13．Favorite Sports
　　"What's your favorite sport, Nick?" Ms. Rodgers asked.
　　Nick thought for a moment, everyone in the class was looking at him. He was nervous. He needed a good answer. "I like (1)      ," Everyone smiled. A few people said, "I like soccer, too!"
　　That was a safe answer. Nick really liked hockey (曲棍球), but no one else in class liked it. He wished he could be (2)      , but he worried about what they would say. They would say things like, "Hockey?Why?" or "What is that?" They didn't know about it.
　　Nick came from Maryland Up North and all the kids liked hockey, Down in Florida, kids loved soccer. He didn't really understand why they didn't like hockey.
　　He asked his dad when he got home. "Why don't the kids here like hockey?"
　　His dad smiled. "Their families grew up watching soccer. They like soccer. We grew up watching hockey, so we like hockey."
　　"They are so (3)      ."
　　"You're right. They both have goalkeepers. They both have nets. The scoring and penalties (处罚•点球) are nearly the same, too."
　　"Hockey is inside a cool arena (竞技场), soccer is hot and sweaty." Nick said.
　　"Why don't you (4)       a couple of kids to watch a game?" Dad suggested. "We will take them with us."
　　Nick did that. He asked his friends Dave and Tommy. They did not know about hockey. They had never been to a game before. They were excited to (5)      .
　　At the game, they had hot dogs and soda. They watched the game. Dave and Tommy asked Nick many questions about the rules and the teams. They watched with great (6)      . All of them had fun.
　　The next time at school when Ms. Rodgers asked Nick what his favorite sport was, he said, "Hockey."
　　Dave and Tommy said (7)      , "We like hockey, too!"
　　Nick was happy. He liked it when other people liked the things he liked. It made him feel like he had friends who (8)       him.

15．The Guitar
　　The sound coming from Alper's room was awful. His mum opened the door.
　　"Son, I've got a headache. Can you give it a rest?"
　　"But I'm practicing the guitar."
　　"Practicing? Your mouth is open all the time. And you keep shouting. We send you to a guitar course but it's a waste of time and money!Didn't they give you songs you're supposed to practice with?"
　　"Oh, I do play those songs sometimes. They're really boring though, I play with my heart. It's a lot more fun that way."
　　"It's disturbing the neighbours. Last night, Mr. Arif from upstairs said that your singing sounded as if you had fallen into a pot of boiling water!"
　　Alper likes writing lyrics (歌词). But he had no music for his words. He couldn't write music. He bought the guitar because he thought that he only needed to touch the guitar and beautiful music would just come out on its own. But instead it was only practice, practice, practice. Not real music.
　　His mum's words really made him upset. He picked up his guitar and went to the park. He played the guitar and started to sing his song on the bench.
　　At that moment, some young people walked into the park. A boy had a clarinet (单簧管) in his hand and the other boy had a drum. A girl took out her violin. Then they started to play. First the drum, next the clarinet, then the violin. They were all doing their own things. The music didn't go together. The instruments didn't go together. But when they put together, it sounded fantastic. They were making their own kind of music!
　　The park was getting more and more crowded with people attracted by the young group's music.
　　Alper slowly walked towards the group of young people. He began to sing the song he had written himself. The one he didn't know how to compose (作曲). The words fitted the music now!
　　He left his guitar on the grass and now started to sing out loud.
　　Alper was finally happy. Maybe this was all he had ever wanted.

16．　　Life of children is competitive. For example, in kindergarten, some children can do something faster or better than other children can. In school, some children do very well in spelling or they always win in sports.
　　Every child likes winning because it gives children a good feeling about themselves and makes them proud. But learning to lose is just as important as learning to win. Research has shown that losing games is helpful for children.
　　Melody Brook, a therapist (治疗师) in Texas says that the experience of coping with (处理) loss is helping children to understand other children in the same position. A child that has never lost a game will not realize that everyone struggles in life.
　　Losing a game is the only way for children to learn from their mistakes and think about strategies (策略) to improve. When children improve their skills and win the next time, they do not only get better at the sport or game, but they also learn something new. Learning new things increases children's confidence and their self-belief and they start to be proud of their abilities.
　　Finally, losing shows children that they need to work hard in order to have success because good things are not just handed over to them. These situations also help children to lose with grace (优雅) in front of others and to be seen as a fair loser.
　　Children need to practice losing in order to be able to cope when they lose in a competition in front of their peers. Children who do not experience losing can grow up to be anxious, because they start seeing the possibility of not winning as some form of harm and they cannot deal with situations that do not go their way.
　　The feelings of losing and moving on are special skills children need to develop in order to deal with negative experiences in life when they become older. It might not seem fair to children that one kid can do something faster or better than they can, but children must understand that everyone has different talents and that it is impossible to be good at everything.

17．　　Does Writing by Hand Make Kids Smarter?
　　Do you often write by hand or type on a keyboard? Does your school offer any handwriting training?
　　Maybe you think it's the age of technology now and digital learning is popular. And typing is easier than handwriting. Digital learning has many positive aspects, but we also need to write by hand.
　　The result from Van der Meer and her colleagues' studies has shown that both children and adults learn more and remember better when writing by hand. They used an EEG (脑电图) to track and record brain wave activity. Young adults and children participated in their study. The participants wore a hood (兜帽) with over 250 electrodes (电极) attached. The brain produces electrical impulses (脉冲) when it is active. The sensors(传感器) in the electrodes are very sensitive and pick up the electrical activity that takes place in the brain. The result shows that the brain in both adults and children is much more active when writing by hand than when typing on a keyboard.
　　"Writing by hand creates much more activity in the sensorimotor (感觉运动的) parts of the brain. A lot of senses are activated by pressing the pen on paper, seeing the letters you write and hearing the sound you make while writing. These sense experiences create contact between different parts of the brain and open the brain up for learning. We both learn better and remember better." says Van der Meer.
　　In the debate about handwriting or keyboard use in school, some teachers believe that keyboards create less frustration for children. They point out that children can write longer texts earlier, and are more motivated to write because they experience greater mastery with a keyboard.
　　"Learning to write by hand is a bit slower process, but it's important for children to write by hand. The hand movements and the shaping of letters are beneficial in several ways. If you use a keyboard, you use the same movement for each letter. Writing by hand requires control of your fine motor skills and senses. It's important to put the brain in a learning state as often as possible." says Van der Meer.
　　Given the development of the last several years, we risk having one or more generations lose the ability to write by hand. In order for the brain to develop in the best possible way, we need to use it for what it's best at. If we don't challenge our brain, it can't reach its full potential (潜能). And that can have a strong effect on school performance.
　　We should ensure children receive at least a minimum (最小量) of handwriting training. Now it's time to use the pen and paper to do some writing.

18．Teen Scientist Finds a Low-Tech Way to Recycle Water
　　Shreya Ramachandran is 17 years old. She lives in Fremont, California. In 2014, she visited Tulare County and remembered seeing California's water crisis (危机). Tulare is in California's Central Valley, and at that time, locals were facing terrible water shortages caused by climate change. The wells completely ran dry and they were trucking water in for even basic needs.
　　Ramachandran was really shocked so she decided to do something for the locals. She tried to find ways to reuse water from showers and washing machines in order to help people better deal with water shortages.
　　Around that time, Ramachandran's grandmother was visiting from India, and had brought with her a handful of soap nuts. A soap nut, also known as a soap berry, is a small yellow or brown fruit covered with a hard, brown shell. Soap nuts are native to India, where they are used for bathing.
　　One day, when she was using soap nuts as a shampoo, she suddenly realized that probably soap nuts can be used as laundry detergent (洗衣粉) as well, and then they can reuse the leftover water because soap nuts are all natural.
　　To see if the leftover water could be used to water plants, she also developed a project. She sent emails to universities up and down in California to ask for help. Finally, she got the support of a professor at the University of California, Berkeley. She tested the water on grasses and vegetables and found that gray water from soap nuts could be reused safely for non-potable (非饮用的) uses．
　　Ramachandran went on her project, which teaches people how to recycle gray water in their own homes, She does workshops at schools, libraries and business events, and she develops a gray water science lesson that has been used in more than 90 schools so far.
　　"I've learned a lot about what it means to be a scientist," Ramachandran, now a senior in high school, says, "You can use science to develop the solutions, but it's equally important to put it in practice."
1. How old is Shreya Ramachandran?
__________________________________________________
2. What caused terrible water shortages in Tulare County in 2014?
__________________________________________________
3. Why did Shreya Ramachandran want to find ways to reuse water?
__________________________________________________
4. Which country are soap nuts native to?
__________________________________________________
5. What did Shreya Ramachandran do to carry out her project?
__________________________________________________

19．从下面两个题目中任选一题, 根据中文和英文提示, 完成一篇不少于50词的文段写作．文中已给出内容不计入总词数．所给提示词语仅供选用．请不要写出你的校名和姓名．
题目①
假如你是李华, 你们学校正在为交换生举办"走进北京"的主题活动．请用英语写一封电子邮件向你们班交换生Peter推荐参观的地点, 告诉他推荐的理由和参观建议．
提示词语:the Great Wall, history, hiking, shoe
提示问题:
●Where do you advise him to visit?
●Why do you advise him to go there?
●What are your suggestions for the visit?

题目②
"凡事预则立, 不预则废"．事先做好准备, 是做事成功的前提和条件．某英文网站正在开展以"事预则立"为主题的征文活动, 假如你是李华, 请用英文写一篇短文投稿, 谈谈你曾经为某事做过什么准备, 过程和结果怎么样, 以及有什么收获．
提示词语:run for, poster, speech, important
提示问题:
●What did you prepare for?
●How did you prepare for it and what was the result?
●What do you learn from it?