I can well remember that I was once asked to deliver a speech titled “A Real Test in My Life” before the whole class at the age of 9! You can imagine how 1. (terrible) shy I was with so many eyes 2. (fix) upon me. I had no 3. (choose) but to prepare for it, though. First of all, I was to draft the speech, which was just a piece of cake for me, a good writer. But the hardest part 4. (lie) in my oral presentation from my memory— for to read from the paper was not allowed. The real moment began 5. I stood on the platform with my legs trembling and my mind blank. But my listeners were waiting patiently without any signs of rushing me. Gradually I found myself back, 6. (deliver) my speech with difficulty. After what seemed to be a hundred years, I found my audience applauding— I made 7.! From then on, my fear of talking before an audience disappeared. Actually with my 8. (confident) building up, I now turn out to be a great speaker. Looking back, I know the greatest difficulty on our way 9. success is our fear. Overcome it 10. we will be able to achieve our goals.
In the fourth grade, I discovered my one true love—acting. It is not only fun, but it ______ teamwork and empathy, things I think the world should have more of.
However, I never expected that acting would also teach me to ______!
In the first semester of my freshman year of high school, my school ______ the play Frankenstein. It’s about a scientist named Victor Frankenstein who creates a monster, and ______ the monster destroys the scientist’s life.
I got the lead female ______ of Frankenstein’s girlfriend, Elizabeth. I had been in plays before, so I was very ______ to the rehearsal(排练) process of memorizing lines and then ______ a character with help from the director. But this play was different from ______ one I had ever done before, because Frankenstein and Elizabeth had to kiss in the play a lot. The boy who ______ Frankenstein was very cute, I must say. There was a(n) ______ in which our characters shared “15 kisses”. ______, the director removed it. But there were still some kissing scenes.
Would we __ to kiss, or would we actually kiss? Our director __ having us kiss for real, and for the first few times, it was very ______. My lips barely touched the boy’s. Many of the other actors and actresses laughed at us.
__, one thing about stage kissing that you have to understand is that you are not being yourself. That goes for any ______. After that experience, I feel like I can ______ any role. It was a big event in my ______ toward becoming a better actress. I feel more ______ being onstage and showing my character’s personality to the ______. And that is important for getting the message of a play across.
1.A. 1earns B. teaches C. directs D. explains
2.A. kiss B. hug C. bow D. pray
3.A. prepared for B. carded out C. put on D. took up
4.A. when B. where C. whether D. how
5.A. star B. role C. maid D. keeper
6.A. used B. addicted C. related D. devoted
7.A. imagining B. convincing C. developing D. revising
8.A. each B. no C. some D. any
9.A. played B. served C. created D. replaced
10.A. space B. part C. area D. interval
11.A. Eventually B. Surprisingly C. Fortunately D. Regrettably
12.A. intend B. mean C. try D. pretend
13.A. applied to B. ended up C. objected to D. gave up
14.A. fierce B. romantic C. awkward D. pitiful
15.A. However B. Therefore C. Meanwhile D. Otherwise
16.A. behaving B. acting C. touching D. moving
17.A. change B. design C. handle D. assess
18.A. way B. journey C. tour D. trip
19.A. comfortable B. practical C. optimistic D. hopeful
20.A. readers B. actresses C. actors D. audiences
Article writing has been a way of conveying information through the web. If you’re a writer, being able to let them stay on your article for more than two seconds is already a success. Your writing style can create more readers for your content if you know how to capture the attention of readers. 1.
Be Direct-to-the-Point
Website writing differs from print writing. People do not want to spend much time on a website because they want to get the information they need. 2.
Be Informative
Articles for web content are briefly written. They flesh out the information without decorations. Be sure that your articles are not confusingly worded. 3. Make sure you organize your facts logically so that your reader can effectively process them.
Be Conversational
4. Be conversational so that readers can grasp what you mean in your article. With quality content, engage your readers so that your article will have that personal and human touch.
Be Connected
Most article writers just place sentences that state a certain fact to form a paragraph. However, in readers’ hopes, these writers fail to establish a human connection. 5. So it is important to make the connection smooth and not abrupt.
A. Stay away from decorations when writing online content.
B. Most readers like to read articles that “speak” to them.
C. Connection will allow the readers’ minds to effectively process what is written.
D. Get to your point directly so that your readers can process the information.
E. Here are some important points to consider before writing online.
F. Article writing is a fun way of establishing a connection with a reader and a writer.
G. Complex sentences tend to wrongly lead your reader and make them confused.
We’ve been covering standing desks for a long time now because experts agree that sitting all day is killing us. We want to be productive while also keeping our bodies healthy. Over the years, there have been several solutions to this from fixed standing desks to adjustable ones, portable desks to ones that change into shelves.
However, the most high tech and elegant solution has to be this new smart desk called The Stir Kinetic Desk. The desk learns your daily behaviors and moves between a sitting and standing height regularly throughout the day to keep you moving without interrupting your work flow.
You can program specific sitting and standing intervals or let the desk set the schedule. If you tend to sit while returning emails in the morning, but always want to stand during that afternoon conference call, the desk will learn those regular habits and adjust the schedule to fit them. Of course, the desk can always be manually lowered or raised by using the touch screen on the lower left comer of the desk.
When switching positions, the desk gently dips and rises to let you know that a change is coming up. If you’re not ready to switch positions at that time, you can tap the touchscreen to stay sitting or standing for a while longer.
The built-in touchscreen also keeps track of your daily sitting and standing times and tells you how many calories you’ve burned. You can even set goals for how long or often you want to stand. The desk also works with fitness devices like the FitBit to track your movements.
All of that smart tech doesn’t come cheap though. The M1 desk, which is the everyday model, runs a steep $2,990, while the more executive model with added features, the F1, goes for$4,190.
While expensive, it’s worth thinking of how much time we spend at our desks. Much like a good mattress(床垫), a good desk that works with you is worth the investment. Hopefully in a few years these smart, integrated desks will be more common and less expensive.
1.The Stir Kinetic Desk has been designed to_______.
A. help users with their work
B. keep users moving all the time
C. get users to exercise while working
D. remind users of their working schedule
2.Which is the feature of the touchscreen of the desk?
A. It can tell users when to change positions.
B. It can track users’changes of positions.
C. It can keep users in a fixed position.
D. It can detect users’ health condition.
3.Which of the following can best describe the desk?
A. Productive but challenging.
B. Convenient but unaffordable.
C. Complex and impractical.
D. Multi-functional and intelligent.
4.What does the author intend to tell us in the last paragraph?
A. To spend money on such a desk is rewarding.
B. We should get such a desk as soon as possible.
C. It won’t be long before the desk is widely used.
D. Desks play a very important role in our daily life.
The world’s richest man might seem to have it all, but Bill Gates has one regret. The self-made billionaire said he felt stupid for not knowing any foreign languages.
Speaking in his third Ask Me Anything question-and-answer session for online forum Reddit(红迪网), the Microsoft founder said that he wished he spoke French, Arabic or Chinese.
He said: “I took Latin and Greek in high school and got A’s and I guess it helps my vocabulary. I keep hoping to get time to study one of these—probably French because it is the easiest. I did Duolingo for a while but didn’t keep it up.”
Gates, who is worth $79.3 billion, praised Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg for surprising an audience in Beijing when he spoke fluent Chinese. “Mark Zuckerberg amazingly learned Chinese and did a Q&A with Chinese students—unbelievable, isn’t it?” he said.
This isn’t the first time for Gates to admit his regret over language. He also showed his habits at home and personal insights.
Last February, Gates said he likes to do the dishes himself—to his own special standards every night and also told the interviewer that his wife, Melinda, would likely want Samuel L. Jackson to play her husband in a biopic(传记片).
He also admitted that he would pick up a $100 bill if he found it on the street.
As he took the top spot on Forbes(福布斯)28th Annual Billionaires list last year for the fourth time, he said he is pretty basic when it comes to so ending on clothes and food, but that he enjoys investing in shoes and racquets(球拍)when he plays tennis.
When asked a life lesson he had to learn the hard way, the billionaire said staying up too late is a habit he is still trying to break. “Don’t stay up too late even if the book is really exciting. You will regret it in the morning. Pam still working on this problem,” he said.
1.Which of the following can be the best title for the passage?
A. An Interview with Bill Gates B. How Bill Gates Succeeded
C. Bill Gates’ Regret D. The Richest Billionaire
2.The underlined part in Paragraph 8 may actually mean that_____.
A. it is important to lay a good foundation of life
B. food and clothing are basic needs for people’s life
C. he doesn’t spend much money on food and clothes
D. he never cares about buying food and clothing
3.What advice did Bill Gates give?
A. Avoid staying up too late. B. Be a good language learner.
C. Do the dishes yourself at home. D. Pick up the $100 bills in the streets.
4.Which of the following is true according to the passage?
A. Bill Gates is also the founder of Facebook
B. Bill Gates topped the list of Forbes 28 times.
C. Bill Gates was good at learning languages in high schoo1.
D. Bill Gates’ wife wants Samuel to play a game with Gates.
The International Painting Contest on Google’s homepage in 2015 may look pretty strange, but it spotlightings a very serious issue: clean water, which is unusual for an 11-year-old from Long Island.
Audrey Zhang, a fifth-grader from Levittown, N.Y, is the winner of this year’s Doodle 4 Google contest, rising to the top of some 100, 000 entries on the theme of “draw one thing to make the world a better place.”
Her piece, titled “Back to Mother Nature,” describes a detailed water-cleaning machine. Zhang worked with a team of artists at Google to animate(使……生动)her drawing.
“To make the world a better place, I came up with a transformative water purifier, a machine used to remove dirty or harmful substances,” Google quoted Zhang as saying. “It takes in dirty and polluted water from rivers, lakes and even oceans, then massively transforms the water into clean, safe and pure water. When humans and animals drink this water, they will live a healthier life.”
She created a whole world around the device—one populated by humans, a whale in a top hat and dragons.
Zhang, s piece is “so vivid and so rich and so full and so complete,’’ Google Doodle team leader Ryan Germick told the Washington Post. “Every leaf seemed to have life in it.”
Along with having her artwork featured on Google’s homepage, Zhang wins a $30,000 college scholarship. In addition, her school will receive a $50,000 Google for Education technology grant, and the company is donating $20,000 in her name to a charity devoted to bringing clean water to schools in Bangladesh.
On Sunday, the night before her work was revealed on net, Zhang told Newsday she was excited by the big win, but said she wouldn’t be awake when her art first went online at midnight.
“I have school-tomorrow, so I can’t stay up late,” she told the paper.
1.What’s the passage mainly about?
A. The winner and her work in the painting contest.
B. The team of artists at Google to animate drawings.
C. The painting contest of Google’s homepage in 2015.
D. The water-cleaning machine in the painting contest.
2.According to the passage, we know that______.
A. Audrey Zhang is creative and self-disciplined
B. a water-cleaning device was made in the contest
C. $50, 000 will be donated in Audrey Zhang’s name
D. Zhang’s piece was printed in all major newspapers
3.The underlined word in Paragraph l probably means “_____”.
A. put up with B. 1ook forward to
C. breakaway from D. focus attention on
