1 . By day, Robert Titterton is a lawyer. In his spare time though he goes on stage beside pianist Maria Raspopova — not as a musician but as her page turner. “I’m not a trained musician, but I’ve learnt to read music so I can help Maria in her performance.”
Mr Titterton is chairman of the Omega Ensemble but has been the group’s official page turner for the past four years. His job is to sit beside the pianist and turn the pages of the score so the musician doesn’t have to break the flow of sound by doing it themselves. He said he became just as nervous as those playing instruments on stage.
“A lot of skills are needed for the job. You have to make sure you don’t turn two pages at once and make sure you find the repeats in the music when you have to go back to the right spot.” Mr Titterton explained.
Being a page turner requires plenty of practice. Some pieces of music can go for 40 minutes and require up to 50 page turns, including back turns for repeat passages. Silent onstage communication is key, and each pianist has their own style of “nodding” to indicate a page turn which they need to practise with their page turner.
But like all performances, there are moments when things go wrong. “I was turning the page to get ready for the next page, but the draft wind from the turn caused the spare pages to fall off the stand,” Mr Titterton said, “Luckily I was able to catch them and put them back.”
Most page turners are piano students or up-and-coming concert pianists, although Ms Raspopova has once asked her husband to help her out on stage.
“My husband is the worst page turner,” she laughed. “He’s interested in the music, feeling every note, and I have to say: ‘Turn, turn!’ Robert is the best page turner I’ve had in my entire life.”
1. What should Titterton be able to do to be a page turner?| A．Read music. | B．Play the piano. |
| C．Sing songs. | D．Fix the instruments. |
| A．Boring. | B．Well-paid. |
| C．Demanding. | D．Dangerous. |
| A．Counting the pages. | B．Recognizing the “nodding”. |
| C．Catching falling objects. | D．Performing in his own style. |
| A．He has very poor eyesight. | B．He ignores the audience. |
| C．He has no interest in music. | D．He forgets to do his job. |
2 . Many people believe that working to the maximum is the secret to success, but research has found that moderation(适度) also gets results on the job.
In a study led by Ellen Langer of Harvard University, researchers asked people to translate sentences into a new made-up language. Subjects who practiced the language moderately beforehand made fewer errors than those who practiced extensively or not at all. High levels of knowledge can make people too attached to traditional ways of viewing problems across fields the arts, sciences, and politics. High conscientiousness is related to lower job performance, especially in simple jobs where it doesn’t pay to be a perfectionist.
How long we stay on the clock and how we spend that time are under careful examination in many workplaces. The young banker who eats lunch at his desk is probably seen as a go-getter, while his colleagues who chat over a relaxed conference-room meal get dirty looks from the corner office. “People from cultures that value relationships more than ours does are shocked by the thought of eating alone in front of a computer”, says Art Markman, a professor of psychology at the University of Texas, Austin. Social interaction has been shown to lift mood(情绪) and get people thinking in new directions and in ways that could help improve any post-lunch effort.
Markman also promotes off-task time. “Part of being a good thinker is experiencing things that are seemingly unrelated to what you are working on at the moment but give you fresh ideas about your work,” he says. “Also, there is a lot of research showing that a positive mood leads to higher levels of productivity and creativity. So, when people do things to increase their life satisfaction, they also make themselves more effective at work.”
1. What does Ellen Langer’s study show?| A．It is worthwhile to be a perfectionist | B．Translation makes people knowledgeable. |
| C．Simpler jobs require greater caution. | D．Moderate effort produces the best result. |
| A．is good at handling pressure | B．works hard to become successful |
| C．a has a natural talent for his job. | D．gets on well with his co-workers |
| A．A good thinker is able to inspire other people. |
| B．Experience unrelated to your job is useless. |
| C．A cheerful mood helps make a creative mind. |
| D．Focusing on what you do raises productivity. |
| A．Middle-of-the-road work habits. | B．Balance between work and family. |
| C．Long-standing cultural traditions. | D．Harmony in the work environment. |
3 . When I turned twelve, I worked in summer at my father’s small brick cleaning business. I remember the harsh acid smell of the cleaning solution, the dim bulb light reflecting the busy figures and the scraping sound of stiff iron brushes against rough brick. It was tempting to have your job just finished. But anybody who worked for Thomas Kahoon had to meet his standards, and that included me. If I messed up, he made me stay late until I got it right. My father wasn’t being mean. He demanded the exact same of himself. Every brick he cleaned on the house stood out like a red jewel in a white setting. It was his signature.
In 1970, when I was twenty, I was to get married. I moved out of my parent’s modest place into a housing project. Drugs and gang violence were just beginning to damage the projects. Some of my friends went to jail. Some were killed. My wife Verllen, was 18, and nobody gave our marriage a chance. But we believed in each other. And our faith made us strong.
When we married, I worked as a stock clerk at Southwest Super Food. It was hard, tedious work. Each Friday night a truck came, with cases of food that had to be unloaded, priced and placed on shelves. Most of stock clerks try to get Friday night off. But I was always ready to work. By Saturday morning, all the cans and jars in my aisle were placed with a label facing smartly out, like a line of soldiers on review. That was my signature. I took pride in a job nobody wanted.
Years past since I established my belief in doing the job, influenced profoundly by my father’s persistence and standards. In my mind, it has become a tradition I hope this generation and the generations behind can keep to and follow.
1. What do we learn about the author’s father?| A．He is a tough person. | B．He is quite mean to others. |
| C．He is very demanding in his work. | D．He usually works very late. |
| A．It was a promising industry. | B．It was bothered by drugs and gang violence. |
| C．It enabled the author to get married. | D．It forced many people to go to prison. |
| A．He was mainly responsible for unloading food. | B．He had to sign his name on every label. |
| C．He had to endure the hardship and boredom. | D．He was required to work at Friday night. |
| A．Persistence can be passed on to the next generation. |
| B．Hardship can help develop a person’s patience. |
| C．Demanding jobs are hard to address for a beginner. |
| D．Strong will must be cultivated in the harsh working environment. |
4 . Do you like the idea of running your own business from home? Most of you do, and the first things you say you like about it are being your own boss, having flexible hours and working in your pajamas.
Being your own boss is definitely one big advantage.
Working in your pajamas may seem appealing initially. But it can also prevent you from actually getting your work done.
In order to run a successful business from home you need to have a good mindset.
Taking off too many hours each week will damage your financial stability and long-term success. Set goals and limits on your time. Build your business first, before taking advantage of what working from home offers.
| A．But it can also become your downfall without care. |
| B．Flexible hours are another huge plus of working from home. |
| C．Once it's achieved, you'll have more opportunities to develop business contacts. |
| D．You may find it more efficient to get up, exercise, then shower and dress for work. |
| E．This includes realizing that you and only you are responsible for your own income. |
| F．One of the biggest drawbacks is that it is so easy to allow yourself to have excuses. |
| G．While these benefits sound great, the reality of working from home can be a little different. |
5 . When I was a boy growing up in New Jersey in the 1960s, we had a milkman delivering milk to our doorstep. His name was Mr. Basille. He wore a white cap and drove a white truck. As a 5-year-old boy, I couldn’t take my eyes off the coin changer fixed to his belt. He noticed this one day during a delivery and gave me a quarter out of his coin changer.
Of course, he delivered more than milk. There was cheese, eggs and so on. If we needed to change our order, my mother would pen a note — “Please add a bottle of buttermilk next delivery” — and place it in the box along with the empty bottles. And then, the buttermilk would magically (魔术般) appear.
All of this was about more than convenience. There existed a close relationship between families and their milkmen. Mr. Basille even had a key to our house, for those times when it was so cold outside that we put the box indoors, so that the milk wouldn’t freeze. And I remember Mr. Basille from time to time taking a break at our kitchen table, having a cup of tea and telling stories about his delivery.
There is sadly no home milk delivery today. Big companies allowed the production of cheaper milk, thus making it difficult for milkmen to compete. Besides, milk is for sale everywhere, and it may just not have been practical to have a delivery service.
Recently, an old milk box in the countryside I saw brought back my childhood memories. I took it home and planted it on the back porch (门廊) . Every so often my son’s friends will ask what it is. So I start telling stories of my boyhood, and of the milkman who brought us friendship along with his milk.
1. Mr. Basille gave the boy a quarter out of his coin changer to __________.| A．show his magical power | B．pay for the delivery |
| C．satisfy his curiosity | D．please his mother |
| A．He wanted to have tea there. | B．He was a respectable person. |
| C．He was treated as a family member. | D．He was fully trusted by the family. |
| A．Nobody wants to be a milkman now. | B．It has been driven out of the market. |
| C．Its service is getting poor. | D．It is not allowed by law. |
| A．He missed the good old days. | B．He wanted to tell interesting stories. |
| C．He needed it for his milk bottles. | D．He planted flowers in it. |
6 . I decided to be a teacher when I was 10, because I could clearly see some of my teachers had extraordinary powers.
There was an English teacher in fifth grade who could
I know being a teacher isn’t the
I have taught for three decades. Occasionally, I meet my
| A．carefully | B．casually | C．deliberately | D．magically |
| A．take away | B．pick up | C．hand out | D．leave alone |
| A．see | B．bear | C．break | D．cover |
| A．missed | B．hated | C．lacked | D．valued |
| A．ambiguous | B．foreign | C．urgent | D．unspoken |
| A．vividly | B．partly | C．hardly | D．roughly |
| A．work | B．task | C．major | D．duty |
| A．empathy | B．doubt | C．desire | D．superpower |
| A．easiest | B．hardest | C．dullest | D．weakest |
| A．errors | B．risks | C．skills | D．stages |
| A．voice | B．sight | C．cars | D．legs |
| A．sign | B．cause | C．gift | D．reason |
| A．cheap | B．private | C．slight | D．emotional |
| A．present | B．former | C．patient | D．polite |
| A．adventures | B．services | C．memories | D．messages |
7 . How to Choose Your Purpose-Filled Career
When you think about choosing a career, you often do it in the following two ways.
Think about a well-paid job that you can do and doesn’t sound so bad. Maybe a doctor, engineer or lawyer? Or maybe that’s out of your educational reach, so you choose office or retail worker.
However, there’s another way that is perhaps better:
There are endless ways to do that. The point isn’t how you serve the world, but just serving the world in some way will help you feel filled with purpose.
| A．These are all great choices |
| B．Think about what you like to do |
| C．You can identify your purpose and work out how to get there |
| D．Each of these is just one of many possibilities filled with purpose |
| E．Try to do something to serve a community or make the world better |
| F．The sooner you complete the training requirements, the sooner you will make a living |
| G．If you choose a purposeful and enjoyable job, you’re always further along than most people |
8 . When Ryad Alsous arrived in England, he knew one thing: he wanted to keep bees. The insects had been a major part of his life in Syria, and fleeing his war-torn homeland. It was a precious certainty amid so much chaos.
As a lecturer at the University of Damascus, Ryad had built a respected reputation for his research on Syrian bees. With over 500 hives, he produced over ten tons of honey every year. Fleeing his country in 2013, he lost everything.
Yet even with all his knowledge and experience, Ryad didn’t know if his dream would be possible in the UK. “I found that there is a lot of rain and the temperature isn’t very high. All the time I was thinking ‘How can I set up another project here?’”
The wet weather wasn’t Ryad’s only challenge. The language barrier and a vastly overqualified CV made it difficult to find work. Eventually, Ryad volunteered at the Huddersfield Beekeepers’ Association, but he was still without a colony of his own. Finally, Facebook brought him into contact with a woman in Manchester who was willing to donate an entire colony of rare British black bees.
“In one year, I was able to split the colony she gave me into seven. I realised that the beekeeping project could become very profitable and successful in the UK.”
Soon, Ryad found himself with 17 hives, but he wasn’t finished yet. His inner teacher was itching to get out. Through City of Sanctuary, a British refugee charity, Ryad began to run beekeeping workshops for refugees and job seekers. The Buzz Project was born.
Today, the Buzz Project houses 14 hives, where Ryad shares his expertise. It has started to bear fruit. Last year, they produced-half ton of honey (around 1,000 jars). But for Ryad, the most important thing is bringing people together.
“We have local people, job seekers and volunteers, in addition to refugees. All of them work together doing the same job. The exchange between the groups, the information and skills, helps them integrate very well and improve their language skills” he says.
1. Why did Ryad come to England?| A．To keep bees. | B．To do research. |
| C．To seek shelter. | D．To run business. |
| A．The hot weather. | B．His poor English. |
| C．His inadequate qualification. | D．The cultural differences. |
| A．He wanted to share his beekeeping skills. |
| B．He decided to establish a beekeeping school. |
| C．He wanted to expand his business. |
| D．He decided to find a teaching job. |
| A．Persistent and charitable. | B．Ambitious and reliable. |
| C．Curious and responsible. | D．Independent and respectably. |
9 . I left university with a good degree in English Literature, but no sense of what I wanted to do. Over the next six years, I was treading water(停滞不前), just trying to earn an income. I tried journalism, but I didn’t think I was any good, then finance, which I hated. Finally, I got a job as a rights assistant at a famous publisher. I loved working with books, although the job that I did was dull.
I had enough savings to take a year off work, and I decided to try to satisfy a deep-down wish to write a novel. Attending a Novel Writing MA course gave me the structure I needed to write my first 55,000 words.
It takes confidence to make a new start—there’s a dark period in-between where you’re neither one thing nor the other. You’re out for dinner and people ask what you do, and you’re too ashamed to say, “Well, I’m writing a novel, but I’m not quite sure if I’m going to get there.” My confidence dived. Believing my novel could not be published, I put it aside.
Then I met an agent(代理商) who said I should send my novel out to agents. So, I did and, to my surprise, got some wonderful feedback. I felt a little hope that I might actually become a published writer and, after signing with an agent, I finished the second half of the novel.
The next problem was finding a publisher. After two-and-a-half years of no income, just waiting and wondering, a publisher offered me a book deal—that publisher turned out to be the one I once worked for.
It feels like an unbelievable stroke of luck—of fate, really. When you set out to do something different, there’s no end in sight, so to find myself in a position where I now have my own name on a contract(合同) of the publisher—to be a published writer—is unbelievably rewarding.
1. Why did the author decide to write a novel?| A．Because she hated her previous jobs. |
| B．Because her parents and friends had encouraged her to do so. |
| C．Because she wanted to pursue her own dream of writing a novel. |
| D．Because she graduated from university with a good degree in English Literature. |
| A．She became less stubborn. |
| B．She became more stubborn. |
| C．She suddenly lost confidence. |
| D．She gradually gained confidence. |
| A．An agent who she signed with. |
| B．A rights assistant she once worked with. |
| C．An agent who advised her to send her novel out to agents. |
| D．A publisher who she once worked for as a rights assistant. |
| A．Tough but rewarding. | B．Interesting and smooth. |
| C．Difficult but thrilling. | D．Complicated and fruitless. |
10 . My husband jokes with me that my midlife crisis was having my now 11-year-old daughter in my 40s.
I started my career as Associate Editor at Woman’s World magazine in the late 1990s. Then I was a magazine editor-in-chief for five national consumer publications and also contributed to magazines like Longevity and New Woman.
Four years after getting married in 2005, I eventually gave birth to my daughter, Crystal. As I wrote on Parenting.com: “As the doctor checked her vital organs and my husband counted her 10 perfect fingers and toes, I realized that my body had produced a wonder.”
While my peers were dealing with the stresses of kids in school, I focused my creative energy on carving out my new identity. I was excited when I was offered a “Mom’s Talk” column where I wrote about toys, breastfeeding, and my ongoing(追求) for “baby-free” time.
When Crystal was 3 years old, I wrote an essay about watching her dance at a toddler(学步的小孩) reading group at the library, instead of sitting down with the other children. I expected her performance to annoy people, but her joyful dancing attracted them and made me consider my own possibilities.
“Had I ever been that way, I wondered. If so, could I be like that again? Could I become as free as a child with her whole life ahead of her, ready and willing to be the star of her own production?”
As my daughter transformed from a toddler into a young girl, she continued to be my inspiration. I wrote about the new rules for babysitting and shared research showing that fathers who participated in housework had a positive impact on their daughter’s future success on The Washington Post.
I focused on providing Crystal with resilience-building(韧性) when she neared her teens. I wrote about powerful phrases for The Week, like “no one is the judge of your self-worth”.
As my daughter continues to grow during this messy time, there is one certainty: I will continue to tell my stories, through the eyes of my midlife wisdom. I can’t wait to see her next chapter----and for you to read mine.
1. How did the author feel when giving birth to her daughter?| A．Frightened. | B．Pleased. |
| C．Puzzled. | D．Disappointed. |
| A．she had to deal with more stress from being a mom |
| B．she left all the babysitting work to her husband |
| C．she combined the new identity with her career |
| D．she adopted a creative method of raising her baby |
| A．Living the same free life as her daughter’s. |
| B．Giving performance in front of a crowd |
| C．Her previous life before having the baby. |
| D．Pure pleasure during “baby-free” time. |
| A．Crystal has inspired her to take a writing career. |
| B．She has started writing in the tone of Crystal. |
| C．Her writing keeps developing as Crystal grows. |
| D．Many of her stories are centered on her daughter. |
