1 . Many of us seem to have lives that follow a certain way. From kindergarten all the way to when we get married, every stage of our lives seems to be preset. And although this works well for a lot of people, according to British scholar Jay Shetty, there is no “right” schedule to live our lives by.

A few months ago, a video of Shetty’s speech “Before You Feel Pressure” became popular on the Internet across the world. In the video, he sends an important message that we should think “outside of the way” and have the courage to follow our hearts. As Shetty says in the video, we don’t have to get stressed and put ourselves in a race with our peers or judge our lives based on others’. “Everything in life happens according to our time, our clocks,” he says.

In his inspiring speech, Shetty points out that UK author J. K. Rowling got her famous “Harry Potter” series published at age 32, after being turned down by 12 publishers. Shetty also mentions that US actor Morgan Freeman didn’t get his big break until he was 52 years old. So we shouldn’t let anyone rush us.

As physicist Albert Einstein once said, “Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that’s counted truly counts. The key to staying on our own tracks is to be patient and keep our own interest. ” In Australian nurse Bronnie Ware’s best-selling book “The Top Five Regrets of the Dying”, she recorded the dying regrets of her patients, and the top one on the list was: “I wish I had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the one others expected of me. ”

Indeed, we are all unique in our personalities and gifts, and there’s no perfect fit for all. We should listen to our inner voices and ignore what the world has taught us, and what we’ve picked up from people around us. “It is important to allow people to go back to being self-aware of their own interests, needs and concerns,” Shetty told the magazine. “It’s disconnecting from what ‘makes sense’ to what actually moves you and what makes sense internally (内在地). ”

1. What does Jay Shetty agree to?

A．The stages of our lives should be preset.

B．Few people have lives that follow a certain way.

C．All people live their lives according to schedules.

D．We can live our lives not according to the given way.

2. According to Jay Shetty’s video, people should _________.

A．put more pressure on themselves

B．adjust their lives based on others’

C．decide their lives in terms of actual cases

D．compete with those who are better than themselves

3. Shetty lists the famous people in his speech to show ________.

A．everyone can be a winner	B．hard work is the key to success
C．great new life can begin anytime	D．success does not happen in one’s youth

4. Which of the following statements is TRUE according to Paragraph 4?

A．Everything that’s counted truly counts.

B．One should live a life as expected by others.

C．We should count and analyze everything in life.

D．The top dying regret was not living in the way one wanted.

5. We can conclude from the last paragraph that _______.

A．people should never listen to others’ advice

B．we should follow the heart and do what we want to do

C．what makes sense should not be about what people care internally

D．being self-aware of interests, needs and concerns is not acceptable

2 . When you need to find a solution to a design problem, you could ask yourself, “What animals or plants face a similar problem in their lives, and how do they handle it?”    1     Termites (白蚁) in Africa control the temperature and air currents in their nests by having thick walls and air spaces in the top part. The Eastgate Centre in Harare, Zimbabwe was designed in a similar way, with thick overhangs shading the windows, and all the offices connected to a big chimney letting hot air escape. This allows it to stay cool while using much less air-conditioning.    2    

Engineer Nakatsu also asked himself the same question.    3     A keen birdwatcher, Nakatsu realised that kingfishers also experience an abrupt pressure change when diving into the water, but their beaks allow them to pierce through the water smoothly. His team found that putting a long, pointed nose on the train greatly reduced the loud booms in the tunnel and allowed it to run faster.

Having a big picture of the world we live in also helps us understand how technology can be used to protect instead of destroy it.    4     On the other hand, plastic packaging creates a lot of waste and pollution. One company has come up with an alternative material made of com husk waste and some big companies are starting to use it.

    5     Nakatsu worries that children today do not have the opportunity to touch and feel nature. He advises that students in university should study more than one narrow field so that they do not just have one fixed way of thinking.

A．In nature, everything gets recycled.

B．To mimic (模仿) nature, we must be familiar with it.

C．It turns out that natural beauty often has a logical reason behind it.

D．Large cities full of people are often compared to ants’ colonies (群).

E．This idea was used to arrange hundreds of mirrors at a solar power plant.

F．It could be a good solution for the hot and crowded cities in Southeast Asia too.

G．His problem was that the pressure from a bullet train rushing into a tunnel at high speed caused loud noises.

3 . 阅读短文，并按照题目要求用英语回答问题。

When I was a little girl, I spent memorable holidays with my grandmother, who lived in a small village. She was a farmer with a stooped (弯曲的) back that made it seem like she was always leaning forward to examine something. Early in the morning, she would tie a cloth around her waist and set out to the farm. I would skip breathlessly alongside, trying to keep up. On our way, she would greet everyone we passed.

There was the standard greeting, “Did you wake up on the right foot this morning?” Then, the more personalized greetings. To Patriarch Kosi who sat under the mango tree, she would ask, “Are the grandchildren in good health?” To the Bean Stew Seller who was preparing to serve breakfast, she would inquire, “Are your boys well?”

Sometimes, the greetings were spoken soothingly (安慰地). When we walked past the widow, Dada Mawusi, many months after her husband’s death, Grandmother would say directly, “How is your grieving?” She didn’t like to beat around the bush. The greeting made more sense to her to acknowledge the woman’s suffering, and in doing so, empathize (理解) with her.

The people that Grandmother greeted would respond similarly. “I see you have your granddaughter with you today. How is her father?” or “I see you have woken up before the cock’s crow today. May it be a fruitful day at the farm.” As a young girl, I thought these greetings were unnecessarily time-consuming. What I now realize is that the greetings increased a sense of belonging. My grandmother taught me that there is always time to greet someone before getting down to business. You can always take a few extra seconds to say a greeting to a person. We enrich our society when we acknowledge the unique presence of one another.

1. Where did the writer spend holidays when she was young? (no more than 6 words)
________________
2. What made the writer feel breathless? (no more than 8 words)
________________
3. How do you understand the underlined sentence in Paragraph 3? (no more than 10 words)
________________
4. What did the writer think about greetings when she was young? (no more than 10 words)
________________
5. Why do you think greeting neighbors is important? Give your reasons, (no more than 20 words)
________________

4 . 阅读下面材料，根据其内容和所给段落开头语续写两段，使之构成一篇完整的短文。

It was early morning, yet already it had been a very bad day. One thing after another, the downward spiral (螺旋) continued when a large bottle of orange juice slid from my hands and fell to the floor. Glass and sticky juice splashed to the farthest corners of the kitchen. Shocked, I looked at the mess. Then I dropped heartbrokenly down to the floor, my eyes filling with tears. The tears seemed to show that “today is just not my day.”

Bad day or not, things had to be done. Filled with anxiety and negative mental baggage, I got in my car to drive into town. In the few minutes it took to travel to the bank I made a decision. I would be careful not to pass my bad day off to anyone else. I would be friendly and polite. And I would NOT be angry when that careless driver pulled quickly and rudely in front of me causing me to brake suddenly.

Standing in line at the bank, I was silently talking to myself. Actually, I was scolding myself. All of the events that had accumulated and contributed to my bad day were, in reality, so very minor and trivial. I was over-reacting. I was filled with self-pity. I tried to imagine the innumerable, individual lives that had been affected by terrorist attacks, by war, by hurricanes, earthquakes, and other natural disasters.

For the second time that day my eyes filled with tears as I realized how disconnected I felt from all those individuals who are trying to cope with truly miserable experiences in their lives.

They all seemed so distant and unknowable, and this justified and strengthened my belief that I was being self-centered and selfish. I was sure that all my efforts to be a caring and loving person were in vain.

A voice broke through my mental distractions. Somehow I had mechanically finished my bank transaction (交易) and the teller was trying to get my attention. “Young lady,” she was saying, gently, “Young lady!”

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 looked up and into the eyes of the bank teller, a silver-haired grandmother with a gentle beauty.

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In the moment of her touching my hands, my self-doubt disappeared.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

5 . I don’t own a camera anymore. I know my computer has one and my daughter is ________ taking photos with her smart phone. However, I rally miss those ________ cameras. I can remember taking a roll of film, mailing it out, and then ________ for two weeks to get the pictures back. And half of them were either overexposed by the sunlight or all of us had red eyes in them from the flash on the ________.

I can also remember the ________ when we finally saved up enough money to get a Polaroid (一次成像的) camera. It was more exciting to ________ the camera and have a photo ________ in only a minute. Even then, though, we only used it for special ________, such as birthdays and family gatherings.

Nowadays everything seems to be ________, saved and posted online. I wonder ________. Maybe a part of it is that we all want to stop, freeze and ________ these moments in time that fly by so fast. I have to ________ that sometimes I do. Just the other day I ________ some dusty photo albums about my ________. In one there was a picture of me just a few years old, laughing in my front yard. How I longed to go back to that ________, see my mother’s smiling face and be held in my grandmother’s ________ arms once more. Still, I know that does live on in my heart, and one day we will all be ________ again.

The truth is that hard as we try we can’t ________ time. All the photos can’t keep it in place, either. Perhaps we should really ________ our lives instead of just filming them. Perhaps it is best to smile with joy instead of smiling for a ________.

1.

A．unwillingly

B．hesitantly

C．barely

D．constantly

2.

A．expensive

B．advanced

C．old

D．popular

3.

A．relaxing

B．advertising

C．hiding

D．waiting

4.

A．watch

B．phone

C．camera

D．computer

5.

A．thrill

B．confusion

C．terror

D．peace

6.

A．replace

B．click

C．send

D．return

7.

A．ready

B．destroyed

C．posted

D．still

8.

A．accidents

B．occasions

C．challenges

D．adventures

9.

A．ignored

B．deleted

C．filmed

D．combined

10.

A．why

B．where

C．when

D．how

11.

A．judge

B．transform

C．bury

D．preserve

12.

A．forget

B．admit

C．doubt

D．predict

13.

A．looked through

B．broke down

C．mixed up

D．swept away

14.

A．adulthood

B．childhood

C．birth

D．adolescence

15.

A．thought

B．debate

C．moment

D．ceremony

16.

A．cold

B．unfamiliar

C．shaky

D．loving

17.

A．awake

B．asleep

C．together

D．away

18.

A．spend

B．stop

C．count

D．kill

19.

A．waste

B．assess

C．record

D．live

20.

A．photograph

B．game

C．mail

D．face

6 . 阅读下面材料，根据其内容和所给段落开头语续写两段，使之构成一篇完整的短文。

One day a man named Steve Gowan was fishing in the Thames Estuary in Britain. By the end of the day, besides fishes and sea weeds, he fished a message bottle. He opened it carefully and inside the bottle was a brief loving letter from a British soldier named Hughes to his wife:

Dear Wife, I am writing this note on this boat and dropping it into the sea just to see if it will reach you. If it does, sign this envelope on the right hand bottom corner where it says receipt. Put the date and hour of receipt and your name where it says signature and look after it well.

Ta-ta sweet, for the present. Your Hubby

Also attached was a covering note intended for the finder of the bottle:

Sir or madam, would you kindly forward the enclosed letter and earn the blessing of a poor British soldier on his way to the front this ninth day of September, 1914. Signed Private T. Hughes.

Actually, as Hughes crossed the English Channel from Southampton to St. Nazaire on 9 September, 1914, at 7:52 p.m., he dropped a message in a green beer bottle over the side of the ship and he died two days later in the war.

85 years later, the bottle was finally caught by Steve Gowan, the fisherman. Steve Gowan examined the letter carefully. It had the soldier’s name and army number, so he supposed that the message should be real. But how could he deliver it to the intended recipient? In 1999, the internet was still in its early years. No way would he be able to find Hughes’s possible surviving family that way! So, what to do?

Well, he put an advertisement in a local paper! The story captured so many hearts and minds that it gained national coverage. Somewhere along the way, through magic and luck, he learned that Hughes’s daughter, Emily, was still alive in New Zealand!

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。

Right away, Gowan and journalists managed to get in touch with Emily.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The local paper decided to offer Mr. Gowan an air ticket to deliver the letter in person.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

7 . 阅读短文，并按照题目要求用英语回答问题。

For years, I played around with writing. I wrote when I felt like it. Then one day, a friend asked what my dream was. When I said it was to be a writer, he said these words that changed my life, “You don’t have to want to be a writer. You are a writer; you just need to write.” So I started calling myself a writer. Everywhere I went, I introduced myself as “Jeff Goins, Writer,” and even put it in email signatures and on my Facebook page. And you know what? I started acting like it. Eventually, I even began to believe it. It turns out that sometimes you do have to fake it before you make it.

The lesson here is simple: If you wait for someone to give you permission to start pursuing your dream, you’ll be waiting for a long time. You have to begin before you think you’re ready.

After I decided to pursue my dream, I still had to find the time to do it. Working a full-time job and having a wife and other things to do, I didn’t have unlimited free time. I had to find time to write. For me, that meant getting up early. Like, 5:00 a. m. early. Every morning, I would wake up, get my coffee, and write for two hours. At first, this was difficult;I had to force myself out of bed and downstairs before the sun rose. But eventually, it became habitual. I did it without even thinking about it. And soon, what started as a discipline became a daily joy.

By doing this, I learned the excuse I had given myself — “I don’t have enough time” — wasn’t true. I did have enough time; it was just hiding in “inconvenient” places.

These days, most people I meet are talking about their dreams. For example, they want to bravely pursue a successful career. However, they’re doing it all wrong. They think they need to take a huge leap out into the unknown when, in fact, the opposite is true. So if you have a dream, just take action. And don’t say you don’t have time for it.

1. How did the friend’s words change his attitude towards writing? (no more than 10 words)
2. What does the underlined word “fake” mean in the first paragraph? (no more than 1 word)
3. How did the author find time for writing? (no more than 15 words)
4. What does the author advise us to do to pursue a successful career? (no more than 10 words)
5. Suppose you’re crazy about playing basketball, but you have no time for it. How will you deal with it?

8 . If you took the strengths of others, and compared them to your weaknesses, do you think this would make you feel good? The funny thing is, this is _________ most of us do at one time or another — and some of us do it pretty _________.

It’s surely a _________ for a drop in self-confidence and for unhappiness. Let’s say I take a look at someone who creates amazing artwork on their website and I look at my art, and realize I don’t come close to being _________ with him. In fact, I look pretty _________. But it’s not a fair _________. If I looked at my strengths — writing useful and honest posts — I can see that I have a lot to _________, a lot to be happy about.

That’s so important-being able to look at your own strengths, and see your true _________. It’s actually one of the keys to success and happiness.

I want to talk about this issue _________ an email from a reader recently: I have some teammates from very rich families, I can’t stop myself comparing my __________ with theirs. I must say that my financial planning is sound enough to take care of my __________ family; and I can take care of new family members also, at least for some time __________ I lose my current job. But __________ I see or hear them spending so much money after possessions, I start comparing again. How can I stop this habit, without changing jobs?

This is an excellent but tough __________. I think it’s __________ to compare ourselves to others, but it often makes us unhappy even if we have enough and should be __________ what we have. My quick __________: try to be aware of when you start comparing yourself to others. . . once you’ve developed this __________, stop yourself and tell yourself, “Stop that!” And then __________ thinking about all the things you do have, the things you love, the people you have and the blessings that __________ has given you. Make this a regular practice, and you’ ll start to be happier with your life.

1.

A．why

B．what

C．that

D．how

2.

A．often

B．hard

C．soon

D．well

3.

A．theory

B．option

C．practice

D．idea

4.

A．blessed

B．connected

C．weighed

D．matched

5.

A．grateful

B．pitiful

C．shocked

D．confident

6.

A．comparison

B．communication

C．competition

D．combination

7.

A．regret

B．correct

C．offer

D．afford

8.

A．thoughts

B．values

C．alternatives

D．weaknesses

9.

A．because of

B．according to

C．apart from

D．in spite of

10.

A．concept

B．health

C．profession

D．lifestyle

11.

A．developing

B．working

C．existing

D．coming

12.

A．as if

B．even if

C．in case

D．now that

13.

A．however

B．whatever

C．wherever

D．whenever

14.

A．programme

B．fantasy

C．question

D．reality

15.

A．strange

B．natural

C．difficult

D．important

16.

A．sorry for

B．curious about

C．guilty at

D．happy with

17.

A．judgement

B．conclusion

C．formula

D．advice

18.

A．awareness

B．hobby

C．tradition

D．custom

19.

A．require

B．risk

C．fancy

D．start

20.

A．happiness

B．life

C．success

D．confidence

9 . 阅读下面材料，根据其内容和所给段落开头语续写两段，使之构成一篇完整的短文。

Often, when he came to visit, my grandfather would bring me a present. These were never the sorts of things that other people brought, such as dolls, books or toys. My dolls and toys have been gone for more than half a century, but many of my grandfather’s gifts are still with me.

Once he brought me a little plastic cup. I looked inside, expecting to see something special. But there was only some loose soil in it, which made me disappointed. He smiled at me affectionately. Turning around, he picked up a little teapot from my dolls’ tea set and took me to the kitchen where he filled the little cup with water. Back in the living room, he put it on the windowsill(窗台) and handed me the teapot. “If you promise to put some water in the cup every day, something may happen.” he told me.

At that time, I was only five years old. This whole thing made no sense to me at all. I looked at him doubtfully and asked, “Do I have to water it every day? What will happen?” He nodded to me with encouragement, “Yes, every day, dear.”

And so I promised. At first, curious to see what would happen, I did not mind doing this. But as the days went by and nothing changed, it got harder and harder to remember to put water in the cup. After a week, I asked my grandfather if it was time to stop yet. Shaking his head no, he said, “Every day.” The second week was even harder, and I became regretful of my promise to put water in the cup. When my grandfather came again, I tried to give it back to him, but he refused to take it, saying simply the same words, “Every day.” By the third week, I began to forget to put water in the cup during the day. Often, I would remember only after I had been put to bed and would have to get out of bed and water it in the dark. But I did not miss a single day.

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。

One morning, something amazing happened.

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This was perhaps my first lesson in the power of perseverance.

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10 . Amazing and perfectly beautiful, The Midnight Library is everything you’d expect from the genius storyteller, Matt Haig. I picked it up from our readers’ recommendations (we asked our readers to send in some of their favorite recent books) and I can see why it won Best Fiction of 2020 in the Good Reads Choice Awards.

The story follows Nora Seed, a woman who is struggling and feels like nothing in her life has gone according to plan. While the initial chapters of the book are quite sad, Nora finds herself given a chance to start over in the Midnight Library, a magical place full of books of all the different paths her life could have taken. Nora is forced to stay in the library and try out different versions of her life until she finds the life she most wants to live.

I loved the idea that no dream or fork in your road is insignificant, and that they all lead us to become different versions of ourselves. In one life, Nora is an Olympic swimmer. In another, she is a glaciologist living on a boat off the coast of Antarctica. The novel reveals in a beautiful way that the potential we all have within us is impossible to measure, and that we have the possibility to be happy in many different versions of life.

It also discusses how dangerous it can be to live your life with regrets. The Midnight Library revealed to Nora that even if you make very different choices, you may uncover a deeper appreciation for your current home and the people in your life. It is your perspective that matters.

I really loved the fantasy and magical realism in this novel, and I would love for this to be turned into a series where we get to explore The Midnight Library of other characters’ lives as well.

1. What can we know about the author of the text?

A．He should be an editor.	B．He is the friend of Matt Haig.
C．Magical realism books are his favorite.	D．He shares a similar experience with Nora.

2. What does The Midnight Library mainly discuss?

A．A magic library.	B．The harm of regret.
C．The exploration of life.	D．Ways to make correct choices.

3. Where can the text be found?

A．In a novel.

B．In a magazine.

C．In a history book.

D．In a biography.

4. What is the purpose of the text?

A．To thank readers who introduced the book.	B．To honour Matt Haig, the author of the book.
C．To share the author’s opinions on the book.	D．To publicize the book to people who are struggling.