Some American parents might think their children need better education to compete with China and other countries’ children． But how much do the parents themselves need to change?
A new book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother written by Amy Chua has caused a debate about cultural differences in parenting． Ms． Chua is a professor at the Yale Law School in New Haven, Connecticut, and a mother of two daughters． She was raised in America by immigrant Chinese parents． In her book, Ms． Chua wrote about how she demanded excellence from her daughters． For example, she threatened to burn her daughter’s dolls unless she played a piece of music perfectly． She would scold her daughters if they failed to meet her expectations．
Ms． Chua had a clear list of what her daughters, Sophia and Louisa, were not permitted to do: “Attend a sleepover, have a play date, watch TV or play computer games, be in a school play, get any grade less than an A．” Many people criticize Amy Chua, saying her parenting methods were cruel and violent． She even admits that her husband, who is not Chinese, sometimes objected to her parenting style． But she says that is the way her parents raised her and her three sisters．
Ms． Chua says she eased some of the pressure after her younger daughter rebelled and shouted “I hate my life! I hate you!” But she also says American parents often have low expectations of their children’s abilities． Amy Chua thinks one of the biggest differences between Western and Chinese parents is that Chinese parents take on strength rather than fragility．”
Stacy DeBroff, who has written four books on parenting, says: “Parents should rethink, what does it mean to be a successful parent and what does it mean to be a successful child?” She says Amy Chua’s parenting style is not limited to Chinese families． It represents a traditional way of parenting among immigrants seeking a better future for their children． But she also sees a risk． When children have no time to be social or to follow their own interests, they might not develop other skills that they need to succeed in life． Stacey DeBroff advises parents to develop their own style of parenting and not just repeat the way they were raised．Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother is mainly about ___________．
| A．how to teach children to learn music |
| B．how to change the ways of parenting |
| C．Amy Chun’s experience in parenting |
| D．Amy Chun’s reflection of her family life |
The underlined word “rebelled” in Paragraph 4 probably means “____________”．
| A．disobeyed | B．succeeded | C．failed | D．panicked |
According to Ms． Chua, Chinese way of parenting is powerful because ____________．
| A．parents set good examples to children |
| B．parents understand their children better |
| C．parents usually treat their children as friends |
| D．parents have high expectations of their children |
What is Stacy DeBroff’s warning to immigrant parents?
| A．Don’t expect too much from their children． |
| B．Don’t allow them to communicate with others． |
| C．Don’t give them freedom to do what they want to． |
| D．Don’t bring up their children as their parents did． |
阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项(A、B、C和D)中，选出最佳选项。
If you see a group of people dancing and singing on the street or in the railway station, you don't need to feel surprised. They are a flash mob(暴民). Who are they? Are they mobs? Don't be confused by their name. Actually, a flash mob is a group of people who gather suddenly in a public place, do something unusual for a brief period of time, and then quickly disappear.
They are usually organized with the help of the Internet or other digital communications networks. The messages may be sent to friends, who send to more people. At a predetermined time, they gather and perform some activities such as exchanging books, coming together to look at the sky, waving their hands and yelling something at the top of their voice for 30 seconds. Then, they quickly disappear before the police can arrive. Using mobile phones, the flash mob can change its place if the first one has been cancelled for any reason.
Bill Wasik, senior editor of Harper's Magazine, organized the first flash mob in Manhattan in May 2003 and the first successful flash mob gathered on June 3, 2003. Wasik claimed that he created the flash mob as a social experiment designed to laugh at fashion seekers and stress the cultural atmosphere of wanting to be an insider or part of “the next big thing”.
Flash mob gatherings can sometimes shock people. Such an activity might seem amusing and magical, but it also might frighten people who are not aware of what is taking place. Undoubtedly, flash mob can serve as good political tools and have great potential, such as using flash mob to advertise a product.
The flash mob is now becoming more and more popular. People use it to do many things. For example, in 2009, Michael Jackson’s fans took part in a flash mob to remember him. Hundreds of his fans gathered singing and dancing Michael’s famous song “Beat It” together. Flash mobs give people from all walks of life an opportunity to come together to create a memory.What is NOT the feature of the flash mob?
| A．It can get together quickly. |
| B．It can change its place freely. |
| C．It can do activities suddenly. |
| D．It can injure people seriously. |
How do flash mobs inform one another?
①By using the Internet.
②By writing letters.
③By yelling.
④By waving hands.
⑤By using mobile phones.
⑥By holding a meeting.
| A．③④ | B．①⑤ | C．②⑥ | D．⑤⑥ |
Why did Bill Wasik create the flash mob?
| A．To advertise some products. |
| B．To help people make friends. |
| C．To laugh at fashion seekers. |
| D．To create some memories. |
What can we learn about the flash mob from the passage?
| A．Bill Wasik organized the first successful flash mob in May, 2003. |
| B．People are encouraged to take a more active part in an activity. |
| C．Flash mobs tend to do something illegal for a short time. |
| D．Flash mob gathering can frighten all the people present. |
阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项(A、B、C和D)中，选出最佳选项。
If you have a little child, who hates sitting in a car seat, then the FreedomRide is the answer to your problem.
Would you want to be stuck in an unchangeable position every time you’re in the car? No. You wouldn’t.
When an adult sits in a car for any length of time, we stretch, we change the position, we move our legs again and again. We do this without thinking. But kids in a traditional car seat can’t do this. They are stuck in one position, and they can’t move. We move because the circulation of blood needs to be recovered in our legs as we sit in the same position for any longer.
In a traditional car seat, the child can’t move to reduce the pain, so it puts them in anger.
The FreedomRide lets them have a little freedom, and still be safe. The 5-Point Harness(背带)gives them additional safety over a traditional child car seat.
I am the Webmaster for islandbreeze.com, and when JoeySafe asked us to redo their website, I was attracted by this system. That is because I have two small children, both girls, aged 3 and 4 and we obviously use car seats. I lived in Southern California, and every couple of months, my wife, the girls and I, go to see grandma who lives in Nevada. It’s a 5-hour drive, so the FreedomRide works well. Our trips are so much better now, especially since there is more room in the car without the car seats.
The FreedomRide really did make it easier to go on trips. The only thing you need when you use the JoeySafe instead of your old child car seat is a pillow. Besides, my kids want to take a pillow anyway! As a dad, I feel safe driving with the kids in the FreedomRide. I am a very safety-oriented person.From the text we can infer the FreedomRide is a _______.
| A．car seat | B．car for children |
| C．safety belt | D．game on islandbreeze.com |
The FreedomRide is likely to be designed for________.
| A．a person hating sitting in the car for long |
| B．an adult often driving a traditional car |
| C．a child requiring some freedom in the car |
| D．a driver needing comfortable seats |
The purpose of the last two paragraphs may be to ________.
| A．support the topic of the child car safety |
| B．describe the advantage of the FreedomRide |
| C．introduce the detail of the author’s work and web. |
| D．describe what the author does with his child car seat |
The next part following the last paragraph may mention________.
| A．the way of ordering |
| B．the way of communicating |
| C．the inventor of this product |
| D．the advantage of the product |
请认真阅读下列短文，从短文后各题所给的A、B、C、D四个选项中，选出最佳选项，并在答题卡上将该项涂黑。
Oliver Twist was born in a workhouse, and when he arrived in this hard world, it was very doubtful whether he would live beyond the first three minutes. He lay on a hard little bed and struggled to start breathing.
Oliver fought his first battle without much assistance from the two people present at his birth. One was an old woman, who was nearly always drunk, and the other was a busy local doctor, who was not paid enough to be very interested in Oliver’s survival. _______________
However, Oliver managed to draw his first breath, and then announced his arrival to the rest of the workhouse by crying loudly. His mother raised her pale young face from the pillow and whispered, “Let me see the child, and die.”
The doctor turned away from the fire, where he had been warming his hands. “You must not talk about dying yet,” he said to her kindly. He gave her the child to hold. Lovingly, she kissed the baby on its forehead with her cold white lips, then stared wildly around the room, fell back—and died. “Poor dear!” said the nurse, hurriedly putting a green glass bottle back in the pocket of her long skirt.
The doctor began to put on his coat. “The baby is weak and will probably have difficulties,” he said. “If so, give it a little milk to keep it quiet.” Then he looked at the dead woman. “The mother was a good-looking girl. Where did she come from?”
“She was brought here last night,” replied the old woman. “She was found lying in the street. She’d walked some distance, judging by her shoes, which were worn to pieces. Where she came from, where she was going to, or what her name was, nobody knows.”
The doctor lifted the girl’s left hand. “The old story,” he said sadly, shaking his head. “No wedding ring, I see. Ah! Good night.”
And so Oliver was left with only the drunken nurse. Without clothes, under his first blanket, he could have been the child of a king or a beggar. But when the woman dressed him later in rough cotton clothes, yellow with age, he looked exactly what he was—an orphan in a workhouse, ready for a life of misery, hunger, and neglect.
Oliver cried loudly. If he could have known that he was a workhouse orphan, perhaps he would have cried even more loudly.
There was no one to look after the baby in the workhouse, so Oliver was sent to a special “baby farm” nearby. There, he and thirty other children rolled around the floor all day, without the inconvenience of too much food or too much clothing. Mrs Mann, the old woman who “looked after” them, was very experienced. She knew what was good for children, and a full stomach was very dangerous to their health. She also knew what was good for herself, so she kept for her own use the money that she was given for the children’s food. The board responsible for the orphans sometimes checked on the health of the children, but they always sent the beadle, a kind of local policeman, to announce their visit the day before. So whenever the board arrived, of course, the children were always neat and clean.
This was the way Oliver was brought up. Consequently, at the age of nine he was a pale, thin child and short for his age. But despite frequent beatings by Mrs Mann, his spirit was strong, which was probably the reason why he managed to reach the age of nine at all.
On Oliver’s ninth birthday, Mr Bumble, the beadle, came to the house to see Mrs Mann. Through the front window Mrs Mann saw him at the gate, and turned quickly to the girl who worked with her.
“Quick! Take Oliver and those others upstairs to be washed!” she said. Then she ran out to unlock the gate which was always kept locked.According to the passage, a workhouse was where ________.
| A．many women died unexpectedly |
| B．workers helped each other |
| C．the poor and homeless lived |
| D．people were only interested in money |
Which of the following is true according to the passage?
| A．Oliver was born into the world on a cold day. |
| B．Many people, especially women, drank heavily at that time. |
| C．The children in the baby farm were taken good care of. |
| D．Doctors were usually paid too little for the work they did. |
Which sentence is most suitable for the blank in Paragraph 2?
| A．Therefore, he felt very lonely in the world. |
| B．Frightened at the sight of the two, he started to cry. |
| C．After all, death was a common event in the workhouse. |
| D．In fact, the world was privileged to have him in it. |
It can be inferred that the gate of the baby farm was always kept locked in order to ________.
| A．protect the children inside from dangers outside |
| B．prevent official visitors walking in unexpectedly |
| C．keep the children inside working all the time |
| D．ensure the children were always neat and clean |
According to the passage, Mrs. Mann ________.
| A．was mad keen on looking after children |
| B．provided children with little food and few comforts |
| C．beat children frequently to make them mentally strong |
| D．cared little about Mr Bumble’s abrupt appearance |
What is the passage mainly about?
| A．Oliver’s early life. | B．Oliver’s personality. |
| C．Mother’s death. | D．People’s selfishness. |
请认真阅读下列短文，从短文后各题所给的A、B、C、D四个选项中，选出最佳选项，并在答题卡上将该项涂黑。
Wind turbines are efficient sources of cheap energy but also a source of concern as their huge spinning blades (叶片) frequently kill birds and bats. A new type of wind generator developed in Spain offers a creative solution to that problem.
In 2002, Spanish inventor David Yanez saw a short film about the Tacoma Narrows Bridge in the U.S., collapsing in strong wind. It was a vivid example of the powerful vibrations wind can create when it blows past a long pole, such as a car antenna or even a stick of bamboo. It gave him the idea for a new type of wind-energy generator.
“The initial philosophy or spirit was to create a generator of dreams that had all the qualities one would want: It should be as cheap as possible, need as little maintenance as possible, the setup as simple as possible,” he said.
Yanez and his friend Raoul Martin took the idea to an engineering firm, where they were told it would never work. Undiscouraged, they started experimenting on their own in a small wind tunnel they built.
Good initial results were repeated by a larger working model called Vortex (涡旋) installed in a nearby field. “What we have is a mast (桅杆), which is the top piece and acts as a blade,” Yanez said. “It’s constructed from the same material as a conventional generator, and what it does is it oscillates (振荡), transmitting the oscillation to a conventional alternator, which by its own oscillation converts the wind’s energy into electric energy.”
Yanez said the output of the 6-meter-tall generator, and even that of smaller models, was better than expected. The Vortex creates about 30 percent less energy than a comparable bladed wind turbine, but it is lighter and cheaper to build and maintain. It is made mostly of reinforced plastic and has very few moving parts. Also, it does not create noise and—even more important for many environmentalists—it does not present a threat to passing birds.
The current prototype works at wind speeds ranging from 1.5 to 7 meters per second. The inventors say the next step is building a 12.5-meter tall bladeless generator with a 4-kilowatt capacity that could power small businesses or individual homes, or provide supplemental power to a main grid. The commercial version of the Vortex Bladeless generator should be ready for the market by 2017.The author mentions a short film about the Tacoma Narrows Bridge to show ________.
| A．what the initial philosophy or spirit was |
| B．what inspired Yanez to create the generator |
| C．how the bridge was destroyed in strong wind |
| D．how wind creates powerful vibrations |
What do we know from the passage?
| A．The original idea was considered as practical in an engineering firm. |
| B．Yanez and Martin’s initial tests by themselves proved to be successful. |
| C．The material for constructing the mast is different from that of the past. |
| D．The new generator is better at creating energy than a comparable bladed one. |
What would be the best title for the passage?
| A．Bladeless wind-power generator is friendly to birds. |
| B．Wind turbines are efficient sources of cheap energy. |
| C．A new generator will come onto the market by 2017. |
| D．Yanez has made a generator for the benefit of people. |
请认真阅读下列短文，从短文后各题所给的A、B、C、D四个选项中，选出最佳选项，并在答题卡上将该项涂黑。
My mother has always instilled in me the importance of education. Education is essential. It will help me get accepted to college if I perform well academically and advance my opportunities for success in the future. Most jobs now require at least a high school diploma, and for many jobs, a college degree is preferred. It is important that all students have excellent educators in their life to help them achieve and have the opportunity to go to college, get a job, support themselves and their family, and impact the community.
As we celebrate and honor all teachers during Teacher Appreciation Week, I’ve reflected on the impact my teachers have had, and will continue to have, in my life. From Mr. Bowker, who challenged me in math, to Mr. Bernsteen, my health teacher who taught me the value of hard work, my teachers have helped shape the student I am today. But one of the teachers who left a lasting impression on me was my summer school teacher, Mr. Davis, who impacted me beyond the classroom. He found time to connect with me on a personal level and talk to me after class. I felt like Mr. Davis cared about my academic success and was committed to setting an example of what’s possible.
Mr. Davis could relate to what it was like to be a rising ninth-grade black male in today’s society. He taught me how to speak up confidently and share my ideas with others. He told me that I was brilliant and that when I spoke, the world should listen. And when I would put my hand down because I was unsure of my answer, Mr. Davis would immediately say, “No guts, no glory.” He never made me feel inadequate; he encouraged me to always pursue knowledge because he, too, was learning every day. Mr. Davis helped me navigate the challenges and take advantage of the opportunities.
I think having more black male teachers like Mr. Davis in the classroom could increase student success. They would share the background and experiences of many of their students and help build long-lasting teacher/student relationships. But, unfortunately, the likelihood that students of color in Nevada will have a teacher that looks like them is one of the lowest in the country.
As the student population becomes more ethnically diverse, teachers in Nevada still are predominantly white. According to a 2012 Education Week report, in the Clark County School District, nearly 70 percent of students identified as students of color, but 76 percent of teachers were white. The numbers for black male teachers are more discouraging. Just 2 percent of teachers nationwide are black men.
But you can help change the numbers. Whether you decide to study education in college or graduate school, or apply to programs in Las Vegas such as Teach For America, I hope more black males will consider teaching as a career.
My peers and I need more examples of excellence and success in classrooms—examples who look like us. You can be the model to impact our life and push us to achieve. You can ensure that, when we look to the front of the room, we can see a little bit of ourselves reflected back.Mr. Davis left the author with a very deep impression mainly because he ________.
| A．was extremely knowledgeable and hard-working |
| B．was a role model to teach hearts and change minds |
| C．spent much time helping the author with his homework |
| D．kept in close touch with the author even after graduation |
The underlined word “guts” in Paragraph 3 is closest in meaning to ________.
| A．bravery | B．connection |
| C．opportunity | D．qualification |
By writing the passage, the author intends to ________.
| A．show students’ love for their teachers |
| B．appeal to more black males to be teachers |
| C．express sympathy for students of color |
| D．advertise for black male teachers |
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