有关兴趣爱好的英语写作素材【实用20篇】

我的英语外教长着鹰钩鼻，白色的皮肤，一个大大的嘴，眼睛炯炯有神。

再一次上英语外教课，老师给我们做游戏，这个游戏又可以学英语，又可以玩，各个同学都玩得很过瘾。是这样的：老师把一二大组叫TEST1，三四大组叫TEST2，先是TEST1回答问题，再是TESE回答问题，每个人只能回答一次问题。就是把电脑缺的单词补上去，如果答对的话就可以在大方格中选一个小方格，里面分别有5分，10分，20分，30分，而且还有两个台风。台风可以把对方得分是降为零，这样玩起来很刺激。然后再投球，把一个软绵绵的球扔到黑板上，黑板上有一个大圈，里面有一个小圈，如果投到那里就可以乘5分，如果投到其他地方只能乘2分。玩完后，大家有的愁眉苦脸，显然他们组输了。有的却眉开眼笑，显然是他们组赢了。

这就是我的外教，是我们班的外教，是一个令人喜欢的外教。

[我的英语外教作文素材

导语：懂得放弃,才更懂得拥有,懂得珍惜.在你一生中,你不可能什么都得到,所以你应该学会放弃。下面是yuwenmi小编为大家整理有关懂得放弃的作文写作素材，欢迎阅读与借鉴，谢谢!

没有人有义务必须透过你邋遢的外表，去发现你优秀的内在。你必须干净、整洁、甚至是精致，这是你做人的基本与尊严，不分男女。

懂得放弃是种成熟美

看清一个人又何必去揭穿;讨厌一个人又何必去翻脸。活着，总有看不惯的人，就如别人看不惯我们。人的成熟不是年龄，而是懂得了放弃，学会了圆融，知道了不争。有些苦衷不言痛，不是没感觉，而是知道说与不说都一样;那些暗伤，不是不在乎，而是懂得了慢慢修复。

懂得放弃是种成熟美

成败聚散，都是人生中的一种成长。

人，各有各的位置，各有各的价值，各有各的理念，各有各的世界观，各有各的人生观，各有各的价值观。不随意苛求别人，不盲目要求自己，保持善良，做到真诚，宽容待别人，严以律自己，得与失，成和败，聚或散，都是人生的一种成长，看淡，心情才好，看开，日子才美。

懂得放弃是种成熟美

心是一块田，快乐自己种。

人活着不是靠身体，而是靠心。有时候，换个心情，你会快乐些。心是一块田，靠自己去播种，种善因，故得善果;种恶因，故得恶果。如果你有一颗宽容的心，有一颗善良的心，有一颗充满生机的心，你就是播下了快乐的种子，就会收获一颗快乐的心。

胸襟决定器量，境界决定高下。

人心就像一个容器，装的快乐多了，烦恼自然就少;装的简单多了，纠结自然就少;装的满足多了，痛苦自然就少;装的宽容多了，仇恨自然就少。胸襟决定器量，境界决定高下。活着就是一种修行，修行就是修心。修得一颗平常心，无时不是快乐;修得一颗满足心，无处不是幸福。

心若年轻，则岁月不老。

事在人为是一种积极的人生态度，顺其自然是一种达观的生存之道，水到渠成是一种高超的入世智慧，淡泊宁静是一种超脱的生活态度。无事时，澄然;有事时，断然;得意时，淡然!心若年轻，则岁月不老，无论时光如何流转，守住心中那一季春暖花开，其实，我们想要的幸福一直都在。

人生无常，心态最重要。

人生，因静而从容，因从容而优雅。淡然于心，自在于世间。云淡得悠闲，水淡育万物。世间之事，纷纷扰扰，对错得失，难求完美。若一心想要事事求顺意，反而深陷于计较的泥潭，不能自拔。若凡事但求无愧于心，得失荣辱不介怀，自然落得清闲自在。人活一世，心态比什么都重要。

人生不在于获得，而在于放下。

一些得到，不一定会长久;一些失去，未必不会再拥有。重要的是：让心，在阳光下学会舞蹈;让灵魂，在痛苦中学会微笑。向前走，潇洒心情，收获淡定。人生并不在于获取，更在于放得下。放下一粒种子，收获一棵大树;放下一处烦恼，收获一个惊喜;放下一种偏见，收获一种幸福;放下一种执著，收获一种自在。

人生宛如单程列车，一去不复返。

人生是一趟单程车，我们最应该做的，就是好好善待自己，珍惜今天，期待明天。那些走过的，错过的，都不再回来;丢掉的，失去的，都不复拥有。所以我们不要走得太匆忙，该爱的要用心去爱;该留的，要真诚挽留;该感受的要充分感受，该珍惜的要好好珍惜。该记得记下，该忘的忘掉，来的欢迎，走的目送，不以物喜，不以己悲，泰然若处，冷暖自尝。

​

导语：文明礼仪是人类为维系社会正常生活而要求人们共同遵守的最起码的道德规范，它是人们在长期共同生活和相互交往中逐渐形成，并以风俗、习惯和传统等方式固定下来的。下面是yuwenmi小编为大家整理的中考写作素材，欢迎阅读与借鉴，谢谢!

1.德厚者流光，德薄者流卑。

2.让者，礼之实也。——朱熹

3.静以修身，俭以养德。——诸葛亮

4.安上治民，莫善于礼。——孝经

5.德行广大而守以恭者荣。

6.德必报，怨不仇。——赵谦

7.所守者道义，所行者忠信，所惜者名节。

8.礼，不妄说人，不辞费。

9.勿以恶小而为之，勿以善小而不为。

10.为善则预，为恶则去。

11.爱人者，人恒爱之;敬人者，人恒敬之。

12.环境整洁优美，生活健康科学，社会文明进步。

13.怀着善意的人，是不难于表达他对人的礼貌的。——卢梭

14.礼貌之风为每一个人带来文明温暖和愉快。——诺·文·皮尔

15.人待我一尺，我待人一丈;人待我一丈，我把心捧上;好话一句三冬暖，冷言半句六月寒。

16.美德是精神上的一种宝藏，但是使它生出光彩的则是良好的礼仪。

17.向老师说声“好”，不困难;困难的是，要坚持向老师真心地说声“好”。

18.礼仪是微妙的东西，它既是人们交际所不可或缺的，又是不可过于计较的。——培根

19.一个人的礼貌，就是一面照出他的肖像的镜子。——歌德

20.有礼貌不一定总是智慧的标志，可是不礼貌总使人怀疑其愚蠢。——兰道尔

21.有一种内在的礼貌，它是同爱联系在一起的：它会在行为的外表上产生出最令人愉快的礼貌。——歌德

22.人无礼则不生，事无礼则不成，国无礼则不守。——孔子

23.德厚者流光，德薄者流卑。

24.人之有德于我也，不可忘也;吾有德于人也，不可不忘也。

25.仁者爱人，为仁由己。唯仁者能好人，能恶人。克己复礼为仁，一日克己复礼，天下归仁焉。

26.以爱己之心爱人则尽。——张载仁

27.仁之发处自是爱。——朱熹

28.人必知道而后知爱身，知爱身而后知爱人，知爱人而后知保天下。

29.信则人任焉。——论语

30.唯宽可以宽人，唯厚可以载物。君子以厚德载物。——易传

31.君子诚之为贵。——礼记

32.君子己善，亦乐人之善也。——礼记

33.恭近于礼，远耻辱也。恭则不侮。——论语

34.敬人者，人恒敬之。——孟子

35.德行广大而守以恭者荣。

36.为善则预，为恶则去。

37.不学礼，无以立。——孔子

38.礼貌和文明是我们共处的金钥匙。

39.微笑是我们的语言，文明是我们的信念。

40.学校是学习之所，文明是成功之本。

41.让我们一起来：关心集体，爱护公物，保护环境!

42.手边留情花似锦，脚下留情草如茵!

43.花儿用美丽装扮世界，我们用行动美化校园!

44.不敬他人，是自不敬也。——旧唐书

45.让，德之主也，让之谓懿德。——左传

46.让者，礼之实也。——朱熹

47.让，德之主也，让之谓懿德。——左传

48.谦恭有礼，人人欢迎。——托马斯。福特

49.良好的礼貌是由微小的牺牲组成。——爱默生

50.良心是由人的知识和全部生活方式来决定的。——马克

51.人不能象走兽那样活着，应该追求知识和美德。——但丁

52.善气迎人，亲如弟兄;恶气迎人，害于戈兵。——管仲

53.礼义廉耻，国之四维，四维不张，国乃灭亡。——《管子》

54.行一件好事，心中泰然;行一件歹事，衾影抱愧。——神涵光

55.应该热心地致力于照道德行事，而不要空谈道德。——德谟克利特

56.心诚气温，气和辞婉，必能动人。——薛宣《谈书录》

57.唯宽可以宽人，唯厚可以载物。君子以厚德载物。——易传

58.礼，经国家，定社稷，序民人，利后嗣。——左传

59.彬彬有礼的风度，主要是自我克制的表现。——爱迪生

60.勿以恶小而为之，勿以善小而不为。惟贤惟德，能服于人。——刘备

61.礼貌经常可以替代最高贵的感情。——梅里美

62.非礼勿视，非礼勿听，非礼勿言，非礼勿动。——孔子

63.美德是精神上的一种宝藏，但是使它生出光彩的则是良好的礼仪。——约翰·洛克

64.礼貌是儿童与青年所应该特别小心地养成习惯的第一件大事。——约翰·洛克

65."礼貌之风为每一个人带来文明温暖和愉快。——诺·文·皮尔

66.我们应该注意自己不用言语去伤害别的同志，但是，当别人用语言来伤害自己的时候，也应该受得起。——刘少奇

67.礼貌是最容易做到的事情，也是最容易忽视的事情，但她却是最珍贵的事情。

68.鸟儿因翅膀而自由翱翔，鲜花因芬芳而美丽，校园因文明而将更加进步。

69.关心学校，我们的职责;爱护学校，我们的义务;热爱学校，我们的心声。

70.顺手捡起是的一片纸，纯洁的是自己的精神;有意擦去的一块污渍，净化的是自己的灵魂。

71.高高兴兴做游戏，和和气气在一起。不打不闹不追逐，安全二字不忘记。

72.花儿用美丽装扮世界，我们用行动美化校园!

73.顺手捡起是的一片纸，纯洁的是自己的精神;

74.有意擦去的一块污渍，净化的是自己的灵魂。

75.爱人者，人恒爱之;敬人者，人恒敬之。

76.只有尊敬别人的人，才有权受人尊敬。

77.礼貌是人类共处的金钥匙。

78.不在墙上留一条伤痕，不在空气中留下一句脏话。

79.倾听可以使说话者感到被尊重。

80.恭近于礼，远耻辱也。恭则不侮。——论语

81.知识使人变得文雅，而交际使人变得完善。——(美)乔·富勒

82.我深信只有有道德的公民才能向自己的祖国致以可被接受的敬礼。——卢梭

83.人之有德于我也，不可忘也;吾有德于人也，不可不忘也。

84.礼仪是微妙的东西，它既是人们交际所不可或缺的，又是不可过于计较的。——培根

85.礼貌是有教养的人的第二个太阳。——赫拉克利特

86.爱人者，人恒爱之;敬人者，人恒敬之。

87.敬人者，人恒敬之;爱人者，人恒爱之。——孟子

88.礼貌周全不花钱，却比什么都值钱。——西班牙。塞万提斯

89.一毫之善，与人方便。一毫之恶，劝君莫作。——唐·吕岩《劝世》

90.尊人立莫坐，赐坐莫背人。蹲坐无方便，席上被人嗔。“又”尊人与酒吃，即把莫推辞。性少由方便，圆融莫遣之。——唐·王梵志

91.待富贵人，不难有礼，而难有体;待贫贱人，不难有恩，而难有礼。——《史典》

92.不敬他人，是自不敬也。——旧唐书

93."幽默是具有智慧教养和道德上优越感的表现。——恩格斯"""

94.土扶可城墙，积德为厚地。——李白

95.礼义生于富足，盗窃起于贫穷。——汉·王符

96.世界上最廉价，而且能得到最大收益的一项物质，就是礼节。——拿破仑·希尔

97.夫君子之行，静以修身，俭以养德，非淡泊无以明志，非宁静无以致远。——诸葛亮

98.礼者，人道之极也。——荀子

99.人们最看重的是特权，哪怕是主持葬礼的特权。——詹·拉·洛威尔

100.一旦学会了眼睛的语言，表情的变化将是无限的。——泰戈尔

101.仁之发处自是爱。——朱熹

102.礼以行义，义以生利，利民，政之大节也。——左传

103.人间的面孔从未像在葬礼中看上去那么世俗——乔·艾琪渥斯

104.无礼是无知的私生子。——巴特勒

105.博学于文，约之以礼。——孔子

106.不患位之不尊，而患德之不崇;不耻禄之不伙，而耻智之不博。——张衡

107.以爱己之心爱人则尽。——张载仁

108.有礼貌不一定总是智慧的标志，可是不礼貌总使人怀疑其愚蠢。——兰道尔

109.道之以告德，齐之以礼。——论语

110.一毫之善，与人方便。一毫之恶，劝君莫作。——唐·吕岩《劝世》

111.礼节及礼貌是一封通向四方的推荐信。——西班牙女王伊丽莎白

112.礼貌像只气垫，里面什么也没有，却能奇妙地减少颠簸。——约翰逊

113.所守者道义，所行者忠信，所惜者名节。

114.生活里最重要的是有礼貌，它比最高的智慧，比一切学识都重要。——俄。赫尔岑

115.礼貌是一种回收有礼貌的尊重的愿望。星球礼品礼品册礼品商务送礼会议礼品。——法·拉罗什福科

116.一个人如果在街上注意观察的活动，我相信，他一定会在灵车上发现最愉快的表情。——乔·斯威夫特

117.仁者爱人，为仁由己。唯仁者能好人，能恶人。克己复礼为仁，一日克己复礼，天下归仁焉。

118.人在智慧上应当是明豁的，道德上应该是清白的，身体上应该是清洁的。——契诃夫

119.自觉心是进步之母，自贱心是堕落之源，故自觉心不可无，自贱心不可有。—邹韬奋

120.礼仪是在他的一切别种美德之上加上一层藻饰，使它们对他具有效用，去为他获得一切和他接近的人的尊重与好感。——洛克

Keeping a diary in English does a great deal of good to my English study. Keeping a diary can help you review all the English knowledge you have learned. For example， you must know the correct spelling of each word needed in the diary； you must use the phrases correctly and choose the suitable sentence patterns， meanwhile， it is also necessary to use you knowledge of grammar in a correct way.Keeping a diary can help you not only to console your knowledge of English， but to form the habit of thinking in English. Practice makes perfect. By and by， your English writing will be greatly improved.

[谈写英语日记的好处英文写作

A man was going to the house of some rich person. As he went along the road, he saw a box of good apples at the side of the road. He said, "I do not want to eat those apples; for the rich man will give me much food; he will give me very nice food to eat." Then he took the apples and threw them away into the dust.

He went on and came to a river. The river had become very big; so he could not go over it. He waited for some time; then he said, "I cannot go to the rich mans house today, for I cannot get over the river."

He began to go home. He had eaten no food that day. He began to want food. He came to the apples, and he was glad to take them out of the dust and eat them.

Do not throw good things away; you may be glad to have them at some other time.

【译文】

一个人正朝着一个富人的房子走去，当他沿着路走时，在路的一边他发现一箱好苹果，他说：“我不打算吃那些苹果，因为富人会给我更多的食物，他会给我很好吃的东西。”然后他拿起苹果，一把扔到土里去。

他继续走，来到河边，河涨水了，因此，他到不了河对岸，他等了一会儿，然后他说：“今天我去不了富人家了，因为我不能渡过河。”

他开始回家，那天他没有吃东西。他就开始去找吃的，他找到苹果，很高兴地把它们从尘土中翻出来吃了。

不要把好东西扔掉，换个时候你会觉得它们大有用处。

1、individuals, characters, folks代替people ,persons。

2、positive, favorable, rosy(美好的),promising (有希望的),perfect, pleasurable ,excellent, outstanding代替good。

3、dreadful, unfavorable, poor, adverse(有害的)代替bad， 如果bad做表语,可以有be less impressive代替。

举例： An army of college students indulge themselves in playing games, enjoying romance with girls/boys or killing time passively in their dorms. When it approaches to graduation, as a result, they find their academic records are less impressive.

4、(an army of; an ocean of; a sea of; a multitude of; many, if not most)代替many。

注：用many, if not most一定要小心,many后一定要有词。

举例：Many individuals, if not most, harbor the idea that….同理用most, if not all ,代替most。

5、a slice of, quite a few ,several代替some。

6、harbor the idea that, take the attitude that, hold the view that, it is widely shared that, it is universally acknowledged that)替think。

因为是书面语,所以要加that。

7、affair ,business ,matter代替thing 。

8、shared代common。

9、reap huge fruits代替get much benefit。

10、for my part, from my own perspective代替in my opinion。

11、Increasing(ly),growing代替more and more(注意没有growingly这种形式。所以当修饰名词时用increasing/growing.修饰形容词,副词用increasingly)

举例：Sth has gained growing popularity. Sth is increasingly popular with the advancement of sth.

12、little if anything,或little or nothing代替hardly

13、beneficial rewarding代替helpful be beneficial of

14、shopper, client, consumer, purchaser,代替customer

15、exceedingly, extremely代替very

16、hardly unnecessary, hardly inevitable ...代替necessary, inevitable。

17、sth appeals to sb, sth exerts a tremendous fascination on sb代替sb take interest in

18、capture ones attention代替attract ones attention

19、facet, dimension, sphere代aspect

20、be indicative of ,be suggestive of ,be fearful of代indicate, suggest ,fear

21、give rise to, lead to, result in, trigger代替cause

22、There are several reasons behind sth代替..reasons for sth

23、desire代替want。

24、pour attention into代替pay attention to。

25、bear in mind that代替remember。

26、enjoy, possess代替have。(注意process是过程的意思。)

27、interaction代替communication。

28、frown on sth代替be against ,disagree with sth。

29、to name only a few as an example代替for example。

30、next to/virtually impossible,代替nearly impossible。

作文是六级考试的一个重要得分部分，可说起写作技巧，很多同学都会皱眉头，抱怨无话可写，内容平淡。下面是小编整理的六级写作的七大要点，欢迎阅读。

一、 长短句原则。

工作还得一张一弛呢，老让读者读长句，累死人!写一个短小精辟的句子，相反，却可以起到画龙点睛的作用。而且如果我们把短句放在段首或者段末，也可以揭示主题：As a creature, I eat; as a man, I read. Although one action is to meet the primary need of my body and the other is to satisfy the intellectual need of mind, they are in a way quite similar. 如此可见，长短句结合，抑扬顿挫，岂不爽哉?牢记!

强烈建议：在文章第一段(开头)用一长一短，且先长后短;在文章主体部分，要先用一个短句解释主要意思，然后在阐述几个要点的时候采用先短后长的句群形式，定会让主体部分妙笔生辉!文章结尾一般用一长一短就可以了。

二、 主题句原则。

国有其君，家有其主，文章也要有其主。否则会给人造成“群龙无首”之感!相信各位读过一些破烂文学，故意把主体隐藏在文章之内，结果造成我们稀里糊涂!不知所云!所以奉劝各位一定要写一个主题句，放在文章的开头(保险型)或者结尾，让读者一目了然，必会平安无事!

特别提示：隐藏主体句可是要冒险的!To begin with, you must work hard at your lessons and be fully prepared before the exam(主题句). Without sufficient preparation, you can hardly expect to answer all the questions correctly.

三、 一 二 三原则。

领导讲话总是第一部分、第一点、第二点、第三点、第二部分、第一点… 如此罗嗦。可毕竟还是条理清楚。考官们看文章也必然要通过这些关键性的“标签”来判定你的文章是否结构清楚，条理自然。破解方法很简单，只要把下面任何一组的词汇加入到你的几个要点前就清楚了。

1)first, second, third, last(不推荐，原因：俗)

2)firstly, secondly, thirdly, finally(不推荐，原因：俗)

3)the first, the second, the third, the last(不推荐，原因：俗)

4)in the first place, in the second place, in the third place, lastly(不推荐，原因：俗)

5)to begin with, then, furthermore, finally(强烈推荐)

6)to start with, next, in addition, finally(强烈推荐)

7)first and foremost, besides, last but not least(强烈推荐)

8)most important of all, moreover, finally

9)on the one hand, on the other hand(适用于两点的情况)

10)for one thing, for another thing(适用于两点的情况)

建议：不仅仅在写作中注意，平时说话的时候也应该条理清楚!

四、短语优先原则。

写作时，尤其是在考试时，如果使用短语，有两个好处：其一、用短语会使文章增加亮点，如果老师们看到你的文章太简单，看不到一个自己不认识的短语，必然会看你低一等。相反，如果发现亮点—精彩的短语，那么你的文章定会得高分了。

其二、关键时刻思维短路，只有凑字数，怎么办?用短语是一个办法!比如：I cannot bear it. 可以用短语表达：I cannot put up with it. I want it. 可以用短语表达：I am looking forward to it. 这样字数明显增加，表达也更准确。

五、多实少虚原则

原因很简单，写文章还是应该写一些实际的东西，不要空话连篇。这就要求一定要多用实词，少用虚词。我这里所说的虚词就是指那些比较大的词。

比如我们说一个很好的时候，不应该之说nice这样空洞的词，应该使用一些诸如generous, humorous, interesting, smart, gentle, warm-hearted, hospitable 之类的形象词。

再比如： 走出房间，general的词是：walk out of the room 但是小偷走出房间应该说：slip out of the room 小姐走出房间应该说：sail out of the room 小孩走出房间应该说：dance out of the room 老人走出房间应该说：stagger out of the room 所以多用实词，少用虚词，文章将会大放异彩!

六、 多变句式原则。

1)加法(串联)都希望写下很长的句子，像个老外似的，可就是怕写错，怎么办，最保险的写长句的方法就是这些，可以在任何句子之间加and, 但最好是前后的句子又先后关系或者并列关系。比如说：I enjoy music and he is fond of playing guitar. 如果是二者并列的，我们可以用一个超级句式：Not only the fur coat is soft, but it is also warm. 其它的短语可以用：besides, furthermore, likewise, moreover

2)转折(拐弯抹角)批评某人缺点的时候，我们总习惯先拐弯抹角说说他的优点，然后转入正题，再说缺点，这种方式虽然阴险了点，可毕竟还比较容易让人接受。所以呢，我们说话的时候，只要在要点之前先来点废话，注意二者之间用个专这次就够了。The car was quite old, yet it was in excellent condition. The coat was thin, but it was warm. 更多的短语：despite that, still, however, nevertheless, in spite of, despite, notwithstanding

3)因果(so, so, so)昨天在街上我看到了一个女孩，然后我主动搭讪，然后我们去咖啡厅，然后我们认识了，然后我们成为了朋友…可见，讲故事的时候我们总要追求先后顺序，先什么，后什么，所以然后这个词就变得很常见了。其实这个词表示的是先后或因果关系!The snow began to fall, so we went home. 更多短语：then, therefore, consequently, accordingly, hence, as a result, for this reason, so that

4)失衡句(头重脚轻，或者头轻脚重)有些人脑袋大，身体小，或者有些人脑袋小，身体大，虽然我们不希望长成这个样子，可如果真的是这样了，也就必然会吸引别人的注意力。文章中如果出现这样的句子，就更会让考官看到你的句子与众不同。其实就是主语从句，表语从句，宾语从句的变形。举例：This is what I can do. Whether he can go with us or not is not sure. 同样主语、宾语、表语可以改成如下的复杂成分：When to go, Why he goes away…

5)附加(多此一举)如果有了老婆，总会遇到这样的情况，当你再讲某个人的时候，她会插一句说，我昨天见过他;或者说，就是某某某，如果把老婆的话插入到我们的话里面，那就是定语从句和同位语从句或者是插入语。The man whom you met yesterday is a friend of mine. I don’t enjoy that book you are reading. Mr liu, our oral English teacher, is easy-going. 其实很简单，同位语--要解释的东西删除后不影响整个句子的构成;定语从句—借用之前的关键词并且用其重新组成一个句子插入其中，但是whom or that 关键词必须要紧跟在先行词之前。

6)排比(排山倒海句)文学作品中最吸引人的地方莫过于此，如果非要让你的文章更加精彩的话，那么我希望你引用一个个的排比句，一个个得对偶句，一个个的不定式，一个个地词，一个个的短语，如此表达将会使文章有排山倒海之势!Whether your tastes are modern or traditional, sophisticated or simple, there is plenty in London for you. Nowadays, energy can be obtained through various sources such as oil, coal, natural gas, solar heat, the wind and ocean tides. We have got to study hard, to enlarge our scope of knowledge, to realize our potentials and to pay for our life. (气势恢宏) 要想写出如此气势恢宏的句子非用排比不可!

七、挑战极限原则。

既然十挑战极限，必然是比较难的，但是并非不可攀!原理：在学生的文章中，很少发现诸如独立主格的句子，其实也很简单，只要花上5分钟的时间看看就可以领会，它就是分词的一种特殊形式，分词要求主语一致，而独立主格则不然。比如：The weather being fine, a large number of people went to climb the Western Hills. Africa is the second largest continent, its size being about three times that of China. 如果你可以写出这样的句子，不得高分才怪!

导语：小小蚂蚁只因它们之间有着明确的分工与合作,所以整个家族就拥有了强大的生存力量。下面是yuwenmi小编为大家整理的写作素材，欢迎阅读与借鉴，谢谢!

蚂蚁是我们最常见的昆虫之一。在不大的蚂蚁家族中,有着复杂却又严格的分工与合作。蚁后,也叫蚁皇,是一族之主,专管产卵繁殖,一般一群只有一个。雄蚁,专与蚁后交配,交配后即死亡。工蚁,是蚁群中的主要成员,专司觅食、饲养幼蚁、侍候蚁后、搬家清扫等勤杂工作。兵蚁,个头较大,两颚发达,是蚁群中的保卫者,担负着本蚁群的安全,如有外蚁入侵,或争夺食物时,必誓死决斗。蚂蚁家族中的每一个成员既不多做也不少做,缺了其中任何一个环节都不行。蚂蚁家族正是凭借每一个成员的合作精神,才能生存下去。

【温馨提示】小小蚂蚁只因它们之间有着明确的分工与合作,所以整个家族就拥有了强大的生存力量。运用这则材料时,我们不但要点明蚂蚁之间的分工,更要说明蚂蚁分工之中的互相合作。我们还可以进行迁移联想,蚂蚁都懂得合作对于生存的重要性,那么我们人呢?以蚂蚁的这种现象来反观我们的人类社会,进而从中得出自己对“合作”的独到思考。这则材料适用于“分工”、“合作”、“团结”、“阅读自然”等话题。

导语：学而不思则罔，思而不学则殆。从古至今，不乏关于鼓励世人读书的例子，下面是yuwenmi小编为大家整理的从古至今关于读书的名人格言，欢迎阅读与借鉴，谢谢!

关于读书的名言警句-古代名人篇

1.己所不欲，勿施于人——孔子

2.读万卷书，行万里路——刘彝

3.敏而好学，不耻下问——孔子

4.千里之行，始于足下——老子

5.业精于勤，荒于嬉;行成于思，毁于随——韩愈

6.学而不思则罔，思而不学则殆——孔子

7.知之者不如好之者，好之者不如乐之者——孔子

8.三人行，必有我师焉 。择其善者而从之，其不善者而改之——孔子

9.兴于《诗》，立于礼，成于乐——孔子

10.读书有三到，谓心到，眼到，口到——朱熹

11.立身以立学为先，立学以读书为本——欧阳修

12.黑发不知勤学早，白发方悔读书迟——颜真卿

13.书卷多情似故人，晨昏忧乐每相亲——于谦

14.书犹药也，善读之可以医愚——刘向

15.少壮不努力，老大徒伤悲——《汉乐府。长歌行》

16.莫等闲，白了少年头，空悲切——岳飞

17.发奋识遍天下字，立志读尽人间书——苏轼

18.鸟欲高飞先振翅，人求上进先读书——李苦禅

19.立志宜思真品格，读书须尽苦功夫——阮元

20.非淡泊无以明志，非宁静无以致远——诸葛亮

21.勿以恶小而为之，勿以善小而不为——刘备《三国志》

22.熟读唐诗三百首，不会作诗也会吟——孙洙《唐诗三百首序》

23.书到用时方恨少，事非经过不知难——陆游

24.问渠那得清如许，为有源头活水来——朱熹

25.旧书不厌百回读，熟读精思子自知——苏轼

26.书痴者文必工，艺痴者技必良——蒲松龄

27.读书百遍，其义自见——《三国志》

28.路漫漫其修道远，吾将上下而求索——屈原

29.奇文共欣赏，疑义相如析——陶渊明

30.读书之法，在循序而渐进，熟读而精思——朱熹

31.吾生也有涯，而知也无涯——庄子

32.非学无以广才，非志无以成学——诸葛亮

33.玉不啄，不成器;人不学，不知道——《礼记》

关于读书的名言名句-近代名人篇

1.为中华之崛起而读书——周恩来

2.读书忌死读，死读钻牛角——叶圣陶

3.不怕读得少，只怕记不牢——徐特立

4.与肝胆人共事，无字句处读书——周恩来

5.读书也像开矿一样“沙里淘金”——赵树理

6.读过一本好书，像交了一个益友——臧克家

7.聪明在于勤奋，天才在于积累——华罗庚

8.读不在三更五鼓，功只怕一曝十寒——郭沫若

9.韬略终须建新国，奋发还得读良书——郭沫若

10.千教万教教人求真，千学万学学做真人。——陶行之

11.如果把生活比喻为创作的意境，那么阅读就像阳光——池莉

12.时间就像海绵里的水，只要愿挤，总还是有的。——鲁迅

13.饭可以一日不吃，觉可以一日不睡，书不可以一日不读——毛泽东

14.处处是创造之地，天天是创造之时，人人是创造之人——陶行之

15.阅读的最大理由是想摆脱平庸，早一天就多一份人生的精彩;迟一天就多一天平庸的困扰——余秋雨

16.伟大的成绩和辛勤劳动是成正比例的，有一分劳动就有一分收获，日积月累，从少到多，奇迹就可以创造出来——鲁迅

导语：自私是指只为自己、只为个人利益考虑. 于是,在社会生活中的各个场合、各个角色里就有了自私. ­ 拥挤的公交车上,自私是不顾他人地乱挤; 下面是yuwenmi小编为大家整理的相关高考素材，欢迎阅读与借鉴，谢谢!

有些文章你注定一辈子没法忘记。我做编辑时，接到过一篇来稿，读后，感动异常。这位作者名不见经传，但，我把它一字一字地抄了下来。

现在，我把这篇文章抄给你：

这是一个听来的故事。

越南战争中，一个美国士兵打完仗后回到国内，在旧金山旅馆里他辗转反侧，夜不能寐。午夜，他给家中的父母打了一个电话。

“爸爸，妈妈，我要回家了。但是我要你们帮一个忙，我要带一个朋友一起回来。”

“当然可以。”父母亲回答说。“我们见到他会很高兴的。”

“但是，有件事一定要告诉你们，他在那可恶的战争中踩响了一个地雷，受了重伤，他成了残疾人，少了一条腿和一只手。他已无处可去，我希望他能和我们住在一起。”

“我们为他感到遗憾，孩子，我们帮他另找一个地方住下，好吗?”

“不，他只能和我们住在一起。”

“孩子，你不知道，这样他会给我们造成多大的拖累，我们有我们的生活。孩子，你自己一个人回家来吧。他会有活路的。”话没说完，儿子的电话就断了。

父母在家等了许多天，未见儿子回来。一个星期后，他们接到警察局打来的电话，被告知他们的儿子坠楼自杀了。悲痛欲绝的父母飞到旧金山，在停尸房内，他们认出了他们的儿子，然而，他们惊愕地发现：他们的儿子少了一条腿、一只手。

我说过，有的文章注定让你记住一辈子。因为，它震撼我们的心灵。

will, i have two hobbys . the first one is music, my favourite music group is a group from ireland , it is called boyzone, it is pretty good i think .

the other hobby is traveling, i had been to many citys in china , there is a famous saying that " man who travel s far learns more" , and traveling makes me brave, energetic and optimistic, that is why i love traveling .

中英语作文经典范文一：

In work hard learning, the library is a good place, I study it brings me a lot of knowledge. For every class often in and out of the library I; Selected for the volunteers by the teacher, in the heart very happy, because finally had a chance to service for people!

When a small volunteers on the first day, class library all things for me; Is a question mark, for others, photocopies accidentally! A wrong button, the paper places appeared a piece of data only a quarter of the paper, I have to pay.Sacrifice lunch break I went to the library work, the more cautious to fill a book, seeing so many tattered book, thinking "can have such a good study environment, dont cherish" an angry heart. One day, after finishing the book, see a man in the book, a stepped forward to wanted to scold him a lesson, but the thought of Confucius said: "the way of administration, together with punishment, people free and shameless. Virtue, together with the ritual, shame and." Im not angry, had to use moral to persuade him, and when no ones in, also wont destroy the book.

Busy, the teacher also told us to read, to gain understanding. When moving the heavy book, in fact, think about it, this will not only help the teacher save trouble, also enhance their own strength, every second, why not

As the young volunteers, I though a little tired, but for the teacher to share many things; I am also very happy, because "help others for pleasure this!"

翻译：

在功课繁重的学习中，图书馆是我进修的好场所，它带给我许多知识。因每天下课常出入图书馆的我;被老师选为小志愿者，心中无比的高兴，因为终于有机会替大众服务了!

当上小志愿者的第一节下课，图书馆一切的事物对我来说;都是一个问号，替别人影印资料时，一不小心!按错一个钮，出纸的地方出现了一张只有资料四分之一的纸，使我得自己掏腰包了。

牺牲午休时间 去图书馆工作的我，更加谨慎的补书，眼见这么多破烂的书，心想“能有这么好的读书环境，竟然不好好珍惜”心中一股气愤涌上心头。一天，在整理书时，见到了 一位在破坏书的人，走上前去原想臭骂他一顿，但一想到孔子说：“道之以政，齐之以刑，民免而无耻。道之以德，齐之以礼，有耻且格。”我也不生气了，只好用 道德来规劝他，才能在没人的时候，也不会再破坏书。

忙碌之余，老师也叫我们看书，以增广见闻。在搬那沉重的书时，其实，想想看，这不但帮老师省麻烦，也增强自己的体力，一举二得，有何不可呢

身为小志愿者的我，虽然累了一点儿，但替老师分担了许多事物;我也很快乐，因为“助人为快乐之本”呀!

中英语作文经典范文二：

Everyone in the path of growth, must through all kinds of test. Some people own learning is not ideal, some bad for your skin and worry, and some to get parents understand and feel wronged... I think it should be growing pains.

"You how so careless, English written in capital letters lowercase letters; math is not decimal forgot to add, is the brain around it; the language too, shouldnt always wrong... wrong since time, scores have been falling, straight down to 20 name!" Is the time, this kind of words are often in my mind.

I also want to increase the performance to once upon a time, but always cant contentment. Is not the improvement to the subject, is a division of grades and beaten down. Who wouldnt want to test a good result, but each persons ability is different, also the effort by different, so the harvest "fruit" is also different. So I can only say: "do your best!"

As a student, I told myself not too bad; I told myself cant let parents down; I told myself cant let the teacher lose faith in yourself... So, my worries are growing.

But think carefully, if falling grades so easily becomes good, so dont lose its senseSo think about it, there is less worry a lot. But dont strive for it, it wont come. So, still want to care my shadow, always follow me, this should be most students face troubles.

Trouble is important in life, we should be brave to face, with positive attitude, trouble will be gone.

翻译：

每个人在成长的道路上，必须经各种考验。有的人为自己的学习不理想而烦恼，有的为自己的皮肤不好而发愁，有的为得不到父母的理解而感到委屈我想，这应该就是成长的烦恼吧。

“你怎么这么粗心，英语的大写字母写成小写字母;数学不是小数点忘了加，就是脑筋转不过弯;语文也是，不该错的总是错自从一回，成绩就一直下降，直降到第二十名!”就是那个时候，这类话就常常在我心头萦绕。

我也想把成绩提高到从前，不过总是不能够称心如意。不是那一科的成绩提高了，就是这一科的成绩又败了下来。谁不想考个好成绩啊，可是每个人的能力不同，所尽的努力也不同，所以收获的“果实”也不同。因此我也只能说一声：“尽力而为了!”

作为一名学生，我告诉自己成绩不能太差;我告诉自己不能让父母失望;我告诉自己不能让老师对自己失去信心因此，我的烦恼也就日益增多。

可是仔细反过来想想，如果下降了的成绩这样轻易就变好，那么不就失去了它本身的意义了吗这样想想，烦恼也就减少了许多。可是不努力争取它，它也不会自己过来的。所以，烦恼还是想我的影子一样，一直跟着我，这应该也是大部分同学面临的烦恼吧。

烦恼是人生中重要的考验，我们应该要勇敢去面对，用积极乐观的态度，烦恼就会随风而去了。

中英语作文经典范文三：

Everyone has their own hobbies, I was no exception. My hobby numerous as the stars in the sky, but I most like to read books.

Since I was young, I love reading, where I can see, in bed, go to the toilet see, going to travel in the car, even to eat. Mom and dad always hope me the real little bookworm go out to play for a while, but I dont know a person in the neighbourhood, so the book has become my best friend. Remember once I went to a bookstore reading a book, with my mother agreed to go back until five o clock, but the sight of the wide variety of books, I swim in the sea of stories to boil. I picked up a book "laughing cat diary", read, and was attracted by Yang hongying style of writing. Time like off the string arrow, blink of an eye by six o clock, I remembered that time, is on his way back, met a mother, I look with my mom out in a rash.

A few days ago, I was in the toilet for more than half an hour, I was so angry mother nose crooked, is this whyBecause I see in the toilet, "meaning Lin" youth version by that mom took her killer response - animal roars at fellow players.

However, a yard to yard, reading is a good thing. Now, one in the class, my composition since school reading quantity reach millions of words. The classmates, let us read more books!

翻译：

大家都有自己的爱好吧，我也不例外。我的爱好像天上的星星一样数不清，可我最喜欢读书。

我从小就爱看书，在哪儿都看，在被窝里看、上厕所看、去旅游时在车上看、就连吃饭也不放过。爸爸妈妈总希望我这个不折不扣的小书虫出去玩一会儿，可是我在小区里一个人也不认识，所以书成了我最好的朋友。记得有一次我去书店看书，跟妈妈说好五点回去的，但一看到琳琅满目的图书，我禁不住在故事的海洋里熬游。我拿起一本《笑猫日记》，读着读着，被杨红樱的文笔吸引住了。时间像离了弦的箭，眨眼到了六点，我才想起时间，正在回去的路上，遇到了妈妈，我贪看竟把妈妈急得团团转。

前几天，我在厕所里呆了半个多小时，气得老妈鼻子都歪了，这是为什么呢因为我在厕所里看《意林》少年版看入迷了，以致于老妈使出了她的必杀技---狮吼功。

不过，一码归一码，读书可是件好事。现在，我的作文在班里数一数二，自上学以来阅读量达到数百万字。同学们，让我们一起多读书吧!

导语：人的一生能有一个懂你的人，无论是男是女，那就是你人生最大的幸福!下面小编为大家提供一些关于人生感悟的美文，请大家仔细阅读!

【懂你的人， 一生难求】

人的一生能有一个懂你的人，无论是男是女，那就是你人生最大的幸福!这个人不一定十全十美，或许没有年龄的界限;但他能读懂你，能走进你心灵深处，能看到你心里的一切;你在他面前就是个透明体，他知道你在想什么，知道你喜欢什么，爱什么，知道你需要什么;他让你感到非常亲近，和他在一起你会感到轻松快乐。没有顾虑，和他在一起你会感到很安全，于是你就认为他是十全十美的，因为他懂你，就是因为他懂你，在乎你。

当你遇到挫折时，他不会说一句伤害你的话。他会非常心疼的安慰你!告诉你发生的一切都不算什么，告诉你，你行的，于是你学会了坚强，勇敢的走出逆境。

当你心情不好时，他会耐心的安慰你，用尽幽默的语言你开心!让你高兴!当你难得见面的时候，他会给你发信息，打电话，不会让你寂寞，告诉你注意身体!注意安全!给你发幽默的信息，逗你高兴!祝福时刻跟随着你，让你感觉不到距离的遥远，让心灵彼此相通。

懂你的人，是理解你的人，是体谅你的人，对你有爱心的人。

一生能遇到一个懂你的人，很难，这也需要缘分，但要是遇到了，彼此一定要珍惜!最懂你的人，他的心总是会一直的在你身边，默默地牵挂和守护着你，尽力不让你受一点点的委屈，懂你的人对你的爱是默默的爱!是发自肺腑的真爱!真正懂你的人，不会说许多欺骗你的漂亮话，却会做许多关心和关爱你的事。只有一个真正懂你的人，才会和你尽情分享你们开心的时光和爱的快乐!

珍惜那个懂你的人

【有些话，藏在心里;有些痛，无声的忘记!】

慢慢地都淡了;渐渐地都忘了。世上事就是这样，好多熟悉的人，你不去呵护，慢慢就淡了，许多熟悉的事，你不去回味，渐渐就忘了。岁月的风，不仅能吹淡你我心中的情，也能冷却你我的心;时光的手，不仅能模糊你眼中的我，也能淡忘我心中的你。有些人注定成为故人，有些路注定要一个人走。一些人，一些事，闯进生活，得到了，失去的，昨天的悲伤，今天的快乐，喜怒哀乐都要记得。当一切都变成回忆，在我们记忆中又会留下什么?再熟悉的路，你不行走，也有陌生的感受…这就是人生。关键一刻，有人牵着，去哪里都可以;有人回应着，说什么也可以;无须匆忙，该来的总会来。没有谁能一手遮天，可以属于自己的，不要轻易放手;不该属于自己的，要学会舍得放开。死拽着别人的，不去追求自己的，是一种莫大悲哀。有些话，适合藏在心里，有些痛苦，适合无声无息的忘记，有些回忆，只适合偶尔拿出来回味。很多事情，当经历过，自己知道就好，很多改变，不需要说出来的，自己明白就好。所有的日子，都会到来，所有的日子，又都会过去，一切仿佛发生了，又仿佛一切没有发生。我们最孤独的，不是缺少知己，一直以为幸福在远方，在可以追逐的未来。后来才发现，那些拥抱过的人、握过的手、唱过的歌、流过的泪、爱过的人、所谓曾经，就是幸福。人生，既要淡，又要有味。不管过去发生过什么，我没办法改变周围的客观存在，但我可以改变自己的心态。因为真正属于自己的快乐或忧伤，是由自己创造的，而不是其他客观存在影响的。所以，我的世界掌握在自己的手中。人生岁月里，他们给过温暖，给过爱意，不在乎，会失去。太在乎，又会受伤。如果没有十足的把握，试着将一个人，铭记心上。如果没有肯定的缘份，试着将一段爱，藏在心底。有些人离开就是离开了，渐渐地，要替别人着想，但为自己而活。最好的东西，往往是意料之外，偶然得来的。世界上最痛苦的事就是笑脸相迎你最讨厌的人。与其在别人的生活里跑龙套，不如精彩做自己。

心小了，小事就大了;心大了，大事都小了。只有随着自己的心，做最真实的自己，才是最好的。尘世间惺惺相惜。过去的，都让他随风消逝，未来的，都让他自然而然。现在的都让他珍惜拥有。如此这般，只有懂得珍惜，才配得上拥有。只有做到宁静致远，才能看破心结。只有知足感恩，才能笑对人生。有些事，我总是弄不懂;有些人，我总是猜不透;有些道，我总是悟不尽;有些理，我总是想不通;有些坎，我们总是跨不过;有些伤，我总是治不好;有些天，我总是睡不着;有些地，我们总是去不了;有些情，我总是说不出;有些爱，我总是得不到。哎!看透嘞，烦了，与其为失去的哭泣，不如为留在身边的一切微笑。不能把自己看得太重，委屈了，无奈了，想哭了!!!

以前总认为坚持会让我们变强大，但是长大后才发现，让我们强大的，是放下。真正的朋友就是，当你蒙蔽了所有人的眼睛，也能看穿你真实的样子和心底的痛楚。不乱于心，不困于情。不畏将来，不念过往。如此，安好。最先原谅的人最坚强;最先道歉的人最勇敢;最先释怀的人最幸福。人的一生需要走走、停停、看看、想想，没有反思的人生，只是一次没有意义的旅行，来了也白来。我们从地狱到天堂路过人间，不要太在乎结果，老天自有安排，好好享受过程吧!不要总是估量自己在别人心中的地位，去走自己的路，去做最好的自己。

每个人的心里都潜藏着一条悲伤的河流。你有你的疼痛，我有我的艰辛，并非不懂，只是不愿一遍又一遍的去揭自己的伤疤!

生命中，总有些人，安然而来，静静守候，不离不弃;也有些人，浓烈如酒，疯狂似醉，却是醒来无处觅，来去都如风，梦过无痕。缘深缘浅，如此这般：无数的相遇，无数的别离，伤感良多，或许不舍，或许期待，或许无奈，终得悟，不如守拙以清心，淡然而浅笑。看花开花落、云卷云舒、缘来缘去。

这个世界，对你微笑的人很多。而真心包容你的，太少。试着做个个性坚强的人!

what should we thank?

the thankful great universe provides the environment of existence for us and give us sunlight, air, water and everything in keeping with we existence of space, bring storm to let us accept to toughen for us, bring to us mysterious let us look for.

the thankful parents give us the life, make us feel the merriment of the human life, feel the genuine feeling of the human life, feel the comity of the human life, feel happiness of the human life, also feel hardships and pain and sufferings of the human life!

the thankful teacher works with diligence and without fatigue everyday of teach, give us knowledge ability, put on the wing which flies toward the ideal for us.

the thankful classmate and friend grows up road of, let i no longer standing alone in the itinerary of life; the with gratitude is frustrated and let us become in a time the failure stronger.

[感恩节英语作文写作

导语：为了国家和人民的利益而献出了自己的生命，崇高的品德和情操在屈原的身上体现得淋漓尽致。下面是yuwenmi小编为大家整理的相关高考素材，欢迎阅读与借鉴，谢谢!

屈原一生经历了楚威王、楚怀王、顷襄王三个时期，而主要活动于楚怀王时期。这个时期正是中国即将实现大一统的前夕，“横则秦帝，纵则楚王”。屈原出身贵族，又明于治乱，娴于辞令，故而早年深受楚怀王的宠信，位为左徒、三闾大夫。屈原为实现楚国的统一大业，对内积极辅佐怀王变法图强，对外坚决主张联齐抗秦，使楚国一度出现了一个国富兵强、威震诸侯的局面。但是在内政外交上屈原与楚国腐朽贵族集团发生了尖锐的矛盾，由于上官大夫等人的嫉妒，屈原后来遭到群小的诬陷和楚怀王的疏远。他被流放江南，辗转流离于沅、湘二水之间。顷襄王二十一年(公元前278年)，秦将白起攻破郢都，屈原悲愤难捱，遂自沉汨罗江，以身殉国。

分析：为了国家和人民的利益而献出了自己的生命，崇高的品德和情操在屈原的身上体现得淋漓尽致。

话题：“命运”“责任”“精神卫士”

导语：文明在我心、公德伴我行。以下是yuwenmi小编为大家精心整理的名人诚信故事，欢迎阅读与借鉴，谢谢!

一、文明从小事做起

我国是世界是着名的文明古国、礼仪之邦，有着悠久的礼仪传统。从古到今，代代相传。随着社会的发展，礼仪也不断发展，并加入新的内涵，能给人以启迪和力量。

事情发生在前年冬天，天气已经非常冷了。北京的冬天寒风凛冽，我们全家乘车外出看电影。因为奥运会官员到北京考查，北京的街头到处都摆着各色塑料花卉，冬日里让人感到了一丝暖意。我们在车里吃着零食，听着音乐，惬意极了。

快到东直门时，妈妈将装有废物的垃圾袋顺着车窗就投向外面，我急忙制止已来不及。我要求爸爸把车开回去捡起垃圾，可妈妈说车已经无法返回，再说路上车那么多，如果回去的话撞车怎么办?妈妈甚至说下次改掉也就罢了。可我坚决不干，最后爸爸终于把车开了回来。妈妈找回了扔掉的垃圾。虽然耽误了好多时间，但全家都认为我这样的做法是对的。回家的路上，机场高速路两边的树上挂着好多不同颜色的垃圾袋，全家人都进行了深刻的反省。

从此以后，我们全家人都以实际行动成为“讲文明、护环境”的大使。上周，我们全家去爬香山，赏红叶，带了好多食物去野餐。野餐之后，大家分别将垃圾收好，背着下山，到有垃圾桶的地方才扔掉。这样的事情，在我们家里再也不用我监督，都会自觉所为。妈妈更是用实际行动让我感动。她经常会在公共场所将地上的垃圾捡起，扔进垃圾桶。

讲文明、讲礼貌，需要的是人人从我做起，从小事做起。我们是国家的小主人，我们有义务去帮助没有受到良好教育的人去学习文明、实践文明。因为我们今天有了丰富的物质生活，更需要建设高度的精神文明。这样，我们的国家才能成为强大的、高度文明的国家，文明才能受到更多人的敬仰。

二、都是不文明惹的祸

在一座神秘的大森林里，住着一群可爱的小精灵，它们有着一双透明的翅膀，尖尖的耳朵，小巧可爱。而在森林的另一头，住着他们的敌人，它生得丑陋，名为丑八怪。他专抓不讲文明的小精灵，上帝规定，只要小精灵有不礼貌的，就任凭丑八怪处置。这下可美了丑八怪，每隔几天，就会有小精灵被它抓进金鸟笼里。

小精灵们再也受不了这种日子了。决心要改变这种命运。它们坚持每天做文明的小事。可总有懒惰的，懒懒是一个非常懒的小精灵，他懒得去做这些。每天还是呼呼睡大觉。见了长辈不礼貌，这可惹了大祸，丑八怪在魔球里发现了这个小东西，欣喜若狂，立刻派手下去抓它回来。懒懒这时还在苔藓上睡觉呢，丑八怪的手下轻而易举的就将懒懒抓走了。

当懒懒睡醒时，先是伸了个懒腰，然后长舒一口气，刚要起来就撞倒了，丑八怪尖笑着：“啊哈，小东西，我可真幸运，我已经好久没抓到过小精灵了，一会儿，我要把你做成点心，填饱我这肚子。”懒懒吓得又哭又叫，他可真后悔当初自己太懒，为什么自己的名字叫“懒懒”，就在这时，同伴来救它了，咪咪和精精用魔法将丑八怪困住，偷出钥匙打开了笼门，又使用瞬间飞移回到了精灵城堡。懒懒不好意思的低下了头，精灵长老安慰它说：“孩子，不必担心，只要你以后礼貌待人，就会幸福快乐的。”懒懒听后发誓，今后一定要做一个文明的小精灵。

三、孔融让梨

孔融有五个哥哥，一个小弟弟。

有一天，家里吃梨。一盘梨子放在大家面前，哥哥让弟弟先拿。你猜，孔融拿了一个什么样的梨?他不挑好的，不拣大的，只拿了一个最小的。爸爸看见了，心里很高兴：别看这孩子才四岁，还真懂事哩。就故意问孔融：“这么多的梨，又让你先拿，你为什么不拿大的，只拿一个最小的呢?”孔融回答说：“我年纪小，应该拿个最小的;大的留给哥哥吃。”父亲又问他：“你还有个弟弟哩，弟弟不是比你还要小吗?”

孔融说：“我比弟弟大，我是哥哥，我应该把大的留给弟弟吃。”

你看，孔融讲得多好啊。他父亲听了，哈哈大笑：“好孩子，好孩子，真是一个好孩子。”

孔融四岁，知道让梨。上让哥哥，下让弟弟。大家都很称赞他。

四、总理道歉

霍克就任澳大利亚总理期间，有一次在一家商场内与一位老人就养老金问题发生争执。霍克一时冲动，骂那位老人：“愚蠢的老家伙。”老人因此把他告到法院。霍克举行记者招待会，就自己不文明的语言，公开向这位老者道歉。他说：“那天我非常烦恼，但这不能成为我使用那种措辞的理由。如果我确实伤害了他的话，我愿意就此向这位先生道歉，诚请宽容我的不逊。”

五、列宁让路

有一次，列宁下楼，在楼梯狭窄的过道上，正碰见一个女工端着一盆水上楼。那女工一看是列宁，就要给列宁让路，准备自己退回去。列宁阻止她说：“不必这样，你端着东西走了半截，而我现在空着手，请你先过去吧!”他把“请”字说得很响亮，很亲切。然后自己紧靠着墙，让女工上楼了，他才下楼。列宁毫无疑问是一位伟人，但他却不因自己地位的高贵而无礼，这更显出了他伟大的品质。

六、“忍气吞声”的林肯

有一次，美国总统林肯和儿子罗伯特驱车上街，遇到一列军队在街上通过。林肯随口问一位路人：“这是什么?”林肯原想问是哪个州的兵团，但没有说清楚。那人以为他不认识军队，便粗鲁地回答：“这是联邦军队，你真是个他妈的大笨蛋。”林肯面对着一个普通路人对自己的斥责，只说了声“谢谢”，毫无怒容。

七、委屈奖的来历

上海公交22路车售票员柯莉萍，曾获得一个很特殊的奖项——“委屈奖”。一天，一名男青年买车票时，故意将一口痰吐在一张伍角纸币上，又扔在车厢的地上。其他乘客在指责男青年的同时，也悄悄地注视着柯莉萍。只见她弯下腰拾起纸币，用餐巾擦去痰沫，随后又礼貌地向男青年递上车票。柯莉萍的行为受到了乘客的赞扬，男青年更是自感惭愧，向柯莉萍道了歉。事后，同事向车队汇报了此事，车队领导于是向柯莉萍特别颁发了“委屈奖”，以鼓励全队的售票员。

八、以尊重换尊重

在南北朝时期的齐国，有一个叫陆晓慧的人，他才华横溢，博闻强识，为人更是恭谨亲切。他曾在好几个王的手下当过长史，可以说是一个高高在上的人了，然而他却从来不把自己看得很高，前来拜见他的官员，不管官大官小，他都以礼相待，一点儿也不摆驾子。如果客人离开，他更会站起身亲自将对方送到门外。

有一个幕僚看到这种情景，很是难以理解，就对他说：“陆长史官居高位，不管对谁，哪怕对老百姓也是彬彬有礼，这样实在有失身份，更什么也得不到，长史何必这样麻烦呢?”陆晓慧听了不以为然地轻松一笑，说道：“欲先取之，必先与之。我想让所有的人都尊重我，那我就必须尊重所有的人。”

陆晓慧一生都奉行这个准则，所以得到非常多的人的尊重和支持，他的政绩也远远地超过别人。

九、文明礼仪的楷模

孙中山先生是中国资产阶级革命的先行者，又是文明礼貌的楷模。他认为：随地吐痰、留长指甲、不刷牙等陋习，都是违反文明礼貌的行为，是与我们中华民族的文明传统不相称的。他提倡“诚忠形外”，注意“一举一动之微”的文明。

十、尊师

一个春雨霏霏的日子，漫画“三毛”的作者张乐平一手撑雨伞，一手提蛋糕，去看望50余年没有见过面的小学启蒙老师陆寅生。陆寅生曾经给张乐平出了个题目，指导他画政治讽刺画，这是张乐平学漫画的开始。此事虽已过去50多年，但张乐平记忆犹新。80多岁的陆老师把张乐平打量了一下，问：“你是谁?找谁?”张乐平说：“我是张平啊，现在叫张乐平。”陆老师兴奋异常：“几十年来难得你还想着我，真不容易啊!”张乐平说：“我的第一幅漫画是您教我画的，我一直没有忘记您!”

十一、朱德尊师

1957年初，朱德在云南政治学校礼堂和大家一起看戏。开演前，朱德同志和周围的观众愉快地交流，这时，一位年近古稀的老人在旁人的搀扶下走进礼堂，朱德见老人来了，急忙起身向前，立正行军礼，礼毕又亲切地叫了一声“叶老师”，然后，朱德又请老人入座，待老人坐定后，自己才坐下。原来，这位老人叫叶成林，是朱德早年在云南陆军讲武堂学习时的教官。

十二、傲慢的小老鼠

从前有一只小老鼠，总觉得自己了不起，对别人很不礼貌。

一次他去上学，一只蜗牛迎面走了过来，挡住了他的去路。小老鼠凶巴巴地说：“小不点儿，滚开，别挡我的路!”小老鼠说着一脚踢了过去，把蜗牛踢得滚出去很远。

有一次，小老鼠到河边喝水，觉得河里的一条小鱼妨碍了他，于是，捡起一块石头就扔了过去。小鱼受到袭击，吓了一跳，慌忙躲避。小老鼠哈哈大笑说：“知道我的厉害了吧”。

一天晚上，小老鼠在回家的路上看见一只小猪躺在路边，就趾高气扬地说：“谁给你这么大的胆子，竟敢挡住我的路”说着，一脚踢了过去。“嘭”地一声，小老鼠正好踢到小猪的脚上，小猪倒没什么事，小老鼠却“唉呦，唉呦”地叫了起来，原来他的脚肿起了一个大包。小猪站起来对小老鼠说：“你对别人傲慢无礼，不懂得尊重人，今天尝到苦头了吧!只有尊重别人，才能获得别人的尊重。”小老鼠看着受伤的脚，羞愧地低下了头。

十三、程门立雪

杨时(1053~1135)是北宋时一位很有才华的才子，南剑州将乐人(今属福建)。中了进士后，他放弃做官，继续求学。

程颢(1032~1085)、程颐(1033~1107)兄弟俩是当时很有名望的大学问家、哲学家、教育学，洛阳人，同是北宋理学的奠基人。他们的学说为后来的南宋朱熹所继承，世称程朱学派。杨时仰慕二程的学识，投奔洛阳程颢门下，拜师求学，4年后程颢去世，又继续拜程颐为师。这时他年已40，仍尊师如故，刻苦学习。

一天，大雪纷飞，天寒地冻，杨时碰到疑难问题，便冒着凛冽的寒风，约同学游酢(1053~1123年)一同前往老师家求教。当他来到老师家，见老师正坐在椅子上睡着了，他不忍打搅，怕影响老师休息，就静静地侍立门外等候。当老师一觉醒来时他们的脚下已积雪一尺深了，身上飘满了雪。老师忙把杨时等两人请进屋去，为他们讲学。后来，“程门立雪”成为了广为流传的尊师典范。

十四、问路礼仪

牛皋向一位老者问路，他在马路上吼道：“哎，老头儿!爷问你，农场怎么走?”老人说“往前走1500丈”。牛皋奇怪地说“怎么是丈不是里呢”。老人说“我们这儿说丈不说理”，牛皋红着脸走了。过了一会儿，岳飞也来到这里，他先下马，然后上前施礼，“请问老丈，方才可曾见一个骑黑马的?他往哪条路上去了?”老人见岳飞颇有礼貌，便耐心的给他指路。这正如俗话所说：“礼到人心暖，无礼讨人嫌”。

十五、仅仅因为一口痰吗

这是一场艰难的谈判。

一天下来，美国约瑟先生对于对手——中国某医疗机械的范厂长，既恼火又钦佩。这个范厂长对即将引进的“大输液管”生产线行情非常熟悉。不仅对设备的技术指数要求高，而且价格压的很低。在中国，约瑟似乎没有遇到过这样难缠而有实力的谈判对手。他断定，今后和务实的范厂长合作，事业是能顺利的。

于是信服地接受了范厂长那个偏低的报价。“ok!”双方约定第二天正式签定协议。(www.52article.com 励志文章阅读)天色尚早，范厂长邀请约瑟到车间看一看。车间井然有序，约瑟边看边赞许的点头。走着走着，突然，范厂长觉得嗓子里有条小虫在爬，不由得咳了一声，便急急的向车间一角奔去。约瑟诧异地盯着范厂长，只见他在墙角吐了一口痰，然后用鞋底擦了擦，油漆的地面留下了一片痰渍。约瑟快步走出车间，不顾范厂长的竭力挽留，坚决要回宾馆。

第二天一早，翻译敲开范厂长的门，递给他一封约瑟的信：“尊敬的范先生，我十分钦佩您的才智与精明，但车间里你吐痰的一幕使我一夜难眠。恕我直言，一个厂长的卫生习惯，可以反映一个工厂的管理素质。况且，我们今后生产的是用来治病的输液管。贵国有句谚语：人命关天!请原谅我的不辞而别，否则，上帝会惩罚我的……”

范厂长觉得头“轰”的一声，像要炸了。

十六、垃圾回家记

我国是个文明古国，以“礼仪之邦”着称于世。古今中外，许多知礼谦让的故事流传至今。比如：众所周知的“孔融让梨”，说的是孔融七岁时，便懂得礼让;“张良拾鞋”讲的是张良尊敬老人，主动拾鞋，并恭恭敬敬地给老人穿上的故事。国家主席毛泽东，虽然身居高位，却平易近人，谦恭礼让。我们敬爱的周总理，待客热情周到，是世界公认的最有风度的领导和外交家。从这些故事中，我们得到启示：我们从小就要养成讲文明懂礼貌的好习惯。

说起文明礼貌，我想起一件发生在我身边的事。有一天，我和往常一样走在回家的路上，到了楼梯口，我发现墙角有一袋垃圾，这时候楼上的胡奶奶正好走下来，一开始，她没有注意到墙角的垃圾，因为她的眼睛不太好，这时又迎面走来了一位叔叔，胡奶奶回头瞄了他一眼，这才发现了墙角的垃圾，于是转身走回到原地，捡起那袋垃圾，走到垃圾桶面前，“扑通”扔了进去。这袋垃圾回到了应该属于它的地方，胡奶奶也悄然离去。看着胡奶奶离去的身影，我的心里十分后悔，为什么我没有去捡那袋垃圾呢?

虽然这是一桩不起眼的小事情，但她却是保护环境的意义所在。

同学们，让我们行动起来吧，人人争做环境保护的小卫士，人人争做合格的文明礼仪小公民!

十七、让座

在一个阳光明媚的日子里，我和妈妈12路去爱特购物。上车的人真多，我和妈妈上车后赶紧找了两个座位坐了下来，很快车上就没座位了。不一会儿，汽车开到了电影院站头。这时，上来一个大约七十多岁的老奶奶，她步履蹒跚地上了车，不等老奶奶站稳，车子又启动了，差点把那位老奶奶给摔倒了，大家都好像没有看见似的。而我呢，坐在一旁想：如果我把座位让给她，那我自己离到站还那么远……我真是又想让座，又不想让座。这时仿佛有一个声音在对我说：“你是一名少先队员，应该讲文明，讲礼仪，要乐于助人。”我想了想，就不由自主地站了起来。

就在我准备让座的时候，忽然有一位七八岁的小女孩站起来了，她声音甜甜地对那位老奶奶说：“老奶奶，您坐我的座位吧!”“谢谢你，你真是个好孩子!”老奶奶感激地夸奖这位小女孩。

望着这位大眼睛、圆脸蛋的小女孩，我忽然有一阵愧疚感：我最初为什么犹犹豫豫，不想让座呢?小女孩的一举一动深深地印在我的脑海里，让我永远难以忘记。

十八、“会”说话

大作家夏衍老人临终前感到身体十分难受，秘书就说：“我去叫大夫。”不料老人极其困难的说了一句：“不是‘叫’，是‘请’。”

公共汽车上，一中年妇女提着鱼上车，蹭脏了中学生小刚的新衣服。中年妇女：“衣服脏了没关系，回家洗洗就行了。”

小刚笑了：“阿姨，我该说的话都让您说了。我只有说‘对不起了!’”众人向小刚投来赞许的目光，中年妇女被这幽默的批评羞红了脸。

十九、曾子避席

“曾子避席”出自《孝经》，是一个非常着名的故事。曾子是孔子的弟子，有一次他在孔子身边侍坐，孔子就问他：“以前的圣贤之王有至高无上的德行，精要奥妙的理论，用来教导天下之人，人们就能和睦相处，君王和臣下之间也没有不满，你知道它们是什么吗?”曾子听了，明白老师孔子是要指点他最深刻的道理，于是立刻从坐着的席子上站起来，走到席子外面，恭恭敬敬地回答道：“我不够聪明，哪里能知道，还请老师把这些道理教给我。”

在这里，“避席”是一种非常礼貌的行为，当曾子听到老师要向他传授时，他站起身来，走到席子外向老师请教，是为了表示他对老师的尊重。曾子懂礼貌的故事被后人传诵，很多人都向他学习。

二十、张良拜师

张良是西汉高祖刘邦的军师，他的祖先是韩国人。在秦灭韩后，张良立志为韩国报仇。有一次，因刺杀秦始皇未遂，受到追捕而避居到下邳。张良在下邳闲暇无事。有一天他到下邳桥上散步，碰到一个老人，穿着粗布短衣，走到张良旁边，故意把他的鞋子掉到桥下。然后回过头来冲着张良说：“孩子!下桥去给我把鞋子拾上来!”张良听了一愣，很想打他一下，但一看他是个老人，就强忍着怒气，到桥下把鞋拾了上来。那老人竟又命令说：“把鞋子给我穿上!”张良一想，既然已经给他拾来了鞋子，不如就给他穿上吧，于是就跪在地上给他穿鞋。

那老人把脚伸着，让张良给他穿好后，就笑嘻嘻地走了。张良一直用惊奇的目光注视着他的去向。那老人走了里把路，又折回身来，对张良说：“你这个孩子是能培养成才的。5天以后的早上，天一亮，就到这里来同我会面!”张良跪下来说：“是。”第五天天刚亮，张良到了下邳桥上。不料那老人已经等在那里了，见了张良就生气地说：“和老人约会，怎么迟到了?以后的第五天早上再来相会!”说完就离去了。

到第五天早上，鸡一叫，张良就赶去，可是那老人又等在那里了，见了张良又生气地说：“怎么又掉在我后面了?过了五天再早点来!”说完又走了。到第五天，张良没到半夜就赶到桥上，等了好久，那老人也来了，他高兴地说：“这样才好。”然后他拿出一本书来，指着说道：“认真研读这本书，就能做帝王的老师了!过十年，天下形势有变，你就会发迹了。以后13年，你就会在济北郡谷城山下看到我——那儿有块黄石就是我了。”老人说完就走了。

早上天亮时，张良拿出那本书来一看，原来是《太公兵法》(辅佐周武王伐纣的姜太公的兵书)!张良十分珍爱它，经常熟读，反复地学习、研究。

10年过去了，陈胜等人起兵反秦，张良也聚集了100多人响应。沛公刘邦率领了几千人马，在下邳的西面攻占了一些地方，张良就归附于他，成为他的部属。从此张良根据《太公兵法》经常向沛公献计献策，沛公认为很好，常常采用他的计谋，后来成了刘邦运筹帷幄，决胜千里的军师。刘邦称帝后，封他为留侯。

张良始终不忘那个给他《太公兵法》的老人。13年后，他随从刘邦经过济北时，果然在谷城山下看见有块黄石，并把它取回，称之为“黄石公”，作为珍宝供奉起来，按时祭祀。张良死后，家属把这块黄石和他葬在一起。

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

最大限度减少地震伤亡

四川雅安地震发生后，习近平、李克强作出重要指示，要求抓紧了解灾情，把抢救生命作为首要任务，千方百计救援受灾群众，科学施救，最大限度减少伤亡，同时要加强地震监测，切实防范余震带来的次生灾害，妥善做好受灾群众安置工作，维护灾区社会稳定。

根据习近平总书记、李克强总理重要指示精神，中共中央政治局委员、国务院副总理汪洋立即召开会议作出工作部署，决定启动国务院抗震救灾Ⅰ级响应。国务院有关部门和军队、武警部队有关方面紧急赶赴灾区慰问受灾群众，指导抗震救灾工作。

中共中央政治局常委、国务院总理李克强，副总理汪洋，国务院秘书长杨晶乘专机前往四川雅安地震灾区。李克强强调，要抓紧黄金24小时救援，同时要科学救援，一定要科学救援。

适用方向：态度;救援;灾害面前;百姓情怀;快速反应

不要预支明天的痛苦

美国海豹突击队是举世闻名的特种部队，能在海豹突击队服役无疑是美国军人最大的光荣。因为它的出类拔萃，所以海豹突击队的训练是极其残酷的，这也应了那句老话：“训练时多流汗，战场上少流血。”考虑到每个人的忍耐程度不同，海豹突击队特意在训练场边挂了一口钟，并且相当人性化地规定：如果无法忍受训练的强度，可以亲手敲响这口钟，表示自动放弃，然后可以卷铺盖走人。

虽然当逃兵是可耻的，但苦于训练的残酷，钟声还是时不时的响起。但是，很快教官就发现了一个奇怪的现象：极少有人在训练的过程中敲响那口钟，90%以上的钟声是在结束一天的训练、晚上休息时响起的，而这恰恰是一天中最放松的时刻!

百思不解的教官们找到一位心理学家，心理学家对这一现象深入研究后得出结论：“他们挺过了一天的训练，却总担心明天熬不过去，他们提前预支了明天的痛苦，不由自主地陷入恐惧之中，越想越害怕，最终选择了放弃!”

适用方向：毅力;意志;苦与甜;把握当下;坚持就是胜利

不想让人同情的盲人歌手

在2012年7月13日“中国好声音”的舞台上，最后一位来自宝岛台湾的选手张玉霞，给观众带来了深深的震撼。她是盲人，但她的声音好像是来自天堂，唱进了每个人的心里。

35岁的张玉霞，目前在台北淡水做街头艺人。3个月大时，由于视神经萎缩导致失明，但她一直没有放弃歌唱事业，歌龄长达15年。张玉霞模仿邓丽君已经到了出神入化的地步，现在她成了淡水街头一道独特的风景，拥有大量的歌迷。

“中国好声音”导演邬稚晖，是亲自联系张玉霞登台的人。她说，最初张玉霞不愿意参加节目，“我亲自飞去淡水找到她后，发现她之前一直对自己唱歌获得大家赞赏心存疑虑：人们是不是因为同情才喜欢自己?我把节目的盲选规则告诉她，说在听到她的声音之前，导师是看不到她的样子的。这才打动了她”。邬稚晖表示，从最初跟张玉霞接触，到说服她站在“中国好声音”舞台上，花费了超过3个月时间。一曲《独上西楼》，把命运的孤寂表现得淋漓尽致;而与那英合唱的《征服》，却又将不被命运征服的决心展示得气势磅礴。这就是张玉霞——不想被人同情的盲人歌手。舒淇更在微博中赞叹说：“唱出感人的心境，天生一副好歌喉!”

适用方向：感动;尊重;追求;坚守;人生态度

坚持一句话

在美国颇负盛名、人称“传奇教练”的伍登，在12年的全美篮球年赛当中，替加州大学洛杉矶分校赢得10次全国总冠军。如此辉煌的成绩，使伍登成为有史以来公认最称职的篮球教练之一。

曾经有记者问他：“伍登教练，请问你是如何保持这种积极心态的?”

伍登愉快地回答：“每天我在睡觉以前，都会提起精神告诉自己，我今天的表现非常好，而且明天的表现会更好。”

“就只有这么简短的一句话吗?”记者有些不敢相信。

伍登坚定地回答：“简短的一句话?这句话我可是坚持了20年!重要的是这一点和简短与否没关系，关键是在于你有没有坚持去做，如果无法持之以恒就算是长篇大论也没有帮助。”

伍登的积极心态超乎常人，不单是对篮球的执著，其他的生活细节也不例外。例如，有一次他与朋友开车到市中心，面对拥挤的车流，朋友感到不满，继而频频抱怨。伍登却欣喜地说：“这真是个热闹的城市。”

适用方向：心态;坚持;力量;成功;自信

率性而为

美国芝加哥有个公共汽车司机，每天边开车边唱歌，他并不是轻声哼给自己听，他唱歌的时候，整个公共汽车上的人都能听得见。他一整天都边开车边唱歌。

他曾经接受芝加哥电视台的采访。他说其实自己并不是公共汽车司机，“我是个职业歌手，我开车只是为了每天都能有无法走开的听众”。看着吧，人们排队坐他的公共汽车。为了能搭乘“会唱歌的公车司机”开的车，他们甚至有意错过别的公共汽车，他们乐此不疲。

这是一个知道自己为何而生的人。对他来说，生在世上就是为了让别人快乐，他找到了一种将自己的生活目的和职业结合起来的途径，率性而为，于是他过着心目中该过的生活。

适用方向：生活;态度;追求;快乐;价值

黎锦熙近80年天天写

黎锦熙先生是我国著名的语言学家、教育家，他在一生的工作和学习中，养成了勤于动笔的好习惯。拿写日记来说，他从12岁时开始，一直记到89岁临终前夕，近80年，从未间断，积数十本之多。这些日记已成为近、现代的珍贵史料，反映了几十年来国内外政治、经济、文化等方面的变化发展，记载了他个人的工作、学习、生活情况。黎先生录写卡片的数量也很惊人，单为编纂大辞典就收集整理了300多万张卡片。他一生的著述，已出版的就有400余种，涉及语言、训诂、文字、教育、目录、历史、文学、地理、哲学、佛学等方面。十年浩劫期间，他受到迫害，在极端困难的条件下，也写了近30种学术论著。他说自己的一生是：“‘任重’能背，‘道远’不退，快快儿地慢慢走，不睡!”

适用方向：毅力;坚持;成功;自我鞭策;榜样的力量

苏雄的傲气

现任BBDO广告公司亚太区董事长的苏雄认为：如果每一个广告公司都坚持自己的原则，那么整个广告圈的环境也就可以健康起来。而现在的情况是你不做，后面有一大堆公司在排队。

他说：“前段时间，我们在台湾的分公司出了这样一件事，我们有一个已经服务了10年的客户，他们的成功可以说有一半是我们服务的功劳，前段时间他们提出比稿(即广告公司为客户产品所做的市场预测报告，可以由广告公司主动来做，也可按客户的要求来做)，比稿后，他们要求谈价钱，但并没有按照比稿的结果来比较价格，而是让所有参加比稿的公司一起报价，结果另一家国际广告公司报出的是我们原先收费三分之一的价格，客户问我能不能出比他们还低的价钱，我当即决定这笔业务不做了，尽管他们占了台湾公司50%的业务额，但是我觉得作为广告人我们要有这个骨气。”

国有国法，行有行规。不按规矩出牌，最终损害的将是整体的利益。有些人和企业只图一时的获利，缺乏长远的眼光，因小失大，最终难以做大做强。

适用方向：骨气;态度;意志;坚持原则;规矩与方圆

索尼：不迷信专家

近几年，日本索尼公司在招聘大学生时，对学校名称采取“不准问，不准说，不准写”的“三不”方针。公司认为，在激烈竞争和多变时代，企业需要各种人才，只有将各种不同的人聚集在一起，才能更好地发挥创造性，开发出新产品，只在少数名牌大学中招聘人才，会使企业失去活力。索尼公司创始人之一的井深大说：“我从不迷信专家，专家倾向于争辩你为什么不做或不能做某种事情，而我们经常强调的是从无到有去实干。”因此，索尼喜欢思想敏锐、不墨守成规、勇于探索创新的人，他们鼓励科技人才“跳槽”，可以在公司任何部门寻找新的职位，“毛遂自荐”参与项目的开发研究。公司认为，这种人思想开放，思维活跃，兴趣广泛，具有创造意识和创新精神，是实干家而不是空谈家，有培养和发展前途，应加以重用。

适用方向：态度;认知;人才;能力;说和做

导语：要写好作文，必须有很好的积累，文采丰富自然可以拿到高分，小编整理了一些关于谦虚的名言，想要高分的同学，快来YJBYS作文网吧!

若要精，人前听。

喜欢吹嘘的人犹如一面大鼓，响声大腹中空。

强中更有强中手，莫向人前自夸口。

请教别人不折本，舌头打个滚。

人唯虚，始能知人。 满招损，谦受益。 满必溢，骄必败。

知识贮藏在谦虚的大海中。

学问多深也别满足，过失多小也别忽略。

懂得自己无知，说明已有收获。

水满则溢，月满则亏;自满则败，自矜则愚。

不实心不成事，不虚心不知事。

虚心的人，常想己之短;骄傲的人，常夸己之长。

自赞就是自轻。

如果有了胡子就算学识渊博，那么，山羊也可以讲课了。

成就是谦虚者前进的阶梯，也是骄傲者后退的滑梯。

吹嘘自己有知识的人，等于在宣扬自己的无知。

言过其实，终无大用。

越是成熟的稻穗，越懂得弯腰。

虚心使人进步，骄傲使人落后。

谦虚是学习的朋友，自满是学习的敌人。

宽阔的河平静，博学的人谦虚。

山不厌高，水不厌深。

骄傲来自浅薄，狂妄出于无知。

说大话的人像爆竹，响一声就完了。

满足现在的成就，就窒息了未来。

赶脚的对头是脚懒，学习的对头是自满。

讷讷寡言者未必愚,喋喋利口者未必智。

当我们是大为谦卑的时候，便是我们最近于伟大的时候。——泰戈尔

真正的谦虚只能是对虚荣心进行了深思以后的产物。——柏格森

骄傲是跌跤的前奏。

知识愈浅，自信愈深。

骄傲是失败的开头，自满是智慧的尽头。

不自是者博闻，不自满者受益。

我们不要把眼睛生在头顶上，致使用了自己的脚踏坏了我们想得之于天上的东西。——冯雪峰

我们不能一有成绩，就像皮球一样，别人拍不得，轻轻一拍，就跳得老高。成绩越大，越要谦虚谨慎。——王进喜

一个骄傲的人，结果总是在骄傲里毁灭了自己。——莎士比亚

凡过于把幸运之事归功于自己的聪明和智谋的人多半是结局很不幸的。——培根

自负对任何艺术是一种毁灭。骄傲是可怕的不幸。——季米特洛夫

无论在什麽时候，永远不要以为自己已知道了一切。——巴甫洛夫

我们各种习气中再没有一种象克服骄傲那么难的了。虽极力藏匿它，克服它，消灭它，但无论如何，它在不知不觉之间，仍旧显露。——富兰克林

有了一些小成绩就不求上进，这完全不符合我的性格。攀登上一个阶梯，这固然很好，只要还有力气，那就意味着必须再继续前进一步。——安徒生

大多数的科学家，对于最高级的形容词和夸张手法都是深恶痛绝的，伟大的人物一般都是谦虚谨慎的。——贝弗里奇

构成我们学习最大障碍的是已知的东西，而不是未知的东西。——贝尔纳

懒于思索，不愿意钻研和深入理解，自满或满足于微不足道的知识，都是智力贫乏的原因。这种贫乏通常用一个字来称呼，这就是"愚蠢"。——高尔基

伟大的人是决不会滥用他们的优点的，他们看出他们超过别人的地方，并且意识到这一点，然而绝不会因此就不谦虚。他们的过人之处越多，他们越认识到他们的不足。——卢梭

我们的骄傲多半是基于我们的无知!——莱辛

当我历数了人类在艺术上和文学上所发明的那许多神妙的创造，然后再回顾一下我的知识，我觉得自己简直是浅陋之极。——伽利略

要在座的人都停止了说话的时候，有了机会，方才可以谦逊地把问题提出，向人学习。——约翰·洛克

不谦虚的话只能有这个辩解，即缺少谦虚就是缺少见识。——富兰克林

一切真正的和伟大的东西，都是纯朴而谦逊的。——别林斯基

自负对任何艺术是一种毁灭。骄傲是可怕的不幸。——季米特洛夫

真正的谦虚只能是对虚荣心进行了深思以后的产物。——柏格森

将拒谏则英雄散，策不从则谋士叛。——黄石公

不傲才以骄人，不以宠而作威。——诸葛亮

一个人如果把从别人那里学来的东西算作自己的发现，这也很接近于虚骄。——黑格尔

自卑虽是与骄傲反对，但实际却与骄傲最为接近。——斯宾诺莎

显而易见，骄傲与谦卑是恰恰相反的，可是它们有同一个对象。这个对象就是自我。——休谟

我首先要求诸君信任科学，相信理性，信任自己，并相信自己。——黑格尔

卑己而尊人是不好的，尊己而卑人也是不好的。——徐特立

任何人都应该有自尊心自信心独立性，不然就是奴才。但自尊不是轻人，自信不是自满，独立不是弧立。——徐特立

无论是别人在跟前或者自己单独的时候，都不要做一点卑劣的事情：最要紧的是自尊。——毕达哥拉斯

最盲目的服从乃是奴隶们所仅存的唯一美德。——卢梭

蠢材妄自尊大，他自鸣得意的，正好是受人讥笑奚落的短处，而且往往把应该引为奇耻大辱的事，大吹大擂。——克雷洛夫

无论在什么时候，永远不要以为自己已经知道了一切。不管人们把你们评价的多么高，但你们永远要有勇气对自己说：我是个毫无所知的人。——巴甫洛夫

决不要陷于骄傲。因为一骄傲，你们就会在应该同意的场合固执起来;因为一骄傲，你们就会拒绝别人的忠告和友谊的帮助;因为一骄傲，你们就会丧失客观标准。——巴甫洛夫

不管我们的成绩有多么大，我们仍然因该清醒地估计敌人地力量，提高警惕，决不容许在自己的队伍中有骄傲自大安然自得和疏忽大意的情绪。——斯大林

最大的骄傲于最大的自卑都表示心灵的最软弱无力。——斯宾诺莎

骄傲的人必然嫉妒，他对于那最以德性受人称赞的人便最怀忌恨。——斯宾诺莎

由于痛苦而将自己看得太低就是自卑。——斯宾诺莎

自卑虽是与骄傲反对，但实际却与骄傲最为接近。——斯宾诺莎

无论是别人在跟前或者自己单独的时候，都不要做一点卑劣的事情：最要紧的是自尊。——毕达哥拉斯

礼仪不良有两种：第一种是忸怩羞怯;第二种是行为不检点和轻慢;要避免这两种情形，就只有好好地遵守下面这条规则，就是，不要看不起自己，也不要看不起别人。——约翰·洛克

九牛一毫莫自夸，骄傲自满必翻车。历览古今多少事，成由谦逊败由奢。——陈毅

不满足是向上的车轮。——鲁迅

念高危，则思谦冲而自牧;惧满盈，则思江海下百川。——魏徵

好说己长便是短，自知己短便是长。——申居郧

放荡功不遂，满盈身必灾。——张咏

虚已者进德之基。——方孝孺

满盈者，不损何为?慎之!慎之!——朱舜水

人生大病，只是一“傲”字。——王阳明

不骄方能师人之长，而自成其学。——谭嗣同

人生至愚是恶闻已过，人生至恶是善谈人过。——申居郧

盛满易为灾，谦冲恒受福。——张廷玉

骄傲自满是我们的一座可怕的陷阱;而且，这个陷阱是我们自己亲手挖掘的。——老舍

昂着头出征，夹着尾巴回家，是庸驽而又好战的人的常态。——冯雪峰

我们不要把眼睛生在头顶上，致使用了自己的脚踏坏了我们想得之于天上的东西。——冯雪峰

导语：绵羊下海经商，开理发店却把刺猬的刺烫卷了，开洗染店又把乌鸦的黑色羽毛染成白色，开饮食店竟给狐狸送上炒青菜。下面是yuwenmi小编为大家整理的作文素材，欢迎阅读与借鉴，谢谢!

材料作文题：阅读下面的材料，根据要求写一篇不少于800字的文章。

绵羊下海经商。开理发店，把刺猬的刺烫卷了，刺猬大哭;开洗染店，又把乌鸦的黑色羽毛染白了，乌鸦很生气;开饮食店，竟给狐狸送上炒青菜，狐狸砸了它的店牌。

要求全面理解材料，但可以选择一个侧面、一个角度构思作文。自主确定立意，确定文体，确定标题;不要脱离材料的含意作文，不要套作，不得抄袭。

写作点拨

(1)从绵羊一厢情愿地把自己的意愿强加在别人的身上可以得出结论：已之所欲，勿施于人。或切莫“以己律人”。

(2)白发卷发和青菜是绵羊的专利，虽适合自己，却是对刺猬的污辱，对乌鸦的讽刺，对狐狸的愚弄，因为任何事物都有区别于其他事物的特殊性，办任何事都要从实际出发，探求并尊重事物发展的规律性。

(3)从战胜困难的角度得出迎难而上，奋力拼搏才能获取成功的喜悦这一观点。

范文示例：心灵换位―请多站在别人的立场想想

绵羊下海经商，开理发店却把刺猬的刺烫卷了，开洗染店又把乌鸦的黑色羽毛染成白色，开饮食店竟给狐狸送上炒青菜。这自然闹出了不少的摩擦与笑话。追根到底，造成这种结局的原因是绵羊没有站在别人的立场上为别人着想。作为万物之灵长的人类，更应该适当的进行心灵换位，多站在别人的立场想想。

心灵的换位，能化解不必要的矛盾，团结众人之力。大家对“负荆请罪”这个故事也许都耳熟能详了吧。老将廉颇自恃武艺高强，且屡建战功，于是不把别人放在眼里。但靠着能言善辩多次帮国家化险为夷的蔺相如却悄无声息的超过了他的头衔。廉颇当然无法忍受，竟扬言要羞辱蔺相如一番。话传到蔺相如耳中，他不仅不气愤，反而处处忍让，回避廉颇。最终他为国家着想的初衷也被廉颇所理解，两人从而团结一致，使赵国日趋强盛。试想，若不是蔺相如站在廉颇的立场上，了解廉颇争强好胜的个性，也了解他建功立业的壮志，那造成的结果不仅是两人关系的决裂，更严重的是国家前途的断丧。

心灵换位，多站在别人的立场想想，能使我们的社会更和谐发展。美国的对伊战争，造成的是千万无辜伊拉克人民的生灵涂炭。倘若美国人能够站在伊拉克人民的立场上为他国想想，那也许悲剧就不会发生。相反的，当印尼饱受海啸的侵袭时，国际友人站在印尼人民的生活安危上为他国着想，于是千千万万国际友人慷慨解囊援助，给印尼人民帮助，给印尼人民希望，这对于促进社会的和谐发展是多么重要。

但是要做到心灵换位，为别人着想确实不容易。

首先，我们必须摆脱以我为中心的观念。从小的方面讲，以我为中心造成的是个人的孤立与对他人的侵害;从大的方面讲，以我中心造成的会是两个国家之间的战火纷飞，造成的是社会的动荡不安。

其次，我们少把利益渗进人际交往中去。现实中许多人无法站在别人的立场上为之着想，很大程度上是因为自己对利益的迫切追求。我们不应把利益看得如此重要，人与人之间的和谐才是最重要的。

总而言之，无论做任何事，我们都应该适当进行心灵换位，多站在别人的立场想想，这样才能化解不必要的矛盾，才能构建美好和谐的社会。

导语：每一个人都有面临挫折的时候，即使是常胜将军也是如此，问题的关键在于你是如何看待挫折的呢?下面是yuwenmi小编为大家整理的相关中考素材，欢迎阅读与借鉴，谢谢!

每一次挫折都为后面等量的成功播下了种子--但仅仅是种子而已，它必须由人的自我创造力、想像力与确定的目标来浇灌，只有这样，才能结出丰硕的果实。

每一个人都有面临挫折的时候，即使是常胜将军也是如此，问题的关键在于你是如何看待挫折的呢?如果你把挫折看作是对自己的否定，从此一蹶不振，则你便是彻底的失败者;而如果你把挫折看作是成功之母，学会从中吸收促进你成长的合理因素，那么挫折则能促使你成功。

对于充满着自信的青少年来说，没有所谓失败!只要怀着百折不挠的意志、坚定目标就一定能从挫折中走出来，最终获得成功。

请看历史一位杰出人士的人生故事：

当杰出的发明家爱迪生还是小学生的时候，一天，学校将他送回家里，并向其父母说，这孩子不可造就。爱迪生当时受到极大震动。这样的挫折使少年时代的爱迪生感受到，人生必须要奋发图强，而正是这种奋发图强的精神，使他后来成为一名伟大的发明家。

爱迪生后来的听力障碍可能会被某些人认为是很大的不幸，但爱迪生以一种特殊的方式接受了这个不幸，那就是，他逐渐培养起了通过第六感官"内听"的能力，这或许是他能成功地大量创造发明的一个重要原因。

爱迪生在从事发明的过程中也是充满着挫折和艰辛。为了解决玻璃灯泡里的细灯丝难关，他试验了数千种材料，最后终于找到一种较好的材料做灯丝。在解决电灯和应用电灯的事业上，他不仅经历了实验的挫折，竟多达数千次，而且还常常被周围人误解、谣言、中伤、攻击和破坏。如煤气公司财团怕电灯业发展了会冲垮煤气业，因此就组织人造谣、攻击和破坏，为爱迪生制造了种种困难，连那些制造电灯的同行们也咒骂爱迪生是大骗子。这些都没有击倒爱迪生，他专心致志，忘我地工作着，坚持不懈地用了7年时间，终于在1885年使美国纽约全城及其各大城市都用上了电灯。电灯的发明和推广是一件划时代的成就，也是爱迪生一生中最辉煌的功绩，它给全人类带来了光明，为人类做出了伟大贡献。

爱迪生之所以能获得如此伟大的成就，与他敢于直接面对困难和挫折、坚持不懈、持之以恒及勇于创新的高情感智力是分不开的。

挫折到底是幸运还是惩罚，要看个人对它的反应。若某人能够将挫折看成命运之手对他的无形引导，并接受这一信号，把自己的前进方向调整到正确的轨道上，那么挫折对他来说就是幸福。若某人将挫折看成是天意对他本身软弱与无能的暗示，而从此心灰意懒，那么挫折对他来说就是惩罚。

挫折是测定个人软弱度的最好"装置"，而且它会随之提供克服弱点的机会。在这个意义上，遭受挫折又成了一种"幸运"。

挫折作用于人的途径不外乎下列两种：

第一，它作为对更大努力要求的挑战;第二，它冲击个人再试一次的勇气。

大多数人都是在挫折的信号来临时便放弃希望、止步不前，甚至一点征兆都没有就已灰心丧气;也有很多人在受到仅仅一次失败的打击后便丢盔弃甲。而杰出的人物就不是这样，他们总是在挫折之后鼓起更大的热情和干劲。

青少年朋友，你不妨检查一下自己的挫折，看看自己是否有坚强的意志力，对挫折能否给出坚定的反应。

如果在连续3次挫折之后你还能顽强不息地奋斗，那么你就可以不必怀疑自己在选定的领域内能成为一位杰出人物。

如果在连续12次挫折之后你还跃跃欲试，这说明，天才的种子已经在你的心田里发芽成长，只要给予它希望与信心的阳光雨露，就可望开出成功的花朵。

总之，你若总能在挫折之后奋进不息，那么"成功"就会对你的暂时挫折和失利给予宽宏的谅解;但是，那些因前路艰辛而止步不前的"罪行"是不会得到原谅的。