成功需要勤奋英语作文实用20篇

勤奋+尽力而为=成功上天很公平，他赐个勤奋的人丰富的果实，给尽力而为的人如愿以偿。那么你呢？你是否有获得上天赐给你的礼物？

首先来谈谈勤奋。勤奋就好像沸腾的水，但是，难道水壶一放到烧水炉上就能沸腾吗？不，沸腾的原因是因为水是炽热的，只有炽热才能产生沸腾。极度的炽热也就换回了极度的成功，极度的坚强，极度的荣誉。世界上难道有无缘无故成功的人吗？要想得到成功，你首先要学会付出，只有付出才有回报，不是吗？从现在开始，你不要羡慕别人的成就，你要知道，那成就里面凝聚了多少的艰辛，多少的付出！不要抱怨自己的天赋多么不好，不要抱怨自己的运气多么不佳。从现在开始，不要抱怨自己得到太少，而是先审视自己的不是。再问问自己：你的水是不是已经沸腾了？

其次再来看看尽力而为，有多少人能做到尽力而为呢？你去拼了，你尽力而为了，但是输了，这时，你不应该为自己的失败而垂头丧气，而是为自己的尽力而为感到高兴，“败”也“败”得无所畏惧。拼搏，可以让成功更进一步，尽力而为，可以让你在成功之路上跃过别人一步！尽力而为，这应当是人世间最容易而又最难做到的吧？你，从现在开始，尽力而为吧！

成功，来之不易。可成功，是有方法的。

文章采用总分总的结构，开篇提出论点，中间进行论述，结尾与开头相呼应，突出论点，层次清晰有条理，在内容上论据充分，论述合理，语言准确精炼富有感染力。

[勤奋+尽力而为=成功小学作文

Disposition Decides to Man’s Success

As we all known, the man who wants to be success should have a good disposition. As the saying goes, “disposition decide to everything.” I remember a famous motto: there are no two identical people in the world, but the success people are similar in many ways. Exactly, good disposition is the foundation of success. From my point of view, I deemed it success should also rely on these factors: diligent, confident, humor. It can help us to open the door of success.

There is no denying that diligent is the first step to the success. As the proverb says, no pains, no gains. Absolutely, guess that a person without diligent, how can he get achievements. Many successful people have become famous in the world by their diligent. Therefore we should take diligence as a good habit rather than lazy at every time.

Edison said “confident is the mother of the success. There is no doubt that confidence is important to our daily life .If someone without confident, he will never succeed in the end of his life. If someone trusted himself, he would gained more chance to succeed. How could you get other’s trust if you didnt trust yourself?

In addition, humor plays an important role in our life. It’s obvious that a sense of humor can bring happiness to others and get involved to a group easily. Just like my friend who is an energetic and lovely boy. The boss and staff like him very much. Boss thinks highly of him in the

company. Sometimes, we should learn to how express humorously. A sense of humor can create unexpected result.

From what has been mention above, a good disposition is an important factor to our success. Therefore, how to develop a good disposition is essential.

[性格决定成功英语作文

“我们要全心全意默默地开花，以花来证明自己的存在。”当我翻开翻到《心田上的百合花》这个故事，读到这句话时，我的心被震撼了。

一株小小的百合花，长得和杂草一模一样的百合花，它的心中一直有一个念头：“我是一株百合，不是一株野草，唯一能证明我是百合的方法，就是开出美丽的花朵。”为了这个目标，它努力地吸收水分和阳光，深深地扎根，直直地挺起胸膛;为了这个目标，它忍受着他人的嘲讽，努力释放内心的力量。终于，它开花了，它那灵性的白和秀挺的风姿，成为断崖上最美丽的颜色。“有志者，事竟成。”百合开出鲜艳的花朵，靠的就是坚持不懈，它向我们诠释了这句话的真正含义。

许多作出卓越贡献的伟人无不是靠着这种持之以恒的精神才获得最终成功的。明代史学家谈迁用二十多年心血写成的《国榷》被小偷盗走，他却很快从痛苦中挣脱出来，从头撰写这部史书;诺贝尔为了发明炸药，投入了他的整个生命，实验中，弟弟被炸死，父亲被炸成残废，但是他毫不气馁，靠自己的毅力为人类做出了贡献;现代著名书画家齐白石，数十年艺术生涯中，始终没有停止挥毫作画，他的技艺才达到炉火纯青的境界……

其实，我们又何尝不需要这样的精神呢?学习上坚持不懈，能取得优异的成绩;生活中持之以恒，能够收获良好的习惯。记得上学期冬锻活动中，我们要绕着操场跑三圈。而体育却是我的弱项，跑到第二圈时，我觉得体力不支，两腿发软，真想停下来好好休息一会儿，可这时，我的脑海中跳出了两个字：坚持。那一个个靠坚持成功的例子不停地在我眼前出现，是的，我也要坚持。于是，我继续跑着。最后，成功地跑完两圈，我的心里万分激动：坚持，我不仅收获了成功，还享受到了成功的喜悦。

所以，我更加敬仰这株百合，“人的一生，应当像这美丽的花，自己无所求，而却给人以美。”这美不仅在于花朵的美，更在于它的坚持不懈，在于这种精神上的美。

在宋代，有一位天才名为方仲永，他5岁就会写字作诗，她每天在家中写字作诗，天赋极高，村里的人民也很赞赏他，常常邀请他和他的父亲到家中做客，并为他题诗。她的父亲贪心很大，天天带着仲永到处吃喝，最后仲永的潜力越来越弱了，终于“泯然众人矣”。

由此可见，一个人没有源源不断的勤奋，又怎莫能成功呢?要想成功就要学会勤奋刻苦女里去追求成功，成功来自与勤奋。

《本草纲目》的作者李时珍他为了完成《本草纲目》一书，曾多年读医书，上山采药，试药，查看其药效。一日复一日，日积月累最终完成了本草纲目。

如果李时珍没有刻苦钻研医术、持之以恒的精神有怎摸会有如今的《本草纲目》呢?由此可见，成功离不开勤奋，成功离不开勤奋，勤奋刻苦的人终会成功。

爱因斯坦曾说过“成功等于百分之九十就得勤奋努力再加上百分之一的天赋。”汉代的匡衡，幼时家境贫寒，他非常爱好读书，但是他没有钱买烛夜读。他家的邻居虽然每晚都灯光明亮，却有高墙相隔。于是，匡衡凿壁穿孔，借光读书。后来，匡衡终于成为一位有学问的名人。

由此可见，一个人的勤奋努力对后来的成功很重要。成功来自于源源不断的勤奋。

三国时吴国的吕蒙，近代数学家华罗庚，不都是经过了自己的勤奋而取得成功的吗?爱迪生还说过：“巨大的成就，出与长期的勤奋。”因此，成功来自勤奋。毛泽东也曾说过：“天下无难事，只怕有心人。”一个人要想成功，就必须要勤奋努力。勤奋的人必定会走向成功。”“只要功夫深，铁杵也能磨成针。”成功来自与勤奋让我们大家共同努力为了我们的未来的成功一起努力吧!!

We Must Face FailureAs we all know, "Failure is the mother of success." But few people can really understand what the saying means.In the world, I am sure that no one dare say he hasnt met any trouble all his life. So we must face failure. In fact, failure is not fearful, but important thing is how to face it correctly. Facing failure, people will never take their fate lying down.They will try their best to work harder and harder until at last they succeed.Not being courageous to face setbacks, people have no chance to enjoy the pleasure of success. So they have nothing to do but feel sad and empty all day and all night. In fact, they lose the chance of success themselves.My friend, whenever in trouble, please remember, "Failure is the mother of success.

"我们必须面对失败我们都知道：“失败是成功之母。”但真正理解这句话的人却不多。我相信，世界上没有一个人敢说他一生中从没遇到过任何麻烦。因此，我们必须面对失败。其实，失败并不可怕，重要的是如何正确看待它。敢于面对失败，人们将不再由命运摆布。他们将全力以赴的辛勤工作，直到最后成功。不敢面对挫折，人们也就没有机会享受成功的喜悦。他们会无所事事，终日沮丧而空虚。事实上，是他们自己把成功的机会丧失了。朋友们，无论何时你遇到了困难，请记住：“失败是成功之母。”

学习是件非常有趣的事情!

小时候把学习当成是一项任务，默默地去学校，默默地上课，默默地完成老师布置的作业。从未想过自己为何要学习。长大一些以后开始讨厌学习。现在的我又爱上了学习，感觉学习是件非常有趣有意义的事。我觉得每门科目中都可以长痘一些不同的趣事，自从找到书中的乐趣以后我就非常乐意去学习。比如说：历史书，我可以了解到历史人物和历史事件等;语文书，我可以认识到许许多多的文字以及许多有名的作家;化学书，我认识到一些化学药物设计有什么元素组成的;生物书，我可以认识到动植物的种类大概有多少种以及认识一些未见过的动植物;地理书，我可以更好地去世界各地旅游，不用担心会迷路。。。。。。学习是件多么有趣的事情啊!

我爱上了学习，爱上了学习这个有趣的东西。

坚持和勤奋是两把利刃，它们能帮你斩断许许多多困扰你的绳索。我坚信坚持和勤奋永远是通向成功的必要途径。

雷殿生是一个普普通通的人，当他有了徒步走中国的梦想时，他的生命不再平凡。他在徒步走中国以前，就做了充分的准备，攒下了颇为可观的小金库，他完全可以继续把自己的金库变大，然而为了他的梦想，他出发了。他走过沿海线、高原、峡谷、原始森林、草原、沙漠戈壁等。在干旱的大沙漠，恶劣的环境把他逼到了死亡的边缘。他没有放弃，而是拼命地坚持，渴了喝自己的血和尿，终于成功走出了大沙漠。他历时十年，走遍了中国的各个角落，穿烂了五十多双鞋，他实现了自己的梦想，成为徒步走中国的第一人。十年，这是怎样的一种坚持啊!

雷殿生的坚持使他有了今天的成就，如果当时他没有坚持，他梦想的翅膀早被折断了，如果当时他没有坚持，他的生命早被恶劣的环境吞噬了。坚持就像一艘永远不会破旧的船，驶在心灵之海。

那是我听朋友讲的一个故事。一个小孩特别喜欢吉他，他在公园看见一帮大孩子弹吉他，他很羡慕下决心学吉他，可他没有钱请老师教。于是，他每天都到公园看别人弹吉他。一天那群弹吉他的大哥哥把小孩叫过去帮他们买吃的。小孩二话没说就帮他们买吃的去了。他们慢慢地熟悉了，大哥哥看小孩那么喜欢吉他，就教小孩弹吉他。冬天来了，天气冷了，大哥哥不去公园弹吉他了，小孩就用木板当吉他，不停的练指法。又到了春暖花开的季节了，大哥哥们高兴地看到了小孩的进步，于是把吉他借给了小孩。小孩把吉他拿回了家，他的爸爸很惊讶，不知孩子从哪里弄来了这把吉他，生怕给别人的吉他弄坏了。当爸爸看到孩子通过自己的勤奋已经会弹吉他时，爸爸就决定给孩子买一把吉他。通过自己不懈地勤奋，这个孩子实现了自己也能弹吉他的梦想。

拥有勤奋的品质，再苦再难的事情，也会变得简单;拥有坚持不懈的精神，成功之路即使布满荆棘，我们也会笑着去面对。朋友，让我们每个人都拥有勤奋与坚持吧，成功的花朵一定会为我们绽放!

我们的社会需要创新，我们最讨厌的就是一成不变，循规蹈矩，被各种各样的牢笼所束缚了。我们尊重以前留下来的各种规则，但是不代表我们就要一成不变地去附和，固执地墨守着成规，真的是一件值得称赞的好事吗？

早在战国时期，商鞅就提出“重农抑商”政策，这有利于当时建立和维护封建专制国家，因而，这条规则被历代君王沿用。可是这条规则到了后来，给中国带来了什么？由于重农抑商，抑制了中国资本主义萌芽的发展，让社会迟迟不能向前推进，中国始终是一个农业国。昔日的“天朝上国”逐渐被西方兴起的资本主义工业国甩在了身后。

这就是一个一昧遵守不合时宜的陈规，不思创新改革所带来的惨痛教训。

而愚昧的封建士大夫们，非但没有吸取经验教训，反而固执地力保清王朝，坚受着他们从小就学习的“忠君思想”，顽固地阻挠新阶级地发展。他们所推崇的清政府，一次次的与西方列强签定丧权辱国的条约，一次次地将大片领土拱手相让。现在想起，不仅仅要愤慨**的统治者，更要唾弃那些愚忠地维护着清统治的顽固分子。

切身经历，应该让我们认识到，不要盲目地追随规则。相反，敢于突破规则，勇于创新获得成功的例子比比皆是。

二战时期，美国的蒙格利特将军，别出心裁的将对手的照片摆放在自己的办公桌上，别人对他这种有违常理的做法迷惑不解。将军却说：“我摆放敌人的照片，时常把自己想象成是敌人，想象如果我是他，下一步会怎样做。”正是由于蒙格利特将军非常规地换位思考，让他取得了许多次战役的漂亮胜利。

我常思考，如果蒙格利特将军按照一般规则，只思考自己应该怎么样做，他还能取得如此辉煌的战绩吗？答案也就不那么肯定了吧。

我们所熟悉的数学运算法则，都是从右到左，从低位数算到高位数，没有质疑。可史丰收却不这样想，他偏偏要将常规反着运用。经过无数次研究验证，他最终创造了著名的史丰收速算法。

像这样的例子还有很多，比如：将原用高温处理的金属，改用冷水处理，可以延长其使用寿命；将原本发射上天的火箭，改造为钻井火箭，减小施工难度……通过这样多的成功事例，我们可以看到，勇于向传统规则挑战，打破陈规，会取得进步发展。

成功需要勇于创新，古代很多伟人都在为我们做着榜样，所以说，探索创新，敢于打破常规才是走向成功的必经之路啊！

没有一种花，可以永开不败;却有一种力量，能永远存在人们的心海。 ——题记

成功，就象跑马拉松一样，不要总想着后面的路途有多遥远，只要不断迈出一小步，就能达到终点。

听说开学以后，体育课要跑800米，暑假的最后几天，我不由地紧张起来，平时的400米竞赛，已经被累得气喘吁吁;如今的800米，对我而言是一段征途，终点，遥不可及。

8月30日，我和爸爸出现在了小区门口。心，又一次紧张地乱跳。那“砰砰”的声音，仿佛是比赛的倒数计时。“预备，跑!”爸爸边发出指令，以便按了计时器。

像往常一样，开始的1圈，我的速度较慢。当第2圈开始加速时，却发现脚越来越沉重，步伐越来越小。汗，从脸颊滴落下来，我跑得上气不接下气。我用乞求的眼神望着爸爸，示意想停下来。其实，我这种半途而废的思想，已经在脑海里出现不只一次。出乎意料的是，爸爸没有说话，没有放慢速度，他摇了摇头，眼神告诉我两个字——坚持。

成功，需要坚持。这句话在灵魂深处一闪而过。的确，获得成功的那名马拉松运动员，把路程分为一小段一小段的故事，我听了无数次，在漫漫人生路上，我为什么不能学习那名马拉松运动员呢?

没有多想，我又迈开了步子，坚持，路灯，街心花园，雕塑，我把800米分成了几部分，一个个达到目的地，仍在坚持，我抹去了汗水，往着前方的终点拼命跑着，我依旧在坚持……

那天晚上，当我的脚触到终点线的那一刹那，我仿佛见到了成功的曙光。回头看，跑过的那段路，在昏暗的路灯下显得很耀眼。也许，是坚持，所带来的无尽的力量，使终点不断变近。

坚持，是成功的源泉，无穷的力量。成功，需要技巧，需要勇气，更需要坚持到底!

成功要有信心要用努力去奋斗，要用失败去磨练。

六岁那年，我嚷着要学骑自行车。刚开始，就出师不利，总是接二连三的摔倒。“这是怎么回事啊?”我懊恼地问妈妈。妈妈微笑着给我讲了窍门，我听完恍然大悟，这回我信心十足地把一直脚踏上踏板，另一只脚使劲蹬地，纵身一跃，上了自行车。可劲太大了，车子摇晃起来，摔了我个“四脚朝天。”“什么破车呀，我不学了。”“你骑得太快了，要稳着点，再来!”“失败是成功之母，难道你忘了吗?”听了这话，我不好意思地点了点头，揉了揉屁股，拍了拍土，又上了自行车。

我又继续练习，可是顾着握车把就忘了脚，顾着脚车把又左摇右摆。唉!两只眼睛不够使啊!“坚持!你一定行的!”这时，传来了妈妈鼓励的声音。慢慢的，我掌握了窍门，既要让车稳，又要刹得住车，得全神贯注，手脚协调。我坐上自行车，脚踏踏板，双手紧握车把，眼睛紧盯前方，车平稳的向前驶去。“儿子，就这样，继续!”那边不时传来妈妈的鼓励声。渐渐的，我放松下来，车速快了许多。妈妈向我竖起了大拇指，我开心极了。

看来要想成功，就一定要坚持。

下面的材料旨在丰富学生在是非问题写作方面的思想和语言，考生在复习时可以先分类阅读这些篇章，然后尝试写相关方面的作文题。

对于素材中用黑体字的部分，特别建议你熟读，背诵，因为它们在语言和观点上都值得吸收。学习语言的人应该明白，表达能力和思想深度都靠日积月累，潜移默化。从某种意义上说，提高英语写作能力无捷径可走，你必须大段背诵英语文章才能逐渐形成语感和用英语进行表达的能力。这一关，没有任何人能代替你过。

因此，建议你下点苦功夫，把背单词的精神拿出来背诵文章。何况，并不是要求你背了之后永远牢记在心：你可以这个星期背，下个星期忘。这没有关系，相信你的大脑具有神奇的能力。背了工具箱里的文章后，你会惊讶的发现：I can think in English now！

1.?????? Proverbs

1. A graduation ceremony is an event where the commencement speaker tells thousands of students dressed in identical caps and gowns that individuality is the key to success.

2. The primary purpose of a liberal education is to make one’s mind a pleasant place in which to spend one’s time.

3. Next in importance to freedom and justice is popular education, without which neither freedom nor justice can be permanently maintained.

4. The classroom--not the trench--is the frontier of freedom now and forevermore.

5. Education’s purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one.

6. It is the purpose of education to help us become autonomous, creative, inquiring people who have the will and intelligence to create our own destiny.

7. You see, real ongoing, lifelong education doesn’t answer questions; it provokes them.

8. People will pay more to be entertained than educated.

9.the most important function of education at any level is to develop the personality of the individual and the significance of his life to himself and to others. This is the basic architecture of a life; the rest is ornamentation and decoration of the structure.

10. The essence of our efforts to see that every child has a chance must be to assure each as equal opportunity, not to become equal, but to become different-to realize whatever unique potential of body, mind, and spirit he or she possesses.

11. A great teacher never strives to explain his vision-he simply invites you to stand beside him and see for yourself.

12. If you can read and don’, you are an illiterate by choice.

2. Damaging Research

A study by National Parent-Teacher Organization revealed that in the average American school, eighteen negatives are identified for every positive that is pointed out. The Wisconsin study revealed that when children enter the first grade, 80 percent of them feel pretty good themselves, but by the time they get to the sixth grade, only 10 percent of them have good self-images.

3. Education and Citizenship

An important aspect of education in the United States is the relationship between education and citizenship. Throughout its history this nation has emphasized public education as a means of transmitting democratic values, creating equality of opportunity, and preparing new generations of citizens to function in society. In addition, the schools have been expected to help shape society itself. During the 1950s, for example, efforts to combat racial segregation focused on the schools. Later, when the Soviet Union launched the first orbiting satellite, American schools and colleges came under intense pressure and were offered many incentives to improve their science and mathematics programs so that the nations would not fall behind the Soviet Union in scientific and technological capabilities.

Education is often viewed as a tool for solving social problems, especially social inequality. The schools, t is thought, can transform young people from vastly different backgrounds into competent, upwardly mobile adults. Yet these goals seem almost impossible to attain. In recent years, in fact, public education has been at the center of numerous controversies arising from the gap between the ideal and the reality. Part of the problem is that different groups in society have different have different expectations. Some feel that children should be taught basic job-related skills; still others believe education should not only prepare children to compete in society but also help them maintain their cultural identity (and, in the case of Hispanic children, their language). On the other hand, policymakers concerned with education emphasize the need to increase the level of student achievement and to improve parents in their children’s education.

Some reformers and critics have called attention to the need to link formal schooling with programs designed to address social problems. Sociologist Charles Moscos, for example, is a leader in the movement to expand programs like the Peace Corps, Vista, and Outward Bound into a system of voluntary national service. National service, as Moscos defines it, would entail “the full-time undertaking of public duties by young people whether as citizen soldiers or civilian servers-who are paid subsistence wages” and serve for at least one year. In return for this period of service, the volunteers would receive assistance in paying for college or other educational expenses.

Advocates of national service and school-to-work programs believe that education does not have to be confined to formal schooling. In devising strategies to provide opportunities for young people to serve their society, they emphasize the educational value of citizenship experiences gained outside the classroom. At this writing there is little indication that national service will become a new educational institution in the United States, although the concept is steadily gaining support among educators and social critics.

4. The Teacher’s Role

Given the undeniable importance of classroom experience, sociologists have done a considerable amount of research on what goes on in the classroom. Often they start from the premise that, along with the influence of peers, students’ experiences in the classroom are of central importance to their later development. One study examined the impact of a single first-grade teacher on her students’ subsequent adult status. The surprising results of this study have important implications. It is evident that good teachers can make a big difference in children’s lives, a fact that gives increased urgency to the need to improve the quality of primary-school teaching. The reforms carried out by educational leaders like James Comer suggest that when good teaching is combined with high levels of parental involvement the results can be even more dramatic.

Because the role of the teacher is to change the learner in some way, the teacher-student relationship is an important part of education. Sociologists have pointed out that this relationship is asymmetrical or unbalanced, with the teacher being in a position of authority and the student having little choice but to passively absorb the information provided by the teacher. In other words, in conventional classrooms there is little opportunity for the students to become actively involved in the learning process. On the other hand, students often develop strategies for undercutting the teacher’s authority: mentally withdrawing, interrupting, and the like. Hence, much current research assumes that students and teachers influence each other instead of assuming that the influence is always in a single direction.

5. Education Philosophy

For the past fifty years our schools have operated on the theories of John Dewey (1859-1953), an American educator and writer. Dewey believed hat the school’s job was to enhance the natural development of the growing child, rather than to pour information, for which the child had no context, into him or her. In the Dewey system, the child becomes the active agent in his own education, rather than a passive receptacle for facts.

Consequently, American schools are very enthusiastic about teaching “life skills” –logical thinking, analysis, creative problem--solving. The actual content of the lessons is secondary to the process, which is supposed to train the child to be able to handle whatever life may present, including all the unknowns of the future. Students and teachers both regard pure memorization as an uncreative and somewhat vulgar.

In addition to “life skills”, schools are assigned to solve the ever growing stoke of social problems. Racism, teenage pregnancy, alcoholism, drug use, reckless driving, and are just a few of the modern problems that have appeared on the school curriculum.

This all contributes to a high degree of social awareness in American youngsters.

6. Student Life

To the students, the most notable difference between elementary school and the higher levels is that in junior high they start “changing classes”. This means that rather than spending the day in one classroom, they switch classrooms to meet their different teachers. This gives them three or four minutes between classes in the hallways, where a great deal of the important social action of high school traditionally takes place. Students have lockers in these hallways, around which thy congregate.

Society in general does not take the business of studying very seriously. Schoolchildren have a great deal of free time, which they are encouraged to fill with extracurricular activities—sports, clubs, cheerleading, scouts—supposed to inculcate such qualities as leadership, sportsmanship, ability to organize, etc. those who don’t become engaged in such activities or have afterschool jobs have plenty of opportunity to “hang out”, listen to teenager music, and watch television.

Compared to other nations, American students do not have much homework. Studies also show that American parents have lower expectations for their children’s success in school than other nationalities do. (Historically, there has not been much correlation between American school success and success in later life.) “He’s just not a scholar”, the American parents might say, content that their son is on the swim team and doesn’t take drugs. (Some of the young do choose to study hard, for reason of their own, such as determining that the road to riches lies through Harvard Business School.)

What American schools do effectively teach is the competitive method. In innumerable ways children are pitted against each other—whether in classroom discussion, spelling bees, reading groups, or tests. Every classroom is expected to produce a scattering of A’s and F’s (teachers often grade A=excellent; B=good; C=average; D=poor; and F=failed). A teacher who gives all A’s looks too soft—so students are aware that they are competing for the limited number of top marks.

Foreign students sometimes don’t understand that copying from other people’s papers or from books is considered wrong and taken seriously. Here, it is important to show that you have done your own work and are displaying your own knowledge. It is more important than helping your friends to pass, whom we think do not deserve to pass unless they can provide their own answers. Group effort goes against the competitive grain, and American students do not study together as many Asians do. Many Asians in this country consider their group study habits a large contributor to their school success.

7. Adult Education

After complaining about many aspects of American life, a 40-year-old woman from Hong Kong concluded, “But where else could someone my age go back to school and get a degree in social work? Here you can change your whole life, start a new business, do what you really want to do.”

So at least to this person, school requirements weren’t inhibiting. And to millions of others, adult education is the path to a new career, or if not to a new career, to a new outlook. Schools generally encourage the older person who wants to start anew, and besides regular classes, schedule evening classes in special programs. Today there are so many people of retirement age in college that it is no longer remarkable.

8. Moral Relativism in American

Improving American education requires not doing new things but doing (and remembering) some good old things. At the time of our nation’s founding, Thomas Jefferson listed the requirements for a sound education in the Report of the Commissioners for the University of Virginia. In this landmark statement on American education, Jefferson wrote of the importance of education and writing, and of reading history, and geography. But he also emphasized the need “to instruct the mass of our citizens in these, their rights, interests, and duties, as men and citizens.” Jefferson believed education should aim at the improvement of both one’s “morals” and “faculties”. That has been the dominant view of the aims of American education for over two centuries. But a number of changes, most of them unsound, have diverted schools from these great pursuits. And the story of the loss of the school’s original moral mission explains a great deal.

Starting in the early seventies, “values clarification” programs started turning up in schools all over America. According to this philosophy, the schools were not to take part in their time-honored task of transmitting sound moral values; rather, they were to allow the child to “clarify” his own values (which adults, including parents, had no “rights” to criticize). The “values clarification” movement didn’t clarify values; it clarified wants and desires. This form of moral relativism said, in effect, that no set of values was right or wrong; everybody had an equal right to his own values; and all values were subjective, relative, and personal. This destructive view took hold with a vengeance.

In 1985 The York Times published an article quoting New York area educators, in slavish devotion to this new view, proclaiming, “They deliberately avoid trying to tell students what is ethically right and wrong.” The article told of one counseling session involving fifteen high school juniors and seniors. In the course of that session a student concluded that a fellow student had been foolish to return one thousand dollars she found in a purse at school. According to the article, when the youngsters asked the counselor’s opinion, “He told them he believed the girl had done the right thing, but that, of course, he would not try to force his values on them. ‘If I come from the position of what is wrong,’ he explained, ‘then I’m not their counselor.’”

Once upon a time, a counselor offered counselor, and he knew that an adult does not form character in the young by taking a stance of neutrality toward questions of right and wrong or by merely offering “choices” or “options”.

In response to the belief that adults and educators should teach children sound morals, one can expect from some quarters indignant objections (I’ve heard one version of it expressed countless times over the years): “Who are you to say what’s important?” or “Whose standards and judgments do we use?”

The correct response, it seems to me, is, is we ready to do away with standards and judgments? Is anyone going to argue seriously that a life of cheating and swindling is as worthy as a life of honest, hard work? Is anyone (with the exception of some literature professors at our elite universities) going to argue seriously the intellectual corollary, that a Marvel comic book is as good as Macbeth? Unless we are willing to embrace some pretty silly position, we’ve got to admit the need for moral and intellectual standards. The problem is that some people tend to regard anyone who would pronounce a definitive judgment as an unsophisticated Philistine or a closed-minded “elitist” trying to impose his view on everybody else.

The truth of the real world is that without standards and judgments, there can be no progress. Unless we are prepared to say irrational things—that nothing can be proven more valuable than anything else or that everything is equally worthless—we must ask the normative question. It may come, as a surprise to those who fell that to be “progressive” is to be value-neutral. But as Matthew Amold said, “the world is forwarded by having its attention fixed on the best things” and if the world can’t decide what the best things are, at least to some degree, then it follows that progress, and character, is in trouble. We shouldn’t be reluctant to declare that some things, some lives, books, ideas, and values are better than others. It is the responsibility of the schools to teach these better things.

At one time, we weren’t so reluctant to teach them. In the mid-nineteenth century, a diverse, widespread group of crusaders began to work for the public support of what was then called the “common school”, the forerunner of the public school. They were to be charged with the mission of school felt that the nation could fulfill its destiny only if every new generation was taught these values together in a common institution.

The leaders of the common school movement were mainly citizens who were prominent in their communities—businessmen, ministers, local civic and government officials. These people saw the schools as upholders of standards of individual morality and small incubators of civic and personal virtue; the founders of the public schools had faith that public education could teach good moral and civic character from a common ground of American values.

But in the past quarter century or so, some of the so-called experts became experts of value neutrality, and moral education was increasingly left in their hands. The commonsense view of parents and the publicthat schools should reinforce rather than undermine the values of home, family, and country, was increasingly rejected.

There are those today still that claim we are now too diverse a nation, that we consist of too many competing convictions and interests to instill common values. They are wrong. Of course we are a diverse people. We have always been a diverse people. And as Madison wrote in FederalistNo.10, the competing, balancing interests of a diverse people can help ensure the survival of liberty. But there are values that all American citizens share and that we should want all American students to know and to make their own: honesty, fairness, self-discipline, fidelity to task, friends, and family, personal responsibility, love of country, and belief in the principles of liberty, equality, and the freedom to practice one’s faith. The explicit teaching of these values is the legacy of the common schools, and it is a legacy to which we must return.

9. Schools Should Teach Values

People often said, “Yes, we should teach these values, but how do we teach them?” this question deserves a candid response, one that isn’t given often enough. It is by exposing our children to good character and inviting its imitation that we will transmit to them a moral foundation. This happens when teachers and principals, by their words and actions, embody sound convictions. As Oxford’s Mary Warnock has written, “You cannot teach morality without being committed to morality yourself; and you cannot be committed to morality yourself without holding that some things are right and others wrong.” The theologian Martin Buber wrote that the educator is distinguished from all other influences “by his will to take part in the stamping of character and by his consciousness that he represents in the eyes of the growing person a certain selection of what is, the selection of what is ‘right’, of what should be.” It is in this will, Buber says, in this clear standing for something, that the “vocation as an educator finds its fundamental expression.”

There is no escaping the fact that young people need as example principals and teachers who know the difference between right and wrong, good and bad, and who themselves exemplify high moral purpose.

As Education Secretary, I visited a class at Waterbury Elementary School in Waterbury, Vermont, and asked the students, “Is this a good school?” They answered, “Yes, this is a good school.” I asked them, “Why?” Among other things, one eight-year-old said, “The principal Mr. Riegel, makes good rules and everybody obeys them.” So I said, “Give me an example.” And another answered, “You can’t climb on the pipes in the bathroom. We don’t climb on the pipes and the principal doesn’t either.”

This example is probably too simple to please a lot of people who want to make the topic of moral education difficult, but there is something profound in the answer of those children, something education should pay more attention to. You can’t expect children to take messages about rules or morality seriously unless they see adults taking those rules seriously in their day-to-day affairs. Certain must be said, certain limits lay down, and certain examples set. There is no other way.

We should also do a better job at curriculum selection. The research shows that most “values education” exercises and separate courses in “moral reasoning” tend not to affect children’s behavior; if anything, they may leave children morally adrift. Where to turn? I believe our literature and our history are a rich quarry of moral literacy. We should mine that quarry. Children should have at their disposal a stock of examples illustrating what we believe to be right and wrong, good and bad—examples illustrating what are morally right and wrong can indeed be known and that there is a difference.

What kind of stories, historical events, and famous lives am I talking about? If we want our children to know about honesty, we should teach them about Abe Lincoln walking three miles to return six cents and conversely, about Aesop’s shepherd boy who cried wolf if we want them to know about courage, we should teach them about Joan of Arc, Horatius at the bridge, and Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad. If we want them to know about persistence in the face of adversity, they should know about the voyages of Columbus and the character of Washington during the Civil War. And our youngest should be told about the Little Engine That Could. If we want them to know about respect for the law, they should understand why Socrates told Crito: “No, I must submit to the decree of Athens.” If we want our children to respect the rights of others, they should read the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, the Gettysburg Address, and Martin Luther King, Jr.’ “Letter from Birmingham jail.” From the Bible they should know about Ruth’s loyalty to Naomi, Joseph’s forgiveness of his brothers, Jonathan’s friendship with David, the Good Samaritan’s kindness toward a stranger, and David’s cleverness and courage in facing Goliath.

These are only a few of the hundreds of examples we can call on. And we need not get into issues like nuclear war, abortion, creationism, or euthanasia. This may come as a disappointment to some people, but the fact is that the formation of character in young people is educationally a task different from, and prior to, the discussion of the great, difficult controversies of the day. First things come first. We should teach values the same way we teach other things: one step at a time. We should not use the fact that there are many difficult and controversial moral questions as an argument against basic instruction in the subject.

After all, we do not argue against teaching physics because laser physics is difficult, against teaching American history because there are heated disputes about the Founders’ intent. Every field has its complexities and its controversies. And every field has its basics, its fundamentals. So they are too with forming character and achieving moral literacy. As any parent knows, teaching character is a difficult task. But it is a crucial task, because we want our children to be healthy, happy, and successful but decent, strong, and good. None of this happens automatically; there is no genetic transmission of virtue. It takes the conscious, committed efforts of adults. It takes careful attention.

10. College Pressures

Mainly I try to remind that the road ahead is a long one and that it will have more unexpected turns than they think. There will be plenty of time to change jobs, change careers, change whole attitudes and approaches. They don not want to hear such liberating news. They want a map—right now – that they can follow unswervingly to career security, financial security, Social Security and, presumably, a prepaid grave.

What I wish for all students is some release from the clammy grip of the future. I wish them a chance to savor each segment of their education as an experience in itself and not as a grim preparation for the next step. I wish them the right to experiment, to trip and fall, to learn that defeat is as instructive as victory and is not the end of the world.

My wish, of course, is na?ve. One of the national gods venerated in our media—the million-dollar athlete, the wealthy executive—and glorified in our praise of possessions. In the presence of such a potent state religion, the young are growing up old.

I see four kinds of pressure working on college students today: economic pressure, parental pressure, peer pressure, and self-induced pressure. It is easy to look around for villains—to blame the colleges for charging too much money, the professors for assigning too much work, the parents for pushing their children too far, and the students for driving themselves too hard. But there are no villains: only victims.

“In the late 1960s.” one dean told me. “The typical question that I got from students was ‘Why is there so much suffering in the world’ or ‘how I can make a contribution?’ Today it’s ‘Do you think it would look better for getting into law school if I did a double major in history and political science, or just majored in one of them?’” many other deans confirmed this pattern. One said: “They are trying to find an edge—the intangible something that will look better on paper if two students are about equal.”

Note the emphasis on looking better. The transcript has become a sacred document, the passport to security. How one appears on paper is more important than how one appears in person. A is for Admirable and B is for Borderline, even though, in Yale’s official system of grading, A means “excellent” and B means “very good.” Today, looking very good is no longer good enough, especially for students who hope to go on to law school or medical school. They know that entrance into the better schools will be an entrance into the better law firms and better medical practices where they will make a lot of money. They also know that the odds are harsh. Yale Law School, for instance, matriculates 170students from an applicant pool of 3,700; Harvard enrolls 550 from a pool of 7,000.

It’s all very well for those of us who write letters of recommendation for our students to stress the qualities of humanity that will make them good lawyers or doctors. And it’s nice to think that admission officers are ready reading our letters and looking for the extra dimension of commitment or concern. Still, it would be hard for a student not to visualize these officers shuffling so many transcripts studded with As that they regard a B as positively shameful.

The pressure is almost as heavy on students who just want to graduate and get a job. Long gone are the days of the “gentleman’s C.” when students journeyed through college with a certain relaxation, sampling a wide variety of courses-music, art, philosophy, classics, anthropology, poetry, religion—that would send them out as liberally educated men and women. If I were an employer I would rather employ graduates who have this range and curiosity than those who narrowly pursued safe subjects and high grades. I know countless students whose inquiring minds exhilarate me. I like to hear the play of their ideas. I do not know if they are getting As or Cs, and I do not care. I also like them as people. The country needs them, and they will find satisfying jobs. I tell them to relax. They cannot.

Nor can I blame them. They live in a brutal economy. Tuition, room, and board at most private colleges now come to at least $7,000, not counting books and fees. This might seem to suggest that the colleges are getting rich. But they are equally battered by inflation. Tuition covers only 60 percent of what it costs to educate a student, and ordinarily the remainder comes from what college receives in endowments, grants, and gifts. Now, the remainder keeps being swallowed by the cruel costs—higher every year—of just opening the doors. Heating oil is up. Insurance is up. Postage is up. Health-premium costs are up. Everything is up. Deficits are up. We are witnessing in American the creation of a brotherhood of paupers—colleges, parents, and students, joined by the common bond of debt.

Today it is not unusual for a student, even if he works part time at college and full time during the summer, to accrue $5,000 in loans after four years—loans that he must start to repay within one year after graduation. Exhorted at commencement to go forth into the world, he is already behind as he goes forth. How could he not feel under pressure throughout college to prepare for this day of reckoning? I have used “he,” incidentally, only for brevity. Women at Yale are under no less pressure to justify their expensive education to themselves, their parents, and society. In fact, they are probably under more pressure. For although they leave college superbly equipped to bring fresh leadership to traditionally male jobs, society has not yet caught up with this fact.

Along with economic pressure goes parental pressure. Inevitably, the two are deeply intertwined.

I see many students taking pre-medical courses with joyless tenacity. They go off to their labs as if they were going to the dentist. It saddens me because I know tem in other corners of their life as cheerful people.

“Do you want to medical school?” I asked them.

“I guess so,” they say, without conviction, or “Not really.”

“Then why are you going?”

“Well, my parents want me to be a doctor. They are paying all this money and …”

Poor students, poor parents, they are caught in one of the oldest webs of love and duty and guilt. The parents mean will; they are trying to steer their sons and draughts toward a secure future. But the sons and daughter want to major in history or classics or philosophy—subjects with no “practical” value. Where’s the payoff on the humanities? It’s not easy to persuade such loving parents that the humanities do indeed pay off. The intellectual faculties developed by studying subjects like history and classics—an ability to synthesize and relate, to weigh cause and effect, to see events in perspective—are just the faculties that make creative leaders in business or almost any general field. Still, many fathers would rather put their money on courses that point toward specific profession—courses that are pre-law, pre-medical, pre-business, or, as I sometimes heard it put, “pre-rich.”

But the pressure on students is severe. They are truly torn. One part of them feels obliged to fulfill their parents’ expectations; after all, their parents are older and presumably wiser. Another part tells them that the expectations that are right for their parents are not right for them.

I know a student who wants to be an artist. She is very obviously an artist and will be a good one—she has already had several modest local exhibits. Meanwhile she is growing as a well-round person and taking humanistic subjects that will enrich the inner resources out of which her art will grow. But her father is strongly opposed. He thinks that an artist is a “dumb” thing to be. The student vacillates and tries to please everybody. She keeps up with her art somewhat furtively and takes some of the “dumb” courses her father wants her to take—at least they are dumb courses for her. She is a free spirit on a campus of tense students—no small achievement in it—and she deserves to follow her muse.

Peer pressure and self-induced pressure are also intertwined, and they begin almost at the beginning of freshman year.

“I had a freshman student I’ll call Linda,” one dean told me, “who came in and said she was under terrible pressure because her roommate, Barbara, was much brighter and studied all the time. I could not tell her that Barbara had come in two hours earlier to say the same thing about Linda.”

The story is almost funny—except that it is not. It is symptomatic of all the pressure put together. When every student thinks every other student is working harder and doing better, the only solution is to study harder still. I see students going off to the library every night after dinner and coming back when it closes at midnight. I wish they would sometimes forget about their peers and go to a movie. I hear the clacking of typewriters in the hours before dawn. I see the tension in their eyes when exams are approaching and papers are due: “Will I get everything done?”

Probably they won’t. They will get blocked. They will sleep. They will oversleep. They will bug out.

Part of the problem is that they are expected to do. A professor will assign five page papers. Several students will start writing ten page papers to impress him. Then more students will write ten page papers, and a few will raise the ante to fifteen. Pity the poor student who is still just doing the assignment.

“Once you have twenty or thirty percent of the student population deliberately overexerting,” one dean points out, “It’s bad for everybody. When a teacher gets more and more effort from his class, the student who is doing normal work can be perceived as not doing well. The tactic work, psychologically.”

Why cannot the professor just cut back and not accept longer papers? He can, and he probably will. But by then the term will be half over and the damage done. Grade fever is highly contagious and not easily reversed. Besides, the professor’s main concern is with his course. He knows his students only in relation to the course and does not know that they are also overexerting in their other courses. Nor is it really his business. He did not sign up for dealing with the student as a whole person and with all the emotional baggage the student brought along from home. That’s what deans, masters, chaplains, and psychiatrists are for.

To some extent this is nothing new: a certain number of professors have always been self-contained islands of scholarship and shyness, more comfortable with books than with people. But the new pauperism has widened the gap still further, for professors who actually like to spend time with students do not have as much time to spend. They are also overexerting. If they are young, they are busy trying to publish in order not to perish, hanging by their figure nails onto a shrinking profession.

If they are old and tenured, they are buried under the duties of administering departments—as departmental chairmen or members of committees—that have been thinned out by the budgetary axe.

Ultimately it will be the students’ own business to break the circles in which they are trapped. They are too young to be prisoners of their parents’ dreams and their classmates’ fears. They must be jolted into believing into themselves as unique men and women who have the power to shape their own future.

“Violence is being done to the undergraduate experience,” says Carlos Hortas. “College should be open-ended: at the end it should open many, many roads. Instead, students are choosing their goal in advance, and their choices narrow as they go along. It’s almost as if they think that the country has been codified in the type of jobs that exist-that they’ve got to fit into certain slots. Therefore, fit into the best paying slot.”

“They ought to take chances. Not taking chances will lead to life of colorless mediocrity. They’ll be comfortable. But something in the spirit will be missing.”

I have painted too drab a portrait of today’s students, making them seem a solemn lot. That is only half of their story; if they were so dreary I wouldn’t so thoroughly enjoy their company. The other half is that they are easy to like. They are quick to laugh and to offer friendship. They are not introverts. They are usually kind and are more considerate of one another than any student generation I have known.

Nor are they so obsessed with their studies that they avoid sports and extracurricular activities. On the contrary, they juggle their crowded hours to play on a variety of teams, perform with musical and dramatic groups, and write for campus publications. But this in turn is one more cause of anxiety. There are too many choices. Academically, they have 1,300 courses to select from; outside class they have to decide how much spare time they can spare and how to spend it.

This means that they engage in fewer extracurricular pursuits than their predecessors did. If they want to row on the crew and play in the symphony they will eliminate one; in the ‘60s they would have done both. They also tend to choose activities that are self-limiting. Drama, for instance, is flourishing in all twelve of Yale’s residential colleges, as it never has before. Students hurl themselves into these productions—as actors, directors, carpenters, and technicians—with a dedication to create the best possible play, knowing that the day will come when the run will end and they can get back to their studies.

They also cannot afford to be the willing slave of organizations like the Yale Daily News. Last spring at the one-hundredth anniversary banquet of that paper—who’s past chairmen include such once and future kings as Potter Stewart, Kingman Brewster, and William F. Buckley, Jr.—much was made of the fact that the editorial staff used to be small and totally committed and that “newsies” routinely worked fifty hours a week. In effect they belonged to a club; Newsies is how they defined themselves at Yale. Today’s students will one or two articles a week, when he can, and he defines himself as a student. I’ve never heard the word Newsie except at the banquet.

If I have described the modern undergraduate primarily as a driven creature who is largely ignoring the blithe spirit inside who keeps trying to come out and play, it’s because that’s where the crunch is, not only at Yale but throughout American education. It’s why I think we should all be worried about the values that are nurturing a generation so fearful of risk and so goal-obsessed at such an early age.

I tell students that there is no one “right” way to get ahead—that each of them is a different person, starting from a different point and bound for a different destination. I tell neither them that change is a tonic and that all the slots are not codified nor the frontiers closed. One of my ways of telling them is to invite men and women who have achieved success outside the academic world to come and talk informally with my students during the year. They are heads of companies or ad agencies, editors of magazines, politicians, public officials, television magnates, labor leaders, business executives, Broadway products, artists, writers, economists, photographers, scientists, historians—a mixed bag of achievers.

I asked them to say a few words about how they got started. The students assume that they started in their present profession and knew all along that it was what they wanted to do. Luckily for me, most of them got into their field by a circuitous route, to their surprise, after many detours. The students are startled. They can hardly conceive of a career that was not pre-planned. They can hardly imagine allowing the hand of God or chance to nudge them down some unforeseen trail.

11. To Err Is Wrong

In the summer of 1979, Boston Red Sox first baseman Carl Yastrzemski became the fifteenth player in baseball history to reach the three thousand hit plateaus. This event drew a lot of media attention, and for about a week prior to the attainment of this goal, hundreds of reports covered Yaz’s every more. Finally, one reporter asked, “Hey Yaz, aren’t you afraid all of this attention will go to your head?” Yastrzemski replied, “I look at this way: in my career I’ve been up to bat over ten thousand times. That means I’ve been unsuccessful at the plate over seven thousand times. That fact alone keeps me from getting a swollen head.”?

Most people consider success and failure as opposites, but they are actually both products of the same process. As Yaz suggest, an activity that produces a hit may also produce a miss. It is the same with creative thinking; the same energy that generates good creative ideas also produces errors.

Many people, however, are not comfortable with errors. Our educational system, based on “the right answer” belief, cultivates our thinking in another, more conservative way. From an early age, we are taught that right answers are good and incorrect answers are bad. This value is deeply embedded in the incentive system used in most schools:

Right over 90% of the time = “A”

Right over 80% of the time = “B~”

Right over 70% of the time = “C~” Right over 60% of the time = “D~” Less than 60% correct, you fail.

From this we learn to be right as often as possible and to keep our mistakes to a minimum. We learn, in other words, that “to err is wrong.

Playing It Safe

With this kind of attitude, you aren’t going to be taking too many chances. If you learn that failing even a litter penalizes you (e.g., being wrong only 15% of the time garners you only a “B” performance), you learn not to make mistakes. And more important, you learn not to put yourself to situation where you might fall. This leads to conservative thought pattern designed to avoid the stigma our society puts on “failure”.

I have a friend who recently graduated from college with a Master’s degree in Journalism. For the last six month, she has been trying to find a job, but to no avail. I talked with her about situation, and realized that her problem is that she doesn’t know how to fail. She went through eighteen years of schooling to try any approaches where she might fail. She has been conditioned to believe that failure is bad in and of itself, rather than a potential stepping-stone to new ideas.

Look around. How many middle managers, housewives, administrators, teachers, and other people do you see who are to try anything new because of this failure? Most of us have learned not to make mistakes in public. As a result, we remove ourselves from many learning experience except for those occurring in the most private of circumstances.

Different Logic

From a practical point of view, “to err is wrong” makes sense. Our survival in the everyday world requires us to perform thousand of small tasks without failure. Think about it: you wouldn’t last very long if you were to step out in front of traffic or stick your hand a pot of boiling water. In addition, engineers whose bridges collapse, stock brokers who lose money for their clients, and copywriters whose ad campaigns decrease sales won’t keep their jobs very long.

Nevertheless, too great an adherence to the belief “to err is wrong” can greatly undermine your attempts to generate new ideas. If you are more concerned with producing right answers than generating original ideas, you’ll probably make uncritical use of the rules, formulae, and procedures used to obtain these right answers. By doing this, you’ll by-pass the germinal phase of the creative process, and thus spend litter time testing assumptions, challenging the rules, asking what-if questions, or just playing around with the problem. All of these techniques will produce some incorrect answers, but in the germinal phase errors are viewed as a necessary by-product of creative thinking. As Yaz would put it, “if you want the hits, be prepared for the misses.” That’s the way the game of life goes.

Errors as Stepping Stones

Whenever an error pops up, the usual response is “Jeez, another screw up, what went wrong this time?” the creative thinker, on the other hand, will realize the potential value of errors, and perhaps say something like, “Would you look at that! Where can it lead our thinking?” and then he or she will go on to use the error as a stepping stone to a new idea. As a matter of fact, the whole history of discovery is filed with people who used erroneous assumptions and failed ideas as stepping-stones to new ideas. Columbus thought he was finding a shorter route to India. Johannes Kepler stumbled on to the idea of interplanetary gravity because of assumptions that were right for the wrong reasons. And, Thomas Edison knew 1800 ways not to build a light bulb.

The following story about the automotive genius Charles Kettering exemplifies the spirit of working through erroneous assumptions to good ideas. In 1912, when the automobile industry was just beginning to grow, Kettering was interested in improving gasoline engine efficiency. The problem he faced was“knockthe phenomenon in which gasoline takes too long to burn in the cylinder-thereby reducing efficiency.

Kettering began searching for ways to eliminate the “knock.” He thought to him, “How can I get the gasoline to combust in the cylinder at an earlier time?” the key concept here is “early”. Searching for analogous situations, he looked around for models of “things that happen early.” He thought of historical models, physical models, and biological models. Finally, he remembered a particular plant, the trailing arbutus, which “happens early,” i.e., it blooms in the snow (“earlier” than other plants). One of this plant’s chief characteristics is its’ red leaves, which help the plant retain light at certain wavelengths. Kettering figured that it must be the red color, which made the trailing arbutus bloom earlier.

Now came the critical step in Kettering’s chain of thought. He asked himself, “How can I make the gasoline red?” perhaps I’ll put red dye in the gasoline—maybe that’ll make it combust earlier.” He looked around his workshop, and found that he didn’t have any red dye. But he did happen to have some iodine—perhaps that would do. He added the iodine to the gasoline and, lo and behold, the engine didn’t “knock”.

[英语作文写作的需要背诵的部分

Success, as is known, is the pursuit of many ambitious people. It requires much of a person.

In my  above all, one should be a person of strong perseverance. Rome was not built in a day. On our long way to success, there are  undoubtedly many difficulties standing in the way. If we lose heart and give up

halfway, nothing can be achieved. Throughout history, we havehad many famous successful people in the world, of whom no one is weak-minded. Take the great American scientist Edison as an example, he tried experiment after experiment and had one failure after another before he finally invented the bulb, which lighted up the whole world. So we can conclude perseverance can surely be one of the secrets of success. Furthermore, one needs to work hard to realize his dream just as the famous saying goes “Hard work leads to success”.

Look at these around us and we’ll find diligent people are always the favor of our society. They usually achieve more than expected. Why do so many of our classmates of average intelligence go far ahead of othersHard work is definitely supposed to be the answer. And still, I hold that one must keep in pace with the informative world. There’s no denying that our world is changing every day. So one can never be locked alone inside his own room, doing his research work and dedicated to book knowledge

How can an isolated person be well-informed enough to go ahead of othersIf so, that could be ridiculous. Success is what one desires. So long as one is perseverant, hard working and up-to-date, I am sure success is near at hand

人的一生不可能是一帆风顺的，必定会遇到许多次的困难与失败。当我们遭遇这些人生的必修课时，是选择放弃呢?还是坚持呢? The life of a person cannot be smooth sailing, and he will encounter many difficulties and failures.When we encounter these compulsory courses of life, do we choose to give up? Or do we persist?

那是一个周末的早晨，太阳公公用一束束金光唤醒了我，我轻轻地用手揉了揉迷糊的眼睛，忽然间想起了昨天妈妈对我的交待：“进进，明天妈妈单位忙，没有时间回来了!你要一个人在家啦!”“妈妈，你不要担心，安心工作!我长大了，会照顾好自己!”

说干就干!好好照顾自己，怎么可能让自己饿肚子呢?这就来煎几个荷包蛋来当早餐。

先学着妈妈的样子，在平底锅里倒入少许油，再拿来一枚蛋往锅沿一敲，“哎呀!”力道重了些，蛋壳连着蛋液一起流到了锅里。顿时锅里发出“嚓嚓”声，油不停地往外溅!一眨眼的功夫锅里乌黑一片，面目全非了!煎个蛋怎么这么难?搞得我都打算放弃了!就在这时，叶老师经常鼓励我的话语又萦绕在我耳边：“倪进，做任何事都要坚持!遇到困难时要勇于面对，只要你肯动脑，办法总比困难多!”

想到这里，我又鼓足勇气再试一次。先把锅里的油热一下，用手在表面感觉一下，发现油热了赶紧把火调小。拿来一枚蛋不轻也不重地往锅沿边一敲，蛋清伴着蛋黄流进了锅里。不一会儿，看着鸡蛋边缘微微地变黄了就翻个身，接下来，我又做了几个。我看着胜利的成果，心里开心极了!拿来手机给妈妈发了一通短信：“妈妈，您上班辛苦了!回来给你加餐!”

这真是一次成功的尝试!我发现这次尝试后的成功让我无比的幸福，心情是无比的激动!通过尝试，我才发现生活是如此地美好。更重要的是妈妈眼中的小宝贝长大了!

临近毕业了，我越来越感觉到要想取得好成绩，不是靠考试作弊，而是靠平时的勤奋。

翻开历史的画卷，我们可以看到古今中外的英雄志士，专家学者，他们成功的奥秘之一都是勤奋。不是吗?我国著名的生物学家童第周，上中学时，他考试不及格，老师要让他留级，同学们笑他，他不悲观失望，从此发奋学习，最后取得了优异的成绩。出国留学时又刻苦钻研，为中国人争了气，成了著名的生物学家。科学家居里夫人也是孜孜不倦，勤奋探索才发现了“镭”，为人类做出了巨大的贡献。还有没上过学的张海迪姐姐，身残志坚，勤学苦练，克服了健康人也难以克服的困难，硬是攻克了几门外语。还有我们周围的同学，他们之所以能取得好成绩，无不是勤奋的结果。

然而也有一些人，像仲永那样，小事有点聪明，为走向成功创造了条件，但由于后天不勤学而导致才智消失，失败了。这对于我们是一个多深刻的教训啊!

“勤能补拙是良训，一分辛苦一分才。”同学们，让我们大家以此共勉，用勤奋去攀登智慧的峰巅，用知识的金砖敲开成功的大门!

考试过后，我背着书包走上了回家的路。书包很轻，而我的心却很沉重。脑海中不停地出现试卷上那鲜红分数和那不忍直视的叉叉，就像绞肉机一样，一遍又一遍翻绞着我的灵魂。想到回家后要接受的判决，以及明天的运动会。我已没了斗志，可以说是心如死灰。

回家的路不知何时竟变的这么短了。回到家后，我挂着一张苦瓜脸，没有跟爸妈说一句话，便径直的走进了房间。“哐当·‘我关上了房。将书包随手一丢，自己坐在了书桌前的椅子上。突然，所有的情绪一下子全都涌现了出来。我用手抹去脸上的泪水，可眼泪似乎更多了，不停地向外淌着。

"咚咚" 门开了。我迅速拭去脸上的泪水。回过头去，看见妈妈正向我走来。她坐在我的身旁，拉起我的手。她手上的茧使我很不舒服，但手心的温度却使我温暖。她语重心长地对我说：“姑娘，怎么了，又没考好？‘’我低头不语。”没事儿，虽然你以前没考好的时候妈妈总是批评你，但你要知道妈妈也是因为对你的期望太大呀。妈妈知道你很努力，却始终得不到你因有的回报。你很气愤。但妈妈相信你下次一定能考好，一定能成功的。“妈妈的话对此刻的我来说，就像是一针·定心剂，使·心浮气躁的我安定了下来

我开始沉下心来思考，思考我的考试，思考我的运动会。

几天前，我为了在运动会上取得一个满意的成绩。总是在不断地·训练训练再训练。可是始终却没有得到一个满意的成绩·，是我的心里·很是困惑，苦恼。可是经过妈妈刚才的一席话后。我如同在黑暗中看到了光明。或许当我再次面对失败时，已不再是惧怕，而多了一份迎难而上的精神。

随着枪声的响起，我卖力地向终点处跑去，使出自己全部的力气，不再去想结果会是如何。

"嘭"又是一声枪响。比赛结束了，我赢了。

原来，每一次的成功后面一定会有失败。而这些失败，定·会成为你成功路上的垫脚石，铺就你的成功。

成功需要失败，这已是必然。

无论在事业上、生活上每个人都想获得成功，但往往不能如愿以偿究其原因大多是由于没有勤奋地工作、劳动造成的。

事业的成功来自勤奋。高尔基曾说过“天才出于勤奋。”此话当真不假，马克思的《资本论》、司马迁的《史记》、歌德的《浮士德》等传世佳作，都是作者勤奋一「作的体现。马克思辛勤40年，踏凹图书馆的地板;司马迁20出头便开始周游四方，足迹遍及黄河长江流域;歌德竟苦心搜集了58年的材料。这些作家及他们的作品都已家喻户晓——这就是上帝对他们的辛勤工作的最好的回报勤奋，就能获得工作的成功，我们何乐而不为呢?

生活的硕果来自勤奋。残疾人的生活是艰苦的但他们勤奋锻炼，没有手的就试着用脚用嘴写字干活，弥补了生理上的缺陷，和平常人过着同样幸福的生活。他们过得很充实很有意义，不是靠自己的勤奋创造的吗?

“用着的钥匙永远光亮。”这是富兰克林的一句名言，意思是要人们永不停息地工作;反之，就正如克雷洛夫说的那样：“有了天才不用，天才一定会衰退的而且会在慢性的腐朽中归于消灭。”宋朝有个神童方仲永，他5岁便能写一手好诗，由于名气渐大请他作诗的人也就越多，其父见有利可图，于是每天带着他四处作诗收钱，不让他继续勤奋学习以致后来方仲永才学枯竭，渐渐沉没于众人之电一个文学的新星，就由于不勤奋而夭折又由此看来，无论怎样的天才，只要不勤奋学习，势必会变成无知的人。这同无论多先进的机器，只要不用就会生锈变朽，是一样的道理。

至此，我们可以得到这样一个结论：无论什么事情都离不开勤奋，只有勤奋才能获得成功。

“哪里有天才，只是在别人喝咖啡的时候，我在工作。”鲁迅先生的这句活人回响在我们耳边。确实，世界上有许多名人，他们的成功不是来源于聪明，而是来源于勤奋。

爱迪生被称为发明大王，他一生发明的东西有1000多件。谁能想到这么一个“发明大王”竟然连高中都没有读完。那么他到底是靠什么取的如此巨大的成功的呢？是勤奋，爱迪生在工作之余，努力地学习，不浪费一分一秒。这是他学到了发明必须得知识，为他之后的发明之路奠定了基础。在他发明电灯的过程中，他为了找到合适的材料当灯丝，废寝忘食地工作，找遍了所有有关这一方面的书籍，反复试验了3000多种材料。终于，在他坚持不懈的努力下，他成功了。就是靠着勤奋，他才能够发明出许多别人意想不到的东西。就连爱迪生自己也说：“天才是百分之一的灵感加上百分之九十九的汗水。”

在我国古代，也有类似的故事：车胤家境贫穷，连一盏灯都买不起。在白天他还能够看一些书，可是一但到了晚上，黑暗使他根本无法看书。他为了能够多看一点书，督学一些知识，想到了一个办法。抓一些萤火虫放在一个布袋中，借着萤火虫那微弱的光芒，车胤专心致志的看书。日复一日，年复一年，车胤终于成为了一个有学问的人。

记得在初一时我们学过一篇文言文，题目叫做《伤仲永》。故事的内容是这样的：有一个叫做方仲永的金溪人，到了该学习的年纪却因为家里没有钱而没有学习。有一天突然哭着求父亲想要读书，父亲没办法，只好重邻居那里借了几本书给他看，没有想到他一看就学会了，还以赡养父母为主题写了一首诗，亲自给诗提上了名字。村里的秀才看了都说他文采非常好。这件事被村里的人知道了，村人纷纷请他父亲去做客他的父亲人为之有利可图，就天天拉着仲永到处拜访村人，不让他学习。过了几年后，作者去询问仲永的情况，仲永已经变得和普通人一样了。作者在文章最后还写了一段话告诉我们仲永变成普通人的原因，具体内容我已记不清，只记得其中一句话的意思是：不勤奋学习天才尚且变成普通人，没有天资的人难道这样就停止了吗？实在是不可思议啊，一个拥有那么高的资天真的人，最终居然变成一个普通人。这其中根本的原因就是不努力学习。

通过以上几个事例，我们可以明白地得到一个道理，那就是成功来自于勤奋。一个人就算没有过人的智慧，只要他勤奋努力，也能够取得令人惊叹的成就。相反，一个人即使拥有非常高的天资，如果不勤奋，终将失败。

李阳是疯狂英语的创始人，有一口流利地道的英语，但谁也不会想到他在大学里竟然英语经常不及格，他是怎样改变的?由于当时的胆小内向，为了增强自信心、改变英语不及格的状况，他坚持练习，并且每天坚持喊英语，终于在接下来的考试中取得了全校第二名的好成绩，一直发展到后来建立了自己的传播英语公司。

李阳喊英语的行为，被大家形象的称为“疯子”。但你可别小看这种方法，他不仅喊出的是好成绩，更重要的喊出的是自信心。自信心使李阳在连续的四个月里随时随地不忘学英语：在宿舍食堂、在亭子楼前都能听到他旁若无人的喊英语的声音。他的这种寻求自信的精神真让人敬佩。

自信可以激发人的天赋，从而发挥最大的潜能。有自信的运动员总会挑战自己的极限，有自信的艺术家总会给人一种美的享受，有自信的企业家事业总会蒸蒸日上。在学习中也应该有自信，相信自己通过认真、努力、细心掌握越来越多的知识。在人生中更应该有自信，相信自己会把握好人生中重要的每一步。

在茫茫人海中，我们要满怀信心，因为天生我材必有用，是金子总会发光的。让我们牢记：自信是成功的关键。

收到你的来信，倾听了你的烦恼，我有所感，为你寄去我的话语，希望能让你有所收获。

在信中，你不断抱怨，你的成绩越来越退步了，你越来越害怕一次又一次的考试，即使是班里的一次小测验，你说你的脑子越来越迟钝了，老师讲的一些简单的基础题都听不懂了，你很担忧。

我也算了解你，你太过消极太过自卑，回答问题时，声音也是细微蚊吟，综合上述情况，我认为你是缺少一样东西——自信。

自信对于人的成长有着很大的作用，它是你杀死前进路上拦路虎的利剑，可以帮助你走向成功的人生。

世界著名音乐家贝多芬，身材矮小，容貌丑陋，从小双目失明，两耳失聪，然而他靠着自信的人生态度和不屈不挠的毅力，最终完成了《第九交响曲》等世界名曲，成为音乐巨匠。哥白尼曾因反对地心说，相信日心说呗宗教和当时被封建思想禁锢的人们所唾骂，但他却一直检查自己的观点，毫不动摇，数年之后，他的观点被证实，受到人们的推崇。一代画家徐悲鸿，留学国外，遭到外国留学生的嘲笑和侮辱，他被激怒，决定用事实反驳那些学生，证明中国人的能力。于是，他每天省吃俭用，将心思和精力全部投入创作之中，终于有了《田横五百士》和《奔腾的骏马》……

上述的这些人，除了刻苦、坚毅，更重要的是有强烈的自信心。是自信支持着他们勇敢地走下去。如果没有自信的支撑，就会坚持不下去，因此，要想成功，必须自信。

而你，作为一个中学生，就更应该拥有中学生应有的青春和自信的风采。整天忧前虑后，只会更加颓废，更加失败。

自信是每一个人走向成功的动力，当你失败时，一定要对自己说：“没事，这是人生路上必不可少的磨砺，一次失败就积累一些经验，这一次犯错就是为了下一次不犯错、我相信，下一次我一定能成功。”

永远相信这句话。我能，我行，我成功。

希望我的建议能对你有所启发。

最后，祝愿你能自信地走入考场，取得圆满的成功。

成功，是至高无尚、振奋、喜悦、勤劳和汗水的代名词，有无数人为它而不断奋斗，有无数人为他而不断成长。成功仿佛一座山，在登上这巍峨高山那辉煌壮丽的封顶的过程中，需要万分的努力和摔倒时的坚强。

那天，天气晴朗，阳光明媚，淡淡的花草香沁人心脾。我做完作业，便想出去玩。可刚跨出门槛，就被妈妈叫住。她严肃地说：“作业做完了吗?”“做完了”我理直气壮。“那还不快去写练习题。”“那……好吧……”我支支吾吾地答应，慢吞吞地拿起书和笔，漫不经心地做起来。我三下五除二地做完了前面的题，可最后一题却怎么也做不出来。这道题看上去很简单，可却十分复杂。我拿起笔，在草稿纸上不停地演算，不停地想。我抓耳挠腮，绞尽脑汁，却还是像只无头苍蝇似的，一点头绪也没有。我想了好久，可窗外的嘻哈笑声却使我想着放弃。这时，我想起了毛泽东主席的“世上无难事，只怕有心人。”是啊，这么一点小困难我就退缩，不努力，怎么会成功呢?宝剑锋从磨砺出，梅花香自苦寒来。我振作起来，仔细分析每一个条件的含义。在不停的演算后，终于，我成功了!我征服了这道难题!

“宝剑锋从磨砺出，梅花香自苦寒来”是一种努力;“世上无难事，只怕有心人”是一种坚强。正是它们，让我在困难这座大山前充满信心，克服了困难，走向成功。

我读了《奥运精神伴我成长》这本书后，我从奥运健将身上受到的启示很多，但让我最值得思考的一个问题是他们为什么能够取得成功呢？最重要的是他们有一种勤奋的精神。为什么这么说呢？因为“勤奋是成功的基础”，伟大的发明家爱迪生曾经说过，天才是百分之九十九的汗水加百分之一的灵感。这里的“汗水”，就是“勤奋”。身高只有一米五十的邓亚萍是家喻户晓的世界乒乓球冠军。没有身高优势的她，能在世界乒坛创造了一个不可战胜的神话。完全依靠的是自己的勤奋，无论严寒酷暑，她都夜以继日地刻苦练习。

台上一分钟，台下十年功，辉煌成绩的背后，需要付出比别人多出十倍甚至百倍的努力，邓亚萍舍得付出，所以她最终取得了成功。我们一定也有自己的理想，那么，为了实现自己的理想，我们就一定要勤奋。在通往成功的道路上，没有任何捷径，只有脚踏实地，一步一个脚印，勤奋努力，我们才能成功。而我们现在要做的就是好好学习。如上课的时候，要专心听讲，认真做笔记，不懂的地方就要问老师：下课以后要抓紧时间复习，尽快把课堂上学到的知识进行消化，千万不要一只耳朵进，一只耳朵出，不要把太多的时间花在玩耍上，“玩物丧志”！太贪玩的学生，以后是没有什么出息的。如果现在只知道玩耍，等将来一个人走上社会时，激烈的竞争会让同学们尝到苦头的，那时候再后悔就来不及了。

所以，勤奋学习是我们的天职，是我们一生中首先要做好的第一件事情。“勤奋是成功的基础”，只有打牢这个基础，我们才能获得成功，实现远大的理想。