In 1995, Susan Boyle went to Glasgow to audition (试演) for My Kind of people, a televised talent show popular in the UK. She was immediately rejected. She was nervous during the audition, and felt she didn't perform well, but her brother said that she was rejected because of her plain looks. Boyle was not discouraged and continued to sing at church and at the karaoke nights in a local pub.
Boyle suffered a personal loss in 1997, when her father passed away. After his death. Boyle put her big dreams on hold to care for her sick mother Bridget Boyle. The mother and daughter often talked of Susan's possible fame. Bridget Boyle encouraged her daughter to take part in singing competitions. “She was the one who said I should enter Britain's Got Talent. We used to watch it together.” Susan later told reporters. “She thought I would win.”
In 1999, Boyle used all of her savings to pay for a professional demo (样本唱片) tape. which she sent to record companies. In 2002, Boyle began taking singing lessons from voice coach Fred O'Neil.
In 2007, Boyle's mother passed away at the age of 91. A neighbor reported that when Bridget Boyle died, her daughter “wouldn't come out for three or four days or answer the door or phone.” She lived alone with her cat, Pebbles. For over a year, she refused to sing. But in August of 2008, O'Neil urged her to try out for Britain's Got Talent. Convinced that the performance would be an honor to her mother, Boyle auditioned in Glasgow, Scotland. She sang I Dreamed A Dream in the first round of the show, which was aired on 11 April 2009.
The 47-year-old Scottish woman's plain looks provided a sharp contrast (对比) to her powerfully beautiful voice. The performance astonished the audience and the judges. Online videos of her performance totaled over 40 million views within a week. Although she failed to win the final of Britain's Got Talent, Susan Boyle became globally popular. Her first album I Dreamed A Dream has sold over five million copies.Bridget Boyle's attitude towards her daughter's musical talent can be described as .
| A．critical | B．doubtful | C．indifferent | D．optimistic |
From Para. 4 we learn that Boyle .
| A．was slightly discouraged by her voice coach |
| B．entered Britain's Got Talent to prove her ability |
| C．decided to give up her singing career |
| D．was deeply affected by her mother's death |
Which of the following is TRUE about Susan Boyle?
| A．Her international fame grew rapidly in 2008. |
| B．Her audition for My Kind of People failed. |
| C．She has never stopped singing since 1995. |
| D．She was the winner of Britain's Got Talent. |
In writing this passage, the author mainly intends to .
| A．tell us how Boyle's dream came true |
| B．let us know more about Boyle's personal life |
| C．show how Boyle was influenced by her family |
| D．explain how to enter and win a talent show |
Many people think that listening is a passive business. It is just the opposite. Listening well is an active exercise of our attention and hard work. It is because they do not realize this, or because they are not willing to do the work, that most people do not listen well.
Listening well also requires total concentration upon someone else. An essential part of listening well is the rule known as ‘bracketing’. Bracketing includes the temporary giving up or setting aside of your own prejudices and desires, to experience as far as possible someone else’s world from the inside, stepping into his or her shoes. Moreover, since listening well involves bracketing, it also involves a temporary acceptance of the other person. Sensing this acceptance, the speaker will seem quite willing to open up the inner part of his or her mind to the listener. True communication is under way and the energy required for listening well is so great that it can be accomplished only by the will to extend oneself for mutual growth.
Most of the time we lack this energy. Even though we may feel in our business dealings or social relationships that we are listening well, what we are usually doing is listening selectively. Often we have a prepared list in mind and wonder, as we listen, how we can achieve certain desired results to get the conversation over as quickly as possible or redirected in ways more satisfactory to us. Many of us are far more interested in talking than in listening, or we simply refuse to listen to what we don’t want to hear.
It wasn’t until toward the end of my doctor career that I have found the knowledge that one is being truly listened to is frequently therapeutic(有疗效的) In about a quarter of the patients I saw, surprising improvement was shown during the first few months of psychotherapy(心理疗法), before any of the roots of problems had been uncovered or explained. There are several reasons for this phenomenon, but chief among them, I believe, was the patient’s sense that he or she was being truly listened to, often for the first time in years, and for some, perhaps for the first time ever.The phrase “stepping into his or her shoes” in paragraph 2 probably means _______.
| A．preparing a topic list first |
| B．focusing on one’s own mind |
| C．directing the talk to the desired results |
| D．experiencing the speaker’s inside world |
What is mainly discussed in Paragraph 2?
| A．How to listen well. |
| B．What to listen to. |
| C．Benefits of listening. |
| D．Problems in listening |
According to the author, in communication people tend to ________.
| A．listen actively |
| B．listen purposefully |
| C．set aside their prejudices |
| D．open up their inner mind |
According to the author, the patients improved mainly because _______.
| A．they were taken good care of. |
| B．they knew the roots of problems |
| C．they had partners to talk to. |
| D．they knew they were truly listened to |
Low-Cost Gifts for Mother's Day
Gift No. I
Offer to be your mother's health friend. Promise to be there for any and all doctor's visits
whether a disease or a regular medical check-up. Most mothers always say "no need," another set of eyes and ears is always a good idea at a doctor's visit. The best part ? This one is free.
Gift No. 2
Help your mother organize all of her medical records, which include the test results and medical information. Put them all in one place. Be sure to make a list of all of her medicines and what times she takes them. "Having all this information in one place could end up saving your mother's life," Dr. Marie Savard said.
Gift No. 3
Enough sleep is connected to general health conditions. "Buy your mother cotton sheets and comfortable pillows to encourage better sleep," Savard said. "We know that good sleep is very important to our health."
Gift No. 4
Some gift companies such as Presents for Purpose allow you to pay it forward this Mother's Day by picking gifts in which 10 percent of the price you pay goes to a charity (慈善机构) Gift givers can choose from a wide variety of useful but inexpensive things -many of which are "green" - and then choose a meaningful charity from a list. When your mother gets the gift, she will be told that she has helped the chosen charity.What are you advised to do for your mother at doctor's visits?
| A．Take notes. | B．Be with her. |
| C．Buy medicine. | D．Give her gifts. |
Where can you find a gift idea to improve your mother’s sleep?
| A．In Gift No. 1. | B．In Gift No. 2. |
| C．In Gift No. 3. | D．In Gift No. 4. |
Buying gifts from Presents for Purpose allows mothers to_____.
| A．enjoy good sleep | B．be well-organized |
| C．give others help | D．bet extra support |
Going green seems to be fad(时尚)for a lot of people these days. Whether that is good or bad, we can’t really say, but for the tow of us, going green is not a fad but a lifestyle.
On April22, 2011, we decided to go green every single day for an entire year. This meant doing 365 different green things, and it also meant challenging ourselves to go green beyond easy things. Rather than recycle and reduce our energy, we had to think of 365 different green things to do and this was no easy task.
With the idea of going green every single day for a year, Our Green Year started. My life and I decided to educate people about how they could go green in their lives and hoped we could show people all the green things that could be done to help the environment. We wanted to push the message that every little bit helps.
Over the course of Our Green Year, we completely changed our lifestyle. We now shop at organic(有机的)stores. We consume less meat, choosing green food. We have greatly reduced our buying we don’t need. We have given away half of what we owned through websites. Our home is kept clean by vinegar and lemon juice, with no chemical cleaners. We make our own butter, enjoying the smell of home-made fresh bread. In our home office anyone caught doing something ungreen might be punished.
Our minds have been changed by Our Green Year. We are grateful for the chance to have been able to go green and educate others. We believe that we do have the power to change things and help our planet.What might be the best title for the passage?
| A．Going Green. |
| B．Protecting the Planet. |
| C．Keeping Open-Minded |
| D．Celebrating Our Green Year. |
It was difficult for the couple to live a green life for the whole year because_________.
| A．they needed to perform unusual green tasks |
| B．they didn’t know how to educate other people |
| C．they were unwilling to reduce their energy |
| D．they were expected to follow the green fad |
What did the couple do over the course of Our Green Year?
| A．They tried to get out of their ungreen habits. |
| B．They ignore others’ ungreen behavior. |
| C．They chose better chemical cleaners. |
| D．They sold their home-made food. |
What can we infer form the last paragraph?
| A．The government will give support to the green people. |
| B．The couple may continue their project in the future. |
| C．Some people disagree with the couple’s green ideas. |
| D．Our Green Year is becoming a national campaign. |
When I was 12, all I wanted was a signet (图章) ring. They were the "in" thing and it seemed every girl except me had one. On my 13th birthday, my Mum gave me a signet ring with my initials(姓名首字母) carved into it. I was in heaven.
What made it even more special was that it was about the only thing that wasn't being "replaced". We'd been burnt out in fires that swept through our area earlier that year and had lost everything—so most of the " new" stuff (东西) we got was really just to replace what we'd lost. But not my ring. My ring was new.
Then, only one month later, I lost it. I took it off before bed and it was missing in the morning. I was sad and searched everywhere for it. But it seemed to have disappeared. Eventually, I gave up and stopped looking for it. And two years later, we sold the house and moved away.
Years passed, and a couple of moves later, I was visiting my parents' when Mum told me that she had something for me. It wasn't my birthday, nor was it Easter or Christmas or any other gift-giving occasion. Mum noticed my questioning look. " You'll recognize this one," she said, smiling.
Then she handed me a small ring box. I took it from her and opened it to find my beautiful signet ring inside. The family who had bought our house 13 years earlier had recently decided to do some redecorations, which included replacing the carpets. When they pulled the carpet up in my old bedroom, they found the ring. As it had my initials carved into it, they realized who owned the ring. They'd had it professionally cleaned up by a jeweler before sending it to my mother. And it still fits me.The underlined word "in" in the first paragraph probably means "_____".
| A．renewable | B．available | C．practical | D．fashionable |
When she got the ring back, the writer was about _____.
| A．13 years old | B．15 years old |
| C．26 years old | D．28 years old |
Which of the following is TRUE according to the passage?
| A．The writer's family moved several times. |
| B．The writer never stopped looking for her ring. |
| C．The writer's ring was cleaned up by the new house owner. |
| D．The writer lost her ring in the morning when she took it off. |
What would be the best title for the passage?
| A．My New Ring | B．Lost and Found |
| C．Lost and Replaced | D．An Expensive Ring |
Many people turn to doctors or self-help books, but they forget a great thing that could help them fight illness: their friends.
Researchers are only now starting to pay attention to the importance of friendship in health. A 10-year Australian study found that older people with a large circle of friends were 22 percent less likely to die during the study period than those with fewer friends. A large 2007 study showed an increase of nearly 60 percent in the danger for obesity among people whose friends gained weight. And last year, Harvard researchers reported that strong social ties(关系) could improve brain health as we age.
“In general, the role of friendship in our lives isn’t well realized,” said Rebecca, a professor at the University of North Carolina. “Friendship has a bigger effect on our psychological (心理的) health than family relationships.”
While many friendship studies are about the close relationships of women, some research shows that it can do good to men too. In a six-year study of 736 middle-aged men, having friendships reduces the risk of heart attack. Only smoking was as important a danger factor (因素) as having little social support.
The exact reason why friendship has such a big effect isn’t clear. While friends can send a sick person to the hospital or pick up medicine, the advantages go well beyond physical help. Friendship clearly has a big psychological effect. “People with stronger friendships feel like there is someone they can turn to,” said Karen, a doctor. “The message of these studies is that friends make your life better.”The three studies in paragraph 2 show that .
| A．old people need friends the most |
| B．friends can help us lose weight |
| C．social ties have something to do with health |
| D．having more friends makes us healthier |
What do Rebecca’s words in paragraph3 mean?
| A．Friendship is more important to women than to men. |
| B．What people need most is a friend’s care. |
| C．Friendship is more important than family relationship |
| D．The value of friendship hasn’t been fully understood. |
The author mentioned smoking in the text to discuss .
| A．the cause of heart attack |
| B．the danger of having no friends |
| C．smoking is bad for men |
| D．friends’ influence on habits |
Which of the following has the closest meaning to the underlined word “obesity”?
| A．fatness | B．unhappiness |
| C．excitement | D．health |