There are good Santas and there are bad Santas. The good Santas all realize one thing: In the mind of a child, Santa Claus is perfect.
That’s difficult. And so they come from around the world to attend the Charles W. Howard School in Midland, Mich. The school offers a three-day, 40-hour course for Santas hoping to be excellent. A former Macy’s Santa named Charles Howard founded the Michigan school in 1937. “Many people will think if you have a suit and you’re a Santa,” said Tom Valent, the school’s current dean. “It’s more than that.”
The school teaches everything from breathing techniques for carol singing to the beard maintenance. There are lessons in child psychology, sign language and even media training for talk-show appearances and call-in shows. Santas also need to make sure they know all the names of the reindeer(驯鹿). What’s harder to deal with, however, is children who ask for Christmas gifts like bringing daddy home or making mommy happy again.
After spending time in the classroom, Weir went to the mall to test his training. However, at one point, his hat fell off, and he was unsure how to react. “You’re the real Santa,” Valent said. “Pick that hat up, slip it back on, keep smiling and do your job. You’ve got to stay on top of your game. Even the last one at night, when you’re tired, you’ve got to remember: This one’s forever, so do a good job.”According to the passage, good Santas should be the ones that ______.
| A．can offer the children some gifts |
| B．help adults look after their children |
| C．have ability to make children happy |
| D．should be perfect in the mind of children |
The Michigan school was founded by Charles Howard with the purpose to ______.
| A．train the pet reindeer for the Santas |
| B．earned money from its students |
| C．train perfect Santas for the world |
| D．show the world’s concern to the poor |
According to Weir’s performance, we can conclude that ______.
| A．Weir was short of experience |
| B．Weir was not fit for the job as a Santa |
| C．Weir did very badly in the game |
| D．Weir was not a good student in school |
Vivi Mac, an amazing artist from France, can use nearly any kind of food to create detailed celebrity portraits（名人肖像）．Although she has yet to display her short-lived work of arts in a proper art gallery, Vivi Mac has already made a name for herself online.
We've seen some amazing food artists in the past, but none are quite like this one .Karen Eland is a master coffee painter, Elisabetta Rogai uses wine as her medium(媒介），Kelly McCollam uses food colouring(食用色素）to recreat classic paintings, but the self-taught Vivi Mac can take anything from chewing gum to milk and turn it into a fantastic portrait When working with liquids, Mac uses a simple plastic straw and her hands to guide the unusual .mediums around a plastic plate which acts as a painting. Just how she manages to capture the finest facial features is still a mistery to me, and I've seen videos of her doing it many times，
Vivi Mac has never attended art school. She only used online resources like blogs and facebook to learn the basics of drawing and painting. She started out working with pens and paper, but soon realized drawing wasn't just creative enough for her. She got into speed painting and body painting, posting videos of her works on You Tube, but it wasn't until she began experimenting with different kinds of foods that her art got serious coverage. Photos and videos of her eatable celebrity portraits, like Bruce Lee in milk Ice Cube in crushed ice or Amy Winehouse in wine, became popular on the French inter-webs and changed Vivi Mac into an online celebrity.What does the underlined word "display" in the first paragraph mean?
| A．Exhibit. | B．Create. | C．Produce. | D．Store. |
What is the difference between Vivi Mac and other food artists?
| A．She Uses wine as her medium. |
| B．She is famous for her food website. |
| C．She turns any kind of food into a portrait |
| D．She uses spices to recreate classic paintings. |
In which section of a website are we most likely to find the passage？
| A．Food | B．Science | C．Art | D．Health |
Good health is the most valuable thing a person can have but one cannot take good health for granted .It is important to remember that the body needs proper care in order to be healthy. There are three things that a person can do to help stay in good shape, eat right food, get enough sleep, and exercise regularly.
Proper nutrition is important for good health. Your body cannot work well unless it receives the proper kind“fuel"．Don't eat too much food with lots of sugar and fat, Eat plenty of foods high in protein, like meat fish eggs and nuts. Vegetables and fruits are very important because they provide necessary vitamins and minerals. However don't overeat It is not helpful to be overweight
Getting the proper amount of sleep is also important. If you don't get enough sleep, you feel tired and easily get angry. You have no energy. Over a long period of time a little amount of sleep may even result In a change of personality（人的个性)．Be sure to allow yourself from seven to nine hours of sleep each ,If you do, your body will feel strong and refreshed ,and your mind will be sharp．
Finally, get plenty of exercise Exercise firms the body, strengthens the muscles, and prevents you from gaining weight It also improves your heart and lungs. If you follow a regular exercise program, you will probably increase your life-span（寿命)．An kind of exercise is good. Most sports excellent for keeping the body in good shapes: basketball, swimming, bicycling, running and so on. Sports are not only good for your body, but they are enjoyable and interesting, too.
If everybody were to eat the right foods, get plenty of sleep and exercise regularly, the world would be a happier and healthier place. We would all live to be much older and wiser.In order to keep good health______.
| A．we should eat a lot of sweets |
| B．one needs a large amount of fat |
| C．we must try to sleep now and then |
| D．people should eat according to the foods nutrition |
Eating more and sleeping less_______.
| A． can keep healthy | B． is no good for you |
| C． gets you more energy | D． will keep your personality |
The writer explains ________in the 4th paragraph.
| A． how to eat | B． what to eat |
| C． how to keep healthy | D． the importance of doing exercise |
The title for the article should be“_______".
| A． Eating and Exercising | B． How Vitamins Work in Man's Body |
| C． Staying Healthy | D． Sleeping Well |
It doesn’t kill germs better than cooler water, but turning tap temperatures high, the US burns carbon equal to the emissions of Barbados.
People typically wash their hands seven times a day in the United States, but they do it at a far higher temperature than is necessary to kill germs, a new study says. The energy waste is equivalent to the fuel use of a small country.
It’s cold and flu season, when many people are concerned about avoiding germs. But forget what you think you know about hand washing, say researchers at Vanderbilt University. Chances are good that how you clean up is not helping you stay healthy; it is helping to make the planet sick.
Amanda R. Carrico, a research assistant professor at the Vanderbilt Institute for Energy and Environment in Tennessee, told National Geographic that hand washing is often “a case where people act in ways that they think are in their best interest, but they in fact have inaccurate beliefs or outdated perceptions.”
Carrico said, “It’s certainly true that heat kills bacteria, but if you were going to use hot water to kill them it would have to be way too hot for you to tolerate.”
She explained that boiling water, 212°F (99.98°C), is sometimes used to kill germs - for example, to clean drinking water that might be polluted with germs. But “hot” water for hand washing is generally within 104°F to 131°F (40°C to 55°C.) At the high end of that range, heat could kill some germs, but the sustained contact that would be required would scald the skin.
Carrico said that after a review of the scientific literature, her team found “no evidence that using hot water that a person could stand would have any benefit in killing bacteria.” Even water as cold as 40°F (4.4°C) appeared to reduce bacteria as well as hotter water, if hands were scrubbed, rinsed（冲洗）and dried properly.
In fact, she noted that hot water can often have an unfavorable effect on hygiene. “Warmer water can harm the skin and affect the protective layer on the outside, which can cause it to be less resistant to bacteria,” said Carrico.
Using hot water to wash hands is therefore unnecessary, as well as wasteful, Carrico said, particularly when it comes to the environment. According to her research, people use warm or hot water 64 percent of the time when they wash their hands. Using that number, Carrico’s team calculated a significant impact on the planet.
“Although the choice of water temperature during a single hand wash may appear minor, when multiplied by the nearly 800 billion hand washes performed by Americans each year, this practice results in more than 6 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent emissions annually,” she said.
That’s roughly equal to the emissions of two coal-fired power plants, or 1,250,000 passenger vehicles, over the course of a year. It’s higher than the greenhouse gas emissions of small countries like El Salvador or Armenia, and is about equivalent to the emissions of Barbados. If all US citizens washed their hands in cooler water, it would be like eliminating the energy-related carbon emissions of 299,700 US homes, or the total annual emissions from the US zinc or lead industries.
The researchers found that close to 70 percent of respondents said they believe that using hot water is more effective than warm, room temperature, or cold water, despite a lack of evidence backing that up, said Carrico. Her study noted research that showed a “strong cognitive（认知的） connection” between water temperature and hygiene in both the United States and Western Europe, compared to other countries, like Japan, where hot water is associated more with comfort than with health.
The researchers published their results in the July 2013 issue of International Journal of Consumer Studies. They recommended washing with water that is at a “comfortable” temperature, which they noted may be warmer in cold months and cooler in hot ones.What does the writer mainly focus on when writing this passage?
| A．Whether hot water helps kill germs effectively in hand washing. |
| B．How hot water contributes to the serious worsening of our planet. |
| C．Why the consumption of hot water is unnecessary and wasteful. |
| D．What the advantages and disadvantages of using hot water are. |
The underlined word scald in paragraph six probably means .
| A．burn | B．improve | C．soften | D．wrinkle |
According to the passage, all the following share roughly the same CO2 emissions yearly EXCEPT .
| A．two coal-fired power plants | B．US zinc or lead industries |
| C．1,250,000 passenger vehicles | D．El Salvador or Armenia |
Which of the following is WRONG according to the passage?
A. Boiling water at 212°F (99.98°C) works effectively in killing germs.
B. Warmer water can damage the protective layer of the outside skin.
C. There is much difference between cold water and hot water in reducing bacteria.
D. Americans have inaccurate beliefs or outdated perceptions in hand washing.Which of the following is the standard of a comfortable water temperature for washing hands?
A. Warmer in winter and cooler in summer.
B. Between 104°F to 131°F (40°C to 55°C).
C. Below 104°F (40°C) or above 131°F (55°C).
D. Warm enough to kill germs and clean up. If you want to read stories of this kind afterwards, which of the following magazines will you probably subscribe to?
| A．Universal Science Fiction | B．Science & Discoveries |
| C．Environment & Protection | D．Exploration of America |
My day began on a definitely sour note when I saw my six-year-old wrestling with a limb of my azalea（杜鹃花）bush. By the time I got outside, he’d broken it. “Can I take this to school today?” he asked. With a wave of my hand, I sent him off. I turned my back so he wouldn’t see the tears gathering in my eyes.
The washing machine had leaked on my brand-new linoleum. If only my husband had just taken the time to fix it the night before when I asked him instead of playing checkers with Jonathan.
It was days like this that made me want to quit. I just wanted to drive up to the mountains, hide in a cave, and never come out.
Somehow I spent most of the day washing and drying clothes and thinking how love had disappeared from my life. As I finished hanging up the last of my husband’s shirts, I looked at the clock. 2:30. I was late. Jonathan’s class let out at 2:15 and I hurriedly drove to the school.
I was out of breath by the time I knocked on the teacher’s door and peered through the glass. She rustled through the door and took me aside. “I want to talk to you about Jonathan,” she said.
I prepared myself for the worst. Nothing would have surprised me. “Did you know Jonathan brought flowers to school today?” she asked. I nodded, thinking about my favorite bush and trying to hide the hurt in my eyes. “Let me tell you about yesterday,” the teacher insisted. “See that little girl?” I watched the bright-eyed child laugh and point to a colorful picture taped to the wall. I nodded.
“Well, yesterday she was almost hysterical. Her mother and father are going through a nasty divorce. She told me she didn’t want to live, she wished she could die. I watched that little girl bury her face in her hands and say loud enough for the class to hear, ‘Nobody loves me.’ I did all I could to comfort her, but it only seemed to make matters worse.” “I thought you wanted to talk to me about Jonathan,” I said.
“I do,” she said, touching the sleeve of my blouse. “Today your son walked straight over to that child. I watched him hand her some pretty pink flowers and whisper, ‘I love you.’“
I felt my heart swell with pride for what my son had done. I smiled at the teacher. “Thank you,” I said, reaching for Jonathan’s hand, “you’ve made my day.”
Later that evening, I began pulling weeds from around my azalea bush. As my mind wandered back to the love Jonathan showed the little girl, a biblical verse came to me: “...these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.” While my son had put love into practice, I had only felt anger.
I heard the familiar squeak of my husband’s brakes as he pulled into the drive. I snapped a small limb bristling with hot pink azaleas off the bush. I felt the seed of love that God planted in my family beginning to bloom once again in me. My husband’s eyes widened in surprise as I handed him the flowers. “I love you,” I said.Why did the woman cry when seeing her son had broken the azalea bush?
| A．Because she could not tolerate the harm to it. |
| B．Because it made her bad mood even worse. |
| C．Because her son did not ask her for permission. |
| D．Because she wanted to hand it to her husband. |
The writer wanted to hide in the mountain cave probably for the reason of .
| A．feeling fed up with her endless daily housework |
| B．her husband’s failing to fix the machine in time |
| C．boring daily routine with a feeling of lack of love |
| D．her hoping to seek happiness in a brand new place |
We can infer from the passage that the writer expressed love to her husband in that .
| A．she was inspired by her son that love was supposed to be felt and practiced |
| B．she felt guilty that she misunderstood her husband and wanted to apologize |
| C．she felt it necessary to have a complete family for the happiness of herself |
| D．she wanted to prove her love and expected the same words from her husband |
Q: On Facebook, my friends are a mix of real-life pals, former classmates, professional colleagues, extended-family members, and … my mom. Mom is the first to like and comment on everything I post, which is annoying. I tried talking to her about it, but her feelings quickly got hurt, so I backed off. I know I can’t block her, but now I don’t want to post anything. How do I handle this?
A:This is about Facebook, not your mom. The often-shrugged-off truth about social media is that nothing is private. It’s easy to forget this, so in a way, you’re lucky that your mom is reminding you. Everything you post—comments, likes, photos—is freely available to future friends, employers, lovers etc unless blocked. That said, you can ask Mom again nicely to tone it down. You can also customize your controls so she can’t see everything you post.
Q:In which situations am I required to make a phone call versus send a text message?
A:A text is for information—time, date, news. It’s for the stuff you can keep short and sweet. A phone call is for analysis, discussion, opinion, and, if you must, gossip.
Q:I’m always on Facebook, so I just send messages to friends through the site. But when should I log off and send an e-mail?
A:When you’re serious about anything. Think of it as chatting with someone on a bus versus asking her to meet you for coffee. The former is good for casual conversation; the latter is personal and requires attention.
Q:For which occasions should I mail paper invitations versus send e-mail ones? (E-cards are free and easy—what’s not to love?!)
A:Anything important needs a paper invitation. That’s your baseline. So ask yourself: “Do I want people to dress up for this event?” If the answer is yes, dress up your invitation by making it printed instead of virtual. For more casual events and gatherings, e-card away.
Q:Is using emoticons ever inappropriate to express a feeling or make a point in texts or e-mails?
A:Emoticons are for fun. Is the message you’re writing fun? Use an emoticon. Are you asking for a big favor? Skip it. Is the message to your boss or a colleague? Skip it. Avoid them if you want to be taken seriously about anything.
Q:I have a big, happy announcement to share with a lot of people. Is it appropriate to share it on my blog?
A:Yes, so you don’t have to go cc-ing everyone in an e-mail. Post away. But send a private message to those who should know first.
Q:I have a big, sad announcement. What should I do?
A:Respect your privacy—and yourself. Pick up the phone and call a trusted friend or family member to let her know, and then ask her to help spread the news offline.What do we learn about social media from the first Q and A?
| A．It is illegal to keep track of personal privacy on Facebook. |
| B．Personal privacy is inaccessible online with control customized. |
| C．People tend to ignore privacy provided it is blocked purposefully. |
| D．We need someone to remind us constantly of our privacy online. |
Which of the following is appropriate about using social media?
| A．Sending texts to consult a doctor for surgery |
| B．Carrying on casual conversations via emails. |
| C．Emailing your boss with emoticons for promotion. |
| D．Writing a formal invitation for a dress-up event. |
According to the passage, how would you make it known that you have won a scholarship to Harvard?
| A．Arranging for a social gathering to celebrate it. |
| B．Informing your teachers who may help you spread. |
| C．Telling your parents before posting it on your blog. |
| D．Sending everyone a message privately to share it. |