1 . Many parents worry that showing negative emotions in front of their children will cause them to suffer. For example, children may end up thinking it’s their fault or simply “catch” the emotion. Indeed, this worry has a sound basis—the phenomenon of “emotional contagion” (情绪感染) is real, and one recent study found that parents can transfer their fear of going to the dentist, for example, to their children.

On the other hand, there is the natural idea that we should “be real” with our children, and that they will benefit from watching a parent who struggles and eventually deals with their negative emotions like any other human being.

There are three concepts to consider when it comes to emotional display in front of children: suppression, “uncontained” expression, and talking about emotions. Suppression of emotion is when you hide the outward signs of an emotion. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work very well—the act of suppressing your emotion actually increases your blood pressure. Observers can pick up on your distress despite your efforts to hide it, making them feel stressed. The recent research has also found that when parents feel negative emotions and keep them from their children, they experience lower relationship quality and decreased responsiveness to their child’s needs.

On the other hand, “uncontained” expression of anger and sadness by the parent is also not salutary for the child. Uncontained means high intensity emotion, with no attempts to regulate or take ownership of it. Shouting, smashing (摔) things and blaming someone else for “making you angry” are all example of this.

So, what is the middle ground? That would be talking about emotion taking ownership of them and showing your child that you are trying to deal with them. Classic research found that six-year-old kids had better emotional understanding and perspective-taking skills if their mothers had talked to them about their emotions at the age of three. In fact, the more the mothers had talked, the better the outcome would be.

So next time you feel sad, angry or frustrated and your child is watching you expressing emotion, do explain what’s going on in terms they can understand.

1. The author uses the example of going to the dentist mainly to ________.

A．introduce the topic of negative emotions

B．explain parents’ common fear

C．show children may catch parents’ emotions

D．present the consequences of transferring negative emotions

2. If a mother suppresses her emotions, ________.

A．she will not make her kids feel stressed	B．she can hide her emotions from her kids
C．she can’t respond effectively to her kids’ needs	D．she will often shout at her kids for no reasons

3. What does the underlined word “salutary” in Paragraph 4 probably mean?

A．significant

B．reliable

C．meaningful

D．beneficial

4. What’s the structure of the text?

A．	B．
C．	D．

3 . When I was a little boy, my mom, dad, brothers and I lived in my grandma’s old house, surrounded by four huge vegetable gardens. Around the house she planted so many flowers. On the back porch grandma had dozens of potted plants hanging on hooks. She watered them, talked to them and nurtured them. And in winter she would carry them all inside and set them on shelves near the windows of our enclosed front porch. There with a little water and a lot of love she kept them alive and growing even during the darkest months.

As a boy I was puzzled by all the effort she put into them. I comprehended the four huge gardens. They helped to feed the family all winter long. I even recognized the flowers around the house. They were pretty and smelled so sweet in the summer months. The reason she put so much effort into caring for those potted plants, however, troubled me. They didn’t give us any food and they rarely had any flowers on them. They remained a mystery to my child’s mind.

Now as I’ve grown older, I am beginning to understand why my grandma had those potted plants. It is the same reason I have so many pictures of sunrises and forests hanging in my home. They remind me during the dark winter months full of bare trees and yellow grass that light, love and growth still exist. They remind me that spring will come again.

Today I see grandma’s potted plants in a new light. They were worth every bit of the love and care she put into them. But my greatest reminder of light and love was grandma herself. Her love lives on in my heart although she is in Heaven. May we all learn to love as she loved, shine as she shined and live as she lived!

1. What does the author intend to tell in Paragraph 1?

A．His family all enjoyed a peaceful life in the old house.

B．His grandma brought beauty and brightness to life.

C．His grandma always created surprises to them.

D．The potted plants cost his grandma much energy.

2. What made the author get into knots?

A．The four huge vegetable gardens.	B．The flowers planted around the house.
C．The efforts grandma put in the gardens.	D．The plants grandma took care of.

3. What does the author learn from his grandma?

A．He knows how to seek light and hope in life.	B．He likes taking photos of sunrises and forests.
C．He realizes potted plants are worth doing.	D．He gradually falls in love with potted plants.

4. Which can best describe the author’s attitude to his grandma?

A．Indifferent.

B．Grateful.

C．Cautious.

D．Critical.

6 . Growing up, I understood one thing about my dad: He knew everything. In my teen years, he taught me things I’d need to know to survive in the real world: how to drive a stick shift, how to check the car tyre’s (轮胎) pressure, and the correct knife to use to cut a cantaloupe.

When I moved out on my own, I called him at least once a week, usually when something broke in my apartment and I needed to know how to fix it: the toilet, the air-conditioning, the wall, once, when I threw a shoe at a terrifying spider.

But then, eventually, I needed him less. I got married, and my husband had most of the knowledge I lacked about gutter (排水沟) cleaning and water heaters and nondestructive insect removal. For everything else, we had Google. I didn’t know when it happened, but our conversations turned into six words when I called. Me: “Hi, Dad.” Him: “Hi, sweet. Here’s Mom.”

I loved my dad, of course, but I wondered at times if maybe he had already shared everything I needed to know. Maybe I’d heard all his stories. Maybe, after knowing a man for 40 years, there’s nothing left to say. Then, two summers ago, my husband, our four kids and I moved in with my parents for three weeks while our house was being painted. They owned a lake house, and my dad asked me to help him rebuild the bulkhead (舱壁). It was a hard and manual job. We got wet and sandy. But as we put the new bulkhead together piece by piece, my dad knew exactly what went where. I looked at him, “How do you know how to build a bulkhead?” “I spent a summer in college building it on the Jersey Shore.”

“You did?” I thought I knew everything about my dad, but I never knew this. I realized that maybe it’s not that there’s nothing left to say. Maybe it’s just that I’ve spent my life asking him the wrong questions. That day, my dad talked about what he had learned and what he could do excitedly. We chatted and chatted for a long time.

A few weeks later, after my family and I moved back into our painted house, I called my parents. “Hi, sweets,” he said. “Here’s Mom.” “Wait, Dad,” I said. “How are you?” We ended up talking about everything he was working on. To anyone else, it would sound like a normal conversation between a dad and his daughter. But to me, it was novel and a new beginning. I spent the first part of my life needing to talk to my dad. Now I talk to him because I want to.

1. Why did the author feel that she needed to call her dad before she got married?

A．She called to make sure he was pleased.	B．She wanted to talk to him for knowledge.
C．She knew her parents missed her so much.	D．She was asked to call him once a week.

2. Why hadn’t the author got something to talk with her father before she moved back to be with him?

A．Her father was old and he didn’t keep up with the world.

B．Her father always thought he was right in everything.

C．She didn’t have more to learn from him than she thought.

D．She spent her younger ages asking him too many questions.

3. What does the father’s answer “Hi, sweet. Here’s Mom.” mean?

A．The author’s mother is answering the phone.	B．The author’s mother knows what has happened.
C．He will give the phone to the author’s mother.	D．He finds the author’s mother sweet and kind.

4. Which of the following words best describe the father?

A．Creative and faithful.	B．Selfless and brave.
C．Inspiring and generous.	D．Loving and experienced.

8 . It’s hard when a best friend isn’t around—maybe because you moved to a different school. You may feel lonely at break or lunchtime. You should have new friends. But how do you make new friends? Maybe it seems like everybody else already has their friends. But remember, there’s always room for more friends.

Start by looking around your classroom — think about which kids you’d like to play with at break. Look for chances to say “Hi.” to them, smile and be friendly. Offer to share something or express your appreciation to them. Invite someone to play with you or say “Do you want to sit here?” in the lunchroom. When you’re at break, walk over to kids you want to play with, act friendly and say “Hi, can I play, too?” or just join in.

If you have trouble doing this or if you’re feeling shy, ask your teacher to help you make new friends. Teachers are usually pretty good at matching up friends. The best way to make friends is to be a friend. Be kind, be friendly, share, say nice things and offer to help — and pretty soon, you’ll have one, or two, or even more new friends.

You might still miss that special best friend. But when you see each other, you can share something you didn’t have before you left. You can introduce your best friend to your new friends!

1. What should you do if you move to a new school?

A．Stay alone and wait for opportunity.	B．Contact your best friend often.
C．Try to make new friends.	D．Cut off contact with your old friends.

2. What does the underlined word “room” in paragraph 1 mean?

A．Challenge.

B．Friendship.

C．Intention.

D．Opportunity.

3. What does the author want to express in paragraph 2?

A．The reasons for making new friends.	B．The ways of making new friends.
C．The benefit of making new friends.	D．The importance of making new friends.

4. If you are too shy to speak to new friends, you can ______.

A．turn to your teachers	B．match up friends freely
C．introduce yourself first	D．turn to your best friend

9 . The photographs that Scilla took as a 16-year-old girl on the streets of London in 1955 stayed largely in her album (相册) over the years. Scilla is now 83, and her self-developed black-and-white photos have been brought back to life after they were discovered by a teenage photographer.

Over the past year, Philip Loveday, 16, has been revisiting his grandmother’s path across the capital to carefully rephotograph the pictures. His journey through time with a camera has been especially moving, because his grandmother, Scilla, has Alzheimer’s disease (阿尔茨海默症) and has lost many of her memories.

Philip took new photos that looked like the ones Scilla took long ago, and put them in a new album. Each page of Scilla’s old album was copied and put in the new one, with Philip’s new photos on the opposite pages. Philip’s mother, Catherine Loveday, said Scilla had been happy with the new album, which had “put her back in her shoes” as a teenager.

Philip said his mother showed him the album she had found at her mother’s house. Greatly absorbed in how modern London would compare to the city photographed by his grandmother, Philip and his mother began to make trips into central London. During the trips, they had the idea of retaking the photos.

Some of the places are similar, like Big Ben. Others show how the city has modernized. Unlike Scilla’s view of St. Paul’s Cathedral from the Thames, Philip’s retake has the Millenium Bridge. When Scilla photographed the John Lewis store on Oxford Street, it was a one-storey building — now it has seven floors. Philip had to use his imagination to recreate other sights. Scilla has repeatedly returned to her new album since receiving it. Philip said: “It’s nice for her to see someone taking an interest in those photos and going back over them, and also good for her to connect her past to where we are now.”

1. What did Philip do for Scilla during the past year?

A．He taught her how to use a camera.

B．He took her to visit London streets.

C．He found a new way to treat her disease.

D．He recreated photos of London she had taken.

2. What influence did Philip’s work have on Scilla?

A．It inspired her to take photos.	B．It made her think of her teenage days.
C．It encouraged her to travel across London.	D．It raised her confidence to fight off illness.

3. What does the underlined word “absorbed” in paragraph 4 mean?

A．Troubled.

B．Interested.

C．Experienced.

D．Disappointed.

4. What is the best title of this passage?

A．A teenager sensed the great changes of London.

B．An old lady suffered a lot from Alzheimer’s disease.

C．A teenager and his mother travelled to London for fun.

D．A teenager’s photos helped recover his grandmother’s memory.

10 . For many runners, a marathon can often be a challenge—but sometimes what gets a runner through the tough 26.2 miles is looking out into the crowd and seeing his or her loved one holding up a sign and shouting words of encouragement. For one mom, though, her loved one was a bit more hands-on.

While running the REVEL Big Cottonwood Marathon in Salt Lake City, Courtney Rich, a self-taught baker and mother of two, was beginning to run out of energy just yards from the end when she was suddenly joined by her 10-year-old daughter, Avery.

The touching moment, caught on video and posted on social media, shows Avery running to her mother’s side to support her as she approached the end of the race. Rich’s face lit up when Avery joined her and helped her cross the finish line.

Rich later said in the video’s caption that being joined by her daughter to finish the race was “a moment I hope neither of us ever forget”. Rich said that her daughter could tell she was struggling after a phone call near the end of the race. “She knew I had struggled the last few miles,” Rich said. “She saw tears in my eyes when I called on mile 24.”

In the video, Rich’s facial expression changes from tiredness to a smile after seeing her daughter emerge from the crowd to join her. Then, Rich and her daughter ran hand-in-hand to the finish line. “Nothing could have prepared me for the moment my 10-year-old daughter would jump out of the crowd and run with me to the finish line,” she said. When the race was done, the two hugged each other at the finish line. The video ends with a final caption, “And then she just held me. She held me.”

In the past, the REVEL Big Cottonwood Marathon has had other memorable moments of mothers caring for their children, but perhaps not as hands-on as this one.

1. What happened to Rich when she was coming to the finish line?

A．She felt herself struggling.	B．She was far behind others.
C．She fell down all of a sudden.	D．She was interrupted by Avery.

2. How did Avery react to the accident?

A．She ran the rest in place of Rich.	B．She tried to call for help at once.
C．She helped Rich run to the finish line.	D．She shouted encouraging words to Rich.

3. How did Rich feel about Avery’s response?

A．Doubtful.

B．Content.

C．Concerned.

D．Expected.

4. What can be the best title for the text?

A．A Daughter Cheered For Her Mother By Joining In Her Race

B．A Mother Encouraged Her Daughter To Pursue Her Dream

C．A Daughter Got Involved In Her Mother’s Race By Mistake

D．A Mother Would Never Give Up On Her Marathon Dream