One of the best-known American writers of children’s books is Alfred Strong, or Doctor Strong, as he is better known to readers everywhere. Now, an art show called “Doctor Strong From Then to Now” is travelling around the United States. The pictures and drawings show the history of Doctor Strong.

Doctor Strong first became famous almost fifty years ago when his first children’s book was published. Since then, he has written forty-five books that have sold more than one hundred million copies around the world.

Doctor Strong’s books are known for their easy use of words and colorful, hand-drawn pictures. These drawings bring life to his imaginary creatures. The Cat in the Hat, Horton the Elephant, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, and hundreds of others.

The San Diego Museum, in California, organized the art show. It included about three hundred Doctor Strong’s original(最早的) drawings and some of his writings.

Most of Doctor Strong’s books, although written in a funny way, have serious messages. For example, in Mc Elligot’s Pool, he describes the danger of pollution. He discusses the arms race in The Butter Battle Book, written in 1984.

Doctor Strong is almost eighty-four years old now. He says he never planned to write stories just for children. He says he writes stories that interest people of all ages. He says he uses easy words so that everyone, even a child, can understand.

1.Alfred Strong is a famous _______ in the United States.

A. doctor 　　　　B. artist 　　　　C. writer 　　　　D. reader

2.Doctor Strong first became famous in __________.

A. his eighties when an art show was travelling around the United States

B. his fifties when his drawings and writings were published

C. 1984 when his book Mc Elligot’s Pool was published

D. his thirties when his first book was published

3.Doctor Strong’s books are very popular in America because __________.

A. they are stories about animals such as cats, elephants and so on

B. they are written in easy words with colorful pictures

C. he organized the art show in California

D. they are written in a funny way

4.His purpose in writing many such books is __________.

A. to show his original pictures and drawings

B. to organize a special art show of his own

C. to make his readers laugh or smile when they read his books

D. not only to interest people but also to uncover some serious social problems

 

 

May: Happenings from the past

May 5, 1884

Isaac Murphy, son of a slave and perhaps the greatest horse rider in American history, rides Buchanan to win his first Kentucky Derby. He becomes the first rider ever to win the race three times.

May 9, 1754

Benjamin Franklin's Pennsylvania Gazette produces perhaps the first American political cartoon(漫画), showing a snake cut in pieces, with the words “ Join or Die" printed under the picture.

May 11, 1934

The first great dust storm of the Great Plains Dust Bowl, the result of years of drought(干旱)，blows topsoil all the way to New York City and Washington, D.C.

May 19,1994

Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, former first lady and one of the most famous people of the 1960s, died of cancer in New York City at the age of 64.

May 24,1844

Samuel F. B. Morse taps out the first message, “What hath God wrought, "over the experimental long-distance telegraph line which runs from Washington, D.C. , to Baltimore, Md.

1. We know from the text that Buchanan is ______

A. Isaac's father　　　　　　　　　B. a winning horse

C. a slave taking care of horses　　　D. the first racing horse in Kentucky

2. What is the title of the first American political cartoon? 

A. Join or Die　　　                B. Pennsylvania Gazette

C. What Hath God Wrought            D. Kentucky Derby　　　       

3. In which year did the former first lady Jacqueline die? 

 A.1934.　　　　B.1960.　　　　C.1964. 　　　D.1994.

4. Which of the following places has to do with the first telegram in history?

A. Washington, D. C.　　　　         B. New York City.　　　　　　　　

C. Kentucky                          D. Pennsylvania

 

Adventure Vacations

People like different kinds of vacations. Some go camping. They swim, fish, cook over a fire and sleep outside. Others like to stay at a hotel in an exciting city. They go shopping all day and go dancing all night. Or maybe they go sightseeing to places such as Disneyland, the Tai Mahan or the Louver.

Some people are bored with sightseeing trips. They don’t want to be “tourists”. They want to have an adventure--a surprising and exciting trip. They want to learn something and maybe help people too. How can they do this? Some travel companies and environmental groups are planning special adventures. Sometimes these trips are difficult and full of hardships, but they’re a lot of fun. One organization, Earth watch, sends small groups of volunteers to different parts of the world. Some volunteers spend two weeks and study the environment. Others work with animals. Others learn about people of the past.

Would you like an adventure in the Far North? A team of volunteers is leaving from Mormons, Russia. The leader of this trip is a professor from Alaska. He’s worried about chemicals from factories. He and the volunteers will study this pollution in the environment. If you like exercise and cold weather, this is a good trip for you. Volunteers need ski sixteen kilometers every day.

Do you enjoy ocean animals? You can spend two to four weeks in Hawaii. There, you can teach language to dolphins. Dolphins can follow orders such as “Bring me the large ball.” They also understand opposites. How much more can they understand? It will be exciting to learn about these intelligent animals. Another study trip goes to Washington State and follows orcas. We call orcas “killer Whale”, but they’re really dolphins—the largest kind of dolphin. This beautiful animal travels together in family groups. They move through the ocean with their mothers, grandmothers and great-grandmothers. Ocean pollution is chasing their lives. Earth watch is studying how this happens.

Are you interested in history? Then Greece is the place for your adventure. Thirty-five hundred years ago a volcano exploded there, on Santorum. This explosion was more terrible than Karate or Mount Saint Helens. But today we know a lot about the way of life of the people from that time. There are houses, kitchens, and paintings as interesting as those in Pompeii. Today teams of volunteers are learning more about people from the past.

Do you want a very different vacation? Do you want to travel far, work hard and learn a lot? Then an Earth watch vacation is for you.

1.The Tai Mahan may be _______.

A．a shopping center                       B．a hotel　

C．a dancing hall                          D．a place of interest

2.From the passage, on an adventure trip, people ______.

A．may not spend much time on sightseeing

B．won’t meet some difficulties or hardships

C．can’t enjoy them

D．can’t learn something

3.If you want to learn something about people of the past, you can _______.

A．join the team to Hawaii

B．join the team to the Far North

C．join the team to Washington

D．join the team to Greece

4.Which of the following is false?

A．Some people find sightseeing trips boring.

B．Earth watch is planning all these special adventures.

C．The number of orcas is decreasing.

D．3 volcano explosions in all broke out 3, 500 years ago in Greece.

 

This book is said to be a special one, which ________many events not found on other history books.

　　A. writes　　　　B. covers　　　　 C. prints　　　　 D. reads

I want to make the most of every day. And, like most people, I've      that the best way to do it is (to) let go of past failures. But that's not all. One can never fully      today while thinking too much about past successes, either. People never      while resting comfortably on their laurels (荣誉). The      is that sometimes our successes hold us back more than our failures!

I once       a story about the Oscar owner, actor Clark Gable. A friend      Gable one afternoon at the actor's home. She brought along her      son, who was playing happily with toy cars on the floor. He      he was racing those cars around a great track, which in      was an imaginary circle around a golden statue. The small statue the boy played with was actually the Oscar Clark Gable      for his performance in the 1934 movie It Happened One Night.

When his mother told him the time had come to      , the little boy asked the actor, “Can I have this？”      to the Oscar.

“Sure,” he smiled. “It's yours.”

The horrified mother       . “Put that back immediately！”

Giving the child the golden statue, Clark Gable said, “Having the Oscar around doesn't mean anything to me;       it does.” The actor seemed to know that past success could be a       hammock (吊床) upon which he may be tempted to     , rather than a springboard setting him to begin a new start.

You may have learned to let go of past       and mistakes in order to free the present. But will you forget past successes and achievements in order to free the      ？Will your past be a springboard or a restful hammock?

“I like the       of the future better than the history of the past，” said Thomas Jefferson. I      . After all, the future, not the past, is where the rest of your life will be lived.

1.A.discovered　               B. inferred                  C. preferred             D. worried

2.A.spend                           B. live                         C. affect                    D. enjoy

3.A.struggle             B. work                       C. succeed                D. concentrate

4.A.story                             B. fact                        C. idea                       D. figure

5.A.wrote                           B. told                        C. knew            D. heard

6.A.saw                      B. recognized   C. met              D. visited

7.A.careful                B. small                        C. lonely                    D. clever

8.A.pretended                  B. believed                 C. insisted                 D. suggested

9.A.fact                      B. case                        C. turn             D. need

10.A.cared                         B. asked                       C. won                       D. looked

11.A.act                              B. leave                       C. play                        D. wait

12.A.running            B. getting                     C. pointing                D. shouting

13.A.shouted                     B. noticed                  C. suffered                D. breathed

14.A.selling               B. keeping                   C. earning                 D. sharing

15.A.special              B. comfortable          C. expensive  D. necessary

16.A.rest                            B. cheat                       C. stop                       D. sit

17.A.difficulties                 B. events                     C. failures              D. achievements

18.A.time                           B. future                      C. body             D. brain

19.A.idea                            B. meaning                  C. dreams                  D. thoughts

20.A.obey                          B. permit                    C. wish              D. agree