By the time I reached junior high，I was sure I wanted to be a nurse. If you didn’t study Latin，you couldn’t be a nurse，so I enrolled. Many Latin words were familiar to me. The hard part turned out to be the usage and creating sentences with the words that seemed so easy to pronounce. Several weeks into the course my teacher came to me，saying，“I think you should withdraw from this course. It seems to be too hard for you. ”
That was the day I learned I wasn’t smart enough to become a nurse. With shame. I handed in my Latin textbook.
After high school，the years raced by. I married and had children. Then one day my husband John came home. “Carol. Max died this afternoon. ”I looked at my husband with disbelief.
John was touched by this tragedy. Finally one evening he said，“Carol，Jackie has never worked and now she’s alone with four children. I've been thinking — if anything happens to me. I want you to be able to take care of yourself and the children. Why don’t you think about what you’d like to do and get the training you’ll need to do it?”
I signed up for the entrance exam for nursing programs. One day I received a letter from the schoo1. I wanted so badly to open it，but with my lack of confidence，I laid it on the kitchen counter saying，” I'm not in the mood for a rejection letter today. ”
Finally I forced myself to open it. “Dear Carol，”I read. ”We are pleased to inform you that you successfully passed the entrance exam.”
An insensitive teacher once stole my dream. If you have a dream, exhaust every effort to reach it. I’ve worked thirty years now as a nurse and I’ve never been more certain that this is what I was meant to be.
1.Why did John advise Carol to find a job?
A. To support the family
B. To be able to live independently
C. To live a more colorful life
D. To provide more money for her kids
2.From the text, we know what the teacher said____________.
A. saved Carol from wasting her time
B. helped Carol find her true interest
C. destroyed Carol’s dream to be a nurse
D. encouraged Carol to be careful in learning
3.After receiving the letter from the schoo1, Caro1____________.
A. couldn’t wait to open it
B. had no mood to read it then
C. didn’t take it seriously at all
D. was uncertain about the result
4.What may be the best title for the text？
A. Too stupid to be a nurse
B. A dream too high to achieve
C. Never too late to 1earn
D. A chance too important to miss
A dog’s tail can tell you a lot more than you might think. Is it wagging (摇) to the left or is it wagging to the right?
“The direction of tail wagging does in fact matter，”said Giorgio Vallortigara，a professor at the University of Trento in Italy. Professor Vallortigara finds that the way the tail is wagging can tell you a lot about a dog’s state of mind—whether you’re a human or another dog.
What’s the difference between a left wag and a right wag？Professor Vallortigara and his colleagues have studied 43 dogs of various breeds — German Shepherds，Beagles，Boxers，Border Collies and some mutts. They find that if a dog wags its tail to the left. it’s feeling anxious or nervous. The reason could be an unfamiliar or dangerous situation，an unfamiliar person，or an unfamiliar and possibly threatening dog. But if the tail is wagging to the right，it means the dog is feeling relaxed and approachable.
“The tail is a very important signal，”said Thomas Reimchen，a biologist at the University of Victoria in British Columbia, Canada. ”There is a lot of visual information that dogs use when communicating with each other. ”
How did the scientists figure all this information out? They had the dogs in their study watch videotapes of other dogs. When the dog on the tape wagged its tail to the right，they say the other dogs remained calm and cool. But when the dog on the tape wagged its tail to the left，the other dogs got anxious.
The researchers are still not exactly sure if the direction of tail wagging is something the dog does consciously. They suspect that it might be something the dog does without even thinking about it — kind of like when you get goose bumps if something scares or startles you. They plan to do more research to get more information about what dogs are thinking and feeling while they’re wagging. As Reimchen said，“I'm not going to be surprised if we find all sorts of really interesting processes that nobody has ever seen before. ”
1.Professor Vallortigara’s study focused on the relationship between_________.
A. a dog’s state of mind and its owner's feeling
B. a dog’s state of mind and the direction of its tail wagging
C. a dog’s sense of direction and its state of mind
D. a dog’s intention of tail wagging and its feeling
2.According to the study，dogs which wag their tails to the left may feel_________.
A. calm B. happy C. angry D. nervous
3.It is implied in Thomas Reimchen’s words in Paragraph 4 that___________.
A. dogs’ tails play all important role in their growth
B. dogs show their feelings only by wagging their tails
C. dogs get to know others by watching tail wagging
D. dogs can understand each other by repeating tail wagging
4.How does the passage mainly develop?
A. By asking and analyzing questions
B. By making comparisons
C. By following the order of time
D. By providing examples
As soon as I saw the cat in our yard, I knew he was a stray (流浪儿). He looked —a wounded warrior with a badly scarred (有伤疤的) body.
I started putting out food for him each day, but he wouldn’t come near me if other people were . Winter came, and he still wouldn’t us. Then, one day, a car hit him so we took him to the
vet’s.
After a week, we were eager to bring him home to our family. But when we went to take the cat home, the vet told us we should put him to immediately because the cat was so fierce and meant that he would become tame (驯服的), let alone a pet.
But I have always had in love’s power to even the wildest beasts. I told the vet, “I want to take him home.” We him Paws.
Three days went by, and we only knew Paws was the bed because when we walked past it we heard deep growling.
I wanted to somehow let him know he was and loved. So I put on a hard hat and a pair of welding gloves. I under the bed toward Paws, with my face to the and only the top of my head facing him. I out to stroke (抚摩) him gently over and over again.
He growled and tried to and bite me. It was scary—but I knew he couldn’t me, so I just kept going. Slowly, he began to . Then I slid out from under the bed and left the room.
Several hours later, I noticed a cat on the bed. It was Paws—all on the pillows! I couldn’t believe it.
That dear cat became the of our household. Although Paws finally died of cancer, his legacy(遗赠)—my and firm belief in the power of love—lives on.
1.A. cute B. strong C. fierce D. smart
2.A. around B. in C. out D. away
3.A. love B. attack C. refuse D. trust
4.A. please B. join C. see D. satisfy
5.A. death B. sight C. observation D. sleep
6.A. simply B. hardly C. easily D. gradually
7.A. sense B. interest C. faith D. feeling
8.A. comfort B. convince C. protect D. tame
9.A. named B. appointed C. accepted D. made
10.A. on B. beside C. under D. inside
11.A. hopeful B. pitiful C. careful D. safe
12.A. hid B. slid C. sheltered D. slept
13.A. bed B. sky C. floor D. feet
14.A. turned B. reached C. pulled D. picked
15.A. play B. scratch C. touch D. push
16.A. hurt B. bother C. avoid D. leave
17.A. get angry B. give up C. run away D. calm down
18.A. stepped out B. stood out C. spread out D. stuck out
19.A. hope B. love C. support D. comfort
20.A. normal B. noble C. strange D. continued
I owe it my friends that I went through the hard time after I lost my job. Everything couldn’t have been going so ___________without them.
A. smoothly B. gradually
C. absolutely D. relatively
The city will ___________no more than 10 thousand new car licenses each year in order to set a limit on the number of cars and improve the environment.
A. distribute B. evaluate
C. witness D. declare
As Mr. Jones aged, he decided to ___________charge of his family business to his eldest son, who was without question the most suitable candidate to succeed.
A. take over B. hand over
C. give away D. set aside
