In modern society there is a great deal of argument about competition. Some value it highly, believing that it is responsible for social-progress and prosperity. Others say that competition is bad; that it sets one person against another; that it leads to unfriendly relationship between people.
I have taught many children who held the belief that their self-worth relied on how well they performed at tennis and other skills. For them, playing well and winning are often life-and-death affairs. In their single-minded pursuit of success, the development of many other human qualities is sadly forgotten.
However, while some seem to be lost in the desire to succeed, others take an opposite attitude. In a culture which values only the winner and pays no attention to the ordinary players, they strongly blame competition. Among the most vocal are youngsters who have suffered under competitive pressures from their parents or society. Teaching these young people, I often observe in them a desire to fail. They seem to seek failure by not trying to win or achieve success. By not trying, they always have an excuse: "I may have lost, but it doesn't matter because I really didn't try." What is not usually admitted by themselves is the belief that if they had really tried and lost, that would mean a lot. Such a loss would be a measure of their worth. Clearly, this belief is the same as that of the true competitors who try to prove themselves. Both are based on the mistake belief that-one's self-respect relies on how well one performs in comparison with others. Both are afraid of not being valued. Only as this basic and often troublesome fear begins to dissolve (缓解) can we discover a new meaning in competition.
1.What does this text mainly talk about?
A. Competition helps to set up self-respect.
B. Competition is harmful to personal quality development.
C. People hold different opinions about competition.
D. Failures are necessary experience in competition.
2.Some people favor competition because they think it __.
A. builds up a sense of pride
B. pushes society forward
C. improves social abilities
D. develops people's relationship
3. The underlined phrase "the most vocal” in Paragraph 3 refers to those who
A. are strongly against competition
B. highly value competition
C. try their best to win
D. mostly rely on others for success
4. Which viewpoint does the author agree to?
A. Self-worth relies on winning.
B. Competition leads to unfriendly relationship.
C. Fear of failure should be removed in competition.
D. Winning should be a life-and-death matter.
The rise of the Internet has been one of the most transformative developments in human history, comparable in impact to the invention of the printing press and the telegraph. Over two billion people worldwide now have access to vastly more information than ever before, and can communicate with each other instantly, often using Web-connected mobile devices they carry everywhere. But the Internet’s tremendous impact has only just begun.
“Mass adoption of the Internet is driving one of the most exciting social, cultural, and political transformations in history, and unlike earlier periods of change, this time the effects are fully global,” Schmidt and Cohen write in their new book The New Digital Age.
Perhaps the most profound changes will come when the five billion people worldwide who currently lack Internet access get online. The authors do an excellent job of examining the implications of the Internet revolution for individuals, governments, and institutions like the news media. But if the book has one major shortcoming, it’s that authors don’t spend enough time applying a critical eye to the role of Internet businesses in these sweeping changes.
In their book, the authors provide the most authoritative volume to date that describes — and more importantly predicts — how the Internet will shape our lives in the coming decades. They paint a picture of a world in which individuals, companies, institutions, and governments must deal with two realities, one physical, and one virtual.
At the core of the book is the idea that “technology is neutral, but people aren’t.” By using this concept as a starting point, the authors aim to move beyond the now familiar optimist vs. pessimist dichotomy (对立观点) that has characterized many recent debates about whether the rise of the Internet will ultimately be good or bad for society. In an interview with TIME earlier this week, Cohen said although he and his co-author are optimistic about many aspects of the Internet, they’re also realistic about the risks and dangers that lie ahead when the next five billion people come online, particularly with respect to personal privacy and state surveillance(监视).
【题文1】 In what way is the rise of the Internet similar to the invention of the printing press and the telegraph?
A. It transforms human history.
B. It revolutionizes people's thinking.
C. It is adopted by all human beings.
D. It makes daily communication easy.
【题文2】 In what respect is the book The New Digital Age considered inadequate?
A. It lacks an objective evaluation of the role of Internet businesses
B. It fails to look into the social implications of the Internet.
C. It fails to recognize the impact of the Internet technology.
D. It does not address the technical aspects of Internet communication.
1.What will the future be like when everybody gets online?
A. People don’t have to travel to see the world.
B. People will have equal access to information.
C. People will be living in two different realities.
D. People don’t have to communicate face to face.
2.What does the passage say about the authors of The New Digital Age?
A. They leave many questions unanswered concerning the Internet.
B. They don’t take sides in analyzing the effects of the Internet.
C. They have explored the unknown territories of the virtual world.
D. They are optimistic about the future of the Internet revolution.
It’s hard to find Alice Munro in the media. Even after she won the 2013 Nobel Prize in Literature, the Canadian writer just appeared for a quick interview and then dropped out of sight. On Dec 29, she still didn't seek the spotlight（聚光灯）when she was named one of the five Women of the Year by the Financial Times.
In Munro's eyes, ordinary lives always hide larger dramas. So she records what we casually think of as the everyday actions of normal people. She often focuses on life in her hometown, a small village in Ontario which she is most familiar with. She writes about the ordinary things in the village－fox forming, trees filled in the Ontario wilderness, poor country alcohol and long last illnesses. Above all, she talks about girls and women who have seemingly ordinary lives but struggle against daily misfortune.
She has a special talent for uncovering the extraordinary in the ordinary. These are ordinary people, ordinary stories, but she has the magic. Her precise language, depth of detail and the logic of her storytelling have made her stories inviting.
Runaway, one of Munro’s representative works, is a good example of her writing style. One of the stories centers on the life of an ordinary woman Carla, who lives in a small Canadian town with her husband Clark. The story slowly forms a picture of Carla, trapped in a bad marriage, her unhappiness building into desperation until she decided to flee. The story of Carla is a story of the power and betrayals of love. It is about lost children and lots of chances that we can all find in life, There is pain beneath the surface, like a needle in the heart.
Since she published her first collection of short stories in 1968, Munro has won many awards, with the Nobel Prize being her biggest honor. On Oct 10, 2013, the Nobel Prize committee named Munro the “master of the contemporary short story”.
1.We learn from Paragraph 1 that Alice Munro_____
A．didn't get on well with the media
B．remained modest though very successful
C．didn’t value the title of Women of the Year
D. was surprised at winning the Nobel Prize
2.What makes Alice Munro’s stories fascinating according to the text?
A．Her writing techniques
B．The complicated plots
C．The humorous language
D．Her rich imagination
3.In her representative work Runaway, Carla_____
A．leads a happy life with Clark
B．is a faithful wife to her husband
C．loses all hopes for a better life
D．tries to run away from her husband
4.What is the text mainly about?
A．Alice Munro and her hometown
B．The awards Alice Munro won
C．Alice Munro and her writing style
D．Alice Munro’s literary life
A small boy sat on the street with a hat by his feet. He held up a sign which said: “ I am blind, please help”. There were only a few coins in the hat.
A man was walking by. He took a few coins from his pocket and dropped them into the hat. He then took the sign, turned it around, and wrote some words. He put the sign back so that everyone who walked by would see the new words. Soon the hat began to fill up. A lot more people were giving money to the blind boy. That afternoon the man who had changed the sign came to see how things were.
The boy recognized his footsteps and asked :“Were you the one who changed my sign this morning? What did you write?” The man said: “I only wrote the truth. I said what you said but in a different way.”
What he had written was: “Today is a beautiful day but I cannot see it.”
Do you think the first sign and the second sign were saying the same thing? Of course both signs told people the boy was blind. But the first sign simply told people to help by putting some money in the hat. The second sign told people that they were able to enjoy the day, but the boy could not enjoy it because he was blind.
The first sign simply said the boy was blind. The second sign told people they were so lucky that they were not blind.
There are at least two lessons we can learn from this simple story.
The first is: Be thankful for what you have. Someone else has less. Help where you can.
The second is：Be creative. Think differently. There is always a better way!
1. What was the boy doing on the street?
A. He was selling his old hat.
B. He was busy counting coins.
C. He was begging for money.
D. He was showing his handwriting.
2. How did the man help the blind boy?
A. He took the boy's sign away.
B. He only gave the boy some money.
C. He changed the words on the sign.
D. He asked others to help the blind boy.
3. The blind boy recognized the kind man by his ______ .
A. words B. smell C. voice D. Footsteps
假如你是李华，国际学校的教师Paul邀请你星期六参加该校举行的“中国文化日”活动。但你爷爷突然生病住院，你要和父母一起去医院探视，不得不谢绝他的邀请。请根据下列要点用英语给Paul写一封电子邮件。
要点：1.谢绝邀请；
2．说明理由；
3．预祝活动成功。
注意：1.词数100左右；
2．可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯；
3．邮件开头和结尾已为你写好。
Dear Paul，
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Yours，
Li Hua
短文改错（共10小题；每小题1分，满分10分）
假定英语课上老师要求同桌之间交换修改作文，请你修改你同桌写的以下作文。文中共有10处错误，每句中最多有两处，错误仅涉及一个单词的增加，删除或修改。
增加：在缺词处加一个漏词符号（^），并在其下面写出该加的词。
删除：把多余的词用斜线(＼)划掉。
修改：在错的词下划一横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。
注意：1.每处错误及其修改均仅限一词。
2．只允许修改10处，多者（从第11处起）不计分。
May I have your attention, please?
As you know it, our class will have a talk show on environment protection with Class One on May 4th. Before it take place, we will invite Dr. Lil from Qinghua University give us a talk on the environment problem and he will also tell you about the improvement in environment protection in recent years in Beijing.
The report will begin at 2:00 pm in Wednesday, April 30th in the auditorium on the third floor in the classroom building. I’m sure we can get enough informations from his talk to make well preparations for a coming talk show. Everyone should be there on time, then listen to the report or take full notes on the same time.
That’s all. Thank you.
