As your child progresses through life, he will make mistakes. As a parent, it’s your responsibility to correct those mistakes, but you should use the right way to correct your child’s mistakes or else you risk harming his self-esteem (自尊) or causing problems in your relationship. Using the right way to offer your child constructive criticism (建设性的批评) encourages healthy development.
Parents should be willing to teach their child proper behaviors when offering constructive criticism, according to an Everyday Health article. If your child’s leaving food particles on dishes that he’s washed, teach him your way of properly washing dishes, as opposed to shouting at him or thinking he’s lazy. You can say, “I know you work hard at washing the dishes every night. But for the past few weeks I’ve noticed that there’s been some food stuck on some of the dishes. I used to do this when I was about your age, too. May I show you the way I’ve learned to wash the dishes?”
Your child will probably not reply to your criticism if it is given in an angry tone (语气). Talk to your child when you’re calm and clear-headed. It’s difficult enough to receive criticism because no one really wants to hear about their mistakes, says psychiatrist Harry Croft, so it’s important that you use a loving tone when correcting your child’s mistakes. If the matter doesn’t need to be dealt with immediately, give yourself as much time as you need — even go for a walk — before correcting your child’s behaviors.
Comparison is never a good way of offering constructive criticism. When you compare your child with someone else, you are creating feelings of inadequacy (缺乏信心) in your child, which can have long-lasting bad influences. Instead, focus on your child, his behaviors, and the things he might be able to improve. Instead of saying, “I wish you could be respectful to your grandparents like your brother,” try saying, “I really want you to work on having more respect for your grandparents.”
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Long ago, there was a big apple tree. A little boy loved to come and play around it every day. He climbed to the top of the tree, ate the apples, and took a nap under the shadow. He loved the tree and the tree also enjoyed playing with him.
As time went by, the little boy grew up and he no longer played around the tree.
One day, the boy came back to the tree, appearing sad. “Come and play with me,” the tree asked the boy gently.
“I am no longer a kid; I won’t play around trees any more,” the boy replied. “I want toys. I need money to buy them.”
“Sorry, but I don’t have money. However, you can pick all my apples and sell them. Then, you will have money.” The boy was so excited that he picked all the apples on the tree and left happily. The boy didn’t come back after that.
The tree was upset.
One day, the boy returned and the tree was so joyful. “Come and play with me,” the tree said.
“I don’t have time to play. I have to work for my family. We need a house for shelter. Can you help me?” “Sorry, I don’t have a house. But you can cut off my branches to build your house.” So the boy cut all the branches of the tree and left with delight.
The tree was glad to see him happy but the boy didn’t appear since then. The tree was again lonely and sad.
One hot summer day, the boy returned and the tree was delighted. “Come and play with me!” the tree requested.
“I am sad and becoming old. I want to go sailing to relax myself. Can you give me a boat?”“Use my trunk to build the boat. You can sail and be happy.” So the boy cut the tree trunk to make a boat. He went sailing and did not show up for a long time.
注意：续写词数应为150左右。
Many years later, the boy finally returned.
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The apple tree is our mother.
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My mother always told me it was better to be smart than to be beautiful. “If you are smart, finally you will afford to be beautiful.” All I needed were the brains, and someday, I would be a really beautiful lawyer.
My mother worked at a TV station and I would come along and watch the magic of filming TV shows. But all the same, I was learning.
When my father’s business failed, I was able to continue to attend one of the best bilingual (双语的) schools in Mexico City thanks to scholarship. Scholarship followed me into middle school and high school.
However, during my senior year in high school my family moved to my dad’s country, the United States. For the first time in my life, I had optional (可选择的) classes. So I decided to take psychology class. While I found the public school system to be a joke, I did find my psychology class attractive. My mother, in her dreams for my life, did not see psychology as a good choice, but I was like her, strong-willed to the subject.
I married young, even before I had a degree under my belt. Worst of all, I married a kid who wanted to be poster (牧师). My mother loved Andy dearly but she would ask him occasionally, “When will you have a real job?” I did finish my degree and I became a social worker, but when I had my first child at age 24, I quit my job. Then at 26, another baby girl joined our family. Unfortunately, this baby girl had Down syndrome (唐氏综合征).
How would I be able to break the news to my mother? “It is better to be smart than to be beautiful.” I knew what “smart” meant in the statement, and I doubted if my baby with an extra chromosome (染色体) would meet those expectations. My mom was coming to the hospital to meet her new grandbaby. I would tell her then. I needed time to gather my thoughts. I was afraid, afraid that she would see Nichole as one that would never be smart...or beautiful.
Paragraph 1：
My mother arrived at the hospital midmorning, ready to meet her new granddaughter.
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Paragraph 2：
Six years later, Nichole runs to mom whenever we see each other.
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I pulled the car into the garage and got out, just like every night for the past 16 years. The difference was that I wouldn’t have to work in the morning.
I slammed the car door. I used to be a leader of a national bank until it was closed. I’d put my heart and soul into my job. Not only did I work long hours, but also I was on call 24 hours a day, on weekends and holidays. If someone had a technical problem, even at 2:00 a.m. on Christmas morning, I was on it.
My kids joked that even though they were teenagers, I was the one who was absorbed in my cell phone and had to be told not to text at the dinner table.
My wife, Michelle, had been able to go to work full-time as an office manager once we heard my job was threatened. But our son, TJ, was a high school senior, and the girls, Sarah and Tara, were in ninth grade. And I wanted to give them the education and opportunities they deserved. “If I can’t provide anything for my family,” I asked, “what good am I?”
I opened the garage door and stepped out into our yard. The lawn and flower beds that my mum had tended so carefully were overrun with weeds. There was a maple tree in the middle of the yard that my parents planted when I was a boy. It needed caring. But I’d put on a lot of weight—no time to exercise with my crazy hours. I went up to the house. Michelle greeted me at the door with a hug. “It’s going to be okay. We will get through it,” she said. “Maybe you should think of this time as a break. You deserve one.”
“I’m sorry, Dad,” TJ said. “I know how much your job meant to you.” His concern was mirrored in the girls’ faces.
“I’ll take care of this,” I told them. “I’m going to work round the clock to find a new job and make our lives go back to normal.”
注意：
(1) 续写词数应为150左右；
(2) 请按如下格式作答。
The next morning, I got up before everyone else.
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The new lawn I’d planned for so long began to take shape and so did I.
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George’s mother was very poor. Instead of having bright blazing fires in winter, she had nothing to burn but dry sticks, which George picked up from under the trees and hedges.
One fine day in July, his sick mother sent George to the woods, which were about two miles from the village in which she lived. He was to stay there all day to get as much wood as he could collect.
It was a bright, sunny day, and George worked very hard; so that by the time the sun was high, he was hot, and wished for a cool place where he might rest and eat his dinner. While he hunted for a spot about the bank he saw among the moss some fine, wild strawberries, which were a bright scarlet with ripeness.
”How good these will be my bread and butter!“thought George. Lining his little cap with leaves he set to work eagerly to gather all he could find and then seated himself by the brook.
It was a pleasant place, and George felt happy and contented. He thought how much his mother would like to see him there, and to be there herself, instead of in her dark close room in the village.
George thought of all this and just as he was lifting the first strawberry to his mouth, he said to himself, ”How much mother would like these!“and he stopped, putting the strawberry back again. ”Shall I save them for her?“said he, thinking how much they would refresh her, yet still looking at them with a longing eye.
”I will eat half, and take the other half to her, “said he at last, and he divided them into two heaps(t). But each heap looked so small, that he put them together again.
”I will only taste one“thought he. As he again lifted it to his mouth, he saw that he had taken the finest and he put it back. ”I will keep them all for her, "he said with great happiness, and he covered them up nicely, ready to take home.
注意：(1)续写词数应为150左右;
(2)开头已给出。
He stood up and started to get more and more wood until the sun began to sink.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Just after he had thrown down his wood, he heard his mother’s weak voice calling him from the next room.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________My mom only had one eye. I hated her. She was such an embarrassment.
She ran a small shop at a flea market (跳蚤市场) and collected old clothes and some other things to sell for the money we needed. Once during elementary school, it was field day, and my mom came. I was so embarrassed and wondered how could she do this to me? I threw her a hateful look and ran out. The next day at school, my schoolmates asked me, “Your mom only has one eye？” and laughed at me.
I was so angry with my mom and wished that she would just disappear from this world. So I said to my mom, “Why don't you have the other eye? You're only gonna (将要) make me a joke！” My mom trembled with shock, and said in an apologetic tone, “I'm so sorry that I only have one eye, and I was an embarrassment for you. But I was so proud of my son to see a whole new world for me with that_eye. I will leave right now. Sorry！” My mom turned around and staggered away.
For the words I had said to her earlier, there was something biting at me in the corner of my heart. Even so, I hated my oneeyed mom and our desperate poverty. Maybe because my mom hadn't punished me, I didn't think I had hurt her feelings very badly.
I told myself that I would become successful in the near future, so I studied very hard. Later I got accepted by the Seoul University. I left my mother and came to Seoul to study. I never went back to visit my mom.
Then I got married there. I bought a house of my own. Then I had kids, too. Now I am living happily as a successful man. I enjoy the life in Seoul because it's a place that doesn't remind me of my mom and my past. This kind of happiness was getting bigger and bigger, until one day someone knocked at my door.
注意：1.所续写短文的词数应为150左右；
2．至少使用5个短文中标有下划线的关键词语；
3．续写部分分为两段，每段的开头语已为你写好；
4．续写完成后，请用下划线标出你所使用的关键词语。
Paragraph 1：
It was my mom! And still with her one eye！
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Paragraph 2:
Holding the letter, I cried for the person who only lived for me.
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Every Saturday, Grandpa and I walk to the nursing home (养老院) a few blocks away from our house to visit some of the old people who live there.
First we visit Mrs. Sokol. I call her “The Cook.” She likes to talk about the time when she was a well-known cook back in Russia. People would come from miles around, just to taste her famous chicken soup.
Next we visit Mr. Meyer. I call him “The Joke Man.” He tells us jokes, and laughs at his own jokes, shaking up and down and turning red in the face. Grandpa and I can’t help but laugh along with him, even when the jokes aren’t very funny.
Next door is Mr. Lipman. I call him “The Singer” because he loves to sing for us. Whenever he does, his beautiful voice fills the air, so clear and strong that we always sing along with him.
Then we visit Mrs. Kagan, “The Grandmother,” who shows us pictures of her grandchildren. They’re all over the room, in frames (画框) and even taped to the walls.
One day Grandpa got sick and had to go to the hospital. The doctors said they didn’t think he would ever get better.
Saturday came. How could I go visiting the nursing home without Grandpa? Then I remembered what Grandpa once told me: “Nothing should stand in the way of doing a good deed (行为).” So I went alone. Everyone was happy to see me. They were surprised when they didn’t see Grandpa. When I told them that he was sick and in the hospital, they were sad. They told me that Grandpa would have a complete recovery.
The Cook went on to reveal (透露) some of her secret recipes (食谱). The Joke Man told me his latest jokes. The Singer sang a song especially for me. The Grandmother showed me more pictures. After a while, I said goodbye to everyone.
A few days later, Grandpa was still in the hospital. He was not eating, he could not sit up and he could hardly speak. I went to the corner of the room so Grandpa wouldn’t see me cry.
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。
Suddenly the nurse came into the room and said, “You have some visitors.”
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________That evening, Grandpa called the nurse in and said he was hungry. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Once when I was young and had a loose tooth, I asked my father, a dentist, to look at it.
“It needs to be pulled，” he told me. I frowned, afraid of the pain of that experience. My dad sent me for some tissues and I imagined them soaking up liters of blood from my mouth. I closed my eyes and strengthened myself. I was still waiting for him to pull when I heard my father say, “I’m done.”
I opened my eyes and saw my tooth in his tissuecovered hand. I hadn’t felt anything, and there was just a bit of blood on the tissues. I thought my father was a magician.
The next day at school I bragged to a friend about my father’s wonderful skill. When I explained that the process didn’t hurt, my friend called me a liar. He said that when his tooth was pulled, it had hurt a lot. I talked to my father about this and there was not a single mystery left after my father’s explanation: my tooth had been ready to be removed, while my friend’s had not.
“I’m going to be a dentist，” I declared. I wanted to follow in the professional footsteps of my father, my uncle and grandmother. My father supported my ambition, honoring my interest in his profession even when I was young. He always encouraged me, saying，“To achieve your goal, you should always be devoting hard work and effort to it.”
I didn’t need to visit my father’s office as a child because I had few cavities. As I entered the elementary school and began eating more candy, however, I visited more often. I didn’t mind, though. I was the only kid I knew who was excited about going to the dentist. After my father worked on my teeth, he let me hang around. And I was amazed as he operated complicated machines, leaning over patients’ mouths with a tiny mirror strapped to his head.
注意：1.所续写短文的词数应为150左右;
2．至少使用5个短文中标有下划线的关键词语;
3．续写部分分为两段，每段的开头语已为你写好;
4．续写完成后，请用下划线标出你所使用的关键词语。
Paragraph 1：
Once, when my dad was pulling my mother’s teeth, he even let me clear her mouth.
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Paragraph 2：
Years later, the dream of a child has not declined but actually grown firmer.
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“Class, please line up! Let’s welcome Marti,” said Ms. Baroni, our tae kwon do (跆拳道) teacher.
I was excited that my best friend Marti would be taking lessons, too.
Everyone said, “Hi.” Marti went red in the face.
“You don’t need to be shy here,” I said to Marti in a quiet voice. “Everyone’s really nice.”
After warm-up exercises, Ms. Baroni divided everyone into groups. Even though I was a level above Marti, Ms. Baroni told us to practice together. “Jenna, why don’t you show Marti some basic kicks?”
I said sure and showed her a front kick. Marti copied it. Her kick was as high as my shoulder. “Great job, Marti! Let me show you something,” said Ms. Baroni. She then spent the next five minutes working with Marti. I leaned (倚靠) against the wall and watched Marti copy everything Ms. Baroni did. The more Marti did, the more praise she received from Ms. Baroni.
I practiced my form half-heartedly. “What if Marti became better than me? What if Marti became Ms. Baroni’s favorite student?” I couldn’t help thinking.
“Watch your form!”
“Who is Ms. Baroni speaking to?” I wondered. I turned and saw Ms. Baroni looking directly at me. Nothing could have been worse.
At the end of class, I took my bag and hurried outside to find my mom. I had planned to wait and say good-bye to Marti, but now I wanted to be alone. For the next several weeks, Marti continued to impress our teacher with her skills. Honestly, I felt a little jealous (忌妒的) of her. And as Marti turned into a star student, I became less and less excited about tae kwon do.
One day, as we walked down the hallway at school, Marti said, “Ms. Baroni thinks I’m ready to take the test for the next level.”
I was surprised. “It’s harder than you think. Two judges other than Ms. Baroni will give you points,” I said.
Marti looked disappointed (失望的). “You don’t think I’m good enough to take the test yet?”
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。
I felt my face get hot, and I explained, “I didn’t say that.”
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“I haven’t been a very good friend,” I thought sadly.
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A man came home from work late, tired and unhappy, to find his 5—year—old son waiting for him at the door. How the boy wished to have fun with his father at home even for a short time.
“Daddy, may I ask you a question?”
“Yeah sure. what is it?” replied the man.
“Daddy, how much do you make an hour?”
“That’s none of your business. Why do you ask such a thing?” the man said angrily.
“I just want to know. Please tell me. How much do you make an hour?” pleaded the little boy.
“If you must know, I make $20 an hour.”
“Oh,” the little boy replied with the head down.
Looking up, he said. “Daddy, may I please borrow $10?
The father was angry. “If the only reason you asked that is that you can borrow some money to buy a silly toy or some other nonsense, then you march yourself straight to your room and go to bed. Think about why you are being so selfish. I work hard every day for such childish behavior.”
The little boy quietly went to his room and shut the door. The man sat down and started to get even angrier about the little boy’s questions. “How dare he ask such questions only to get some money?” he thought to himself.
After about an hour or so, the man calmed down, and started to think: Maybe there was something he really needed to buy with that $10 and he really didn’t ask for money very often. The man went to the door of the little boy’s room and opened the door. “Are you asleep, son?” he asked.
“No, daddy, I’m awake.” replied the boy.
I’ve been thinking. maybe I was too hard on you earlier,” said the man. “It has been a long day and I took out my anger on you. Here’s the $10 you asked for.”
The little boy sat straight up, smiling. “Oh. Thank you, daddy!” he shouted. Then, reaching under his pillow he pulled out some crumpled(皱巴巴的)bills.
注意：1．所续写短文的词数不少于100词；
2．续写部分开头语已为你写好；
The man, seeing that the boy already had money, started to get angry again.
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Not knowing what his son meant, the father just stood there, waiting for his boy’s explanation.
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