A

When you think of success, you think of relative achievements in your own world. Each element of your world is important to you, and there is no need to compare with others. You cannot affect the success of others; you can affect your own success.

Success is very much achievable to everybody. Believe that and you have taken the first step. If you do not believe in yourself, then building self-esteem is your first task. However, believing in your ability to achieve whatever you want to succeed in is very important if you are not to be held back by self-doubt throughout your journey to success.

There are many things that will affect your ability to succeed, and it is best to focus on those under your immediate control. Once you do that, then the characteristics you develop can be applied to becoming successful in a range of activities.

What is important to you is that, as you start to reach milestones in your ambitions, you should appreciate your own achievements. Appreciating yourself will strengthen your self-confidence and your determination to succeed.

Some of the key characteristics you will find in those who are successful are perseverance, prepared to research, plan, work hard and practice a lot even when things do not seem to be going well, and an ability to recover and learn from setbacks. At the beginning of whatever you are trying to succeed in, a strong vision of your future, planning, and setting yourself achievable tar gets can all play an important role.

All these qualities, skills and characteristics can be learned and developed. But it is up to you to get things started. Those who do not start travel nowhere. For others, life can be a continuous journey of fulfillment.

1.56. According to the passage, if you want to achieve success, what should you do first?

A．Don’t compare with others.	B．Bring everything under control.
C．Find out what you have in mind.	D．Feel confident about your ability.

2.57. Why should you appreciate your own achievements according to the passage?

A．It will allow you to recover from past failures.

B．It will remind you of the vision of your future.

C．It will motivate you to continue pursuing success.

D．It will help you develop your characteristics in everything.

3.58. The underlined word“setbacks”（in paragraph 5）probably means ________.

A．failures

B．troubles

C．hesitation

D．depression

4.59. What can we learn from the last paragraph?

A．If you are stuck where you are, you cannot travel far.

B．If you don’t start trying, you’ll never embrace success.

C．If you are brave enough, you can get whatever you want.

D．If you don’t study, you can never reach the destination.

 

C

There is a place where Christmas lives all year long. It is called Bronner’s Christmas Wonderland in Frankenmuth, Michigan. The family-owned business calls itself the world’s largest Christmas store. The late Wally Bronner started the business in 1945.

Wayne Bronner, Wally’s son, is president and CEO of what is now a multi-million dollar corporation. He learned the business from an early age. Some of his best memories are traveling to other countries with his father to find new products for the store.

Bronner’s sells more than fifty thousand holiday products from seventy nations. Half of the products cost less than ten dollars. Wayne Bronner says demand for small objects to hang on Christmas trees has expanded over the years. People spend more time, effort and money into decorating their homes with these ornaments(装饰品), lights and religious scenes. Bronner’s is famous for its nativity scenes which show the birth of Jesus Christ.

Michigan has the nation’s highest unemployment rate. Bronner’s has been affected by the financial crisis, too. But not in reduced sales.

Wayne Bronner said, “Even though people are spending less, we’re having more people visit here. And as a result we’ve actually had a sales increase.” Bronner’s success is also linked to community co-operation and investment. Frankenmuth is a town of five thousand people in eastern Michigan’s farm country. The town was settled by Bavarian Germans in the 1800s. It has kept its traditions alive in buildings and restaurants.

Bavarian cultural themes and Bronner’s huge store bring three million visitors a year. The town is the most popular place for tourists in the state. Bronner’s business is aimed at a single day of the year. But that is not too different from other businesses.

 “About half of our business is done in the last quarter of the year, in the last three months. And actually when you compare that with most retailers(零售商), that follows the same pattern.” Wayne Bronner says the family’s long-term planning and willingness to reinvest profits has grown the company into what it is today. Still, it does not hurt to build a business on a holiday which is celebrated worldwide. Currently, about only two percent of sales are overseas. But Wayne Bronner sees room for growth, especially through the Internet.

51. Bronner’s Christmas Wonderland is probably ______.

   A. a private business            B. a state-run business

   C. the world’s largest store       D. a nationalized corporation

52. Bronner’s mainly sells ______.

   A. festival ornaments made by themselves

   B. holiday products imported from foreign countries

   C. festival ornaments during the summer and winter holidays

   D. holiday products to tourists from foreign countries

53. We can learn from the passage that ________.

　 A. most of Bronner’s products are expensive

   B. people are spending less money on small objects

   C. Frankenmuth is a modern town popular with tourists

   D. Wally Bronner, founder of Bronner’s, has passed away

54. In what way has the financial crisis affected Bronner’s Christmas Wonderland?

   A. Many of its staff have lost their jobs.

   B. Only two percent of sales are overseas.

   C. The corporation has had an increased sale.

   D. People are spending less in Bronner’s.

55. Bronner’s success lies in the following EXCEPT ________.

   A. aiming its business at a single day of the year

B. community co-operation and investment

C. the family’s long-term planning

D. the willingness to reinvest profits

When my first wartime Christmas came, I was in basic training in New Jersey and not sure if I would make it home for the holidays. Only on the afternoon of December 23 was the list of men who would have the three-day holiday posted. I was one of the lucky soldiers. It was Christmas Eve when I arrived home, and a little snow had fallen. Mother opened the front door. I could see beyond her, into the corner of the living room where the tree had always stood. There were lights, all colors, and ornaments (饰品) shining against the green of a pine.

"Where did it come from?" I asked.

"I asked the Gates boy to cut it," my mother said. "I wouldn't have had one just for myself, but when in great need... such a rush! He just brought it in this afternoon."

The pine reached to the proper height, almost to the ceiling, and the Tree Top Crystal（水晶） Star was in its place. A few green branches reached out a little awkwardly（难看） at the side, I thought, and there was a bit of bare trunk showing in the middle. But the tree filled the room with warm light and the whole house with the pleasant smell of Christmas.

"It's not like the one you used to find," my mother went on. "Yours were always in good shape. I suppose the Gates boy didn't know where to look for a better one. But I couldn't be fussy(挑剔的)."

"Don't worry," I told her. "It's perfect."

It wasn't, of course, but at the moment I realized something for the first time: All Christmas trees are perfect.

What did his mother's Christmas tree look like?

From the passage we can infer (推断) that______.

A. all the soldiers had the three-day holiday

B. the writer could not go home for Christmas

C. the writer spent his first Christmas during the war

D. not all the soldiers went home for Christmas during the war

From the passage, we can conclude that ______ .

A. his mother didn't like Christmas trees

B. the writer didn't like the tree cut by someone else

C. the writer used to cut very beautiful Christmas trees

D. his mother didn't want to have a Christmas tree during wartime

The best title for this passage would be ______.

A. The Perfect Christmas Tree

B. How to Choose a Christmas Tree

C. How Soldiers Spent Their Christmas

D. A Christmas with an Ugly Christmas Tree

What does the writer mean by saying “All Christmas trees are perfect”?

A. Nothing is as perfect as Christmas.

B. Once at home, everything is so nice.

C. During the war, trees are hard to find.

D. All Christmas trees are the most beautiful.

There are some special traditions in Hawaii .People are very friendly and always welcome visitors. They give visitors a lei,a long necklace made of beautiful fresh flowers. Men wear bright flowered shirts and women often wear long flowered dresses. There are traditional Chinese ,Japanese and Fillipino holidays and all the holidays from the United States. They call Hawaii the Aloha State. Aloha means both hello and good-bye. It also means “I love you”.

Usually when people from different countries,races and traditions live together,there are serious problems. There are a few problems in Hawaii ,but,in general,people have learned to live together in peace.

Hawaiians get most of their money from travelers,and most of the travelers come from the mainland and from Japan. There are so many peole living in Hawaii now that there are residential（居住的） areas where there used to be farms. Some of the big sugar and apple companies have moved to the Philippines,where they don't have to pay workers as much money. The families of the first people who came from the US mainland own the important banks and companies. Japanese are also buying or starting business.

What might be the best title for this text?

A.Hawaii ,the Aloha State          B.Living Hard Together

C.The Flower of Hawaii             D.The Problems of Hawaii

The underlined words “a lei”in the first paragraph here refer to____.

A.a friendly and welcome way

B.a long necklace made of beautiful fresh flowers

C.a bright flowered shirt

D.a long flowered dress

The author wants to show that____.

A.we should all go to Hawaii to work

B.it is possible to learn to live together in peace

C.it is not likely to live together in peace

D.Hawaii is the only place where there is peace

There are still many things that Peter Cooke would like to try his hand at — paper-making and feather-work are on his list. For the moment, though, he will stick to the skill that he has been delighted to make perfect over the past ten years: making delicate and unusual objects out of shells.

As he leads me round his apartment showing me his work, he points to a pair of shell-covered ornaments(装饰品) above a fireplace. “I shan’t be at all bothered if people don’t buy them because I have got so used to them, and to me they’re lovely. I never meant to sell my work commercially. Some friends came to see me about five years ago and said, ‘You must have an exhibition — people ought to see these. We’ll talk to a man who owns an art gallery’”. The result was an exhibition in London, at which 70 per cent of the objects were sold. His second exhibition opened at the gallery yesterday. Considering the enormous prices the pieces command —around ￡2,000 for the ornaments — an empty space above the fireplace would seem a small sacrifice for Cooke to make.

There are 86 pieces in the exhibition, with prices starting at￡225 for a shell-flower in a crystal vase. Cooke insists that he has nothing to do with the prices and is cheerily open about their level: he claims there is nobody else in the world who produces work like his, and, as the gallery-owner told him, “Well, you’re going to stop one day and everybody will want your pieces because there won’t be any more.”

“I do wish, though,” says Cooke, “that I’d taken this up a lot earlier, because then I would have been able to produce really wonderful things — at least the potential would have been there. Although the ideas are still there and I’m doing the best I can now, I’m more limited physically than I was when I started.” Still, the work that he has managed to produce is a long way from the common shell constructions that can be found in seaside shops. “I have a miniature(微型的) mind,” he says, and this has resulted in boxes covered in thousands of tiny shells, little shaded pictures made from shells and baskets of astonishingly realistic flowers.?

Cooke’s quest(追求) for beautiful, and especially tiny, shells has taken him further than his Norfolk shore: to France, Thailand, Mexico, South Africa and the Philippines, to name but a few of the beaches where he has lain on his stomach and looked for beauties to bring home. He is insistent that he only collects dead shells and defends himself against people who write him letters accusing him of stripping the world’s beaches. “When I am collecting shells, I hear people’s great fat feet crunching(嘎吱嘎吱地踩) them up far faster than I can collect them; and the ones that are left, the sea breaks up. I would not dream of collecting shells with living creatures in them or diving for them, but once their occupants have left, why should I not collect them?” If one bases this argument on the amount of luggage that can be carried home by one man, the beauty of whose work is often greater than its natural parts, it becomes very convincing indeed.

What does the reader learn about Peter Cooke in the first paragraph?

A. He has produced hand-made objects in different materials.?

B. He hopes to work with other materials in the future.?

C. He has written about his love of making shell objects.?

D. He was praised for his shell objects many years ago. 

When mentioning the cost of his shell objects, Cooke ____.

       A. cleverly changes the subject.

       B. defends the prices charged for his work.

       C. says he has no idea why the level is so high.

       D. notes that his work will not always be so popular.

The “small sacrifice” in Paragraph 2 refers to _________.?

A. the loss of Cooke’s ornaments?          B. the display of Cooke’s ornaments?

C. the cost of keeping Cooke’s ornaments    D. the space required to store Cooke’s ornaments

What does Cooke regret about his work?

A. He is not as famous as he should have been.?B. He makes less money than he should make.

C. He is less imaginative than he used to be.?    D. He is not as skillful as he used to be. ?

What does the reader learn about Cooke's shell-collecting activities?

A. Not everyone approves of what he does.

B. Other methods might make his work easier.

C. Other tourists get in the way of his collecting.

D. Not all shells are the right size and shape for his work