6-year-old Quinn Hill became her family’s hero when she took immediate action during an emergency that saved her mother’s life with the help of her neighbor, Mrs. Smith.
Jennifer, a 39-year-old single mother, began the day by sending her child, Hill, to school. Having no idea what would happen, Jennifer was filled with anxiety. After all, it was the first day of a new school year for Hill, a fresh start! On the way school. she repeatedly reminded Hill to solve problems positively and fit in. Though worried, Jennifer had to wave goodbye to her daughter, watching her towards the school gate.
The whole day was packed with housework. Jennifer tidied the house, washed clothes, and prepared for the evening meal. As the school bell rang, signaling the end of the day, Jennifer picked Hill up from school. On seeing Jennifer, Hill couldn’t wait to hug her, sharing the school experiences. Chatting and laughing accompanied them all the way. Hill’s innocent laughter was like Jennifer’s ray of sunshine.
Approaching home, they encountered Mrs. Smith, a most kind and thoughtful housewife living in their neighborhood for many years. Mrs. Smith often invited Jennifer and Hill to her home and shared her homemade desserts and cookies. The two families developed a close relationship and Hill liked to stay with Mrs. Smith, who always brightened her days with willingness and timely help. After exchanging greetings, they went back to their own homes.
On arriving home, Jennifer set out to prepare dinner. As the sun began to set, the house was full of a pleasant smell of cooking food. Jennifer and Hill sat at the kitchen table when Jennifer suddenly began to seize. She was sitting in a chair, looking up at the ceiling. and experiencing abnormal breathing. She then fell out of the chair onto her left side, her hands balled into fists, and her body was shaking violently. Her eyes were open, and Hill kept calling “Mommy, Mommy”, but she could not respond.
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。
Realizing the severe situation, Hill ran out for help.
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Jennifer finally came to herself in the hospital.
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Grandma tried to straighten out her fingers.“You know, Ann, I think I am done knitting.” she said.“My fingers just won’t do what I tell them any more.”
I looked at her hands.When I was little, she had taught me how to sew dresses for my dolls and how to embroider (刺绣) the faces of my dolls on the dresses.
But now she can hardly bend her fingers.The doctor said she should keep her hands warm.I made her cups of tea to hold and moved her chair closer to the fire.But it didn’t work.
I wasn’t used to seeing her hands so still.When I came downstairs, her quiet hands made even her voice stay still.I missed her voice more than ever.
I tried to help her find her voice.“Grandma, tell me about when you were a little girl,” I begged, knowing she loved to tell stories.“Tell me about Peti and Zoe.” Peti and Zoe were her brother and sister.“That was so long ago, Ann,” whispered Grandma.“I can barely remember.” But I still remembered her story about Peti cutting off Zoe’s two beautiful long braids (辫子) and then hiding them in the closet.Were those words still moving silently in her head?
Mom was sorting through our clothes for spring.“Ann, take these out to the trash,” Mom said.“There’s no need to keep worn-out clothes.”
I looked sadly at the pile of sweaters and then picked it up.
“Wait,” Grandma said as I walked by her and put the pile downstairs.“Let me see those.”
“Ann, wind the yarn (纱线) of the old sweater into a ball, like this.Then you can use the yarn to knit something new.” Grandma wrapped yarn around and around her fingers, first in one direction and then the other to keep the ball round.
After dinner Grandma fell asleep in her chair.
Mom came downstairs with an old pair of gloves with small holes to add to the pile of sweaters.
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。
Suddenly, the pair of old gloves gave me an idea.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________“Your family,” I said, handing the gloves with the faces of Peti and Zoe to Grandma.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________3 . Of all my girls, I always felt the closest to Yo. My wife says it is because we are much alike, knocking her head with her knuckles as she says so. But that is not why I feel closest to Yo, no.
She looks at me, and I know that she can see all the way back to when I was a boy in half trousers raising my hand in that palm-wood schoolhouse. What color is the hair of God? When you reduce a sum by its shadow and multiply it by its reflection, what will you get? Our teacher, who called himself Professor Cristiano lluminado, spouted his wild questions. Soon after I passed on to the higher school, the professor was taken away to an asylum to contemplate the mathematics of the stars. But, and this is the point of my anecdote, I was the only child in that classroom raising my hand to answer those impossible questions.
And Yo sees that one hand waving when she looks into my eyes. So that I am blessed — and sometimes cursed — with a child who understands my secret heart. I should not say child anymore, for she is a grown woman who is already preparing herself. When she looks at me these days, she can see that fresh-dug hole in the mountain cemetery near the town where I was born, the flash of the river between the trees.
She writes me one, two letters a week. Sometimes she includes an old black-and-white photo with those scalloped edges as if all memories deserve a little lace doily to lay on. A young handsome man sits with a young lady in a crowded booth in a bar sixty years ago. With those pasting papers which were invented for her because she always has to put her two cents (发表意见) on everything, she writes, Where was this taken? Who is the girl beside you? Were you really in love? She strikes right for the secret heart of that young man!
Most of the things she asks I tell her. I run the past through a sieve (筛子) of judgment in my head, and if there is no harm, I give her the full cup of my life to drink from. Some little things catch in that fine net, and I leave them out or I make a broad statement. But then the next letter arrives full of questioning: Papi, you say you had to escape the island because you were in a revolution in 1939 and I can’t find any mention of it in the book. You say that you were in a log-cabin hospital at Lac Abitibi near the Laurentians and look on the map and Lac Abitibi is nowhere near the Laurentians. Are these just lapses of memory or did you make the whole thing up and if so why?
And then I have to explain, sieving everything over again. Until the next letter arrives, and I explain some more, and after a while, I lose that quality control. Before I know it, I’ve told her the whole story I did not want her and the others to know.
Is that really so? I ask myself. Don’t I want to be known before I go? And perhaps Yo sees that secret desire, stronger than all the other secrets in my heart, and that is why she keeps asking.
1. The term “secret heart” in paragraph 4 is used in the passage to stand for ________.| A．the narrator’s unrevealed self | B．the narrator’s unexpressed love for Yo |
| C．a romance during the narrator’s youth | D．a mystery from the narrator’s childhood |
| A．Memories that the narrator recalls only partially. | B．Accusations that the narrator cannot easily deny. |
| C．Information that the narrator is willing to share. | D．Excuses to rationalize the narrator’s shortcomings. |
| A．raise his daughters as he believes they should be raised |
| B．correct the many misconceptions he finds in Yo’s letters |
| C．exclude certain details from the personal experiences he relates |
| D．provide information only to Yo about his relationship with his wife |
| A．He is suspicious of her motives and wishes she would cut the letters short. |
| B．He is moved by her attention but somewhat uncertain about the potential exposure. |
| C．He is angry at her accusation but nevertheless wants to comfort her. |
| D．He appreciates her dedication and takes fatherly pride in her success in life. |
“Keep this a secret,” Jessica whispered to me, “and the money is yours, Raelyn.” After saying that, she looked me in the eye with a stare that was intense. It looked like it was saying, “Do not betray (背叛) my trust.” Then, she gathered her books from her locker and walked off.
I quickly came to my senses after I agreed to Jessica’s strange request. Why did I agree? Just for money? I knew it was wrong for her to lie to her parents, telling them that she was going to meet me for a school project. In truth, she wanted to go to East Coast Park to meet her online friend. It was not safe and I knew this, but I did not want to ruin our friendship, neither did I want to betray her trust.
A few hours later, I received a phone call. It was from Jessica’s mom. Cold sweat started dropping down my forehead. What should I do? Multiple questions flooded my mind. My trembling fingers were forced to pick up the call. “Hello, Aunt May.” I greeted her with some nervousness in my voice.
“Hello,” she said. “How is your project going? I need to tell Jessica something as she doesn’t seem to be picking up the phone. Can I trouble you to pass the phone to her?”
My eyes widened. I quickly thought of an excuse. “She’s in the toilet now. I think she’s having a stomach ache.” Then, many more thoughts rushed through my mind. After a big struggle and debating in my mind, I decided to tell the truth.
Before Aunt May could reply. I said directly. “Aunt May, I’m sorry I lied to you just now. Well...you see. Jessica isn’t at my place doing our project. She went to East Coast Park to meet her online friend. She asked me to keep it a secret, but I had to betray her. This is for her own good if her online friend is a bad person.” I paused and then added, “I think you and Uncle Ron should look for her now before it’s too late.”
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。
“Thank you so much, Raelyn, ”Aunt May replied and I could sense the worry in her voice.
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I rushed towards Jessica as fast as my legs could carry me.
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Catherine had stayed at home all her life to look after her three children, but now, she, who lost her husband in a car accident, had to step out and earn money to make ends meet. With zero work experience and no professional degree, her chances of getting hired for a well-paid job were next to zero.
One day, after dropping her children at school, Catherine spotted a construction site. “I think I can work here,” she thought and approached the manager.
“Hi, are you hiring?” she asked. “Yes, we are,” the manager looked at Catherine from head to toe. “Are you sure you can work here? This job requires a lot of hard work.” “I’m ready for it,” she told the manager and signed a contract to work a 12-hour shift.
However, Catherine kept her new job a secret from her children. She thought they would feel embarrassed after learning their mother worked at a construction site.
Every morning, after dropping her children to school, she would go to the construction site and work until her shift ended. She would pick up heavy bricks on her shoulder to transport them from one part of the site to the other. One evening, Catherine’s son, Peter, told her about an upcoming contest in school that required mothers to participate. In the competition, students will wear blindfolds and have to recognize their mothers without looking at them. “That sounds like such a cool event, Peter!” Catherine said excitedly. “I can’t wait for it!” “I won’t go therewith you, mom,” Peter replied. “But why?” What her son said next was something Catherine wasn’t prepared to hear.
“Mom, I would have to touch your hands to recognize you, and everyone would look at them,” Peter explained. “Your hands are so ugly. They’re so hard and rough,” he added. “I will feel so embarrassed when my classmates look at your hands,” the boy said. “I won’t attend the event.” Catherine felt terrible but couldn’t say anything in her defense.
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:
A few weeks later, Peter was walking home when something unexpected caught his attention.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Paragraph 2:
On his way back home, he kept thinking about how he would apologize to his mother:
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Golden Girl
When your mother enters her ninth decade, you make a point of being a little extra careful for any signs of decline—memory loss, repetition and the like.
Thankfully, my mother has been blessed with good health, and her mental state seems to have remained alright. But when she got inked at such an advanced age, I had to wonder.
My mother looks just like many grandmothers, short, slightly fat and white-haired. She’s rosy-cheeked and jolly, and when she laughs her eyes almost seem to disappear behind her fleshy cheeks. She comes from an old, traditional family. She was a career civil servant. In short, she didn’t do crazy suff.
That all changed a few years ago. She began to surprise my older brother and me with what she described as “independence.” At the time, we merely saw them as examples of irresponsibility and possibly age-related questionable judgment.
In early 2015, the year she turned 75, she informed us she’d booked a seven-night trip to Turkey. Alone. Because she had never been. Of course, that was astonishing. There was no way my brother and I could allow that. A shaky little old lady wandering the streets of Istanbul on her own, not speaking a word of Turkish, with no knowledge of the laws and customs of the land—it was out of the question!
She paid no attention to us. Off she went. When she returned, she told us it had been a wonderful success. As it turns out, she had barely spent any time alone after hiring a taxi driver to show her around Istanbul for a few days. He took her to open-air markets, parks, and restaurants. He introduced her to a rug(小地毯)seller named Mustafa, “a lovely fellow,” and she bought some rugs. The seller had taken her address details and promised to ship the rugs home. The seller and my mother apparently struck up quite a friendship and she had told him to please drop by if he were ever in Canada. My mother beamed as she told this story.
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。
We couldn’t believe how naïve (幼稚) she had been and sat her down to explain that she had been tricked.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________“Mustafa dropped by for a cup of tea as we used to drink a lot in Turkey.” my mother told my brother and me.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________It was in the afternoon before the end of the Second World War that Antonio Black, who was twelve, caught sight of a beautiful brooch (胸针) in a shop window. The brooch is so beautiful that he was unwilling to leave the store until he had purchased it. But it was too expensive — $5. His family was very poor and his parents struggled to make ends meet. Five dollars would buy almost a week’s food for his family.
Antonio couldn’t ask his father for the money. Everything his father made through fishing went to his mother, Susan. Slim and beautiful, his mother was the center of the home and the glue that held it together. The housework was never-ending, and she struggled to feed and clothe their five children, but she was happy as her family and their well-being were all she cared about.
Nevertheless, he opened the shop’s door and went inside. Standing proudly and straight in his flour-sack (面粉袋改做的) shirt and washed-out trousers, he told the shopkeeper what he wanted, adding, “But I don’t have the money right now. Can you please hold it for me for some time?”
“I’ll try,” the shopkeeper smiled. “People around here don’t usually have that kind of money to spend on things. It should keep for a while.”
Antonio respectfully touched his worn cap and walked out. He would raise the money and not tell anybody, for he thought Mum would be surprised when she saw that brooch. On hearing the sound of hammering (锤打) from a side street, Antonio suddenly had an idea that he could raise money by selling the used nail bags. People built their own homes in Bay Roberts, using nails bought in bags from a local factory. Sometimes the used bags were thrown away at the construction site, and Antonio knew he could sell them back to the factory for five cents a piece. That day he sold two nail bags and hid the money in a rusty soda tin.
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。
Every day after school, Antonio started his plan.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________The day finally came!
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________My dad was a cleaner in my school. When I was 12, I decided to study hard to have a life different from his.
One day when Dad asked me to play basketball with him, I just replied, “I’m busy. I want to study well so that I can become a rich man. I don’t want to be a cleaner like you, Dad!” He was shocked (震惊的), but I didn’t care and continued studying hard. Finally, I graduated from high school with honors, and decided it was time to break free from my dad and follow my dreams.
“Dad, I got a scholarship to a law school in California,” I told him. “I’ll leave in 3 days.” My dad was surprised but proud of me. As I left for the airport 3 days later, he said, “Son, wherever you go, welcome back home.” I ignored his words and flew to California.
After I graduated, I found a great job there. Later, I was made manager and earned much money. I no longer remembered my father was a cleaner. I had forgotten my dad, who was still cleaning my school. I seldom answered his calls or wrote back to him. I was busy; I still had a lot more to achieve.
With time, the more success I tasted, somehow, the lonelier I became. I felt especially lonely on my 31st birthday. I kept checking my phone, hoping someone wished me a happy birthday. But there wasn’t a single call or message. Later that evening when I returned home from my office, something in my mailbox drew my attention.
“A letter?” I whispered and saw it was from my father. He never forgot to mail me a letter on my each birthday. However, I never took the trouble to read it. “How did I ignore him?” I thought. I brought the letter home and took out his earlier letters. And I opened one. It read, “Wherever you are, I love you to the last drop of my blood. I wish you a happy life.”
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 picked up another letter and read it.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Finally, I arrived at my dad’s house and saw him sitting alone in the yard.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________9 . My grandma passed away last week. My mum began the painful yet necessary task of sorting through her belongings.
“Is there anything you want from grandma’s flat?” Mum texted me.
“Her aloe (芦荟), please.” I required zero thinking time.
Sometime around 1975, Grandma, always believing good things would happen in the future, received this plant as a gift, which she appreciated and placed in her doorway. It came from the local butcher. Five years later, my mum married the butcher’s son and had me. Grandma revealed to me this particular plant was a living relationship between the two families. And so was I.
Recently, whenever we visited Grandma’s flat, I attempted to fix this concept in my children’s minds. “That was a gift your great-grandma bought your other great-grandma! It’s older than me!” Then my kids would nod and ask Grandma for a sweet.
Numerous times, Grandma gave me cuttings or clippings of the plant, hoping I might raise my own and continue the legend. Yet, every time, my new branch died with my awful gardening skills. But that didn’t used to matter, because I could turn to Grandma, who would wait and accept my disturbance without becoming upset. Then I got another clipping and tried again. But now I can’t. So, I decided that the plant will go and live with Ann, my mother-in-law, who is a genius with a greenhouse.
The plan is for Ann to keep hold of the original plant. In time, she can teach me how to deal with its cuttings properly, and then maybe one day I can settle the plant in my place.
In the meantime, Ann will allocate (分配) clippings among my relatives, as Grandma used to do. My wife’s two sisters, for example, are both better at tending plants than I am, so it is quite imaginable they, too, will offer cuttings of the plant to their partners, spreading this loving plant across my entire extended family.
1. Why did the author want his grandma’s aloe?| A．He wanted to pass it down to others. | B．He showed a preference for gardening. |
| C．He had a pleasant memory of the plant. | D．He received it as a gift from his grandma. |
| A．Optimistic and patient. | B．Generous and helpful. | C．Honest and fashionable. | D．Humorous and skillful. |
| A．display his skills in gardening | B．have the plant better cared for |
| C．announce his grandma’s death | D．protect the plant from dying out |
| A．Aloe: my family bond | B．Aloe: a mysterious plant |
| C．Grandma: my life coach | D．Grandma: a lovely gardener |
10 . The middle child, I think, is now an “endangered species”. According to a study, in 1976,65 percent of mothers between aged 40 and 44 had three or more children. Today, nearly two-thirds of women with children have only one or two. Middle children will soon be the tiniest.
As a middle child, I am disappointed at the potential disappearance of middle children. I’m the middle of three—two boys, one girl—so I’m what’s sometimes regarded as a “classic middle child”.
Being a middle child is not something you are eager for. As one middle child said to me, “There is a thing called middle-child syndrome (综合征). I certainly was always aware that the middle was not a position to be admired, even as I came to see typical middle-child features in myself. Middle children are natural mediators (和事佬); I avoid disagreements and habitually act as the family peace-maker. Middle children tend to be private but also long for love; I keep to myself but do not exactly hate attention.”
According to studies, middles traditionally receive less economic and emotional support from their parents. They also typically have less close relationships with their mothers and fathers compared with other brothers or sisters, so they tend to have more friends to fill the feeling gap.
In a study conducted by the City College of New York in which participants were asked to choose words they associate with the first, last, and middle kids, positive words such as caring and ambitious were cited concerning all three birth orders. Only middles, however, were described with such negative terms as overlooked and confused. More importantly, middles may be many things and they were the only birth order with which no one connected the term “overindulged”. It is true: their parents couldn’t allow them to do or have whatever they want, especially when they are enough old, and they don’t ask for everything either even if they are eager to own it occasionally.
1. Why does the author mention the study in paragraph 1?| A．To inform a definition. |
| B．To introduce the topic. |
| C．To make a comparison. |
| D．To support his opinion. |
| A．It is dangerous for middles to suffer from it. |
| B．It clearly shows the typical features of middles. |
| C．It is what non-middle kids admire and wish for. |
| D．It is the result of the unsuccessful parenting style. |
| A．John, 3, asking his mother for dressing him. |
| B．Mary, 8, busy in focusing on her preference. |
| C．Paul, 12, unwilling to have breakfast by himself. |
| D．Nancy, 17, afraid to challenge the math problems. |
| A．They are always in low spirits. |
| B．They stress the protection of privacy. |
| C．They are ignored but independent. |
| D．They support the family economically. |
