Swizerland is the world’s most famous watchmaker,1.makes it little surprise that2.(it) people are the most punctual in the world. For them, being on time is not only a nice thing to do, but it’s a strict3.(believe) that they build almost every aspect of their lives on.
According to the BBC, everything in Swizerland, from trains and buses4.personal meetings, is on time. If someone says they are meeting you at 3 pm, they5.not be there at 2:55 or 3:05 - just 3 pm. It shows “a deep expression of respect for other people”, US writer Eric Weiner, who6.(recent) traveled to Swizerland, wrote for BBC News. “A punctual person is a7.(consider) one. By showing up on time for everything, a Swiss person is expressing he values your time and, by extension, he values you.”
This valuable quality of Swiss people8.(report) to originate from the country’s mountain areas. Due to poor weather, people had to plant and harvest crops exactly on time,9.they would have nothing to eat.
However, being punctual also has its problems. Since everybody has their lunch at exactly 12 and takes their coffee break at 4pm, elevators and coffee shops all tend10.(be) full at the same time.
I was out for my usual morning run and found myself in the late-summer heat, thirsty. If only I had taken a______bottle. After I stopped under a bridge to shelter myself from the sun for a moment of______, I saw two young,______men standing next to their sleeping bags. One smiled and gently______his hand as if he were about to say hello, but he didn’t say a word. He wasn’t asking for______. I smiled and raised my hand, too.
As I started back on my______, I thought about how much we all______to connect with other people. At that moment, this homeless man seemed to want to connect with someone else______he wanted food or money.
We have all had______of feeling separate and lonely. I once felt lonely being in a relationship that______an emotional connection. Feeling separated doesn’t have anything to do with being alone,______is about the human desire to feel______by being seen and valued by another person.
We all______from connection. That homeless man affected my day. After meeting him, I felt more grateful and it made me______all that I have. He made me feel concerned for him. I had the choice to move toward______or connection. Separation is looking at the homeless person and focusing on how______he looks. Connection is understanding that he influenced my day by______to me. I can______times in my life when, like him, I was in a situation I had never expected. There have been times when I felt down, and times when I needed someone to______what he was doing and say hello to me.
Pay attention today and notice whether you tend to move toward separation or toward connection. If your tendency is to spend time alone,______saying “yes” to invitations. Practice moving toward rather than away from people.
1.A. wine B. water C. glass D. metal
2.A. peace B. joy C. shade D. breath
3.A. handsome B. homeless C. disabled D. tall
4.A. took B. dropped C. crossed D. raised
5.A. anything B. nothing C. everything D. all
6.A. wandering B. walking C. running D. hiking
7.A. need B. have C. try D. seek
8.A. other than B. less than C. rather than D. better than
9.A. expectations B. purposes C. experiences D. worries
10.A. lacked B. contained C. enjoyed D. valued
11.A. or B. and C. so D. but
12.A. amazed B. connected C. amused D. entertained
13.A. benefit B. recover C. suffer D. come
14.A. lose B. question C. recognize D. appreciate
15.A. ignorance B. separation C. depression D. desperation
16.A. kind B. neat C. unhappy D. unclean
17.A. reaching out B. giving in C. turning D. replying
18.A. forget about B. keep up with C. reflect on D. return to
19.A. continue B. accomplish C. handle D. stop
20.A. keep B. practice C. deny D. imagine
Many students have trouble staying focused in class. Some of them easily become absent-minded or fall asleep. As a result, they turn to study drugs in order to stay focused in school.1..
Get some sleep
2.. And it is important to stick with it. Having irregular sleep cycles can really affect concentration and physical well-being. Try to go to sleep at the same time every night and get eight to nine hours of sleep. Your body will thank you in the morning.
3.
Eating first thing in the morning provides fresh energy throughout the day, and it doesn’t even have to be a big meal. Something as small as a bowl of oatmeal can make students more energetic and efficient for the rest of the day. And foods like peanut butter, berries, and whole grains have even shown to improve memory.
Turn off your phone
An obvious way to maintain concentration is to avoid distractions that take your attention away.4.. When students need to channel their energy into studies, turning off the phone or even putting it on airplane mode is a good way to centralize their drive and keep distractions at bay.
Break a sweat
Trying to concentrate in class will feel as challenging as a marathon if you’re not in good physical health. On the other hand, actually running a marathon may help boost your ability to concentrate, as exercise is shown to have many benefits for the brain. While you don’t necessarily have to run 26 miles before class or work, doing exercise in the morning can get your blood flowing toward your brain.5..
A. Do not skip breakfast
B. Sit in the front if you sleep in class
C. That helps in strengthening the mind
D. Probably the biggest one is the smart phone
E. Students should have a regular bedtime routine
F. But many study drugs have proven harmful to human health
G. However, there are other all-natural ways to help with concentration in class
Artificial intelligence, or AI, has slowly begun to influence higher education around the world. Now, one new AI tool could change the way university students evaluate their professor. The tool is called Hubert, a teacher evaluation tool that appears as an AI-powered chatbot. Instead of filling out a form, students use a chat window to give feedback(反馈) on the course and their professor. Afterwards, Hubert categorizes the students’ comments for the professor to review.
Hubert is free for educators to use. More than 600 teachers have used it already. The goal of the new Hubert program is to improve education by giving teachers detailed, organized feedback from students.
Viktor Nordmark, from Sweden, started the company in 2015, with several friends. Before creating Hubert, the founders asked teachers what would improve their teaching skills. The answer, Nordmark said, was qualitative(定性的) feedback from their students. In other words, teachers wanted students to write detailed answers to open-ended questions about their experiences in class.
Qualitative feedback is different from the survey responses, which students are often asked to provide at the end of a class. “This kind of data takes a lot of time for professors to collect and analyze,” Nordmark said. And for the students, it can also be “really boring to fill out.” So Nordmark and his friends designed Hubert as a compromise between a traditional survey and a personal interview. “You can reach a really large crowd, but you can also get really qualitative data back,” Nordmark said.
Now, when Hubert receives comments from students, it compares them with the information already in its system to organize the data. Nordmark says that Hubert will continue to get smarter as it receives more comments in the future. Nordmark says he and his co-founders have plans to make Hubert more flexible and accurate. They hope to give teachers the possibility of selecting their own evaluation questions.
1.What can be inferred about traditional teacher evaluation?
A. Its data is easy to collect
B. Users are charged for using it
C. Students needn’t fill out forms
D. Students find it dull to take part in it
2.According to the text, qualitative feedback .
A. can improve the students’ performance at school
B. is students’ answers to teachers’ questions in class
C. can be obtained by asking students to fill out forms
D. is detailed responses to questions not for fixed answers
3.What is one of the advantages of Hubert at present?
A. Being able to change itself to become smarter
B. Saving much time when collecting survey forms
C. Taking on the strengths of a survey and an interview
D. Enabling teachers to select their own evaluation questions
4.What is the text mainly about?
A. The characteristics of qualitative feedback
B. A new AI-powered tool of teacher evaluation
C. The changes in the way teachers are evaluated
D. A potential revolution in the educational system
Competition in the workplace can be a good thing for a number of different reasons. On the other hand, competition can also have some disadvantages, though. Some industries tend to be more competitive in the workplace than others. For instance, those in the sales field will typically be more competitive with co-workers than individuals in other fields, such as information technology. Nevertheless, a little competition in even the least competitive industries can be positive.
Competition in the workplace can create an environment where employees push each other to exceed their normal limits, which can result in increased production, both at an individual level and among the entire workforce as a whole. As individual production numbers increase, so do those of the entire team of workers who seek to outdo one another. Competition can be rewarded with bonuses or various types of rewards.
Workplace competition can also inspire a commitment to self-improvement. While financial motivations and bonuses are always a plus to get the competition going, those who see the bigger picture may take the competition as an opportunity to better themselves in the process of winning the competition. Self-improvement may include actions like changing work habits to be more organized, using visualization and goal setting to achieve goals and simply performing higher quality work.
Not all competition in the workplace necessarily has to take place at the individual level. Competition can bring about a sense of teamwork in the workplace when workers are placed in groups and asked to compete with one another, which can have a number of positive results that come from workers cooperating with each other. For example, workers can learn the value of communication and helping someone else, both of which have an influence on other areas of work like customer service.
1.What does the underlined word “exceed” in Paragraph 2 mean?
A. Life B. Cancel
C. Break through D. Set up
2.Which industry is likely to involve more workplace competition?
A. The sales field B. Film Production
C. Customer service D. Information technology
3.How can competition contribute to employees’ self-improvement?
A. It changes their lifestyles greatly B. It assists them to achieve a higher goal
C. It improves their financial management D. It offers them chances to change for the better
4.What is the best title for the text?
A. Benefits of Workplace Competition
B. Reasons for Joining in Competitions
C. Approaches to Winning Competition
D. Strengths and Weaknesses of Competition
Throughout high school, I failed to volunteer as much as I had wanted. As a college student, I am still busy with maintaining my grades and staying involved in my school’s community, but I decided to get out of my comfort zone and volunteer for America Recycles Day. And this turned out to be an awesome experience.
The organization Ouachita Green put together this event, which allowed people from the Monroe area of Louisiana to bring in their recyclables, free of charge. Unfortunately, Louisiana is lacking in environmentally-friendly initiatives(倡议) so recycling is not offered to most people in our community. In contrast, it is required by law to recycle back in my home New Jersey. This truth astonished me, but more importantly, it encouraged me to seek change.
I meant to make a difference. Through joint efforts, my classmates and I ended up starting the Green Club at the University of Louisiana. It focuses on creating a green attitude within the university and the greater Monroe area. While working on it, I met a group of ambitious high school students, who shared the same concern about the environment as us. While talking, we decided that working together would benefit not only the organizations at our schools, but also the community as a whole. Is we let the community know we are serious, there is an even better chance that we will succeed and influence others.
If you are hesitant to volunteer or help out with an event in your community, my recommendation is to go ahead and do it. Even if it may be out of your comfort zone, it is important to put yourself out there. At the end of the day, you miss all of the shots you don’t take.
1.What surprised the author greatly?
A. Louisiana’s lack of environmental laws
B. Louisiana’s limited access to recycling
C. New Jersey’s legal requirement of recycling
D. New Jersey’s great advantage over Louisiana
2.The Green Club is intended to .
A. offer part-time jobs for high school students
B. appeal for an environmentally-friendly lifestyle
C. make university life in the Monroe area colorful
D. help with community events in the Monroe area
3.What did the high school students and the author agree on?
A. The need to co-operate B. The importance of recycling
C. The possibility to succeed D. The drawbacks of seriousness
4.The author suggests the potential volunteers .
A. praise themselves B. force themselves
C. believe themselves D. challenge themselves
