles away. The couple had an instinct (直觉) that the letter was composed by their late son, Brian. They recalled that, when he was a sixth grader, he was assigned a creative class project that required him to write a message and place it in a bottle.
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 couple contacted Billy and arranged to check it out.
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Then the couple took it back.
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