Brave Frenchman Found Half-way Around the World (NEW YORK)

A French tourist highly praised for rescuing a two-year-old girl in Manhattan said he didn’t think twice before diving into the freezing East River.

Tuesday’s Daily News said 29-year-old Julien Duret from France is the man who left the spot quickly after the rescue last Saturday.

He lifted the little girl out of the water after she fell off the bank at the South Street Seaport museum. He handed the girl to her father, David Anderson, who had dived in after him.

“I didn’t think at all,” Duret told the Daily News. “It happened very fast. I reacted very fast.”

Duret, an engineer on vacation, was walking with his girlfriend along the pier (码头) when he saw something falling into the water. He thought it was a doll, but realized it was a child when he approached the river. In an instant, he took off his coat and jumped into the water.

When he reached the girl, she appeared lifeless, he said. Fortunately, when she was out of the water, she opened her eyes.

Anderson said his daughter slipped off the bank when he was adjusting his camera. An ambulance came later for her, said Duret, who was handed dry clothes from onlookers. Duret caught a taxi with his girlfriend shortly after.

The rescue happened on the day before he left for France. Duret said he didn’t realize his tale of heroism had greatly moved New York until he was leaving the city the next morning.

“I don’t really think I’m a hero,” said Duret. “Anyone would do the same thing.”

Why was Duret in New York?

A. To meet his girlfriend.              B. To work as an engineer.

C. To spend his holiday.               D. To visit the Andersons.

What did Duret do shortly after the ambulance came?

A. He was interviewed by a newspaper.

B. He asked his girlfriend for his dry clothes.

C. He went to the hospital in the ambulance.

D. He disappeared from the spot quickly.

Who dived after Duret into the river to save the little girl?

A. David Anderson.                 B. A passer-by. 

C. His girlfriend.                   D. A taxi driver.

When was Duret most probably found to be the very hero?

A. The day when he was leaving for home.

B. A couple of days after the girl was rescued.

C. The first day when he was in New York.

D. The same day when he was interviewed.

There is a wonderful story about a young girl who had no family and no one to love her.
One day,feeling very sad and lonely, she was walking through a grassland when she noticed a small butterfly caught in a thorn (荆棘) bush. The young girl carefully released the Butterfly. Instead of flying away, the little butterfly changed into a beautiful fairy. The young girl rubbed(擦) her eyes in disbelief.“For your wonderful kindness,” the good fairy said to the girl,“I will give you any wish you would like.” The little girl thought for a moment and then replied,“I want to be happy.”The fairy  whispered(耳语) in her ear. Then the fairy disappeared.
As the little girl grew up, there was no one in the land as happy as she. Everyone asked her secret of happiness .She would only smile and answer,“The secret of my happiness is that I listened to a good fairy when I was a little girl.”
When she was very old and on her deathbed ,the neighbors gathered around her,they said to her “Tell us, please,” they begged,“Tell us what the good fairy said.” The lovely old woman simply smiled and said,“She told me that everyone, no matter how secure they seemed, no matter how old or young,how rich or poor, had need of me.”
【小题1】______ the girl felt sad and lonely.

A.There was nobody to love her so B.There were many friends
C.There was nothing to doD.Seeing the butterfly was caught
【小题2】 Noticing the butterfly was caught by the thorn,the orphan girl ______.
A.failed to help it release from the thorn
B.felt sorrow,but she didn’t go up to help it
C.fell down on it too
D.helped the butterfly escaped from the thorn
【小题3】 The butterfly ______ after it was saved by the little girl.
A.flied away
B.changed into a fairy
C.still died
D.was more beautiful than before
【小题4】The only thing that the little girl wanted was________.
A.to be richB.to have her own parents
C.to have a lot of friendsD.happiness

A great man married a woman and they had a little lovely girl.

When the little girl was growing up, the man usually hugged her and said, “I love you, little girl.” The Little girl would say, “I’m not a little girl any more.” Then the man would laugh, “But to me, you’ll always be my little girl.”

The little girl later left her home and went into the world. No matter where she was, the man would call her and say, “I love you, little girl.”

One day the little girl received an unexpected phone call. The great man became ill. He couldn’t talk, smile, walk, hug or dance.

So she went to the side of the great man. He looked at her and tried to speak, but he could not. She sat next to the great man, and drew her arms around his useless shoulders(肩膀). Her head on his chest(胸膛), she thought of many good memories. She felt sad as she couldn’t hear the words of love that had comforted her.

And then she heard from within the man, the beat of heart. The magic happened. She heard what she wanted to hear. His heart beat out the words that his mouth could no longer say… I love you, little girl… I love you, little girl.

1.When the little girl said, “I’m not a little girl any more.” , the great man ______.

A. felt sad          B. was happy                 C. was angry                            D. couldn’t stand

2.What did the man do after the little girl left her home?

A. He left her wife.

B. He learned to sing and dance

C. He left his home and went into the world.

D. He would call her and showed his love to her.

3.The little girl went to her father because ______.

A. he became ill

B. she missed her parents

C. she made lot of money outside

D. she didn’t get his father’s calls

4.What can we learn from what the girl had done after seeing his father?

A. She knew his father would die soon.

B. She felt sorry for leaving his father.

C. She loved her father deeply too.

D. She was sure his father would be well soon.

 

Franz Kafka wrote that “a book must be the ax (斧子) for the frozen sea inside us. ”I once shared this sentence with a class of seventh graders, and it didn’t seem to require any explanation.

We’d just finished John Steinbeck’s novel Of Mice and Men. When we read the end together out loud in class, my toughest boy, a star basketball player, wept a little, and so did I. “Are you crying?” one girl asked, as she got out of her chair to take a closer look. “I am,” I told her, “and the funny thing is I’ve read it many times.”

But they understood. When George shoots Lennie, the tragedy is that we realize it was always going to happen. In my 14 years of teaching in a New York City public middle school, I’ve taught kids with imprisoned parents, abusive parents, irresponsible parents; kids who are parents themselves; kids who are homeless; kids who grew up in violent neighborhoods. They understand, more than I ever will, the novel’s terrible logic—the giving way of dreams to fate (命运).

For the last seven years, I have worked as a reading enrichment teacher, reading classic works of literature with small groups of students from grades six to eight. I originally proposed this idea to my headmaster after learning that a former excellent student of mine had transferred out of a selective high school—one that often attracts the literary-minded children of Manhattan’s upper classes—into a less competitive setting. The daughter of immigrants, with a father in prison, she perhaps felt uncomfortable with her new classmates. I thought additional “cultural capital” could help students like her develop better in high school, where they would unavoidably meet, perhaps for the first time, students who came from homes lined with bookshelves, whose parents had earned Ph. Ds.

Along with Of Mice and Men, my groups read: Sounder, The Red Pony, Lord of the Flies, Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth. The students didn’t always read from the expected point of view.   About The Red Pony, one student said, “it’s about being a man, it’s about manliness.”I had never before seen the parallels between Scarface and Macbeth, nor had I heard Lady Macbeth’s soliloquies (独白) read as raps (说唱), but both made sense; The interpretations were playful, but serious. Once introduced to Steinbeck’s writing, one boy went on to read The Grapes of Wrath and told me repeatedly how amazing it was that “all these people hate each other, and they’re all white.” His historical view was broadening, his sense of his own country deepening. Year after year, former students visited and told me how prepared they had felt in their first year in college as a result of the classes.

Year after year, however, we are increasing the number of practice tests. We are trying to teach students to read increasingly complex texts, not for emotional punch (碰撞) but for text complexity. Yet, we cannot enrich (充实) the minds of our students by testing them on texts that ignore their hearts. We are teaching them that words do not amaze but confuse. We may succeed in raising test scores, but we will fail to teach them that reading can be transformative and that it belongs to them.

1.The underlined words in Paragraph 1 probably mean that a book helps to __________.

A.realize our dreams                      B.give support to our life

C.smooth away difficulties                  D.awake our emotions

2.Why were the students able to understand the novel Of Mice and Men?

A.Because they spent much time reading it.

B.Because they had read the novel before.

C.Because they came from a public school.

D.Because they had similar life experiences.

3.The girl left the selective high school possibly because__________.

A.she was a literary-minded girl              B.her parents were immigrants

C.she couldn’t fit in with her class           D.her father was then in prison

4.To the author’s surprise, the students read the novels__________.

A.creatively         B.passively          C.repeatedly        D.carelessly

5.The author writes the passage mainly to__________.

A.introduce classic works of literature

B.advocate(倡导) teaching literature to touch the heart

C.argue for equality among high school students

D.defend the current testing system

 

One summer several years ago, my family was enjoying a barbecue on the beach. After the barbecue, my father-in-law invited me to go fishing.  Fishing was his hobby, but I   36  went fishing. We walked a little way along the beach and reached a rock by the shore, and I    37   the hook into the sea from there.  Frankly speaking, I am a (n)   38  person, and although I had not felt a tug (猛拽) on the line, I reeled up the hook after five minutes or so. I had caught    39 . It was a starfish. It trembled uneasily when I   40  the hook from its ugly mouth. I threw the starfish back into the sea. After another five minutes I caught another starfish and I threw it back again.

After a while, I caught yet another starfish. That was  41  time, and this time I really got angry. I hit the starfish on the rock   42  throwing it into the sea. I was not in the   43  to continue fishing any more.

When I was   44  the fishing tools, I noticed a little girl looking at the starfish on the rock. We   45  looks with each other. The little girl spoke to me in a   46  voice. “Sir, would you mind if I   47  the starfish back into the sea?”“Not at all,” I replied. “"But you know, there are too many starfish in the sea, and they eat many shellfish.   48 , they look so ugly. I don't like them.”

“I understand,” said the little girl. “But if the starfish cannot get back to the sea, it will be   49  by the sun and die. My dead grandfather once told me that there are no living creatures that have no right to exist in the world. God   50  every creature because it was needed by nature. Poisonous snakes, spiders, and starfish were born into this world with a certain   51  for their existence.”

“All right, dear, please throw the starfish back into the sea,” I said to the little girl, feeling   52 . The girl picked up the starfish and gently put it into the sea, and she  53  at me and said, “Thank you, sir.”

Many people like "cute" creatures such as dogs, cats, and rabbits, while they tend to dislike “ugly” creatures such as snakes, spiders, and starfish.  However, the “cuteness” and “ugliness” of things are decided   54  only on one’s personal opinions. There are no living creatures that have no  55  in the world-- this is what I learned from the little girl.

1.

A.even

B.still

C.seldom

D.ever

 

2.

A.dragged

B.pulled

C.cast

D.pushed

 

3.

A.imaginable

B.careless

C.impatient

D.confident

 

4.

A.anything

B.something

C.everything

D.nothing

 

5.

A.received

B.released

C.replaced

D.relaxed

 

6.

A.a second

B.the second

C.the third

D.a third

 

7.

A.other than

B.instead of

C.more than

D.except for

 

8.

A.sense

B.hope

C.mood

D.peace

 

9.

A.putting off

B.putting out

C.putting in

D.putting away

 

10.

A.changed

B.exchanged

C.experienced

D.arranged

 

11.

A.frightened

B.hopeless

C.puzzled

D.hesitating

 

12.

A.put

B.threw

C.cast

D.dropped

 

13.

A.Therefore

B.However

C.Besides

D.Still

 

14.

A.died out

B.worn out

C.turned out

D.dried out

 

15.

A.protected

B.blessed

C.created

D.admitted

 

16.

A.idea

B.excuse

C.purpose

D.ability

 

17.

A.very satisfied

B.a little ashamed

C.quite angry

D.a bit tired

 

18.

A.smiled

B.shouted

C.looked

D.laughed

 

19.

A.carrying

B.based

C.depended

D.following

 

20.

A.value

B.right

C.price

D.life

 

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