A dandelion (蒲公英) kept in my dictionary always reminds me of my lunchtimes with my mother.
When I was in the third grade, I was picked to be the princess in the school play, and for weeks my mother had practised my lines (台词) so hard with me. But no matter how easily I delivered them at home, as soon as I stepped onstage, every word disappeared from my head. Finally, my teacher took me aside. She explained that she had written a narrator’s (旁白) part to the play, and asked me to switch roles.
I didn’t tell my mother what had happened when I went home for lunch that day. But she sensed my pain, and instead of suggesting we practice my lines, she asked if I wanted to walk in the yard.
It was a lovely spring day and the rose vine (藤蔓) was turning green. Under the huge trees, we could see yellow dandelions popping through the grass in bunches, as if a painter had touched our landscape with a little bit of gold. I watched my mother casually bend down by one of the dandelions. “I think I’m going to dig up all these weeds,” she said, suddenly pulling a flower up by its roots. “From now on, we’ll have only roses in this garden.”
“But I like dandelions,” I protested (抗议). “All flowers are beautiful---even dandelions.” My mother looked at me seriously. “Yes, every flower has its own beauty, doesn’t it?” she asked thoughtfully. I nodded, feeling pleased that I had won her over. “And that is true of people too,” she added. “Not everyone can be a princess. Hence, there is no shame in that.”
Relieved that she had sensed my pain, I started to cry when I told her what had happened. She listened and smiled.
“You will be a beautiful narrator,” she comforted.
Backstage on the night of the performance, I still felt nervous.
The days that make us happy make us wise.
--- John Masefield
When I first read this line by England's Poet Laureate, it
Slowly, I seemed to
Active happiness---not mere satisfaction or
Nor are the
Consequently, the long vision is there for the seeing. The ground at your feet, the world about you---people, thoughts, emotions, pressures---are now
| A．terrified | B．satisfied | C．surprised | D．upset |
| A．other | B．opposite | C．view | D．contrast |
| A．arresting | B．amazing | C．interesting | D．disturbing |
| A．handle | B．observe | C．appreciate | D．seize |
| A．iced | B．clouded | C．rained | D．snowed |
| A．roads | B．paths | C．spots | D．places |
| A．fulfillment | B．sorrow | C．disappointment | D．entertainment |
| A．embraced | B．interrupted | C．responded | D．accompanied |
| A．brightness | B．stupidity | C．shortcomings | D．memories |
| A．physical | B．sharp | C．spiritual | D．solid |
| A．insights | B．impressions | C．attentions | D．expectations |
| A．extended | B．collapsed | C．witnessed | D．withdrew |
| A．got out | B．stayed on | C．kept off | D．fitted into |
| A．proportion | B．position | C．explanations | D．duty |
| A．happiness | B．wisdom | C．ability | D．life |
Most of us never forget the person that was there for us in our darkest times. Apparently, penguins (企鹅) don’t either.
On a typical day, off the coast of a small Brazilian island, Joao Pereira was heading out fishing. He was disheartened to find that an oil leak had polluted the waters. Staring out at the oily waves, he decided it was not a good day to fish. But walking on the beach that day, he found a struggling penguin, covered in oil and starving
Joao took the penguin home, gently cleaned it and spent the next week nursing it back to health. He named it Dindim, a Portuguese word meaning “ice pop.” Dindim is a Magellanic penguin, a species known for living in the seas of South America, In order to breed (繁殖), they must return to Patagonia, 5,000 miles from Joao’s home.
After a week of rehabilitation (康复), Joao patiently took Dindim back to the ocean and taught it how to swim again. Soon enough, it was time for Dindim to return to life in the wild. Joao took Dindim out into the sea by boat and dropped it off to encourage it to swim back to its home. But when he was back to shore, he found the penguin waiting for him. Joao made two more attempts later, but each time the bird would just swim back to Joao’s home. It seemed that Dindim had already formed a family bond with his rescuer and wouldn’t leave.
Joao had no choice but to keep the little creature. The following months saw their getting closer. Dindim would follow behind Joao to fish on the coast joyfully. It also liked to lie on Joao’s lap, letting Joao give it showers, allowing Joao to feed it fish and to pick it up. Joao and his family enjoyed the company of Dindim. But deep inside Joao’s heart, he knew Dindim belonged to the wild. Gradually, the hot summer days saw Dindim change its coat with new feathers. Was it time to say goodbye?
One morning, Joao found the bird disappeared.
A few months later, Joao heard some familiar cries in his backyard.
It was a cold, rainy day, and I had no desire to drive up the winding mountain road to my daughter Carolyn’s house. But she
So here I was,
Turning down a narrow track, we
Then we turned a corner and stopped at the top of the mountain and I was entirely held in
As we drove home, I was so moved by what we had seen that I could
The wonder of it would not let me go. “Imagine,” I said, “if I’d had a dream and
| A．asked | B．commanded | C．insisted | D．predicted |
| A．unwillingly | B．undoubtedly | C．unknowingly | D．unexpectedly |
| A．walked | B．inched | C．wandered | D．fled |
| A．pulled over | B．stepped down | C．looked up | D．turned off |
| A．greeted | B．flowed | C．reached | D．towered |
| A．admit | B．fill | C．control | D．read |
| A．amazement | B．curiosity | C．amusement | D．confusion |
| A．pushed | B．moved | C．swung | D．bathed |
| A．Doubts | B．Ideas | C．Questions | D．Requests |
| A．signal | B．symbol | C．symptom | D．sign |
| A．Each | B．Some | C．One | D．That |
| A．surely | B．barely | C．mostly | D．instantly |
| A．beginning | B．intention | C．ending | D．absence |
| A．set off | B．worked out | C．set down | D．worked at |
| A．Later | B．Better | C．Happier | D．Harder |
Plastic-Eating Worms
Humans produce more than 300 million tons of plastic every year. Almost half of that winds up in landfills(垃圾填埋场), and up to 12 million tons pollute the oceans. So far there is no effective way to get rid of it, but a new study suggests an answer may lie in the stomachs of some hungry worms.
Researchers in Spain and England recently found that the worms of the greater wax moth can break down polyethylene, which accounts for 40% of plastics. The team left 100 wax worms on a commercial polyethylene shopping bag for 12 hours, and the worms consumed and broke down about 92 milligrams, or almost 3% of it. To confirm that the worms’ chewing alone was not responsible for the polyethylene breakdown, the researchers made some worms into paste(糊状物) and applied it to plastic films. 14 hours later the films had lost 13% of their mass — apparently broken down by enzymes (酶) from the worms’ stomachs. Their findings were published in Current Biology in 2017.
Federica Bertocchini, co-author of the study, says the worms’ ability to break down their everyday food — beeswax — also allows them to break down plastic. ＂Wax is a complex mixture, but the basic bond in polyethylene, the carbon-carbon bond, is there as well, ＂she explains, ＂The wax worm evolved a method or system to break this bond. ＂
Jennifer DeBruyn, a microbiologist at the University of Tennessee, who was not involved in the study, says it is not surprising that such worms can break down polyethylene. But compared with previous studies, she finds the speed of breaking down in this one exciting. The next step, DeBruyn says, will be to identify the cause of the breakdown. Is it an enzyme produced by the worm itself or by its gut microbes(肠道微生物)?
Bertocchini agrees and hopes her team’s findings might one day help employ the enzyme to break down plastics in landfills. But she expects using the chemical in some kind of industrial process — not simply ＂millions of worms thrown on top of the plastic.＂
1．What can we learn about the worms in the study?| A．They take plastics as their everyday food. |
| B．They are newly evolved creatures. |
| C．They can consume plastics. |
| D．They wind up in landfills. |
| A．identify other means of the breakdown |
| B．find out the source of the enzyme |
| C．confirm the research findings |
| D．increase the breakdown speed |
| A．help to raise worms |
| B．help make plastic bags |
| C．be used to clean the oceans |
| D．be produced in factories in future |
| A．To explain a study method on worms. |
| B．To introduce the diet of a special worm. |
| C．To present a way to break down plastics. |
| D．To propose new means to keep eco-balance. |
Good morning, everyone. It is my honor to stand here and share with something about traveling. Which I’d like to convey is that to travel is also to learn. Take my journey to Xi’an for example. Previously, I do learn something about the city from books and TV programs. Therefore, I didn’t know what wonderful it was until I was there in person. When traveling, we can feel the surrounding with our own eyes, noses and so on, thus broaden our horizons. The picture took on the Great Wall is good reminder of my happy days during my stay in Xi’an. So everyone, seize every chance or you will start an amazing journey to learn.
Previous studies have found that the number of years spent in school relates to cognition (认知) later in life, but few studies have examined the influence of educational quality.
“Our study establishes a link between high-quality education and better later-life cognition and suggests that increased investment in schools could be a powerful strategy to improve cognitive health among older adults in the United States,” said Jennifer Manly, senior author of the study.
The study, led by Manly and Dominika Šeblová, a postdoctoral research scientist at Columbia, used data from Project Talent, a 1960 survey of high school students across the United States, and follow-up data collected in the Project Talent Aging Study. The researchers examined the relationships between six indicators (指标) of school quality and several measures of cognitive performance in participants nearly 60 years after they left high school. Since high-quality schools may be especially beneficial for people from disadvantaged backgrounds, the researchers also examined whether associations differed by geography, gender, race and ethnicity.
The researchers found that attending a school with a higher number of teachers with graduate training was the most consistent predictor of better later-life cognition, especially in language fluency (for example, coming up with words within a category). Attending a school with a high number of graduate-level teachers was about equal to the difference in cognition between a 70-year-old and someone who is one to three years older. Other indicators of school quality were related to some, but not all, measures of cognitive performance.
According to Manly and Šeblová, there may be many reasons explaining why attending schools with well-trained teachers may affect later-life cognition. “Instruction provided by more experienced and knowledgeable teachers might be more intellectually inspiring and provide additional neural or cognitive benefits,” said Šeblová, “and attending higher-quality schools may also influence life track, leading to university education and greater earnings, which are in turn linked to better cognition in later life.”
1．How did Manly and Šeblová conduct the research?| A．By conductıng surveys. | B．By making comparisons. |
| C．By explaining examples. | D．By interviewıng the elders. |
| A．The physical health determines your future life. |
| B．Good education contributes to good later-life cognition. |
| C．Language fluency is based on postgraduate training. |
| D．Good schools should have many well-trained teachers. |
| A．To remind the public of seniors’ health. | B．To look into investment in schools. |
| C．To achieve the fairness of humans. | D．To attach importance to education. |
| A．Favorable. | B．Doubtful. |
| C．Uncaring. | D．Opposing |
The Magic Bus
I was travelling on an overnight bus from Kolhapur to Aurangabad in Maharashtra. This was way back in May 1972, when I was still in college. The bus — an ordinary, non-air-conditioned one — was more than packed; all 55 seats were occupied and there were some 20 people standing in the aisle (过道). The hot day added to the discomfort of the rough, 10-hour journey. Because I was travelling on a student bus pass, I could not claim a reserved seat. I had no option but to stand — quite uncomfortably.
The bus started its journey a little later than scheduled. The passengers seated comfortably by the windows wore happy expressions as they looked at the outside world, the breeze kissing their faces. The people seated by the aisle complained about the standing ones, who had no option but to occasionally lean on the seat corners. The air inside was hot and filled with strange, unpleasant smells. Some enthusiastic travellers had carried small transistor radios with the slim hope that they would be able to listen to some music on the way.
After around two very long hours, I was beyond exhausted and bored. I kept trying to balance myself, shifting my body weight from one leg to the other to manage the discomfort. After another long hour, I was wet with sweat in the noise and shaky rhythm of the bus. I suddenly sensed a soft hand tapping my elbow (手肘), asking for attention. Turning around, I found a middle-aged man with a kind smile looking up at me. He suddenly stood up and said I could take his seat for some time. I was pleasantly surprised and immediately accepted his offer, my entire body heaving a sigh of relief. The man, whose seat I was in, stood next to me, looking around in amusement. After about 20 minutes, I signalled him to take back his space. A man, who was sitting by the window on the other side of the bus, had observed our exchange.
For every one article on some positive aspect, some positive element of life, wellbeing, satisfaction, joy, happiness, you get 21 articles on depression, anxiety and so on. Ratio of 21 to 1. Studies focus primarily on what doesn’t work. And this is not a new phenomenon. The science of psychology (心理) has been far more successful on the negative than on the positive side. It has revealed to us much more about man’s shortcomings, his illnesses, but little about his potentialities, his virtues or his psychological height. We study a lot of depression and anxiety, misjudgments and errors, very much focusing on this aspect and very little on the positive. If you had a person who 21 hours in a day was depressed and one hour in a day felt good or one day feeling good and then 21 days feeling anxious and depressed, you would say that this person would need help. And I think psychology needs help.
Today depression is 10 times higher than it was in 1960. Now part of it is because there’s more awareness, because we measure better. But that’s not all. It’s also simply because objectively there’s more depression. The average age for depression today is less than 15. Kids at very young age are introduced to the “information highway”. And very often, they are not prepared, not able to deal with it in an effective way.
As a result, when we look at this data, we say we do need more research to help people overcome depression or anxiety. And there seems nothing wrong about that.
According to the studies, 47% Harvard students over the past year have experienced depression to the point of not functioning. So they couldn’t leave home. They were really struggling to just basically get through the day. Now this is not unique to United States. We have a global epidemic here. And once again going back: Is the 21: 1 ratio good? How can we even think about studying happiness and well-being and love and joy?
What I’m going to argue for is that we do need to also focus on the positive. I am going to talk about three reasons why we should do that. The first reason is that it is important to focus on what works, because what works or what we focus on rather creates reality. If we focus on what is working, we’ll have more working in our world, more working in ourselves, more working in our relationships. The second reason why positive psychology as an independent field of study is important is that being happy is not just the negative statement of depression. It doesn’t mean just getting rid of depression or anxiety that I am experiencing so I spontaneously (自然而然) become happy. That’s not the case. That’s not how it works. And finally, prevention, which is the most effective way of preventing hardship, is actually realized by focusing on and cultivating the positive. So for these three reasons, we need positive psychology.
1．By using the ratio of 21 to 1, the author means in fact that ________.| A．on an average a person is depressed 21 hours a day and feels good one hour |
| B．most articles and studies focus primarily on what goes wrong |
| C．the science of psychology has revealed human’s nature |
| D．nearly half of Harvard and nationwide students suffer from depression |
| A．The reason for more measures. | B．The need for doing with depression. |
| C．The reason for more depression. | D．The need for taking some measures. |
| A．Prevention by focusing on and cultivating the positive feelings. |
| B．Offering various ways of overcoming the negative feelings. |
| C．Focusing on what is working to have more working in our life. |
| D．Being happy is not equal to avoiding being unhappy. |
| A．It is essential for our research to focus more on the bright side. |
| B．There is no need for the science of psychology to deal with the negative side. |
| C．The conflict between the negative psychology and positive one can’t be avoided. |
| D．We have to remove depression completely for the purpose of being happy. |
Globally, people use roofs to dry out food, do their laundry and sleep. In Belfast, where we’re based, there's a culture of enjoying looking down on the city from up high, because it's in a valley. But because we were a conflict area for a long time, many people didn’t want to live, work or hang out in the city, and our roofs cape has been neglected.
Rooftop projects can be as big or as small as you want. They can be used as social or cultural spaces, for green or blue public facilities. But it's not just about commercial opportunities; it can be as simple as an individual turning his/her city balcony into a mini garden or vegetable patch. It's not just about doing it on a rooftop because it's "cool". It's about giving up the deep-rooted thought that roofs are off limits and embracing their challenges as opportunities. That can make a huge difference. For instance, we're helping turn the rooftop car park of a city central shopping centre into an outdoor space for employees, due to restrictions they now face indoors because of COVID-19.
Using rooftops creatively allows us to cope with many of the challenges faced by cities today--be those environmental, social, technological, or cultural. At the moment, we're being forced to rethink how we use public spaces due to COVID-19. With lots of restrictions on enclosed areas, we should be acknowledging rooftops as viable alternatives. For example, Rotterdam recently hosted a play that took place across its rooftops. Each roof lit up and hosted a different part of the drama, while residents sat and watched, listening to the action through headphones.
Are there any challenges? Rain is one. Also is health and safety. But there are creative and practical solutions to all the barriers we face. In fact, the challenges are what make rooftops so exciting----because they give you even more opportunities to be creative and solve problems. It is always a matter of trial and error.
1．What matters most in taking advantage of rooftops?| A．One's own mindset(心态) | B．Geographic location |
| C．Commercial values | D．Individual support |
| A．Flexible | B．Specific |
| C．Practical | D．Multiple |
| A．What to do with trial and error |
| B．Reasons for building rooftop projects |
| C．How to solve the mentioned challenges |
| D．Obstacles in the course of urban development. |
| A．advise people to start rooftop projects |
| B．present benefits of rooftop-based economies |
| C．offer solutions to long-term city development |
| D．introduce rooftop projects in Belfast |
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