Christopher Garrett was an engineer with the U.S. Army’s 10th Mountain Division. While serving in Afghanistan, Christopher was shot and ______. He was hospitalized and then medically ______.
Christopher was ______ to be returning home to his wife, Brittany, and was looking forward to getting back to normal life. Soon, ______, it became clear that “normal” was going to have a new ______.
Christopher’s ______ made things difficult. Things that had once come ______ to him-like mowing the lawn (修剪草坪) — now seemed almost impossible. Even still, Christopher was ______ not to let his injuries get the best of him. Even though he only had an old-fashioned, non-motorized push mower, he ______ to go out and mow the yard, working through the ______ until the job was done.
It was ______ for Brittany to watch her husband go through this pain. When she saw Christopher threw himself down on the ground in tears one day, she ran to him, thinking he was ______ an emotional breakdown. When she got out to the yard, however, she saw the ______ of Christopher’s tears Sitting in the yard was a(n) ______ riding lawn mower. Attached was a note: “I hope this ______ time for the things that matter most in your life. Thank you for your ______ and for my freedom. A grateful American.”
Though the Garretts have no ______ who left the mower in their yard, it is clear a neighbor had seen Christopher ______ and wanted to help. That person may never know just how much the ______ meant to the Garretts, but for this couple it was life-changing.
Christopher still has a long ______ ahead of him in the recovery process, but thanks to this generous stranger, the journey is now a little easier.
1.A. caught B. wounded C. trapped D. killed
2.A. recovered B. refused C. retired D. removed
3.A. fortunate B. disappointed C. happy D. unwilling
4.A. though B. therefore C. meanwhile D. instead
5.A. story B. direction C. result D. meaning
6.A. disability B. strength C. fear D. appearance
7.A. steadily B. quickly C. naturally D. easily
8.A. forced B. determined C. astonished D. persuade
9.A. continued B. preferred C. promised D. intended
10.A. hunger B. sorrow C. pain D. anger
11.A. embarrassing B. unusual C. annoying D. difficult
12.A. suffering B. imagining C. overcoming D. performing
13.A. source B. outcome C. purpose D. power
14.A. special B. ordinary C. strange D. new
15.A. takes B. saves C. occupies D. leaves
16.A. honesty B. service C. kindness D. attention
17.A. doubt B. question C. idea D. way
18.A. searching B. complaining C. struggling D. crying
19.A. note B. gift C. reward D. solution
20.A. life B. experience C. wait D. road
Many of us are hardwired NOT to ask for help. We think it makes us appear weak. We think people will say no. we think we have to do everything ourselves.1.. We have to get over that, and there’s how:
Get over yourself
No one—and I mean NO ONE----got anywhere alone. You cannot and should not do everything yourself. You are not, in fact, always the best person for the job, or the “only” person who can do it. asking for help is sign of strength, not weakness. Asking for help clears space for you and frees your time and energy. 2..
Rebuild your thinking
Rebuild what it means to ask for help from “I am a weak, incompetent loser” to “I am strategically allocating my time to focus on what matters most.” Don’t focus on the fact that you can’t do something or don’t have the time. 3.. It’s a chance to connect, a chance to value a colleague, a chance to get something done faster or better, a chance to optimize your own time and talents.
4.
Asking for help is about tapping valuable resources to get the best outcome the most quickly with the fewest resources expended. That’s a fancy way of saying “get the right people for the job.” 5.. And the best way to do that is to know your colleagues, and proactively build relationships.
A.Know your colleagues.
B.Think about your colleagues.
C.Your energy can’t be wasted.
D.It’s a smart strategy.
E.It’s all about building the right team.
F.Instead, think about what you will gain from the ask.
G.Whatever the reason, we don’t ask for the help we need.
Growing up can sometimes seem like a roller coaster. There are ups and downs and unexpected turns. Abuse or neglect by adult can make the ride even rougher. But being bullied(欺凌) by another child can leave especially lasting scars. That's the finding of a new study.
Bullied kids face a high risk of mental health problems as teens and as young adults. Indeed bullied kids might be worse off than those who had suffered physical abuse or neglect, the study found.
Dieter Wolke works at the University of Warwick in England. Until recently, most studies of child victims focused not on bullying but on maltreatment, this psychologist says. Maltreatment includes physical or emotional abuse, neglect or other behaviors that can harm a child.
Wolke's team wanted to better understand how bullying's long-term effects compare to those due to maltreatment. They focused on 4,026 children in the United Kingdom and 1,420 more in the United States. Information about bullying and maltreatment was collected for American children to age 13.They collected the same information for British youth up to age 16. The researchers also gathered data on each individual's mental health as a young adult.
Among the Americans, 36 percent of bullied kids had mental problems later. Those problems included anxiety, which is a state of excessive worry. They also included depression. That is a feeling of hopelessness that can last a long time. Among kids who had been maltreated by adults, 17 percent later suffered mental health problems. That was less than half the rate seen in people who had been bullied as school kids.
In the U. K. group, the difference was less spectacular. Roughly 25 percent of the bullied kids reported mental health problems later, compared with about 17 percent who had been maltreated.
But however you look at it, the finding are disturbing, Wolke says. They show that bullied children have similar or worse mental health problems later in life. And that’s why he says schools, health services and other agencies must work together to end bullying.
1.According to the passage, which of the statements is TRUE?
A.Kids treated cruelly recover soon after they grow up.
B.All bullied kids have mental health problems.
C.Most kids with maltreatment experience tend to become violent adults.
D.Most studies didn’t pay much attention to bullying until recently.
2.How does the author support the theme of the text?
A.By providing research results. B.By stating arguments.
C.By explaining statistical data. D.By giving examples.
3.The underlined word “spectacular” in paragraph 6 could be best replaced by _______.
A.slight B.dramatic
C.specific D.similar
4.According to the text, what does Wolke suggest doing?
A.Taking good care of children.
B.Joining hands to stop bullying.
C.Keeping psychologically healthy.
D.Comparing different types of abuse.
Most people love to lose themselves in a great book, maybe a classic novel, a modern storybook or a great work of history. But many people also live busy lives, and for them finding time to sit quietly and read is difficult, if not impossible. Fortunately, with the coming of the Internet and high-tech tools like the iPod, more and more people are making literature a part of their lives again.
A very special website now makes it possible for people to listen to books that they simply would not have time to read. The site is called Audible Inc., and it’s the best place to download audio (音频的) books. Over the past few years, hundreds of thousands of these books have been recorded. They include nearly every classic, as well as most newly-published ones. Most of these are read by voice actors who really bring the text to life.
Audible Inc. lets you easily and quickly download a book and load it onto your iPod or other MP3 players, or onto CDs so that you can listen in your car. The site is like Amazon, com, but for audio books. It includes thousands of recommendations (推荐) and customer reviews that are extremely helpful. The site lets you listen to a free piece of each book so you can tell ahead what the narrator (讲述者) sounds like. No wonder that most people who listen to an audio book for the first time are immediately attracted.
This is the perfect opportunity to find out what so many people know about audio books. But be careful — you may become attracted to audio books for life.
1.Who might be most interested in Audible Inc.?
A.People who have iPods. B.People who travel a lot.
C.Teenagers who love writing. D.Book lovers with little free time.
2.What does Audible Inc. offer people?
A.Free books. B.Books to listen to.
C.Books about history. D.Traditional paper books.
3.Why is a free piece of each book given on Audible Inc.?
A.To let people experience the narrative style ahead.
B.To introduce different styles of modern books.
C.To provide a chance to learn to narrate stories.
D.To meet the customers’ requirements.
4.What can we know from the last paragraph?
A.The author shows the benefits of audio books.
B.The author advises people to choose audio books.
C.The author stresses the great attraction of audio books.
D.The author warns people against addiction to reading.
Ernest Gaines, the son of sharecroppers (佃农), was born in January 15, 1933 on the River Lake Plantation near the small village of Oscar, Louisiana. He attended school for kids more than five months out of the year. But that was more education than his family before him had received. He would say later in life that his ear for the stories of his elders was developed as he wrote letters for adults who couldn’t read or write.
In the late 1940’s, at the age of 15, his family moved to the northern California where he could do something that had been forbidden in the South: visit a library. Ernest later attended San Francisco State University. Then he returned to Louisiana in 1963, inspired by James Meredith’s bid to enroll in the then-all-white University of Mississippi. He took it as a sign that the South was changing and that he could be part of that change. “As I’ve said many times before, the two greatest moves I’ve made were on the day I left Louisiana in 1948, and on the day I came back to Louisiana in 1963,” he said.
Less than 10 years later, in 1971, he published the novel that brought him attention, The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman which told the story of a black woman born as a slave who lives long enough to witness the civil rights era. Ernest would later say that the fictional Jane was modeled after his disabled great-aunt, Augustine Jefferson, who could not walk, but was strong enough to raise a family. Another novel, A Gathering of Old Men, published in 1983, was made into a movie in 1987. He won the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1993 for his novel A Lesson Before Dying. A number of his stories and essays were gathered in the 2005 collection Mozart and Leadbelly.
His permanent residence in Louisiana was a house that he and his wife built on land that was once part of River Lake Plantation. Ernest talked about his home, “If Auntie could sit here with me, or my stepfather who took me away from here, or my uncle George, who used to take me to those old beat-up bars in Baton Rouge — if I could, I’d just buy him a good glass of Gentleman Jack, and we could sit here and talk. Oh, I wish I could do that.”
1.How did Ernest benefit from writing letters for adults?
A.It inspired great love for writing in him.
B.It made him enter the university successfully.
C.It laid the foundation for his writing of his elders.
D.It promoted his communication with his families.
2.What can we know about Ernest from paragraph 2?
A.Ernest got the freedom of education in California.
B.Ernest’s departure and return influenced his life a lot.
C.James helped him apply to University of Mississippi.
D.Ernest’s experience in the South affected him greatly.
3.In which novel can you know about Ernest’s auntie?
A.Mozart and Leadbelly. B.A Lesson Before Dying.
C.A Gathering of Old Men. D.The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman.
4.What does Ernest convey in his words in the last paragraph?
A.He misses his relatives. B.He hopes to leave again.
C.He cherishes his childhood. D.He loves drinking and chatting.
Leila’ s Hair Museum
Before the invention of photography, people kept memories of loved ones by creating mementos(纪念物)using human hair. In 1986, Leila Cohoon opened a museum in Independence, Missouri, to show her collection of more than 2, 000 pieces of hair-based art collected over 30 years. Billed as the only hair museum in the world, it includes more than 400 braided hair wreaths(花环)and 2,000 pieces of jewellery dating back to the mid-1600s. “My museum is filled with other people’s families,” Leila says. “It tells a story. ”
International UFO Museum and Research Center
On July 7, 1947, a farmer discovered mysterious metallic debris(金属碎片)in his farm outside Roswell, New Mexico. Roswell Army Air Field (RAAF)originally said it recovered a flying disc. The next day, RAAF changed its words: The object was a weather balloon. Stories of a UFO and a government cover-up spread. Each year, 180,000 people check out the dirt from the UFO crash site, photos, and reports about the Roswell incident.
Museum of Bad Art
Not all art is created equal. After finding an oil painting in the rubbish in 1993—the now classic Lucy in the Field with Flowers—Scott Wilson started collecting bad art. Before long, he showed his finds at the Somerville movie theater. The Museum of Bad Art (MOBA) gives the public a firsthand look at some of the world’s worst “disaster-pieces”. Popular paintings include Mana Lisa, Hollywood Lips, and Drilling for Eggs. “MOBA is always on the lookout for the best of the worst,” said co-founder Marie Jackson. “But what an artist considers to be bad doesn’t always meet our low standards. ”
Mutter Museum
Welcome to the Mutter Museum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania—home to more than 5,000 brains, bones, and dead bodies! In 1858, Dr. Thomas Dent Mutter gave his collection of preserved body parts, and bones to the College Of Physicians to improve medical education, which led to the museum’s creation in 1863. Today, Mutter is the most famous medical museum in America, housing a wall of bones, and pieces of Albert Einstein’ s brain.
1.What is special about Leila’s Hair Museum?
A. It is full of family stories.
B. It houses the world’s greatest photos.
C. It holds collections from around the globe.
D. It was opened to remember Leila’s loved ones.
2.What can you find in the Mutter Museum?
A. Photos about the Roswell incident. B. Some of Albert Einstein’s brain.
C. 2,000 pieces of jewellery. D. Mana Lisa.
3.What do the four museums have in common?
A. They are newly-founded museums. B. They are art-centered.
C. They are unpopular among visitors. D. They are quite unusual.
