阅读下面短文，在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。
Haven’t you always wondered why the beginning and the end of the present school year don’t line up with the calendar year? Well, 1. answer might surprise you: the school year actually 2. (date) back to the time when the farming schedule took 3. (prior) over everything else — even schooling.
Farming can only be done in spring, summer, and fall. Families needed kids’ help, so their schooling took place in the colder months 4. nothing could be planted or harvested. Thus kids could help with farm duties during busy seasons.
Large cities operated 5. (different). Because people there didn’t rely on farming 6. (earn) a living, kids could go to school all year round and take a few short vacations throughout.
When education started to become more valuable in society, much 7. (strict) rules had to be made so that there would be more uniformity in the school system. In 1852, Massachusetts became the first state to enact a compulsory public law, making it compulsory 8. both rural areas and urban areas to offer schooling. Parents 9. (fine) if they didn’t send children to schools.
Shortly after Massachusetts enacted the law, a compromise 10. (make) between urban and rural school systems let the school year start in the fall so kids could help with farming during the summer.
I had worked for long at the same dead-end job with no pay increases. So I was considering ______ the profession when being offered the job of Office Manager for a company that had been ______ for long. My job would be to change the situation, which meant organizing the office and turning the company profitable.
The ______ knew that would be no easy task, so he offered me a good salary. And I ______ it. Later, my husband joined me and became my ______. With our efforts together, our company became profitable. So I was ______ becoming State Manager with a big salary increase. As our income increased, so did our ______. My husband and I moved into a large, beautiful home with great furniture and ______ two beautiful cars. To all appearances, we were living the American Dream.
Later, ______ the downturn in the economy, the company reorganized and my ______ was removed, and so was my husband’s. ______, we got new ones, but made minimum wages. We had to move into a tiny apartment. It was ______. I measured personal success by how many expensive things I ______. Without them, I felt unimportant and unsuccessful.
Unexpectedly, our loss later turned out to be a(n) ______. It forced us to come to a complete stop and ______ what we really wanted out of life. We realized that to keep that company afloat, we had been so ______ every day that we had sacrificed time that should have been spent with our family and friends. We had ______ important births, graduations and weddings. We knew we needed a change. Now — years later — we are living a more ______ life. Our home is modest; ______, it’s fully paid for. We don’t have many things that need dusting -- only the necessities. Now we are truly living and ______ the American Dream.
1.A.leaving B.regulating C.recommending D.observing
2.A.operating B.consulting C.struggling D.advocating
3.A.partner B.boss C.customer D.employee
4.A.handled B.recognized C.honored D.accepted
5.A.colleague B.competitor C.doctor D.barber
6.A.hired B.comforted C.promoted D.prepared
7.A.experiences B.connection C.spending D.savings
8.A.lent B.changed C.discovered D.purchased
9.A.due to B.regardless of C.in case of D.in comparison to
10.A.allowance B.position C.chance D.office
11.A.Initially B.Apparently C.Gradually D.Luckily
12.A.amusing B.discouraging C.boring D.surprising
13.A.designed B.possessed C.sorted D.donated
14.A.blessing B.surprise C.explanation D.memory
15.A.ignore B.abandon C.consider D.give
16.A.confident B.confused C.joyful D.occupied
17.A.remembered B.missed C.mentioned D.loved
18.A.boring B.demanding C.privileged D.relaxed
19.A.however B.instead C.therefore D.meanwhile
20.A.expecting B.reporting C.enjoying D.replacing
Every life-changing decision we make in our life shapes our current reality. Let’s talk about a few ways that you can use for reference when making your own life-changing decisions.
Realize the power of decision making. Before you start making a decision, you have to understand what a decision does. 1. When you decide to pick up a cigarette to smoke it, that decision might result in your picking up one after one later on to get that same high feeling.
Carry your decision out. It’s pointless to make a decision and just keep it in your head 2. If you want to make real changes in life, you have to apply action to your decision until it’s completed.
Tell others about your decisions. Telling other people what we’re going to do can make us follow through. For example, if you decide to become an early riser, you can go to a forum and tell people that you will wake up at 6 a.m. and keep on it. 3.
Learn from your past decisions. It’s common that you are going to mess up at times when it comes to making decisions. 4. Ask yourself what is good or bad about your decision and what you will do to make a better decision next time.
5. For example, if you made the decision to lose ten pounds by next month through aerobics (有氧运动). You don’t have to just do aerobics. You can be open to losing weight through different methods of dieting as long as it helps you reach your goal in the end.
A.Maintain a flexible approach.
B.Enjoy the process of making decisions.
C.That’s the same as not making a decision at all.
D.It always takes a lot of time to make a decision.
E.Any decision that you make causes a chain of events to happen.
F.So, instead of beating yourself up over it, learn a lesson from it.
G.You’re able to accomplish this because you feel it an obligation to keep your word.
A book is so much more than mere ink and paper. So insist French booksellers, who for nearly four decades successfully persuade the government to keep the forces of the free market at bay. A law passed in 1981 bans the sale of any book at anything other than the price decided by its publisher. Authorities are cracking down on those trying to sell the latest Thomas Piketty or J.K Rowling at a discount.
The fixed-price rule is meant to keep customers loyal to their local bookshop and out of the control of supermarkets and corporations. But the arrival of e-commerce and e-readers has promoted questions worthy of their own tomes(大部头著作). Can you fix the price of a book if it is part of an all-you-can-read subscription service? Are audio-books books at all? And what of authors who self-publish?
Changes have been made to preserve the principle of “one book, one price”. In 2011, the rule began to apply to digital tomes. Free delivery by online sellers was prohibited because it implied a subsidy(补贴) on the delivered books (encouraging online sellers to charge only €0.01 for postage). But a new challenge to the policy is proving more difficult to deal with.
Used books are exempted from the pricing rule. Third-party sellers on Amazon are accused of using this as a way to apply forbidden discounts: selling brand-new books as “second hand” to make them cheaper. So fans can purchase a copy of the latest Michel Houellebecq novel Serotonine for 11.71 pounds on Amazon, roughly half of its original price. Its seller claims it is in “perfectly new” condition.
Amazon claims its practices are legal. But books sellers are upset, and their political allies with them. “This is a major concern,” said Franck Riester, the culture minister, at a bookseller’s conference this week. He says new laws may be needed.
Defenders of the fixed-price principle (which has spread to other parts of Europe) say it helps keep independent bookshops alive. Others are not so sure. Books are expensive in France — an odd way to encourage people to buy more.
1.What was the function of the law passed in 1981?
A.To stop publishers from publishing poor books.
B.To prevent the random price of books in the market.
C.To help book consumers benefit from the free market.
D.To encourage French booksellers to sell cheaper books.
2.What’s implied about the arrival of e-commerce and e-readers in Paragraph 2?
A.It greatly changed people’s reading habits.
B.It challenged the principle of “one book, one price”.
C.It weakened the ties between publishers and authors.
D.It provided local booksellers with some new opportunities.
3.What does the underlined part “are exempted from” in Paragraph 4 mean?
A.are involved in. B.are threatened by.
C.are consistent with. D.are unrestricted by.
4.What is Franck Riester’s attitude towards those third-party sellers’ practices on Amazon?
A.He is hopeful of them. B.He is uncertain of them.
C.He disapproves of them. D.He is indifferent to them.
Recently according to a new research, humans have had a link to starches (含淀粉的食物) for up to 120,000 years — that’s more than 100,000 years longer than we’ve been able to plant them in the soil during the time of the ice Age’s drawing to an end. The research is part of an ongoing study into the history of Middle Stone Age communities.
An international team of scientists identified evidence of prehistoric starch consumption in the Klasies River Cave, in present-day South Africa. Analyzing small, ashy, undisturbed hearths(壁炉) inside the cave, the researchers found “pieces of burned starches” ranging from around 120,000 to 65,000 years old. It made them the oldest known examples of starches eaten by humans.
The findings do not come as a complete surprise — but rather as welcome confirmation of older theories that lacked the related evidence. The lead author Cynthia Larbey said that there had previously only been genetic biological evidence to suggest that humans had been eating starch for this long. This new evidence, however, takes us directly to the dinner table, and supports the previous assumption that humans’ digestion genes gradually evolved in order to fit into an increased digestion of starch.
Co-author Sarah Wurz said, “The starch remains show that these early humans living in the Klasies River Cave could battle against their tough environment and find suitable foods and perhaps medicines. And as much as we all still desire the tubers (块茎), these cave communities were gilling starches such as potatoes on their foot-long hearths. They knew how to balance their diets as well as they could, with fats from local fish and other animals.”
As early as the 1990s, some researchers started to study the hearths in the Klasies River Cave. Scientist Hilary Deacon first suggested that these hearths contained burned plants. At the time, the proper methods of examining the remains were not yet available. We now know human beings have always been searching for their desired things.
1.When did humans begin to farm starches?
A.After the Ice Age. B.After the Middle Stone Age.
C.About 20,000 years ago. D.About 100,000 years ago.
2.What was the previous assumption of starches?
A.Starch diet promoted food culture. B.Starch diet shaped humans’ evolution.
C.Starches had a variety of functions. D.Starches offered humans rich nutrition.
3.What can we learn about the early humans described by Sarah Wurz?
A.They were smart and tough. B.They preferred plants to meat.
C.They were generally very healthy. D.They got along with each other.
4.What’s the best title for the text?
A.Great Civilization of South Africa B.The Evolution of Foods in History
C.Starches--the Important Food of Today D.Big Findings--the Starches in Ancient Times
Something strange happened when I was 14 years old. Every previous year on Thanksgiving Day I’d woken up early, filled with excitement. But that Thanksgiving, for some reason I saw no reason to celebrate. None of my family were really thankful, I realized. The whole thing was a lie!
During the dinner time, I left, hiding in the guest room and cried. My mom came to see what was wrong. “No one is really thankful!” I sobbed, “They just pretend for one day because that’s what they’re supposed to do!”
After I finished talking, she nodded. “You’re right,” she told me. “It’s fake until you find the truth for yourself.” She said it was my choice whether to celebrate with them or not. She said Thanksgiving is a time to reflect because we don’t always get to see loved ones and eat a good meal. Then she left.
I didn’t listen to her, thinking that every holiday was a lie and I could never find joy celebrating again. But giving in to my starving stomach, I went back to the dining room in a few minutes. I couldn’t believe what I saw. My entire extended family was waiting for me with wide smiles and concerned looks, and the table was covered with untouched plates.
“Andy,” my aunt said, “We can’t eat without you. We’re waiting for your turn. Now you can start it.” I didn’t know what to say first. Finally, I said I was thankful for having a younger brother to teach, play with, and see grow.
The family shared, and everyone had something beautiful to say. Listening to what they said, I suddenly understood what my mom meant about finding out my own reason for celebrating. For me, this holiday was a chance to pause and reflect on everything I cared about.
And with that, I took a huge and satisfying bite of food.
1.Why did the author hide himself and cry on the Thanksgiving Day?
A.Because he got up too late
B.Because some of his family were absent.
C.Because he thought the dinner was tasteless.
D.Because he doubted the sincerity of others’ thankfulness.
2.What can we know about the author’s mother according to the text?
A.She is very understanding. B.She is strict with the author.
C.She disagreed with the author. D.She showed great worry about the author.
3.What does the underlined word “it” in Paragraph 5 refer to?
A.Having dinner. B.Expressing thankfulness.
C.Giving a performance. D.Making a wish.
4.Which of the following can be the best title for the text?
A.My loving mother B.Love and lies
C.An inspiring Thanksgiving D.An unforgettable dinner
