I am a volunteer. I set out to help clean up the beach after a violent storm a year ago. The sight I saw was heartbreaking. The broken houses seemed to be crying. I couldn't describe how I felt. But something special among the debris (废墟) turned my day around.

    I joined a club to clean up the beach after the storm last November. As I removed the debris from the beach, I noticed an object with shiny buttons in the wet sand. It was a jacket，and I was excited since Halloween(万圣节) was coming and I thought I had found a great costume(戏服). After picking it up, I was able to see that the jacket was from West Point (西点军校), the United States Military Academy, and it had the name “deGavre” written inside. I realized the jacket might be important to someone. I decided to find the jacket's owner and return it.

    I called the West Point Museum, considering that if the family couldn't be found, the jacket should go there. The museum connected me with Kim McDermott, Director of Communications for the Academy's Association of Graduates. Kim soon ensured that the jacket had belonged to Chester Braddock deGavre, who was a 1933 graduate and a war hero, but passed away in 1993.

    I sent Kim a photo of the jacket and she posted it to the West Point Association of Graduates Facebook Page, asking if anyone could help us find the family. In less than two hours, someone had found and called the hero's wife, Teresa. Soon I started to receive personal messages from members of the deGavre family, their friends and others who were touched by the story and they found me on Facebook.

    Finding Chester deGavre's jacket and connecting to his family with the help of Facebook have been so meaningful to me. I've formed a bond(纽带) with amazing people I might have never met.

阅读理解。阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项（A、B、C和D）中，选出最佳选项，并在答题卡上将该项涂黑。

    F . Scott Fitzgerald, born on September 24,1896, an American novelist, w  as once a student of St.Paul Academy, the Newman School and attended Princeton. University for a short while. In 1917 he joined the army and was posted in Alabama, where he met his future wife Zelda Sayre. Then he had to make some money to impress her.

    His life with her was full of great happiness, as he wrote in his diary :“ My own happiness in the past often approached such joy that I could share it even with the person dearest to me but had to walk it away in quiet streets and take down parts of it in my diary.”

    This side of paradise, his first novel, was published in 1920. encouraged by its success, Fitzgerald began to devote more time to his writing. Then he continued with the novel the Beautiful and Damned (1922), a collection of short stories Thales of the Jazz Age (1922), and a play The Vegetable (1923). But his greatest success was The Great Gatsby, published in 1925,which quick brought him praise from the literary world. Yet it failed to give him the needed financial security. Then, in 1926, he published another collection lf short stories All the Sad Young Men.

    However, Fitzgerald's problems with his wife Zelda affected his writing. During the 1920s he tried to reorder his life, but failed. By 1930, his wife had her first breakdown and went to a Swiss clinic. During this period he completed novels Tender Is the Night in 1934 and The love of the last Tycoon in 1940. while his wife was in hospital in the United States, he got totally addicted to alcohol. Sheila Graham, his dear friend, helped him fight his alcoholism.

    The weather outside might be freezing at home, but that doesn't mean you have to spend the winter shivering. Instead, grab your bathing suit and sunscreen and head to these sunny spots that offer the best warm-weather getaways for every interest.

    The best city beaches: San Juan, Puerto Rico

    Being able to relax on a warm sandy beach in the middle of the winter is obviously a dream getaway, but not everyone wants their sand and surf to be hidden in a remote comer of an island. Instead, head to the sizzling（炎热的）city nightlife of San Juan, where the streets of chic Condado back right into the palm trees and lapping waves of the Atlantic beaches. Top chefs, stylish hotels, bars ， clubs, and shops are all just steps away from the tropical beaches. And since Puerto Rico is a United States Commonwealth, it's one of the easiest islands in the Caribbean to visit since you won't need a passport, have to change money, or even worry about your cell phone working. Puerto Rico is also one of the best tropical vacations you can take without leaving the United States.

    The best swimming holes: Riviera Maya, Mexico

    What's better than diving into the salty sea? Submerging in the crystal clear and salt-free waters of the naturally occurring limestone cenotes of the Riviera Maya and Yucatan Peninsula. Spend a sunny day exploring these natural cave pools filled cool filtered water that springs from the ground below and the lush palm forests that surround them. Then head back to the perfectly located Fairmont Mayakoba for comfortable rooms and modem Mexican cuisine.

    The best girlfriend getaways: New Orleans

    New Orleans vibrant nightlife and live-music scenes make the “Big Easy” a great girl's trip winter getaway (check out the Girl's Trip movie if you don't believe us). And even if your crew isn't one to seek out the boozy Bourbon Street crawl, there's plenty of amazing food to be discovered in the French Quarter, plenty of shopping and strolling in the Garden District, and warm weather cruises along the bayou, too. Check out these other great weekend getaways for girls trips.

    The best aquatic movie star-spotting: Clearwater, Florida

    If you want to meet a real movie star while also soaking up the sun, head to the Gulf shores of Clearwater, Florida. Here you can meet the stars of Dolphin Tale and Dolphin Tale 2, Winter and Hope, who are in residence full-time at the Clearwater Marine Aquarium. The amazing dolphins will probably make you want to hit the waves yourself, which won't be a problem since the beautiful white sand beaches here boast 361 days of sunshine per year. Next, don't miss these destinations that are even better in the winter.

    The first organized system for sending messages began in Egypt around 1500 B.C. This system developed because the pharaohs frequently needed to send messages up and down the Nile River in order to keep their empire running smoothly. Later, the Persians developed a more efficient system for sending messages using men and horses. Messages carriers rode along the road system stretching from one end of the Persian Empire to the other. Along these roads, fresh men and horses waited at special stations to take and pass along any messages that needed to be sent. The stations where riders passed messages back and forth were built 23 kilometers apart, so the men and horses were able to travel quickly between them. The Romans later took up his idea and improved it by using a more advanced and extensive road system.

    In China, however, Kublai Khan had built up his own system for delivering messages. This system worked in the same basic way as the Roman system. The difference was that Kublai Khan kept 300,000 horses along the roads of this delivery lines. There were over 10,000 stations where a message would be passed from one rider to another with a fresh horse. In this way, Kublai Khan could receive messages from anywhere in the country in only a few days.

    It was not until the 1500s that a well-organized postal system appeared again in Europe. One family, the von Taxis family, gained the right to deliver mail for the Holy Roman Empire and parts of Spain. This family continued to carry mail, both government and private, throughout Europe for almost 300 years.

    In 1653, a Frenchman, Renouard de Velayer, established a system for delivering post in Paris. Postal charges at that time were paid by the recipient, but de Velayer's system was unique by allowing the sender to pre-pay the charges, in a similar way to the modern stamp. Unfortunately, de Velayer's system came to an end when jealous competitors put live mice in his letter boxes, ruining his business. Eventually, government-controlled postal systems took over from private postal businesses, and by the 1700s government ownership of most postal systems in Europe was an accepted fact of life.

    The thing that all these early systems had in common was that they were quite expensive for public use, and were intended for use by the government and the wealthy. However, in 1840, a British schoolteacher named Roland Hill suggested introducing postage stamps, and a postal rate based on weight. This resulted in lowering postal rates, encouraging more people to use the system to stay in touch with each other, His idea helped the British postal system begin to earn profits as early as 1850. Soon after that many other countries took up Mr. Hill's idea. And letter writing became accessible to anyone who could write. Today, the Roland Hill awards are given each year to "encourage and reward fresh ideas which help promote philately"(stamp collecting).

    Ender's Game

    Aliens(外星人) have attacked Earth twice and almost destroyed the human beings. We couldn't lose anymore. Therefore, the world government has started to train military geniuses(军事天才) in the arts of war. Ender Wiggin is taking part in this training. He wins all the games. He knows time is running out but can he save the planet? It is a good science fiction for boys.

    Hatchet

    It is the story of a boy named Brian. On a trip to the Canadian oilfields to spend the summer with his dad, the pilot of the Cessna he is traveling in suffers a heart attack and dies. Brian must land the plane in the forest. Brian learns to exist in the forest. He faces many dangers including hunger, animal attacks, and even a tornado.

    Ball Don't Lie

    Sticky, 17, is from the streets and has had a tough life so far. But, his hope for his life to be good and get better is basketball. His basketball skills may be his ticket to a better life. This book is inspiring, and raises questions about race and the difficulties in getting ahead in life when you've had a bad start.

    Crackback

    Miles Manning likes to please people, his father, his coach, and his friends. He is a starter on a winning football team that is favored to win the conference and have a chance to go to state. However, everybody is pressing Miles to be bigger, stronger and faster, including his new head coach, his demanding father, and his best friend.

    She

    A college professor and his young student follow instructions on a broken pottery shard (陶瓷碎片) that lead them to a fabled(传说中的) lost city in the jungles of Africa, where they encounter She Who Must Be Obeyed, the ruler of the land.

Most people assume that the human brain is set on "automatic"—that means it learns all by {#blank#}1{#/blank#}(it). But this isn't always true. We need to train ourselves to be better learners—to {#blank#}2{#/blank#}(active) take part in the learning process and to reflect on {#blank#}3{#/blank#} we have learnt. These kinds of learning behaviours are called "active learning". I suggest doing five things to take an active role{#blank#}4{#/blank#} your learning.

There are two {#blank#}5{#/blank#}(kind) of voices: the inner voice and the outer voice. Your inner voice expresses your {#blank#}6{#/blank#}(person) opinions, {#blank#}7{#/blank#} the outer voice tells you about opinions from what you hear or read. Although your inner voice can be useful, it can also get in {#blank#}8{#/blank#} way of learning. If you keep {#blank#}9{#/blank#}(pay) too much attention to it, you risk missing important information. Instead, active learners are open-minded and focus {#blank#}10{#/blank#} what the speaker / writer is saying, not on what their brain is saying in the background. In this way, they are in a better position to make decisions.