If you intend using humor in your talk to make people smile, you must know how to identify shared experiences and problems. Your humor must be relevant to the audience and should help to show them that you are one of them or that you understand their situation and are in sympathy with their point of view. Depending on whom you are addressing, the problems will be different.
If you are talking to a group of managers, you may refer to the disorganized methods of their secretaries; alternatively if you are addressing secretaries, you may want to comment on their disorganized bosses.
Here is an example, which I heard at a nurses' convention, of a story which works well because the audience all shared the same view of doctors. A man arrives in heaven and is being shown around by St. Peter. He sees wonderful accommodations, beautiful gardens, sunny weather, and so on. Everyone is very peaceful, polite and friendly until, waiting in a line for lunch, the new arrival is suddenly pushed aside by a man in a white coat, who rushes to the head of the line, grabs his food and stomps over to a table by himself. "Who is that?" the new arrival asked St. Peter. "Oh, that's God." came the reply, "but sometimes he thinks he's a doctor."
If you are part of the group which you are addressing, you will be in a position to know the experiences and problems which are common to all of you and it'll be appropriate for you to make a passing remark about the inedible canteen food or the chairman's notorious bad taste in ties. With other audiences you mustn't attempt to cut in with humor as they will resent an outsider making disparaging remarks about their canteen or their chairman. You will be on safer ground if you stick to scapegoats like the Post Office or the telephone system.
If you feel awkward being humorous, you must practice so that it becomes more natural. Include a few casual and apparently off-the-cuff(即兴的)remarks which you can deliver in a relaxed and unforced manner. Often it's the delivery which causes the audience to smile, so speak slowly and remember that a raised eyebrow or an unbelieving look may help to show that you are making a light-hearted remark.
Look for the humor. It often comes from the unexpected. A twist on a familiar quote "If at first you don't succeed, give up" or a play on words or on a situation. Search for exaggeration and understatements. Look at your talk and pick out a few words or sentences which you can turn about and inject with humor.
1.To make your humor work, you should ________.
A. take advantage of different kinds of audience
B. make fun of the disorganized people.
C. address different problems to different people.
D. show sympathy for your listeners.
2.The joke about doctors implies that, in the eyes of nurses, they are ________.
A. impolite to new arrivals.
B. very conscious of their godlike role.
C. entitled to some privileges.
D. very busy even during lunch hours.
3.It can be inferred from the text that public services ________.
A. have benefited many people.
B. are the focus of public attention.
C. are an inappropriate subject for humor.
D. have often been the laughing stock.
4.To achieve the desired result, humorous stories should be delivered ________.
A. in well-worded language. B. as awkwardly as possible.
C. in exaggerated statement. D. as casually as possible.
5.The best title for the text may be ________.
A. Use Humor Effectively. B. Various Kinds of Humor.
C. Add Humor to Speech. D. Different Humor Strategies.
When Charles Strattion was five, he stopped growing. His mother took him to see the famous showman, P.T.Barnum, and thought a small person would be the perfect addition to his show. He hired Charles’ parents along with him, and they traveled around the world together.
He gave the two-foot-tall Charles a new name, general Tom Thumb. He taught Tom how to sing, dance, act, and tell jokes. When he felt Tom was ready to perform on stage, he made up ads. To stir up great interest, he said that Tom was eleven years old and had come from England.
During the show, Tom fought battles pretendedly with tall people. He also danced upon a wooden plate held by a person who was eight feet tall.
Tom’s act was very popular and brought in a lot of money. By the time Tom was an adult, he had grown very rich. He had become a billionaire at the age of twenty-five.
Fortunately for Tom, Mr. Barnum added more little people to his show, and Tom became lucky in love as well. One of the little people was Lavinia Warren, a school teacher. Tom was able to win her love, and they married.
The ceremony and reception were the talk of the town. They were attended by many rich and famous people and by about two thousand guests. Crowds filled the streets of New York to have a look at their tiny wedding carriage. The couple even met with President Abraham Lincoln on their honeymoon, just before going to live in Tom’s house in Connecticut.
Their wedding, which took place during the Civil War, provided a welcome escape from the sad problems of war. Not willing to let this bit of sunshine fade, communities throughout the country sponsored “Tom Thumb” weddings. In these weddings, small boys and girls, all dressed up, went through marriage ceremony for fun.
1.“the talk of the town” means _________ .
A. they were in the newspaper
B. people spread mean rumors about them
C. they were the most popular things happening
D. they were discussed in a city meeting
2.What does the author think about Tom Thumb’s wedding?
A. People gave it too much of their attention.
B. It helped people cheer up in a dark time.
C. It was funny and ridiculous.
D. Tom and Lavinia were stupid.
3.Which of the following is the best clue to the fact that Tom was smart?
A. He became a billionaire at twenty-five.
B. He learned how to sing, dance, and act at a very young age.
C. He met with President Lincoln during his honeymoon.
D. He married a school teacher.
4.It was very funny when Tom danced on a wooden plate held by a person who was eight feet tall because ________ .
A. the wooden plate would make it sound as if Tom were tap dancing
B. it made Tom feel taller
C. the eight-foot-tall man was the only tall person Tom trusted
D. the difference between them would make Tom look even smaller
5.What does the author imply in the last paragraph?
A. Weddings always make people feel full of sunshine.
B. People are always disappointed during wartime.
C. Entertainment can serve an important purpose.
D. People should be married even if they are small.
In 1993, New York State ordered stores to charge a deposit on beverage (=drink) containers. Within a year, consumers had returned millions of aluminum cans and glass and plastic bottles. Plenty of companies were eager to accept the aluminum and glass as raw material for new products, but because few could figure out what to do with the plastic, much of it would end up buried in landfills(垃圾填埋场). The problem was not limited to New York. Unfortunately, there were too few uses for second-hand plastic.
Today, one out of five plastic soda bottles is recycled in the United States. The reason for the change is that now there are dozens of companies across the country buying discarded plastic soda bottles and turning them into fence post, paint brushes, etc.
As the New York experience shows, recycling involves more than simply separating valuable materials from the rest of the rubbish. A discard remains a discard unti1 somebody figures out how to give it a second life — and until economic arrangements exist to give that second life va1ue.Without adequate markets to absorb materials collected for recycling, throwaways actually depress prices for used materials.
Shrinking landfill space and rising costs for burying and burning rubbish are forcing local governments to look more closely at recycling. In many areas, the East Coast especially, recycling is already the least expensive waste-management option. For every ton of waste recycled, a city avoids paying for its disposal, which, in parts of New York, amounts to savings of more than $100 per ton. Recycling also stimulates the local economy by creating jobs and reduces the pollution control and energy costs of industries that make recycled products by giving them a more refined raw material.
1.What regulation was issued by New York State concerning beverage containers?
A. A fee should be charged on used containers for recycling.
B. Throwaways should be collected by the state for recycling.
C. Consumers had to pay for beverage containers and could get their money back on returning them.
D. Beverage companies should be responsible for collecting and reusing discarded plastic soda bottles.
2.The returned plastic bottles in New York used to .
A. be turned into raw materia1s
B. be separated from other rubbish
C. have a second-life value
D. end up somewhere underground
3.The key problem in dealing with returned plastic beverage containers is .
A. how to reduce their recycling costs
B. to sell them at a profitable price
C. how to turn them into useful things
D. to lower the prices for used materials
4.Recycling has become the first choice for the disposal of rubbish because .
A. recycling causes litt1e pollution
B. other methods are more expensive
C. recycling has great appeal for the jobless
D. local governments find it easy to manage
5.It can be concluded from the passage that .
A. recycling is to be recommended both economically and environmentally
B. local governments in the U. S. can expect big profits from recycling
C. rubbish is a potential remedy for the shortage of raw materials
D. landfills will sti1l be widely used for waste disposal
Societies all over the world name places in similar ways. Quite often there is no official naming ceremony but places tend to be called names as points of reference by people. Then an organized body steps in and gives the place a name. Frequently it happens that a place has two names: One is named by the people and the other by the government. As in many areas, old habits died hard, and the place continues to be called by its unofficial name long after the meaning is lost.
Many roads and places in Singapore are named in order that the pioneers will be remembered by future generations. Thus we have names such as Stamford Road and Raffles Place. This is in keeping with traditions in many countries ---- in both the West and the East.
Another way of naming places is naming them after other places. Perhaps they were named to promote friendships between the two places or it could be that the people who used to live there were originally from the places that the roads were named after. The mystery is clearer when we see some of the roads named in former British bases. If you step into Selector Airbase you will see Piccadilly Circus ---- obviously named by some homesick Royal Air Force personnel.
Some places were named after the activities that used to go on at those places. Bras Basah Road is an interesting example, “Base Basah” means “wet rice” in Malay(马来语). Now why would anyone want to name a road “Wet Rice Road”? The reason is simple. During the pioneering days, wet rice was laid out to dry along this road.
A few roads in Singapore are named by their shapes. There is “Circular Road” for one. Other roads may have part of their names to describe their shapes, like “Paya Lebar Crescent”. This road is called a crescent(月牙) because it begins on the main road, makes a crescent and comes back to join the main road again.
1.We learn from Paragraph 1 that _____.
A. the government is usually the first to name a place
B. many places tend to have more than one name
C. a ceremony will be held when a place is named
D. people prefer the place names given by the government
2.What does the underlined phrase “die hard” in Paragraph 1 probably mean?
A. Change suddenly.
B. Change significantly.
C. Disappear mysteriously.
D. Disappear very slowly.
3.Which of the following places is named after a person?
A. Raffles Place.
B. Selector Airbase.
C. Piccadilly Circus.
D. Paya Lebar Crescent.
4.Bras Basah Road is named _______.
A. after a person
B. after a place
C. after an activity
D. by its shape
5.What can be inferred from the passage?
A. Some place names in Singapore are the same as in Britain.
B. Some places in Singapore are named for military purposes.
C. The way Singaporeans name their places is unique.
D. Young Singaporeans have forgotten the pioneers.
阅读下面短文，按照句子结构的语法性和上下文连贯的要求，在空格处填入一个适当的词或使用括号中词语的正确形式填空，并将答案填写在答题卡上标号的相应位置。
Doctors urge more playtime for children
The American Academy of Pediatrics (儿科) says 1.children really need for health development is more good, old-fashioned playtime.
Many parents load their 2.(child) schedules with get-smart videos, enrichment activities and lots of classes in a drive to help 3.do better. The efforts often begin as early as babyhood. Free play is neglected in the shuffle, a new academy report says.
Numerous studies have shown that free play is very 4.(benefit). It can help children become creative, develop problem-solving skills, relate to others and adjust to school settings, 5.academy report says.
“Perhaps above all, play is something 6.is a cherished part of childhood,” says another report, 7.(prepare) by two academy committees for release Monday 8.the group's annual meeting in Atlanta.
It adds that enrichment tools and organized activities can be helpful, 9.should not 10.(view) as a requirement for creating successful children. They must be balanced with plenty of free playtime.
Anna Douglas was 72 years old when she started writing her newspaper column. She had been a school teacher before she retired, but she needed to keep 1. She was even willing to work without pay. She then offered her 2to a business that helped other businesses find jobs for old people. Every day she 3other old folk like her, by talking with them, she 4two things. Old people had abilities that were not 5. But old people also had some 6. She found a new purpose for herself then.
Through the years, she 7to write stories about people for national magazines. There was now a new 8: Old people like herself. She began to write a newspaper column called “Sixty Plus”, which was about 9old. She writes about the problems of old people, especially their problems with being 10. Anna Douglas uses her 11ability to see the truth behind a problem. She understands 12problems begin. For example, one of her 13said that his grandchildren 14the houses as soon as he came to visit. Mrs. Douglas 15some ways for him to understand his grandchildren.
1.A. free B. rich C. powerful D. busy
2.A. services B. money C. students D. books
3.A. observed B. met C. comforted D. answered
4.A. enjoyed B. followed C. recognized D. demanded
5.A. studied B. agreed C. gave D. used
6.A. mistakes B. problems C. questions D. characters
7.A. had B. ought C. was D. used
8.A. subject B. life C. way D. plan
9.A. getting B. respecting C. employing D. supporting
10.A. unknown B. refused C. misunderstood D. discouraged
11.A. thinking B. working C. reading D. leading
12.A. that B. when C. whether D. why
13.A. visitors B. readers C. listeners D. friends
14.A. got B. entered C. left D. passed
15.A. suggested B. chose C. invented D. imagined
