I believe that the stories we tell our children shape the future stories of their lives.
As a father of four, I consider storytelling a vital part of family life because it provides ______ nourishment (营养) children need. However, that’s really not ______ I’m talking about.
All the bedtime storytelling I did to my kids was just ______ the groundwork for the lives I wanted them to have. With my kids, the typical bedtime stories, like Snow White and Little Red Cap, ______ the stories of my own life. One ______ like this: Uncle Rick fell asleep on the bus coming home from school. My Dad had to run after the bus, ______ and begging the bus driver to ______ him. My children never tired of hearing them. Soon, the place of the storytelling changed from the ______ to the dinner table.
My stories are ______ of who they’re now. They like to repeat them at family get-togethers and I ______ they’ve learned valuable life ______ during the retelling. They’re beginning to tell their own stories now too. There’s ______ sweeter to my ear than hearing my twenty-one-year-old kids say: “Remember the time when...” It’s like a(n) ______ of the old scenes.
These stories built a ______ of family that could never have been ______ in any school. What my kids were ______ in these stories was the ______ that they were part of something larger. ______ to me, these stories gave me a way to ______ each child with the other and then with me. This is how we ______ present the world to them and finally begin to change it.
1.A. physical B. abundant C. temporary D. imaginative
2.A. what B. how C. that D. when
3.A. recovering B. exploring C. laying D. arranging
4.A. gave way to B. kept in with C. set apart from D. made up for
5.A. moved B. went C. spoke D. passed
6.A. whispering B. cursing C. shouting D. murmuring
7.A. wake B. hit C. amuse D. disturb
8.A. office B. living room C. playground D. bedroom
9.A. whole B. one C. none D. part
10.A. doubt B. remember C. imagine D. believe
11.A. rules B. lessons C. experiences D. purposes
12.A. nothing B. something C. everything D. anything
13.A. reappearance B. challenge C. origin D. standard
14.A. change B. future C. sense D. model
15.A. observed B. taught C. ignored D. improved
16.A. playing with B. turning down C. setting aside D. picking up
17.A. explaining B. understanding C. leaving D. teaching
18.A. However B. So C. But D. Though
19.A. unite B. compare C. match D. concern
20.A. last B. secretly C. first D. immediately
Sports offer kids the ability to exercise while having fun, the chance to learn how to play as a team, and a good way to develop athletic skills. Despite these benefits, 70% of kids quit sports by the age of 13. 1..
◆2..
Have you ever watched kindergarteners play soccer against another team of kindergarteners? It is both enjoyable and amusing. No matter what the score, all the kids have a good time and are happy.
3.. The focus changes from having fun to practicing skills. Only the pre-teens with the best skills can get the most time in the game. What was a fun activity at age 5 becomes a source of stress and pressure for a pre-teen. Those who are not among the most talented players tend to quit and find something else they might be good at.
◆ It costs more.
4.. Parents of a pre-teen are going to need to purchase a uniform, gear, and equipment. Teams need to travel to compete against teams from other schools or districts. Parents who want to watch the games now have extra gas costs to deal with.
Therefore, when an activity becomes expensive, parents start pushing their pre-teen to do well in it. Perhaps the parents complain that if their pre-teen is sitting on the bench, or isn’t the star player, the money wasn’t worth it. This adds extra pressure on a pre-teen who might quit the team.
◆ It’s the age.
Parents need to remember that pre-teens are going through a lot of changes. Their bodies are changing School has become more challenging (and requires them to manage a lot of homework). 5. If your pre-teen’s friends quit playing soccer, your pre-teen might quit as well.
A. Their peers are becoming more important to them than their family is.
B. The more money in a sport, the less participation in it.
C. As kids get older, the experience of playing sports changes.
D. The older a player gets, the more expensive the participation in a sport becomes.
E. It stops being fun.
F. Here are some reasons why that happens.
G. Their friends are becoming bored of some sport.
Musicians are said to have better language skills and scientific studies have backed that up. But it’s not clear why that might be the case.
Now, a study of 74 Chinese kindergarteners suggests six months of piano lessons can heighten the brain’s response to changes in pitch (声调). And kids who got piano lessons were also better at telling apart two similar-sounding Mandarin (普通话) words, which contained different consonants (辅音), than were students who got extra reading training or who went through regular kindergarten.
Mandarin is a tonal language — the famous example is the word ma which can mean mother or horse depending on its pitch. So might musical training translate better to Mandarin than it would to English?
Yeah, it’s possible that this influenced the results, said Robert Desimone, a neuroscientist (神经科学家) at the McGovern Institute at MIT. But he says other studies do back up the fact that music lessons benefit language learners, even in countries without tonal languages. “And what our study added on top of that was some idea of the neural basis for those benefits.”
And if you don’t own a piano, don’t despair. The reading group actually did just as well on many measures as the piano group. “Reading’s pretty good actually. We don’t mean to disvalue reading instruction.”
More important, he says, was to show piano wasn’t actually worse than reading for these kills... thus perhaps encouraging cash-strapped schools to bring their music programs alive.
1.Which of the following is true according to the article?
A. It’s obvious why musicians have better language skills.
B. Musicians tend to be better language learners.
C. Reading works better than a piano for language skills.
D. Music lessons are greatly valued in money-tight schools.
2.What does the underlined part in paragraph 3 mean?
A. Musical training makes Mandarin easier than English to understand.
B. Musicians translate Mandarin better than English.
C. Musical training contributes better to learning a tonal language than a non-tonal one.
D. Musical lessons help English learners more than Mandarin learners.
3.From what column of the magazine might the article be taken?
A. Sports. B. Entertainment.
C. Education. D. Economy.
4.What may be the best title of the article?
A. Musicians Are Smarter
B. Reading Helps Language Learning
C. Benefits of Language Learning
D. Piano Lessons Tune Up Language Skills
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has issued a recommendation about how much juice children should consume. In general, the recommendations might be less than what you are currently giving your child.
An AAP policy statement issued in 2001 recommended no juice for children younger than 6 months of age, 4-6 ounces of juice daily for children aged 1-6, and 8-12 ounces for children 7 or older.
Those recommendations have now been revised partly due to considerable concern about increasing weight and teeth problems.
The new AAP recommendation is that fruit juice should not be provided at all to children under I year of age, instead; water and cow’s milk are preferred as primary liquid sources for children after weaning (断奶).
The new recommendations also lower the amount of juice for older children. Children aged 1-3 can have 4 ounces of 100% juice daily, children aged 4-6 4 to 6 ounces, and children 7 or older 8 ounces.
The AAP says there is no role for juice during the first year of life, and that expensive juice products designed specially for infants (new-born babies) are not of value. They note that juice should not be given as a means of soothing an upset child.
This doesn’t mean that the AAP is against fruit. In fact, they recommend that whole fruit be provided and encouraged for children.
One big advantage of whole fruit is that whole fruit contains fiber. It also contains some protein.
Children aged 4-6 should be offered fruit that has a lot of fiber, such as apples, pears, berries, or oranges. They can also have juice that has fiber in it. Children 7 and older should get a total of 2 to 2 1/2 servings of fruit per day.
1.Which of the following words can replace “soothing” in paragraph 6?
A. Annoying. B. Calming.
C. Refreshing. D. Teasing.
2.What may account for the AAP’s issuing the new recommendation?
A. People’s health is put at risk from taking too much juice.
B. Juice products are proved of little value.
C. Whole fruit is gaining popularity among kids.
D. None of the above.
3.We know from the passage that ________.
A. water and cow’s milk are a better choice for infants’ health than juice.
B. juice contains more nutrients necessary for health than whole fruit.
C. the more expensive juice products are, the more value they have.
D. the earlier children take juice in their first year, the healthier they’ll become.
4.What is the passage mainly about?
A. Advantages of whole fruit over juice.
B. Harm done to children who take juice
C. The amout of juice children can take
D. The time when children can take juice.
My first performance in front of an audience was coming up soon.
I tried as hard as I could to remain calm, but my heart was racing. I stared down at my sweat-covered, shaking hands.
I looked up again at the audience realizing that these were real people. They were not just my mum and dad, who would say, “Good job!” even if I messed up the entire piece.
What if I had the wrong music? What if I played the wrong notes?
As it turned out, I was never able to answer these questions because the spotlight was waiting for me. I grasped my hands tightly together, drying off the sweat.
Slowly I walked to the mud-brown piano in the center of the room. It contained 88 demanding keys, which were waiting impatiently to be played. swallowed the golf-ball-sized lump (隆起部分) in my throat and sat down Slowly, I opened the music. Next, I rested my still shaking hands on the ivory (象牙色的) keys.
As my fingers played across the keys, I was becoming more unsure of my preparation for this moment. But the memory of my years of training came flooding back. I knew that I had practiced this piece so many times that I could play it backwards if requested.
Although at one point I accidentally played two keys instead of the intended one, I continued to move my fingers automatically.
My eyes burned holes into the pages in front of me. I was not going to lose my concentration. To keep this to myself, I leaned forward and focused carefully on the music.
When I came to the end of the page, a warning went off inside my head: DONT MAKE A MISTAKE WHEN YOU TURN THE PAGE!
Needless to say, I obeyed myself with all my heart and mind. And, proud of my “page-turning skill”, I finished the rest of the piece without making a single mistake.
After the final note died away, a celebration went into action inside my head. I had finished. I had finished. I had mastered the impossible.
1.How did the author feel while on stage before the performance?
A. Over the moon. B. On pins and needles.
C. As cool as a cucumber. D. Hot under the collar.
2.We learn from the passage that ________.
A. the author had never performed in public before
B. the author didn’t make a single mistake while playing
C. the author’s parents were present at the performance
D. the author hadn’t made full preparations for the performance
3.What did the author mean by saying “My eyes burned holes into the pages in front of me.”?
A. He/She tried to fix his/her eyes on the pages.
B. He/She wanted to tear the pages into pieces.
C. He/She lost his/her interest in the pages.
D. He/She was dissatisfied with his/her performance.
4.The author successfully finished the performance because of ________.
A. the warning inside the head B. the wonderful “page-turning skill”
C. the encouragement from his/her parents D. the timely adjustment
What’s on?
Electric Underground
7:30 pm—1:00 am Free at the Cyclops
Do you know who’s playing in your area? We’re bringing you an evening of live rock and pop music from the best local bands. Are you interested in becoming a musician and getting a recording contract? If so, come early to the talk at 7:30 pm by Jules Skye, a successful record producer. He’s going to talk about how you can find the right person to produce you music.
Gee Whizz
8:30 pm—10:30 pm Comedy at Kaleidoscope
Come and see Gee Whizz perform. He’s the funniest stand-up comedian on the comedy scene. This joyful show will please everyone, from the youngest to the oldest. Gee Whizz really knows how to make you laugh! Our bar is open from 7:00 pm for drinks and snacks.
Simons Workshop
5:00 pm—7:30 pm Wednesdays at Victoria Stage
This is a good chance for anyone who wants to learn how to do comedy. The workshop looks at every kind of comedy, and practices many different ways of making people laugh. Simon is a comedian and actor who has 10 years’ experience of teaching comedy. His workshops are exciting and fun. An evening with Simon will give you the confidence to be funny.
Charlotte Stone
8:00 pm-11:00 pm Pizza World
Fine food with beautiful jazz music; this is a great evening out. Charlotte Stone will perform songs from her new best-selling CD, with James Pickering on the piano. The menu is Italian, with excellent meat and fresh fish, pizzas and pasta (面食). Book early to get a table. Our bar is open all day, and serves cocktails, coffee, beer, and white wine.
1.The only place available at midnight is ________.
A. Cyclops Theatre B. Kaleidoscope
C. Victoria Stage D. Pizza World
2.At Victoria Stage, you ________.
A. would be entertained a lot by some comedians
B. might spend a whole day with Simon
C. could learn how to entertain people
D. would become an expert in teaching comedy
3.We know that in Pizza World, ________.
A. people can enjoy rock and pop music
B. people can receive a CD by Charlotte Stone
C. food from all over the world is served
D. a table reservation is necessary
