A very little boy was spending his Saturday morning playing in his sandbox. He had with him a plastic pail (桶) and a shiny, red plastic shovel (铲). In the 1 of creating roads and tunnels in the sand, he 2 a large rock in the middle of the sandbox.
The boy dug around the rock, 3 to move it off the dirt. At first, he wanted to carry it out of the sandbox with his hands; however, it was too heavy. Later, with much 4 , he pushed the rock across the sandbox by 5 his hands. When the boy got the rock to the 6 of the sandbox, he found that he couldn’t roll it up and 7 the little wall. 8 , the little boy pushed, but every time he thought he had made some 9 , the rock tipped (翻滚) and then fell back into the sandbox. The little boy pushed and pushed, but his only 10 was to have the rock roll back.
Finally he 11 tears. All this time the boy’s father watched from his living room window 12 the drama was unfolded. The moment the tears fell, a large 13 appeared across the sandbox. It was the boy’s father. Gently but 14 , he said, “Son, why didn’t you use all the strength that you had?”
Defeated, the boy 15 back, “I did! I did! I used all the strength that I had!”
“No, you didn’t. You didn’t ask me for help.” The father 16 down, picked up the rock and dropped it off the sandbox.
Do you have “rocks” in your life that need to be 17 ? Are you discovering that you don’t have 18 it takes to lift them? There is someone who is willing to give us the 19 we need. Maybe, it’s sometimes a good idea to ask others for 20 when we meet difficulties we can’t overcome.
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Christmas is perhaps the most important holiday in American culture. On Christmas Eve, children sit out with parents in the living room hanging stockings, setting up a Christmas tree, eating candy canes, and setting up milk and cookies for Santa Claus. Perhaps the most beloved figure in American history, Santa Claus has become an important icon for Christmas.
I remember believing in Santa when I was a very young girl. However, as I grew older, I learned many facts that “proved” his existence as false. Always inquisitive by nature and very keen on the scientific method of experimentation, I was determined to use tests and observations to determine whether Santa Claus was real.
The first year of tests happened when I was 5. I decided that if I stayed up all night on Christmas Eve, I could see if Santa really did come down the chimney. However, that was a futile attempt, I fell asleep that year. The next year, I was able to test if location was an issue with Santa’s deliveries. That year, my family spent Christmas with the family of one of my mother’s friends. At the time, I decided that if Santa was all-knowing he would know I wasn’t home. Sure enough, there was a pretty pink package waiting for me the next morning. At age 7, I came up with my ultimate test to see if Santa was real. That year, I didn’t send out my Christmas letter to Santa. On Christmas Eve, my mother dragged me to our local Wal-Mart and led me around the toy section. I refused to say a word, but did let my eye linger on a ballet set. I figured that “Santa” wouldn’t know what to get me because he shouldn’t be able to read my mind. However, mother would know everything that caught my eye in the store. If I got the ballet set the next morning, I would have my evidence. Christmas morning, there was the ballet set, sitting under the tree. As I didn’t use it much, mother ended up returning it a few days later. She claimed Santa was generous enough to leave a receipt. That was the end to my mission to discover the existence of Santa.
Now, I can look back on all of these with fond nostalgia(怀旧). The magic and mystery of it all made Christmas a fun time. Santa was a big part of my childhood.Children do all the things on Christmas Eve except______
set up a Christmas tree
hang stockings and eat candy canes
prepare milk and cookies for Santa Claus
wait for Santa Claus with their parentsThe underlined word “futile” means____
| A．unreal | B．unusual |
| C．unsuccessful | D．unreasonable |
How did the writer prove the existence of Santa Claus as false?
| A．He stayed up all night on Christmas Eve and saw Santa come down the chimney. |
| B．He found that Santa was all-knowing and could make the deliveries accurate |
| C．He didn’t send out his Christmas letter but still got his Christmas present |
| D．He used the receipt left by Santa to return his present |
The writer wants to tell us that_____
| A．He proved the existence of Santa Claus as false. |
| B．Christmas and Santa is a part of his life as well as his child |
| C．Christmas plays an important role in American culture |
| D．Santa Claus is the most popular figure in American history |
If you can see the magic in a fairytale, you can face the future.” —Danielle Steel
Who have not read fairytales? We all have had the experience of reveling in the beauty and innocence of fairytales. May it be Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty... fairytale is a word which cannot be new to us. But have you ever traveled ages back to the earliest of times and uncovered the fascinating facts about these stories? Well, if not, then here are some mystical finds I discovered when I undertook this journey.
A fairytale or fairy story is a fictional tale that usually features folkloric characters (such as fairies, talking animals). A fairytale often stars transformed princes, princesses, animals, as in “fairytale ending” where the humble but heroic princes defeat the wicked enemies or as in “fairytale romance” where after much ado the beautiful princesses marry their Prince Charming.
One distinct feature of fairytales is that, they take place “once upon a time”. The history of the fairytale is particularly difficult to trace. The oral tradition of the fairytale came long before the written page. The oldest known fairytales stem from ancient Egypt around 1,300 B.C and now, after traveling through various periods of time, they have grown and matured in various aspects and have become the most popular genre of stories for young children.
The most famous authors of fairytales are the Grimm Brothers whose works include Cinderella, Rapunzel, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and many more; The Grimm Brothers collected their tales from farmers and edited them to suit their audience.
But whatever may the form be, fairytales are after all fairytales! G. K. Chesterton said, “Fairytales do not tell children the dragons exist; they tell the dragons can be killed.” This quote has great weight. Every child believes in fairies, dragons, etc. They do not need fairytales to tell them that. Instead fairytales tell that good always succeed over evil. So fairytales are necessary for young minds.
Fairytales are narrated to children when they are young. This is very essential indeed, for if in the beginning of our lives our minds are touched by the beauty, innocence and the morals in these tales, we will be able to trace the optimistic side of happenings. The fairies are like our wildest dreams, which seem unreachable but we can make them plausible（真实的）.What does paragraph 2 mainly tell us?
| A．The definition of fairytale. |
| B．The characters in the fairytale. |
| C．The brief introduction of fairytale. |
| D．The plot of the fairytale. |
What implies in the passage?
| A．The fairytale first appeared as a written form. |
| B．The spoken form of fairytale came earlier than the written form. |
| C．The fairytale came from ancient Egypt and hasn’t changed much since then |
| D．The fairytale always begins with “once upon a time”. |
By saying “Fairytales do not tell children the dragons exist; they tell the dragons can be killed.”, G. K. Chesterton meant________.
| A．the dragons are evil things |
| B．good always win over evil |
| C．every child believes the existence of the dragon |
| D．every child can know how to kill a dragon from the fairytale |
What does the writer think about the fairytale?
| A．He believes that we can make fairytale come ture. |
| B．He thinks the fairytale makes no difference to our lives. |
| C．He feels doubtful of the fairytale. |
| D．He thinks the fairytale is unreachable. |
Anna Riviere was one of the most admired of 19th-century English sopranos(女高音). She was also one of the most adventuresome.
She was born in London on January 9th, 1810. She entered the Royal Academy of Music at the age of 14. Seven years later, just after her first show, Anna married Sir Henry Bishop, who was 24 years her senior. Her reputation as a singer grew rapidly, based largely on her tours with Sir Henry and harpist Nicholas Bochsa. After a tour of Dublin, Edinburgh, and London, Anna Bishop deserted her husband and three children and ran away with Bochsa.
From then on, Madame Bishop—as she continued to be known—traveled and sang as if her life depended on it. Between 1839 and 1843 she traveled to every major town in Europe, where she sang in 260 concerts. In the course of two years in Naples, she performed in 20 operas. In 1855 she and Bochsa sailed for Sydney, Australia. He died there the following year, and Anna went on to tour South America before returning to New York, where she married a diamond merchant.
Then she began what proved her most dangerous adventure. After another American tour in 1866, she and her husband set sail across the Pacific. They were shipwrecked on a small coral reef, and for more than a month they drifted in a small boat before they finally reaching Guam. She had lost her music, her wardrobe, and her jewelry, but Madame Bishop was not to be stopped. She went on to Manila and began a concert tour that led to Hong Kong, Singapore, and India before she went back to England. After another two-year world tour she returned eventually to New York, where she gave her last public performance in 1883—at age 73.
Meanwhile the husband she left behind, Sir Henry, had become famous for writing the music to lyrics that might eventually have been meaningful to Anna Bishop—“Home, Sweet Home.”Which of the following message about Madama Bishop is true?
| A．She became famous after her first show. |
| B．After her tour in Europe, she returned to New York. |
| C．She got married more than once. |
| D．The song “Home, Sweet Home” was meaningful to her. |
Sir Henry is a _____.
| A．poem | B．singer |
| C．writer | D．composer |
Which is the right order of the event？
a. Bochsa died in Australia.
b. Madama Bishop deserted her husband and three children.
c. Madama Bishop toured South America.
d. Madama Bishop and her husband, a diamond merchant, set sail across the Pacific.
| A．abcd | B．bacd | C．bcda | D．dcba |
The best title for this passage is_____.
| A．The English soprano |
| B．The soprano toured around the world |
| C．A soprano and her husband |
| D．The adventuresome soprano |
Single people, especially women, are stigmatized（指责） in our society: We’re all familiar with the image of a sad, lonely woman eating ice cream with her cats in her pajamas on Saturday night. But about 45 percent of US adults aren't married and around one in seven lives alone. This might be you. Research shows that young people's expectations about their marital status (e.g. the desire to be married by 30 and have kids by 32) have little or no relationship to what actually happens to people. So, go with the flow. And, if you're single, you're in good company. Single people spend more time with friends, volunteer more, and are more involved in their communities than married people. Never-married and divorced women are happier, on average, than married women. So, don't buy into the myth of the miserable singleton.
If you do get married, keep going with the flow. Relationship satisfaction, financial security, and happy kids are more strongly related to flexibility in the face of life's challenges than any particular way of organizing families. The most functional families are ones that can bend. So partnering with someone who thinks that one partner should support their families and the other should take responsibility for the house and children is a recipe for disaster. So is being equally rigid about non-traditional divisions of labor. It's okay to have ideas about how to organize your family but your best bet for happiness is to be flexible.
Buying a home is often taken for granted as a stage on the path to adulthood. But the ideal of universal home ownership was born in the 1950s. It's a rather new idea.With such a short history, it's funny that people often insist that buying a house is a fool-proof investment and the best way to secure retirement. In fact, buying a house may not be the best choice for you. The mortgage(按揭) may be less than rent, but there are also taxes, insurance, and the increasingly common Home Owners Association (HOA) fees. You may someday sell the house for more than you bought it but, if you paid interest on a mortgage, you also paid far more than the sale price. You have freedom from a landlord, but may discover your HOA is just as controlling, or worse. And then there's the headache: renting relieves you from the stress of being responsible for repairs. It also offers a freedom of movement that you might cherish.
So be wise and consider all your options.It can be inferred from the passage that_________.
| A．many Americans get married by 30 and have kids by 32 |
| B．married women have a happier life than those never-married |
| C．divorced women lives a miserable life |
| D．the society tends to have a wrong image about single women |
According to the passage, what can be a happy family？
| A．The happy family is flexible in the face of life’s challenges. |
| B．The happy family has particular way of organizing families. |
| C．The happy family believes the traditional divisions of labor. |
| D．The happy family has relationship satisfaction, financial security and happy kids. |
The purpose of paragraph 3 is to _______.
| A．tell people to rent a house rather than buy a house |
| B．ask people to think hard about whether to buy a house |
| C．show people buying a house is foolish |
| D．tell people buying a house may cost a lot of money |
The passage mainly tells us _______.
| A．how to have a happy family |
| B．what’s the life of American youth |
| C．what American youth should know for living a happy life |
| D．why American youth should be wise when making decisions |
As a health editor, I spend the majority of my day poring over content related to health. At HuffPost, we're lucky to talk to experts on a daily basis about how to live our best lives. It’s clear that life would be healthier if we would just do the following things. Sure, some of these are easier said than done.
1.Have a bedtime.
Sleep is considered the third pillar(支柱) of health, and for good reason. Research is only making it increasingly clear that not getting enough of the stuff can have serious health effects. Meanwhile, getting enough sleep is good for everything ranging from weight, to mood, to even the immune system. One of the simplest things you can do to ensure you get enough sleep each night is to set a bedtime. Forgive yourself if you can't meet it every night, but make a point to try to stick to it.
2. Cultivate your emotional intelligence
To have emotional intelligence means to be "confident, good at working towards your goals and adaptable. You recover quickly from stress." psychologist Daniel Goleman previously told HuffPost. It's made up of five parts: social skills, empathy, motivation, self-awareness and self-regulation. And fortunately, these are all traits you can cultivate. Be curious about things beyond yourself. Know what you're good at and where you can stand to improve. Try to improve your ability to pay attention.
3.
This is something I'm still working on. I'm an objectively fast person -- fast at walking, fast at eating, fast at talking. This also makes me very impatient, and also sometimes very unobservant -- stopping to smell the roses has never been my strong suit. But slowing down to appreciate life and all its little moments builds gratitude -- and that's a very healthy thing.
4. Find an exercise you actually enjoy
It's not exactly a secret how much I opposite-of-like running. I'll still do it, because of health, but there are certainly other ways I'd rather get my fitness in. And that's completely OK. Research has even shown that whether we think of fitness as "fun" or "exercise" affects how much we end up eating. For me, exercise is a pill best swallowed as volleyball. For you, it may be dancing, or swimming, or riding your bike. Don't think that just because you don't like "conventional" exercise -- running, going to the gym, etc. -- you're "bad at exercise." No such thing!Which of the following has something to do with the immune system?
| A．exercise | B．sleep |
| C．emotional intelligence | D．mood |
What can we infer from the passage?
| A．You should set a bedtime and stick to it no matter what happened. |
| B．Paying attention is not as important as other abilities for emotional intelligence. |
| C．The writer is no longer a fast person. |
| D．The exercise the writer likes most is volleyball. |
Emotional intelligence includes the following except______.
| A．confidence | B．motivation |
| C．stress | D．self-awareness |
The best title for the third tip is___________.
| A．Feel gratitude to life |
| B．Stop to smell the roses |
| C．Lead a simple life |
| D．Take a time to appreciate your life |
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