It is quite apparent that competition surrounds every aspect of human life whether in the United States or the Amazon rainforest. Without it we would not have grown into primates (灵长类动物) . Or we would probably still be struggling to sharpen a bronze tool while crawling around on four legs in search of meat. Without competition, Columbus wouldn’t have discovered America and Edison would never have invented the light bulb.
Friendship, like all relationships between two people, involves competition. It isn’t competition in a traditional sense because there are no goals to be scored and no prize. Perhaps the ecological definition --- the simultaneous (同时) demand by two or more organisms for limited environmental resources, such as nutrinents, living space, or light --- better explains it.
As in nature, high school life is governed by a set of laws, similar to a shortened version of Darwin’s theory of evolution, overpopulation, and competition. There is an abundance of high school students and to distinguish them, ranking and categorizing (分类) take place. In high school, friendships learn to coexist with competition even though at times the relationship is rough. In fact, in some circumstance, competition is too much of a burden for a friendship to bear, causing it to fall apart. College admission is the final high school objective. Four years of hard work is to achieve good grades, and a student’s fate is determined not only by these achievements, but by the records of thousands of other seniors trying to achieve a similar recognition.
Nevertheless, by necessity, competition between students exists in all aspects of high school life. It sets and improves the standards in everything from sports to schoolwork. A healthy, friendly competition can have only benefits, but when it becomes too fierce, jealousy (妒忌) can tear friendships apart. Yet, despite all this, without competition, we would be lost.
1.What does the ecological definition mainly explain?
A.How to win the competition. B.What competition exactly is.
C.What the result of competition is. D.How friends compete with each other.
2.According to the writer, what causes the high school students to compete?
A.They know the laws of nature well. B.Friendship is a burden for them.
C.The number of them is too large. D.They are divided into different groups.
3.Which best describes the relationship of friendship and competition?
A.Friendship is always based on competition.
B.Competition is a result of lost friendship.
C.Competition is terribly harmful to friendships.
D.The degree of competition is vital to friendship.
4.What does the author think of “competition”?
A.Competition is certain to happen at school.
B.The result of competition are out of control.
C.Competition becomes fierce in high school.
D.Friendship is not as important as competition at school.
Bullying（欺凌）at school is a problem around the world. Most schools have. tried to reduce bullying by- making more rules. And many schools even have made their teachers supervise（监督）their students' behavior more strictly But one school in Auckland, New Zealand has done something different. Instead of making more rules for the playground, they reduced the number of rules. What happened? There's less bullying and other injuries.
At Swanson Primary School, during playtime, students can play in the mud, climb trees, ride skateboards, and do many such things that aren't allowed at other schools. If they promise that they do not hurt others and do not make trouble for their classmates, they can do just about anything they want.
“They may accidentally hurt themselves, but that's 0K," the teacher Bruce Mclachlan says. " We want kids to be safe and we look after them, but we end up wrapping（包裹）them in cotton wool when in fact they should be able to fall over. " Because students are able to do almost anything they want, they are happier. And happier students are less interested in making trouble. That makes parents and teachers happy.
Playtime freedom all helps the students learn the dangers of rude behavior. This will help develop the part of their brain that measures risks. This can be helpful when they are older. For example, if a kid does something rude on a skateboard and gets hurt, he or she will be less likely to repeat the rude activity. And if kids learn not to be rude on a skateboard, they are less likely to be hurt later in life when they're driving cars. Safety is important, but as Swanson Primary School has shown, more rules don't always mean more safety.
1.What happened when a school reduced the number of playground rules?
A.Students were out of control completely.
B.Teachers took on more responsibility.
C.Less students were bullied or injured.
D.More parents worried about school bullying.
2.What rule should students obey if they want to do something freely at Swanson Primary School?
A.They do not hurt anyone else.
B.They're being strictly supervised.
C.They study carefully in the classroom.
D.They do not make trouble for their teachers.
3.What does Bruce Mclachlan mean by saying “we end up wrapping them in cotton wool” in Paragraph 3?
A.Students get hurt easily.
B.Students are overprotected.
C.Students can't wear what they like.
D.Students are given too much freedom.
4.According to the last paragraph, playtime freedom helps students .
A.avoid driving cars
B.make safe decisions
C.learn how to obey rules
D.become more confident
Doing voluntary work is becoming more and more popular nowadays because it benefits the individual volunteer, people in need and our society.
When helping others, we are enriching our lives as well. First, doing voluntary work is our responsibility and duty. Second, we can enlarge our life circles so that we get more chances to learn deeper about the present situation of our society, which is very important to our future development. Last, when doing voluntary work with others, we are improving our ability to cooperate with different people and build up team spirit. As for us students, doing voluntary work is an effective way to participate in social activities. In other words, it gives us the chances to prepare to fit into the society in advance.
Through voluntary work, the living conditions of people in need are improved. For example, lots of children in remote areas don't have access to enough food and clothes, let alone education. Some people donate money and clothes while some volunteers go to these areas to teach these children, bringing them knowledge as well as the latest information of the world. In this way, these children's qualities of life are improved and they'll integrate into the society more easily and get a sense of belonging.
The more voluntary work we do, the more steady and harmonious our society will be. Volunteers spread warmth and care all over the world, strengthening union and trust among citizens. As Ban Ki-moon once said, “Volunteerism is a source of community strength. It can bring positive social change by promoting respect for diversity, equality and the participation of all."
In conclusion, by doing voluntary work, both volunteers and people in need get the precious life experience, and it benefits our society to a large degree. We should keep on doing and appeal to more people to take part in this meaningful activity.
1.What does the passage mainly talk about?
A.Doing voluntary work is becoming popular at present.
B.Doing voluntary work takes much energy and money.
C.Doing voluntary work can make more people live a happy life.
D.Doing voluntary work is beneficial to others, our society and volunteers themselves.
2.Why does the writer say it also benefits individual volunteers while they are helping others?
A.It can improve their ability to get along with different kinds of people,
B.It helps them win recognition and respect from others.
C.One can become famous for doing voluntary work.
D.One can make more friends while helping others.
3.Which of the following can best replace the underlined phrase in the third paragraph?
A.Break into. B.Look into.
C.Adapt to. D.Contribute to.
4.From what Ban Ki-moon said, what did he disagree with?
A.Voluntary work makes our society a big family full of love and care.
B.Voluntary work is a bridge connecting all kinds of people together.
C.Voluntary work is so necessary that we should stick with it.
D.Voluntary work contributes to people's leading a wealthy life.
短文改错
High school is regarded as best time of my life. Besides classes and homework，there's something more that I especial treasure. To leave school without regret, I'll make the best of my limiting time to go over the lessons I've learned from. At the same time, I'd like to show my thanks to all the teacher who have given me so many help. For the purpose of improving me, I'll ask my classmates for some advice, that may be of great value to me. Last and not least, doing some good deeds for my classmates was also my plan. With these things being done, I will have no regret in my high school life.
Informal conversation is an important part of any business relationship. 1.Latin Americans enjoy sharing information about their local history, art, and customs. They expect questions about their family and are sure to show pictures of their children. The French think of conversation as an art form. 2.For them, arguments can be interesting---and they can cover pretty much or any topic---as long as they occur in a respectful and intelligent manner.
In the United States, business people like to discuss a wide range of topics, including opinions about work, family, hobbies, and politics. 3.They do not share much about their thoughts, feelings, or emotions because they feel that doing so might take away from the harmonious business relationship they’re trying to build. Middle Easterners are also private about their personal lives and family matters. It is considered rude, for example, to ask a businessman from Saudi Arabia about his wife or children.
4.This can get you into trouble, even in the United States, where people hold different views. Sports is typically a friendly subject in most parts of the world, although be careful not to criticize a national sport.5.
A.Instead, be friendly and praise your host’s team.
B.You may feel free to ask your Latin American friends similar questions.
C.Before you start a discussion, however, make sure you understand which topics are suitable in a particular culture.
D.In Japan, China, and Korea, however, people are much more private.
E.In addition, discussing one’s salary is usually considered unsuitable.
F.They enjoy the value of lively discussions as well as disagreements.
G.As a general rule, it’s best not to talk about politics or religion with your business friends.
Traditionally, across the world, boys and girls attend a mixed school, where they study together. But boys’ schools are the perfect place to teach young men to express their emotions and involve them in activities such as art, dance and music.
Boys at single—sex schools were said to be more likely to get involved in cultural and artistic activities that helped develop their emotional expressiveness, rather than feeling they had to correspond to（和……相符）the “boy code” of hiding their emotions to be a “real man”.
The findings of the study go against received wisdom that boys do better when taught alongside girls.
Tony Little, headmaster of Eton, warmed that boys were being failed by the British education system because it had become too focused on girls. He criticized teachers for failing to recognize that boys are actually more emotional than girls.
The research argued that boys often perform badly in mixed schools because they become discouraged when girls do better earlier in speaking and reading skills.
But in single-sex schools teachers can tailor lessons to boys’ learning style, letting them move around the classroom and getting them to compete in teams to prevent boredom, wrote the study’s author, Abigail James, of the University of Virginia.
Teachers could encourage boys to enjoy reading and writing with “boy-focused” approaches such as themes and characters that appeal to them. Because boys generally have more acute vision, learn best through touch, and are physically more active, they need to be given “hands-on” lessons where they are allowed to walk around. “Boys in mixed schools view classical music as feminine（女性的）and prefer the modern genre（类型）in which violence and sexism are major themes,” James wrote.
Single—sex education also made it less likely that boys would feel that they had to be “masterful and in charge” in relationships. “In mixed schools, boys feel forced to act like men before they understand themselves well enough to know what that means,” the study reported.
1.The author believes that a single-sex school would ________.
A.force boys to hide their emotions to be “real men”
B.help boys to be more competitive in schools
C.encourage boys to express their emotions more freely
D.naturally strengthen boys traditional image of a man
2.It is commonly believed that in a mixed school boys ________.
A.behave more responsibly
B.grow up more healthily
C.perform relatively better
D.receive a better education
3.According to Abigail James, one of the advantages of single—sex schools is that ________.
A.teaching can be tailored to suit the characteristics of boys
B.boys can focus on their lessons without being distracted
C.boys can choose to learn whatever they are interested in
D.teaching can be designed to promote boys' team spirit
4.What does the underlined word “acute” in Paragraph 7 mean?
A.lovely.. B.sharp.
C.serious. D.dull
