Talking behind someone’s back is considered to be rude and mean. Such a conversation can cover all kinds of criticism, from their looks to their work and personality.
The other day at lunch I was with a group of colleagues, and we were talking about our boss. She is the new headmaster of our middle school.
We talked about how kind she is to us. She handwrites notes to wish us happy holidays or to thank us for jobs well done. She checks on us when she knows we’re facing difficulties outside school with our health or with our families. We talked about the good role model that she is for the young women in our school and the fair but firm way she treats students and parents.
I thought about this after lunch. Sometimes we have the good fortune to be part of another kind of “talking behind someone’s back”. And too often when we say something good about someone behind their backs, they never know about it! That night, I sent her an email to report the conversation. She replied by saying how much she appreciated hearing about this, and how it made a bright spot in a tough week of testing.
Watch for your next opportunity to be the reporter! Make sure you tell them about the nice things said behind their backs! Because how will they know unless we tell them?
【小题1】What do you conclude from the text the writer might be?

Psychologists(心理学家) have known that what's going on inside our head affects our senses. For example, poorer children think coins are larger than they are, and hungry people think pictures of food are brighter. Professor Remi Radel wanted to investigate(look into) how this happens -- whether it's right away, as the brain receives signals from the eyes, or a little later, as the brain's higher-level thinking processes get involved.
Radel chose 42 students and each student was told to arrive at the lab at noon after three or four hours of not eating on the day of the test. Then they were told there was a delay. Some were told to come back in 10 minutes; others were given an hour to get lunch. So half the students were hungry when they did the experiment and the other half had just eaten.
For the experiment, the participant looked at a computer screen. One by one, 80 words flashed on the screen. A quarter of the words were food-related. After each word, the person was asked how bright the word was and asked to choose which of two words they'd seen -- a food-related word like gateau (cake) or a neutral (中性的) word like bateau (boat).
Hungry people saw the food-related words as brighter and were better at identifying food-related words. Because the word appeared too quickly for them to be reliably seen, this means that the difference is in perception (直觉), Radel says—it's not because of some kind of processing happening in the brain after you've already figured out what you're looking at.
"This is something great to me, that humans can really realize what they need or what they hope for, to know that our brain can really arrange for our motives and needs," Radel says. "There is something inside us that selects information in the world to make life easier.”
【小题1】The purpose of Radel's research is to let us know ____.

The care given to pupils at an infants school has been rated （评定）as outstanding in a recent Ofsted report. Inspectors （视察员）visited Avondale Infants School in Kettering in June and were pleased with what they found.

    Schools are graded between one and four, with one being outstanding, and staffs（全体职员）at Avondale were delighted to be to be given an overall（总的）grade of two.

    The reports states that the school, which has an above average number of children who are entitled to free school meals, is improving.

    It also focuses on the good progress made by children who enter the school with below or well below average standards – the standards at the end of Year 2 are now the best since 2004.

    The report states: "Pupils' behavior and personal development are good, being enhanced（增强）considerably by the vibrant（活跃的）atmosphere within the school."

    Headteacher Jean Wilkins is also praised as "the driving force behind developments and the vision of the future. Under her exceptional guidance, a conscientious team is intent（专注）upon raising standards."

    Mrs. Wilkins said that staff at the school, which has 163 children aged from four to seven, pride themselves on the support and guidance they offer the children.

    She said: "We're extremely pleased with these results. We put a lot of emphasis（强调）on the well-being of the pupils to raise their self esteem（尊重）and make sure they enjoy being at school.

    "We have focused carefully on where we needed to make improvements."

    Inspectors said that the school could improve further through closer working with the parents of some pupils who do not attend regularly.                        

1. The main idea of the text is that _________.

  A. The pupils at an infants school.            B. Happy school wins inspector’s praise.

  C. The pupils have made much progress.       D. The Avondale Infants School is improving.

2. What else will the school need to do with?

  A. Make the meals better                    B. Focus on the pupils

  C. Hire a great many staffs                   D. Work with the parents.

3. From the passage, we can learn that what “ infant school” is ?

  A. Children attend school with little intelligence.

  B. Children attend school with good understanding.

  C. Children attend school in the first few years of their life.

  D. Children attend school with outstanding performance.

4. The writer wants to tell us the following EXCEPT that _______.

  A. Inspectors paid a visit to Avondale Infants School in June, 2004.

  B. More than 50% of the children in the school have meals for free.

  C. The staffs at the school provide the pupils with much guidance.

  D. The infant school has made large quantities of improvement.

When I was seven, my father gave me a Timex, my first watch. I loved it, wore it for years, and haven’t had another one since it stopped ticking a decade ago. Why? Because I don’t need one. I have a mobile phone and I’m always near someone with an iPod or something like that. All these devices (装置) tell the time — which is why, if you look around, you’ll see lots of empty wrists (手腕); sales of watches to young adults have been going down since 2007. 
But while these wise people have realized that they don’t need them, others — including some distinguished ones of our time — are spending total fortunes on them. Brands such as Rolex, Patek Philippe and Breitling command shocking prices, up to £ 250.000 for a piece.
This is ridiculous. Expensive cars go faster than cheap cars. Expensive clothes hang better than cheap clothes. But these days, all watches tell the time as well as all other watches. Yes, you may say expensive watches will come with some extra functions — but who needs them? How often do you dive to 300 metres into the sea to test its function of waterproof, or need to find your direction in the area around the South Pole by using its compass? So why pay that much of five years’ school fees for watches that allow you to do these things?
If justice were done, the Swiss watch industry should have closed down when the Japanese discovered how to make accurate watches for a five-pound note. Instead, the Swiss re-invented the watch, with the aid of millions of pounds’ worth of advertising, as a message about the man —— usually a famous star, wearing it. Rolexes are for those who spend their weekends climbing icy mountains; a Patek Philippe is for one from a rich or noble family; a Breitling suggests you like to pilot planes across the world. 
Watches are classified as “investment items” (投资项目) now. A 1994 Philippe recently sold for nearly £ 350, 000, while 1960s Rolexes have gone from 15, 000 to 30, 000 plus in a year. But, to some wealthy people, a watch is more than an investment. It’s a valuable toy for self-satisfaction, a matter of fashion. Prices may keep going up — they’ve been rising for fifteen years. But when fashion moves on, the owner of that £ 350, 000 treasured object will suddenly find his pride and joy is no more a good investment than my childhood Times. 
【小题1】The sales of watches to young people have fallen because ______. 

When I was growing up, I had an old neighbor，a doctor named Gibbs. When Dr. Gibbs wasn’t saving lives, he was   1  trees. His house sat on ten acres(英亩), and his life’s goal was to make it a   2 .
The good doctor had some interesting   3  concerning planting trees. He never  4  his new trees. Once I asked why. “Watering plants will   5  them.” He said, “If you water them, each younger generation will grow   6 . So you have to make things  7  for them.”
He talked about how watering trees 8  shallow roots, and how trees that weren’t watered had to grow  9  roots in search of water. He’d planted an oak and,   10  watering it every morning, he’d   11  it with a rolled-up newspaper. I asked him why he did that, and he said it was to get the tree’s   12 .
Dr. Gibbs died a couple of years after I left home. Every now and again, I returned and walked by his  13  and looked at the trees that I’d watched him plant some twenty-five years ago. They’re incredibly   14  now.
Every night before I go to bed, I check on my two   15 . I stand over them and pray for them.   16  I pray that their lives will be easy. But lately I’ve been thinking that it’s time to change my   17.
I know my children are going to encounter hardship. Life is tough, whether we want it to be or not. Too many times we pray for   18 , but that’s a prayer seldom met. What we need to do is pray for   19  that reach deep into the earth  20  they won’t be swept apart when the rains fall and the winds blow.