One morning, Oral Lee Brown stopped by a local grocery store to make her usual purchases. A little girl approached Brown to ________ a quarter on this particular day. Because all she had was a $5 bill, Brown invited the little girl with her to the store to get some ________. Inside the store, Brown told the little girl she could ________ anything she wanted.
Instead of choosing candy or gums, which would have been the ________ choice for most kids, the little girl immediately ran for a loaf of bread. Brown asked the girl if she went to school. She ________ responded, “Sometimes,” as she shyly ________ Brown and quickly disappeared around the corner.
That night, Brown couldn’t sleep. She ________ she had to find the poor little girl. She went to the school the girl would most likely ________, but in vain. ________, she found many other similar children in less ideal conditions. Brown decided to “________” a class of 23 first-graders. She told them, “Stay in school, and I’ll ________ you to college.” To achieve this ________ goal, Brown began saving money, ________ $10,000 per year from her $45.000 salary.
From that day on, Brown did more than simply make a(n) ________ to the children; she became an active part of their lives, beginning with regular visits and parent meetings. Nineteen of the students were ________ to college and they all graduated from college in 2003 and 2004.
Brown is now working on her sixth ________ of “adopted” students. More than 125 young people have benefited from her ________. If it hadn’t been for Brown, they would never have been given such a ________ opportunity for college education.
With her life ambition found in the work of ________ others to achieve undreamed-of goals, Brown embodies the values of helping others and truly ________ how to pass the values on.
1.A. apply for B. look for C. pay for D. ask for
2.A. fruit B. food C. drink D. loan
3.A. point out B. give out C. pick out D. find out
4.A. right B. vital C. last D. first
5.A. quietly B. loudly C. proudly D. impatiently
6.A. pushed B. touched C. thanked D. greeted
7.A. supposed B. hoped C. knew D. expected
8.A. train B. instruct C. quit D. attend
9.A. Instead B. As a result C. Therefore D. In addition
10.A. follow B. start C. teach D. adopt
11.A. deliver B. send C. walk D. collect
12.A. great B. easy C. impossible D. simple
13.A. putting aside B. putting down C. putting off D. putting back
14.A. agreement B. decision C. appointment D. promise
15.A. accepted B. admitted C. taken D. brought
16.A. term B. grade C. class D. stage
17.A. generosity B. example C. wisdom D. honesty
18.A. ridiculous B. suitable C. valuable D. practical
19.A. leading B. persuading C. telling D. supporting
20.A. realizes B. shows C. learns D. understands
In the digital age, copying someone else’s words is easy, but getting caught copying is even easier. When Jake, a college professor, recently spoke at the convention (大会), he used some of the same words that some famous person had used at another convention in 2008. Within hours, news spread around the world with the claim that Jake had plagiarized (剽窃) other’s speech. Students and teachers at the university were shocked. 1.
What is plagiarism?
2. That person could also be called a “literary thief” or a “plagiarist”.
Why is plagiarism a serious problem?
It’s our own worst fear, to have which thing that we created stolen from us, and it’s the same as our words. That thing that we created is essential to who we are. 3. Academics are especially aware of the nature of plagiarism because their work is essentially the creation of ideas and putting them into words.
4.
One of the possible punishments for plagiarism at the university is dismissal (开除) from the school. Students may fail a course or be given a letter of censure (谴责) that stays on their school record. Professors or researchers who plagiarize may damage or end their careers.
Plagiarism is easy to find.
Before the digital age we live in, plagiarizing was harder. You had to write out the words you
copied. But now anything can be copied and pasted. In the past, teachers would have to work hard to prove that work was copied. 5. The plagiarism checking software programs used by many students and universities include Turnitin, Grammarly, Duplichecker, and iThenticate. Nobody is going to get away with it.
A. How to avoid plagiarism.
B. Consequences of plagiarism.
C. Stealing our words is as serious as stealing our children.
D. Nowadays, some software programs will help you avoid plagiarism.
E. Plagiarism is to copy other people’s written work without giving them credit.
F. But nowadays, all you have to do is to run a paper through a plagiarism detection software.
G. They learned from their early years in school that copying another writer’s words was wrong.
Every human being, no matter what he is doing, gives off body heat. The usual problem is how to get rid of it. But the designers of the Johnstown campus (校园) of the University of Pitsburgh (commonly referred to as Pitt) set themselves the opposite problem—how to collect body heat. They have designed a collection system which uses not only body heat, but the heat given off by such objects as light bulbs and refrigerators as well. The system works so well that no fuel is needed to make the campus’s six buildings comfortable.
Some parts of most modern buildings—theaters and offices as well as classrooms, are more sufficiently heated by people and lights and sometimes must be air-conditioned even in winter. The technique of saving heat and redistributing (重新分配) is called “heat recovery”. A few modern buildings recover heat, but the campus’s system is the first to recover heat from buildings and reuse it in others.
Along the way, Pitt has learned a great deal about some of its producers. The harder a student studies, the more heat his body gives off. Male students send out more heat than female students, and the larger a student is, the more heat he produces.
We may conclude that the hottest prospect for the Johnstown campus would be a hard-working overweight male genius.
1.The heat in the heating system of the Johnstown campus is supplied .
A. by human bodies
B. by both human bodies and other heat-giving objects
C. by both human bodies and commonly-used fuels
D. by human bodies, commonly-used fuels and other heat-giving objects
2.According to the passage, the technique of “heat recovery” is used .
A. to find the producers of heat B. to provide heat for the hot water system
C. to make the campus more beautiful D. to collect heat and reuse it
3.The underlined phrase “the hottest prospect” in Paragraph 3 refers to .
A. the person who suffers most from heat
B. the person who needs more heat than others
C. the person who gives off most heat
D. the person who makes better use of heat
4.Which of the following may be the best title for this passage?
A. A New Heat Recovery System in Pitt
B. Modern Buildings’ Heat System
C. Body Heat and Its Producers
D. Ways of Heating Buildings
It is a familiar scene these days: employees taking newly laid-off co-workers out for a drink for comfort. But which side deserves sympathy more, the jobless or the still employed? On March 6, researchers at a conference at the University of Cambridge suggested it was the latter.
Brendan Burchell, a Cambridge sociologist, presented his analysis based on various surveys conducted across Europe. The data suggest that employed people who feel insecure in their jobs show similar levels of anxiety and depression as those who are unemployed. Although a newly jobless person’s mental health may “bottom out” after about six months, and then may even begin to improve, the mental state of people who are continuously worried about losing their own job “just continues to get worse and worse”, Burchell says.
Psychologists support this theory by arguing that human beings feel more stressed during times of insecurity because they sense an immediate but invisible threat. Patients have been known to experience higher levels of anxiety, for example, while waiting for examination results than knowing what they are suffering from—even if the results are cancer. It’s better to get the bad news and start doing something about it rather than wait with anxiety. When the uncertainty continues, people stay in a nonstop “fight or flight” response, which leads to damaging stress.
But not every employee in insecure industries has such a discouraging view, Burchell says. In general, women get on better. While reporting higher levels of anxiety than men when directly questioned, women score lower in stress on the GHQ 12, even when they have a job they feel insecure about losing. As Burchell explains, “For women, most studies show that any job—it doesn’t matter whether it is secure or insecure—gives psychological improvement over unemployment.” He supposes that the difference in men is that they tend to feel pressure not only to be employed, but also to be the primary breadwinners, and that more of a man’s self-worth depends on his job.
1.Why do researchers think the still employed deserve sympathy more?
A. They have to do more work since then.
B. They have no chance to find better jobs.
C. They have to work with inexperienced workers.
D. They constantly worry about losing their jobs.
2.What is most likely to cause a “fight or flight” response?
A. Not having a paid job. B. Fierce competition for jobs.
C. Not knowing what will happen. D. Pressure to work longer hours.
3.What will the writer talk about following the last paragraph?
A. Advice on preparing for a job interview.
B. Advice on handling pressure from insecure industries.
C. Some knowledge of psychology.
D. Difference in men and women.
4.What is the topic focused on by the author of the passage?
A. Is it less stressful to get laid off than stay on?
B. Should greater sympathy be given to the jobless?
C. Do employees bear more stress than ever before?
D. Do men or women show higher levels of anxiety?
I can still remember it as if it happened yesterday. I was a college freshman and had stayed up most of the night before laughing and talking with friends. Now just before my first class of the day my eyelids were feeling heavier and heavier and my head was drifting down to my desk to make my textbook a pillow. A few minutes’nap time before class couldn’t hurt, I thought.
Boom! I lifted my head immediately and my eyes opened wider than saucers. I looked around with my heart beating quickly trying to find the cause of the noise. My young professor was looking back at me with a mischievous, boyish smile on his face. He had intentionally dropped the pile of textbooks he was carrying onto my desk. “Good morning !”he said, still smiling. “I’m glad to see everyone is awake. Now let’s get started.”
For the next hour I wasn’t sleepy at all. It wasn’t from the shock of my professor’s textbook alarm clock either. Instead, it was from the attractive discussion he led. With knowledge and good humor, he made the material come alive. His insights were full of both wisdom and loving kindness. And the enthusiasm and joy that he taught with were contagious（有感染力的）. I left the classroom not only wide awake, but a little smarter and a little better as well.
I learned something far more important than not sleeping in class that day too. I learned that if you are going to do something in this life, do it well, do it with joy, and make it an expression of your love. What a glorious place this world would be if all of us did our work joyously and well ! What a beautiful world we could create if every doctor, teacher, musician, cook, waitress, poet, miner, farmer, and laborer made their work an expression of their love ! Don’t sleepwalk your way through life then. Wake up! Let your love fill your work and your soul. Life is too short not to live it well.
1.What did the author want to do just before his first class of the day?
A. Talk with his friends. B. Take a short sleep.
C. Get his eyes examined. D. Stay away from the class.
2.The underlined word “mischievous” in Paragraph 2 probably means “________”.
A. naughty B. tricky
C. sensitive D. dishonest
3.What else did the author learn that day?
A. Students should not sleep in class but respect their teachers.
B. Everyone should love his job and sleepwalk his way through life.
C. Life is too limited to make your work an expression of your love.
D. People from all walks of life should do their jobs with wisdom and love.
4.What can be inferred from this passage?
A. The professor often kept his students sharp by using a textbook alarm.
B. The author was attracted by the professor’s great wisdom and enthusiasm.
C. The author left the two-hour period not only wide awake, but a little smarter.
D. Though the author was frightened awake, he was not clear-headed in the class.
The Origins of Famous Brands
Our lives are full of brand names and trademarked products that we use every day. Although many brand names are simple acronyms(首字母缩略词) or versions of their founders names, some of the companies we trust every day actually have fascinating and surprising back stories.
Starbucks
It seems fitting that the most famous coffee brand in the world would take its name from one of the world’s greatest works of literature. The inspiration for the name of the coffeehouse came from Herman Melville’s Moby Dick. The founders’ original idea was to name the company after the Captain Ahab’s ship, but they eventually decided that Pequot wasn’t a great name for coffee, so they chose Ahab’s first mate, Starbucks, as the name instead.
Google was originally called Backrub, for it searched for links in every corner of the Web. In 1997, when the founders of the company were searching for a new name showing a huge amount of data for their rapidly improving search technology, a friend suggested the word “googol”. When a friend tried to register the new domain (域) name, he misspelled “googol” as “google”.
Nike
Originally founded as a distributor for Japanese running shoes, the company was originally named BRS, or Blue Ribbon Sports. In 1971, BRS introduced its own soccer shoe, a model called Nike, which is also the name for the Greek goddess of victory. In 1978, the company officially renamed itself as Nike, Inc.
The right name is essential to a company’s success, and a great origin story is just as important as a great product. An attractive origin story is one more thing that keeps customers guessing, wondering, and buying its products.
1.What is the name of the Captain Ahab’s ship?
A. Moby Dick. B. Starbucks.
C. Pequot. D. Herman Melville.
2.Why did the founders of the Google want to change its name?
A. They mistook their name.
B. They wanted new customers.
C. The company’s original name was too long.
D. The company’s search technology was improving rapidly.
3.Where does the importance of the origin story of one company lie in?
A. It can change the company’s image.
B. It can add myth to the company.
C. It explains the development of the company to customers.
D. It makes customers imagine and purchase its goods.
