When I was young, my mum always encouraged me to do new things. She often said, "Have a try!" She didn't allow me to 1 at the very beginning until I tried it. Over the years, I have realized my 2 mainly comes from keeping those words in mind.
After leaving university, I started working in a big business （公司）. I just wanted to work for a short time until I decided on my career（职业）. At that time, my attention wasn't on the 3 itself. I thought I would work for several years, get married, stay home and take care of a family. However, I was 4 . I've worked for the same business for 28 years. I've got many chances to 5 different positions （职位） in the business. I've 6 every change of my position. Whether I was doing my daily work or finding new solutions, I liked learning and growing in each position. I've found that I have many talents and skills, because I 7 try new things. I´ve also found that if I put what I 8 into practice and work hard to achieve my dreams, I can succeed.
Today, I am so excited and thankful to become the top of the business. Another 9 has come and I am ready to take it, no matter what difficulty there will be. Thanks to the words "Have a try!", I become 10 enough to take every new challenge.
Jerry Sun is 28 years old. He （spend） the Chinese New Year with his family every year. "It is part our family tradition, wherever we live or spend it," said Sun.
Sun was b in Shandong. All his family （move） to New Jersey14 years ago. He went to junior high school college in New York. Now he works a bank clerk in Manhattan. Though he is busy, he lets nothing stop （he） from spending the Chinese New Year with his family. Sun always takes few days off every year to be with his family at festival time.
"I think it is because my parents take every Chinese New Year （serious）, even though we live in the US," said Sun. "We cook together. We make （dumpling） every year." Sun also added that they took an （act） part in watching the CCTV New Year's Gala （春晚）. They could feel the love, kindness and （happy） of Chinese people.
Being a Chinese- American, Sun said he got the （good） of both China and the US. He likes the （color） cultures and celebrates festivals from both.
Sun said, "Spending the festival in the most （tradition） way is what we can do to keep the culture."
Contents
Unit 1 Festivals and Celebrations
I. Listening………………………………………………………………… 1
Do You Know These Festival Activities?
※ Listen for vocabulary
※ Listen for relationships
II. Speaking
A Recent Festival Experience……………………………………………4
※ Talk about festival experiences
※ Role- play the conversation
III. Reading
A. Why Do We Celebrate Festivals? ……………………………………6
※ Get reading skills
B. Which Festival Is the Best? …………………………………………8
※ Learn the grammar: the - ing form
IV. Writing
My Amazing Naadam Experience ………………………………………10
※ Write about your festival experience
V. Project
Project 1 Draw a picture about a festival in China………………………11
Project 2 Share your picture in your class………………………………12
When you run into someone, will you say "Sorry"? When you get help from others, will you say "Thanks"? You will if you are polite.
A new study shows students seem to be less and less polite as they grow up and middle school students aren't as polite as primary school students. They start to swear（说脏话） and laugh at their classmates.
Wu Lin, 13, of Fujian, said, "More than 10 of 22 boys in my class often swear. We just swear for fun most of the time. But later, I understood that it was bad for me. So I stopped."
Li Fangfang, 13, Beijing, knows that laughing at others can really hurt. "Once, a classmate put up her hand to answer a question. But she didn't give the right answer. Then some classmates laughed at her," Li said. "From that day on, she never put up her hand. Those laughing kids hurt her a lot."
"Impoliteness comes from students' growing pains（痛苦）," said Wang Yamin, a teacher of a university. "Some middle school students become impolite because their classmates or parents do things that way. They think it's cool and funny. But our people are famous for politeness. Every student should speak and do things politely to respect （尊敬） others and let others respect you."
Our English teacher Mrs. Wang let us do an English research about the Chinese festivals. Here are two groups´ reports about it.
Linda´s Group |
| John's Group | |
The subject we've chosen is the Lantern Festival. We collected much information about the festival by doing some reading in the library. The Lantern Festival has a history of about 2,000 years. It's celebrated on the15th day of the first lunar month. People get together to enjoy beautiful lanterns and play riddle games. Small gifts are usually offered when they get right answers. It's a tradition to eat tangyuan on this special day. As for the next step, we will make our own lanterns and make some English riddles. This will help us understand the meaning of the festival better. | We learned about t the Dragon Boat Festival. To do the research, we searched for infor-mation online and visited a local museum about culture and customs. We've learned a lot about the festival. With a history of about 2,000 years, the Dragon Boat Festival falls on the 5th day of the fifth lunar month. People usually celebrate it by watching boat races. Zongziis eaten to honor（纪念)the great poet Qu Yuan. Next, we plan to learn how to make zongei, and produce an English video to make the festival known by more people around the world. | ||
①History ②What to eat ③When to celebrate ④Whom to honor
The Double Third Festival, also ancient Shangsi Festival is an ancient Chinese festival. It comes on the third day of the third lunar month, so It's not on the same day every year. The day is said to be the birthday of Yellow Emperor （Huangdi）. It didn't have a fixed date until the Wei and Jin dynasties（朝代）.
In the Eastern Jin Dynasty, people often bath in the river on that day to wash away bad luck. Wang Xizhi wrote in his Lantingji Xu- about how people took a bath and wrote poems while drinking. In the Tang Dynasty, people enjoyed drinks and sightseeing. In the Ming and Qing dynasties, people did activities like throwing stones, going for long walks in the country and listening to music.
In modern times, people in the southern parts of China mainly celebrate the festival. For the Zhuang people in Guangxi, they can enjoy a two or three- day holiday. And it is a festival for young people to sing songs and find their true love. Bamboo dancing is another important actıvıty for them. For the Li and Miao people in Hainan, it is a day for remembering ancestors （祖先）. For the Han people, it is a time to go outside to enjoy flowers and cook eggs with jicai. The Han people believe the wild vegetable and the special eggs are of great benefit to human health. In some areas, there are dragon boat races and other cultural performances to celebrate this lucky day.
All in all, the Double Third Festival is a time for people to feel nature, share traditions, and celebrate the arrival of spring with joy.
In our daily life, we usually use direct questions to ask for information we do not know. Direct questions are either yes or no questions such as "Are you married?" or information questions such as "Where do you live?"
It's OK to ask your friends or someone you know well direct questions, but such questions can seem unfriendly at times, especially when you are asking a stranger. For example, if you come up to someone and ask "What time is it?" or "Can you move?", he or she may refuse to help you. It is certainly right to ask questions in this way, but it's very common to make these kinds of questions more polite by adding "Excuse me" or "Pardon me" to begin your questions. "Excuse me, when does the bus leave?" or "Pardon me, may I sit here?" sounds more polite.
It's also possible to use "can" in more informal （非正式的） situations. In the past, people used" can" when asking for something, but only to speak about abilities. In the UK, some English teaching materials from Cambridge University come with the phrase （短语） "Can you lend me…" "Can I have...", etc. In the US, this form is still considered to be not true, especially for written English, and "May I have..." is better. Questions with "can" will sound more polite by using "could": "Pardon me, could you help me?"
"Would" can also be used to make questions more polite. "Would you let me borrow your pencil?" is also polite.
Another way of making direct questions more polite is to add "please" at the end of the questions, We can say "Could you help me, please?" But notice this, "please" should not appear at the beginning of the questions.
A: Hi, Emily. Nice to meet you.
B: Nice to meet you, too. Your city looks very nice in winter.
A: . And many people come to our city to play in the snow every year.
B: Winter is a good time to have fun. ?
A: Yes, I do. I like winter very much. Winter is a time for festivals, too.
B: Oh, I love festivals.
A: ?
B: New Year's Day. It's a time for me and my family to have fun. What about you?
A: My favorite festival is Jilin Snow Expo（雪博会）.
B: ?
A: Because there are many interesting things about ice and snow.
B: That sounds great!
A: ?
B: Sure. Let's go then. I´m expecting the interesting things.
《论语》中说："不学礼，无以立。"请你以"How to be a polite student"为题写一篇短文。
提示: 1.What you usually do to show your politeness;
2.Some other advice on how to be a polite student.
注意：1.短文须包括以上提示内容，可适当发挥。
2.文中不得出现真实的人名、校名及地名。
3.80词左右（开头已给出，不计入总词数）。
It is a virtue（美德） to be polite to others.
