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【阅读理解】Reading: The Dawn Sessions
At 6:40 a.m., the barbecue smoke filled the alley where Zhou Min had once lined up for her first IELTS mock test.
Now 34, she had left her job at a private school in Chengdu to tutor candidates in a rented room above a noodle shop.
The room smelled of damp sponge and old textbooks, with a string of fairy lights flickering above the whiteboard.
That weekend, 47 students would squeeze into the room.
Her most promising student was Li Haoran, a 19-year-old from Mianyang who dreamed of studying astrophysics in Toronto.
He had taken the IELTS three times, scoring 6.0, 6.5, and 6.5, but needed a 7.0.
One Tuesday, he told Zhou Min about a reading passage on urbanisation and insularity: 'I understood every word, but the questions asked for inference. I just—I crashed.'
Zhou Min nodded; she had seen this before.
The test was not just a vocabulary check, but an audition for a certain kind of attention.
She sketched a plan on the back of an old transcription exercise: 'We will tackle your stamina first, then your speed.'
For eight weeks, they met daily at 5:30 a.m.
She made him read aloud from The Economist and summarise each paragraph in one sentence, timing him and deducting points for hesitation.
The pressure was intense, and rituals grew strange: he chewed the same gum, wore the same faded blue frock—a lucky charm from his mother—and refused to speak Chinese before noon.
Zhou Min kept a spreadsheet of his errors and told him, 'Your vocabulary is formidable, but your stance is too passive. The test rewards aggression.'
He laughed, 'Aggression?' 'Yes. Controlled aggression. You must attack the question, not embrace it.'
On the morning of his fourth attempt, the test centre lobby was crowded with anxious parents.
A woman in a red coat was crying softly; her son had scored 5.5 twice.
She whispered to Zhou Min, 'The fees are prohibitive. We have spent 28,000 yuan on preparation alone.'
Zhou Min had no comforting prediction.
She watched Li Haoran disappear behind the security door, his shoulders hunched.
Three hours later, he emerged, his face unreadable.
'The listening was a circus,' he said, 'but I finished the writing task.'
They waited fourteen days for the result.
When the email arrived, Li Haoran was eating noodles in her classroom.
He read it twice, then set down his chopsticks.
'7.5,' he said.
Zhou Min felt a brief exhilaration—then something heavier.
He would leave for Canada in September.
Her other students would remain, trapped in the same cycle of mock tests and shattered expectations.
The following week, she raised her fee from 200 to 260 yuan per hour, telling herself it was economics, but knowing it was also grief.
The night before he flew, he came to say goodbye.
The alley was quiet; the barbecue stall had closed early.
He handed her a small notebook—his error log from eight weeks of dawn sessions.
On the last page he had written: 'I still don't know what the test wanted from me. I only know how to give it.'
Zhou Min tucked the notebook into her bag and did not open it again for months.
When she finally did, she found a dried leaf from the plane tree outside the test centre pressed between the pages.
She held it under the desk lamp, turning it over, as if the answer might be written on the other side.
Questions
1. What was Li Haoran's IELTS score after his fourth attempt?
A. 6.0 B. 7.0 C. 6.5 D. 7.5
2. How much did Zhou Min charge per hour after raising her fee?
A. 200 yuan B. 280 yuan C. 260 yuan D. 300 yuan
3. What does the word 'formidable' most likely mean in the passage?
A. Very impressive B. Quite limited C. Extremely poor D. Somewhat average
4. Why did Zhou Min raise her fee after Li Haoran passed?
A. To follow government regulations B. To cover the cost of new textbooks C. To cope with her emotional loss D. To reduce the number of students
5. What would be the best title for this passage?
A. A Student's Journey B. The IELTS Challenge C. The Price of a Dream D. A Teacher's Struggle