You want to know about my staying in America, right? Well, to tell you the truth, it is really an eye-opening experience study here.
In China, I had English classes five times a week since fifth grade. However, I didn’t know how different textbook English could be from everyday English until I came to Hotchkiss School, Connecticut.
When I first studied English, I was told to say, “I am fine.” when people say “How are you?” But in the US, I found that people say, “I am good.” or “I’m tired.”
One day, someone greeted me with “What’s up?” It made me confused. I thought for a moment and then smiled because I didn’t know what to say.
Since then, I have discovered more and more differences between Chinese and US cultures.
To my surprise, US girls spend a lot of time in the burning sun to get a tan. However, in China, girls try every possible way to get their skin paler, or “whiter.” I also surprised by how hard-working US students are. In China, schoolwork is almost everything, so we study hard and that’s it. But here, a “good” student gets good grades, does a l
ot for the public and plays sports or music.
The kids here are so talented, I am starting to be sorry that I gave up playing the piano at an early age and that I have never thought about sports. What does the word “tan” in the sixth paragraph mean in Chinese?
| A．晒黑 | B．晒白 | C．能量 | D．保护 |
A good US student spends his/her time ________.
| A．only in doing homework |
| B．only on sports |
| C．only on music |
| D．on studies, sports or music and public work |
Which of the following is NOT true?
| A．The writer is now in US. |
| B．American girls love to have white skin. |
| C．American girls love to have brown skin. |
| D．US students are talented and hard-working. |
Which is the best title for the passage?
| A．My Own Travel in the US |
| B．My Studying in the US |
| C．My Opinion about the US |
| D．My Studying in China |
One of the latest trend（趋势） in American Childcare is Chinese au pairs. Au Pair in Stamford, for example, has got increasing numbers of request for Chinese au pairs from aero to around 4,000 since 2004. And that’s true all across the country.
“I thought it would be useful for him to learn Chinese at an early age” Joseph Stocke, the managing director of s company, says of his 2-year old son. “I would at least like to give him the chance to use the language in the future,” After only six months of being cared by 25-year-old woman from China, the boy can already understand basic Chinese daily expressions, his dad says.
Li Drake, a Chinese native raising two children in Minnesota with an American husband, had another reason for looking for an au pair from China. She didn’t want her children to miss out on their roots.” Because I am Chinese, my husband and I wanted the children to keep exposed to(接触) the language and culture.” she says.
“Staying with a native speaker is better for children than simply sitting in a classroom,” says Suzanne Flynn, a professor in language education of Children.” But parents must understand that just one year with au pair is unlikely to produce wonders. Complete mastery demands continued learning until the age of 10 or 12.”
The popularity if au pairs from China has been strengthened by the increasing numbers of American parents who want their children who want their children to learn Chinese. It is expected that American demand for au pairs will continue to rise in the next few years.What does that term” au pair” in the text mean?
| A．A mother raising her children on her own |
| B．A child learning a foreign language at home |
| C．A professor in language education of children |
| D．A young foreign woman taking care of children. |
Li Drake has her children study Chinese because she wants them ______.
| A．to live in China some day |
| B．to speak the language at home |
| C．to catch up wit other children |
| D．to learn about the Chinese culture |
What can we infer from the text?
| A．Learning Chinese is becoming popular In America, |
| B．Educated woman do better in looking after children |
| C．Chinese au pairs need to improve their English Skills. |
| D．Children can learn a foreign language well in six months. |
Since the first Earth Day in 1970,American have gotten a lot “greener” toward the environment . “We didn’t know at that time there even was an environment ,let alone that there was a problem with it,” says Bruce Anderson, president of Earth Day USA.
But what began as nothing important in public affairs has grown into a social movement .Business people, political leaders, university professors, and especially millions of grass-roots Americans are taking part in the movement. “The understanding has increased many ,many times,” says Gaylord Nelson, the former governor from Wisconsin, who thought up the first According to US government reports , emissions (排放)from cars and trucks have dropped from 10.3 million tons a year to 5.5 tons .The number of cities producing CO beyond the standard has been reduced from 40 to 9 .Although serious problems still remain and need to be dealt with , the world is a safer and healthier place .A kind of “Green thinking ” has become part of practices .
Great improvement has been achieved .In 1988 there were only 600 recycling programs ,; today in 1995 there are about 6,600 .Advanced lights ,motors , and building designs have helped save a lot of energy and therefore prevented pollution .
Twenty –five years ago , there were hardly any education programs for environment .Today , it’s hard to find a public school , university , or law school that does not have such a kind of program .” Until we do that , nothing else will change! ” say Bruce Anderson .According to Anderson , before 1970, Americans had little idea about ___
| A．the social movement |
| B．recycling techniques |
| C．environmental problems |
| D．the importance of Earth Day |
Where does the support for environmental protection mainly come from?
| A．The grass –roots level |
| B．The business circle |
| C．Government officials |
| D．University professors |
What have Americans achieved in environmental protection ?
| A．They have cut car emissions to the lowest |
| B．They have settled their environmental problems |
| C．They have lowered their CO levels in forty cities. |
| D．They have reduced pollution through effective measures . |
What is especially important for environmental protection according to the last paragraph ?
| A．Education |
| B．Planning |
| C．Green living |
| D．CO reduction |
ArrivinginSydneyonhisownfromIndia, my husband ,Rashid, stayedina hotel for a short time while looking for a house for me and our children.
During the first week of his stay, he went out one day to do some shopping. He came back in the late afternoon to discover that his suitcase was gone. He was extremely worried as the suitcase had all his important papers, including his passport.
He reported the case to the police and then sat there，lost and lonely in strange city, thinking of the terrible troubles of getting all the paperwork organized again from a distant country while trying to settle down in a new one.
Late in the evening, the phone rang. It was a stranger. He was trying to pronounce my husband's name and was asking him a lot of questions. Then he said they had found a pile of papers in their trash can（垃圾桶）that had been left out on the footpath.
My husband rushed to their home to find a kind family holding all his papers and documents. Their young daughter had gone to the trash can and found a pile of unfamiliar papers. Her parents had carefully sorted them out, although they had found mainly foreign addresses on most of the documents. At last they had seen a half-written letter in the pile in which my husband had given his new telephone number to a friend.
That family not only restored the important documents to us that day but also restoredour faith and trust in people. We still remember their kindness and often send a warm wish their way.
| 1． |
What did Rashid plan to do after his arrival in Sydney?
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| 2． |
The girl's parents got Rashid's phone number from.
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| 3． |
What does the underlined word "restored" in the last paragraph mean?
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| 4． |
Which of the following can be the best title for the text?
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As more and more people speak the global languages of English, Chinese, Spanish, and Arabic, other languages are rapidly disappearing. In fact, half of the 6,000-7,000 languages spoken around the world today will likely die out by the next century, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
In an effort to prevent language loss, scholars from a number of organizations- UNESCO and National Geographic among them –have for many years been documenting dying languages and the cultures they reflect.
Mark Turin, a scientist at the Macmillan Center, Yale University, who specializes in the languages and oral traditions of the Himalayas, is following in that tradition. His recently published book, A Grammar of Thangmi with an Ethnolinguistic Introduction to the Speakers and Their Culture, grows out of his experience living, looking and raising a family in a village in Nepal.
Documenting the Tangmi language and culture is just a starting point for Turin, who seeks to include other languages and oral traditions across the Himalayans reaches of India, Nepal, Bhutan, and China. But he is not content to simply record these voices before they disappear without record.
At the University of Cambridge Turin discovered a wealth of important materials- including photographs, films, tap recordings, and field notes- which had remained unstudied and were badly in need of care and protection.
Now, through the two organizations that he has founded-the Digital Himalaya Project and the World Oral Literature Project- Turin has started a campaign to make such documents, found in libraries and stores around the world, available not just to scholars but to the youngers.
Generations of communities from whom the materials were originally collected.Thanks to digital technology and the widely available Internet. Turin notes,the endangered languages can be saved and reconnected with speech communities.Many scholars are making efforts to _____.
| A．promote global languages |
| B．rescue the disappearing languages |
| C．search for language communities |
| D．set up languages research organizations. |
What does “that tradition” in Paragraph 3 refer to?
| A．Having first records of the languages |
| B．Writing books on language searching |
| C．Telling stories about language users |
| D．Linking with the native speakers |
What is Turin’s book based on?
| A．The cultural statics in India. |
| B．The documents available at Yale. |
| C．His language research in Britain. |
| D．His personal experience in Nepal. |
Which of the following best describe Turin’s Work?
| A．Write sell and donate. |
| B．Record,repeat and reward. |
| C．Collect,protect and reconnect. |
| D．Design, experiment and report. |
A typical lion tamer (驯兽师) in people's mind is an entertainer holding a whip (鞭子)and a chair .The whip get all of the attention , but it's mostly for show .In reality , it's the chair that does the important work .When a lion tamer holds a chair in front of the lion's face , the lion tries to focus on all four legs of the chair at the same time .With its focus divided , the lion becomes confused and is unsure about what to do next .When faced with so many options , the lion chooses to freeze and wait instead of attacking the man holding the chair.
How often do you find yourself in the same position as the lion ? How often do you have something you want to achiever (e,g. lose weight , start a business , travel more ) -only to end up confused by all of the options in front of you and never make progress ?
This upsets me to no end because while all the experts are busy debating about which option is best , the people who want to improve their lives are left confused by all of the conflicting information .The end result is that we feel like we can't focus or that we're focused on the wrong things , and so we take less action , make less progress , and stay the same when we could be improving .
It doesn't have to be that way .Anytime you find the world waving a chair in your face , remember this :All you need to do is focus on one thing .You just need to get started .Starting before you feel ready is one of the habits of successful people .If you have somewhere you want to go , something you want to accomplish , someone you want to become ….take immediate action .If you're clear about where you want to go , the rest of the world will either help you get there or get out the way .
| 1． |
Why does the lion tamer use a chair?
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| 2． |
In what sense are people similar to a lion facing a chair?
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| 3． |
What is the author's attitude towards the experts mentioned in paragraph 3?
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| 4． |
When the world is "waving a chair in your face", you're advised to.
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