1 . You can learn a lot sitting in a parking lot. One day, I was sitting in my car with my son waiting for my wife who was in the _________. I would look up and _________what was going on outside. Then, I noticed a brand new bright red car park next to my car. A well-dressed woman stepped out of it. She looked _________with a serious look and her eyes were hidden behind sunglasses. I watched her as she headed for the same supermarket and _________what her life was like.

After a while, a truck parked on the other side of the red car. It _________ of burning oil and probably didn’t have many months of life left in its engine. A young mother with four little girls got out. All were dressed in _________ clothes that were most probably _________ at the second-hand store. She gathered them together and headed for the store, laughing and talking all the way.

A while later, I saw the well-dressed lady come out, _________ a shopping cart with several bags of items in it. She put them in the car and drove away quickly. Her eyes were still _________ and there was still a frown (皱眉) on her face. About thirty minutes later, the mother came back with her girls. They had a week’s __________ of groceries in their cart. After putting everything into the truck, the mother took out two __________, broke both in half, and gave each girl a half. They smiled as if the cookies were the most__________ gift in the world.

As they __________, I thought about the two women. I __________ knew who had more money, but I wasn’t sure who really owned more. Actually, there are many kinds of __________, but the most valuable is love. The truth is that one who loves the most, also learns the most, lives the most, gives the most, and grows the most in this life. And the more you share, the more you get.

1.

A．bookstore

B．supermarket

C．hotel

D．library

2.

A．find

B．guess

C．observe

D．judge

3.

A．unhappy

B．shocked

C．proud

D．unsatisfied

4.

A．asked

B．suspected

C．understood

D．wondered

5.

A．tasted

B．smelled

C．looked

D．sounded

6.

A．fashionable

B．ugly

C．new

D．worn

7.

A．made

B．bought

C．designed

D．washed

8.

A．pushing

B．lifting

C．carrying

D．driving

9.

A．hidden

B．affected

C．injured

D．closed

10.

A．bill

B．price

C．cost

D．worth

11.

A．candies

B．cookies

C．chocolates

D．cakes

12.

A．colorful

B．meaningless

C．priceless

D．useful

13.

A．drove away

B．turned up

C．pulled in

D．came over

14.

A．partly

B．gradually

C．temporarily

D．obviously

15.

A．fame

B．power

C．wealth

D．sadness

2 . Allamby started his auto-repair business at the age of 19. Over the years it had grown into two shops, but Allamby______something more. At first, he thought it must have to do with______his business. So at age 34, he______to go for his bachelor’s degree in business management.

After taking classes part-time over the next five years, Allamby was told he had to take biology to get his______. Attending biology class reawakened his______dream. “After the first day, I remembered the feeling of wanting to be a doctor______when I was younger,” Allamby says.

So a______Allamby walked into that biology class at age 39. He was______to live his dream. With the______of his family, he decided to______business school. Instead, he took the science classes he’d need for a second______as a doctor. And so in 2015, Allamby cut______with his past. He sold off his two shops. Then he started at Medical University.

In 2019, at age 47, Allamby______Allamby, MD (医学博士). He took a job in emergency medicine at Cleveland Clinic Akron General.

It’s a small______to pay for the life Allamby now gets to lead, but he finds his true direction halfway in life. So it’s really never too late for one to ______ his dream.

1.

A．waited for

B．longed for

C．depended on

D．acted on

2.

A．launching

B．handling

C．starting

D．growing

3.

A．decided

B．continued

C．desired

D．ceased

4.

A．direction

B．business

C．degree

D．agreement

5.

A．long-held

B．odd

C．romantic

D．short-lived

6.

A．next

B．later

C．only

D．back

7.

A．different

B．healthy

C．learned

D．single

8.

A．unsure

B．hesitant

C．ready

D．likely

9.

A．sympathy

B．support

C．cooperation

D．company

10.

A．attend

B．skip

C．finish

D．run

11.

A．operation

B．deal

C．career

D．major

12.

A．wires

B．classes

C．expenses

D．ties

13.

A．betrayed

B．became

C．abandoned

D．accepted

14.

A．fortune

B．fee

C．price

D．salary

15.

A．remember

B．interpret

C．forget

D．pursue

3 . What is talent? Are you born with it? Or does it seem to develop over time? Before I start, I’d like to say that one thing everyone agrees on is that the most skilled musicians have worked hard to get there.

While it’s true that a few of us had enough “talent” to avoid extra practice to do just as well as those who did, those who worked hard easily beat us. It is, in fact, very likely that if some of us “talented ones” had actually been practicing and improving our skill, we would have achieved a whole different level.

Another aspect of talent seems to be heart and passion (酷爱). The people I see who are the most talented musicians are crazy about music. They eat, breathe, and live music and they make an extraordinary effort to make it part of their lives. As Remus Badea said, desire for the musician-to-be is significant for them to be successful. This desire is easily found in those considered to be talented. When you want and love something so bad, it drives you and your entire character can be shaped around it. Such determined passion seems to produce incredible skill and talent.

The third aspect (方面) of talent is having talent around you. When surrounded by talented musicians, it only seems natural that you start to catch up to their level Take a look at almost any group of musicians in history. The more talented people in the group the more talented the group is as a whole. A great example of this is the relationship between audio producer and artist. The artist turns up to the studio with their song, and as they work through recording it, the audio producer will often suggest various changes to the song to make it better.

1. What can we learn from Paragraph 2?

A．Pride goes before a fall.

B．It’s never too old to learn.

C．Practice contributes to talent.

D．Talent determines achievements.

2. What is the key to success according to Remus Badea?

A．Passion.

B．Character .

C．Skill.

D．Talent.

3. Why is the example mentioned in the last paragraph?

A．To introduce what real talents are.

B．To explain how a song is composed.

C．To prove talents need team spirit.

D．To show the benefits of being with talents.

4. What might the author probably agree with?

A．Music has no limits.

B．Musicians are born with talent.

C．Music favors the talented.

D．Musicians are created, not born.

4 . Several weeks ago, I pulled an old road map out of the glove box and passed it to my children. They had never seen the province of Ontario laid out like that before. They stared at the map, asking about all the towns, parks, and other landmarks we'd visited, and I pointed them out on the map.

Google Maps and GPS are modern wonders that have gotten me out of many confusing places, but paper maps still have a role to play in our lives. Most of us adults learned to read them out of necessity, but it's up to us to pass on that skill to children whose need may not be so obvious, but who still stand to benefit from it.

As Trevor Muir wrote in an article on this topic, "When kids learn how to create and use paper maps, they are doing more than just learning how to get around. They are actually developing fundamental skills that they will use for the rest of their lives. Map skills still belong in today's classroom. "

As a child I had National Geographic maps taped to my bedroom walls. This aroused my curiosity and imagination about those places and thus made me eager to remember my geography and history lessons because they were tied to places I'd "seen". Even now as a mother of four, I've also spared time to travel to many of the countries whose maps I studied as a child.

Additionally, in this fast-changing world, unexpected events can rapidly influence one's usual way of life. When GPS satellites or Internet connections are affected, this old-fashioned skill can get you out of a mess without requiring a smartphone. Last but not least, paper maps arouse "big picture" thinking, showing kids that there's a much bigger world out there and helping to direct them within it.

So, now is a good time to pull out those dusty old maps and lay them on the kitchen table.

1. How did the children react when they were given the paper map?

A．They showed great curiosity.

B．They seemed totally confused.

C．They considered it old-fashioned.

D．They found it less convenient than GPS.

2. What might be the topic of the article written by Trevor Muir?

A．The teaching focus in today's classroom.

B．The situations where paper maps are used.

C．The necessity of digital maps in the modem world.

D．The benefit of developing paper map skills for kids.

3. Which of the following shows the author's opinion?

A．Internet connections are very reliable today.

B．GPS will sooner or later replace paper maps.

C．Paper maps provide kids with a grand vision.

D．Paper maps make people connected with each other.

4. What would be the best tide for the text?

A．Time to Teach Kids to Read Paper Maps.

B．How to Teach Kids about Different Kinds of Maps.

C．Time to Encourage Kids to Step into a Bigger World.

D．How to Teach Kids Fundamental Skills with Paper Maps.

5 . Directions: Read the following passage. Summarize the main idea and the main point(s) of the passage in no more than 60 words. Use your own words as far as possible.

Why Mindset Mastery Is Vital to Your Success

The single most important factor influencing a person's success, whether personal or professional, is mindset. What you think about has a direct impact on your behavior, and not the other way around. A seemingly small thing that makes a huge difference, mindset accounts for the primary distinction between those who succeed and those who do not. And, if you are serious about achieving success in any area of your life, you must learn to master yours.

To successfully accomplish any worthwhile feat, a person must first feel capable of achieving it. It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks. Mindset is essential to developing healthy self-esteem. It is an important tool that affects our daily self-dialogue and strengthen our beliefs, attitudes and feelings about ourselves. So, become the gatekeeper of your mind and plant seeds of positivity rather than criticism and doubt.

Besides, mindset is critical to drive. Drive is the constant determination to achieve an important objective. It includes the process of developing a vision for success and engaging in sustained effort over time. Without drive, achieving most goals would be difficult at best. With the power to direct focus and encourage commitment to higher purpose, mindset can easily urge someone to push past comfort zones. People with drive are self-motivated and strive to accomplish more.

No matter what goal you seek to achieve, the path to your success is sure to include some challenges. When facing an extreme hardship, a person may feel justified in bowing to defeat. For them, it can feel like an easy road. If you want to get through them, however, you will need to develop thick skin and learn to lace each challenge head on. Yet, this is where mindset plays a critical role. The capacity to move through the fire, to get knocked down and not knocked out, is the proof to the power of a strong mindset.

Are you ready to command your results? If so, make a conscious decision to master your mindset and reach for greater success in the new year and beyond.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

6 . A study of violinists found that merely good players practised as much as better players, leaving other factors such as quality of education, learning skills and perhaps natural talent to account for the difference.

This finding challenges the 10, 000-hour rule promoted in Malcolm Gladwell’s 1993 study of violinists and pianists. Gladwell states that enough practice will make an expert of anyone. “The idea has been popular and entrenched in our culture for years. It’s not an idiom but an overstatement,” said Brooke Macnamara, the lead author. “When it comes to human skill, a complex combination of environmental factors and genetic factors explains the performance differences across people.”

Macnamara and her colleagues set out to repeat part of the 1993 study to see whether they reached the same conclusion. They interviewed three groups of 13 violinists regarded as best, good, or less accomplished about their practice habits, before having them complete daily diaries of their activities over a week. While the less skillful violinists reached an average of about 6,000 hours of practice by the age of 20, there was little to separate the good from the best, with each reaching an average of about 11,000 hours. In all, the number of hours spent practising accounted for about a quarter of the skill difference across the three groups.

Macnamara believes practice is less of a driver. “Once you get to the highly skilled groups, practice stops accounting for the difference. Everyone has practised a lot and other factors are at play in determining who goes on to a higher level,” she said. “The factors depend on the skill being learned: in chess it could be intelligence or working memory; in sport it may be how efficiently a person uses oxygen. To complicate matters further, one factor can drive another. Children who enjoy playing the violin, for example, may be happy to practise because they do not see it as a trouble.”

The authors of the 1993 study are unimpressed. Macnamara said it was important for people to understand the limits of practice, though. “Practice makes you better than you were yesterday, most of the time,” she said. “But it might not make you better than your neighhour or the other kid in your violin class.”

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

A．Rooted.

B．Advanced.

C．Changed.

D．Unconfirmed.

2. What can we learn about Macnamara’s study?

A．It convinced Malcolm Gladwell.	B．It involved violinists and pianists.
C．Its process was similar to the 1993 study.	D．Its result is consistent with the 1993 study.

3. What does Macnamara find about highly skilled people?

A．Practicing for 11,000 hours is their main driver.

B．They enjoy keeping diaries about their progress.

C．Environmental factors have little relation to their success.

D．More practice makes little difference to their further progress.

4. What is the best title for the text?

A．What makes an expert?	B．Does practice make perfect?
C．The early bird catches the worm	D．Enthusiasm is the key to success

7 . On a freezing January evening, Ashley Austrew sat in her car in an Omaha parking lot. She was working up the _______ to go into a comedy improv (即兴表演) class. For 20 minutes, the 33-year-old journalist and mom of two sat with thoughts of _______: “I can’t do this. I’ll be the worst one.” Then she turned off the engine, took a few deep breaths, and went _______.

For Austrew, _______ improv was the first small step to improve her self-esteem. She lacked confidence and didn’t have the courage to try anything _______. So she made a list of all the things she was afraid to _______ and then asked herself, “What if I didn’t let my excuses win?” Improv was her biggest _______.

Her fear _______ as soon as she walked into the class. Her classmates were also _______, and she discovered that she was ________ capable of earning a few laughs and making new friends. Over the next two years, Austrew went on to deal with other what-ifs, including writing a book. “Self-esteem is like a muscle--you have to ________ it constantly,” she says.

Some people are ________ with a seemingly unshakable positivity, but most of us need to learn how to ________ ourselves up by our own hands. Thankfully, like Austrew, we can learn to feel ________ about ourselves and ________ our feelings of hope.

1.

A．courage

B．project

C．preparation

D．solution

2.

A．self-esteem

B．self-confidence

C．self-doubt

D．self-reflection

3.

A．inside

B．ahead

C．home

D．out

4.

A．acting

B．trying

C．building

D．getting

5.

A．important

B．different

C．special

D．new

6.

A．abandon

B．attempt

C．absorb

D．account

7.

A．confidence

B．guarantee

C．surprise

D．target

8.

A．dissolved

B．arose

C．appeared

D．changed

9.

A．helpers

B．strangers

C．supporters

D．beginners

10.

A．barely

B．perfectly

C．slightly

D．widely

11.

A．work

B．break

C．catch

D．take

12.

A．connected

B．burdened

C．blessed

D．tired

13.

A．bring

B．put

C．pick

D．pull

14.

A．better

B．simpler

C．smaller

D．smarter

15.

A．forget

B．strengthen

C．spread

D．hide

8 . Some time ago, in my class I was about to fail a student for his answer to a physics question when the student claimed he deserved a better score. The examination question sounded “safe”.

“Show how it is possible to determine the height of a tall building with the aid of a barometer（压表）.” The student had answered: “Take the barometer to the top of the building, attach a long rope to it, lower the barometer to the street, and then bring it up, measuring the length of the rope. The length of the rope is the height of the building.”

I argued that a high grade should prove his competence in physics, but the answer did not confirm this. I suggested that the student have another try. Immediately, he worked out his answer: A second best way is to take the barometer to the top of the building. Drop the barometer, timing its fall with a stopwatch. Then, using the formula to calculate the height of the building.

I was shocked by his answer. His method gave me not only a broken barometer but a U-turn in my teaching philosophy. I gave him full marks.

On his leaving my office, I recalled that he suggested there could be a better answer. So I asked him what it was. “Oh, yes,” said the student, “There are many ways. Probably the best,” he said, “is to take the barometer to the basement and ask the superintendent （楼管）. You speak to him as follows: Mr.Superintendent, here I have a fine barometer. If you tell me the height of this building, I will give it to you.

At this point, I asked the student if he really did not know the conventional answer to this question. He admitted that he did, but said that he was fed up with high school instructors’ trying to teach him how to think, and to use the so-called “scientific method”. He just wanted to solve the problem in a practical manner, not just answer the question in an expected way. Hearing this, I really had nothing to do but give the boy a firm handshake, feeling thankful that I hadn’t failed him in the first place and even more thankful, neither had he.

1. Why did the author want to fail the student in the first place?

A．The student challenged his authority.

B．The student’s answer was not practical.

C．The student didn’t show his academic ability.

D．The student had a poor performance in physics class.

2. Which of the following can best describe the author’s new teaching philosophy?

A．Without love, there is no education.

B．A man becomes learned by asking questions.

C．Teaching is to make two ideas grow where only one grew before.

D．You can lead your horse to the river, but you can’t make it drink.

3. What made the student abandon the conventional answer?

A．Lack of physics-related knowledge.

B．Ignorance of the teacher’s expectation.

C．Intention to deeply impress his teacher.

D．Disapproval of existing teaching concepts.

4. What can we infer from the text?

A．The superintendent was a greedy person.

B．School education restricted this student’s thinking.

C．The teacher appreciated the student’s answers finally.

D．The examination question is a lough physics problem.

9 . I saw in my rearview mirror that a large SUV headed straight for my car at a breakneck speed. My heart and mind started racing, and panic (恐慌)instantly set in.

With fear in my voice, I started saying out loud, "Oh my goodness! Oh my goodness!", making my friend who was with me immediately scared and puzzled. I was sure that within mere seconds, we were going to be knocked from behind by a careless vehicle clearly going over 100 miles per hour in heavy traffic.

Unable to change lanes or speed up because of cars on all sides, I just prepared myself for the impact. But thank goodness, the driver missed hitting my car by an inch as he went into the lane beside me, nearly hitting another vehicle, tires screeching (刺耳声)and burning, filling the air with clouds of smoke. He continued dashing in and out of traffic, causing more near-collisions, and then quickly disappeared into the distance.

As I sat there surprised, loosening my fingers from the steering wheel, my friend and I began to talk about what if we had been hit. How life could have been changed in an instant(瞬间)or even ended.

I thought about my precious children, my husband, my family and things undone. I wondered whether I would have regrets if that had been my last day. I began to consider if I was truly enjoying and embracing(拥抱) my life, even if it hadn't turned out the way I thought it would or should. I couldn't help but ask myself if I was by accident taking for granted the pure blessing of waking up every morning and being given another day, and if I was spending time being unhappy because of difficult circumstances instead of living with joy.

1. Why was the author stuck in panic?

A．The road was too crowded.	B．A rude driver attacked her.
C．She drove at too high a speed.	D．An accident seemed to happen.

2. How did the author deal with the dangerous situation?

A．She took no action.	B．She sped up her car.
C．She gave others a warning.	D．She drove into another lane.

3. What does the underlined word "it" in paragraph 5 refer to?

A．That day.	B．That car.
C．The author's life.	D．The author's family.

4. What does the author want to tell us in the last paragraph?

A．Behind bad luck comes good luck.	B．Love me, love my dog.
C．Live in the present moment.	D．Value our friends and family.