Students should spend at least one year working or travelling before they go to the university.

【题目大意】： 中学生是否应该在上大学之前拿出至少一年去工作或旅行。主观点可以同意，因为一让学生放松，二可以让学生学到新的技能。

题目：Do you agree or disagree with the following statement:

Students should take at least a year to work or travel before beginning college.

Do you agree or disagree with the following statement: After high school, students should have at least one year to work or travel. It's better than attending university straight away.

范文参考一:

The prevailing notion is that high school students are under huge pressure. Then appears a controversy whether students should have one year to engage in other things before they attend their university. After weighing the pros and cons, I am favor of the opinion that having a gap year can produce many benefits.

First off, students can benefit a lot from traveling. As everyone knows, to maintain strong competitiveness, high school students are required to accomplish a wide range of either required or optional curriculums at school and the rights to develop their own interests have been deprived relentlessly, which has proven to be a detriment of their growth. Instead of pursuing their bachelor degree without pause in the college, traveling can help them regain chances to cultivate and perfect their personalities and release pressure. For instance, many more college graduates are reported to be indifferent to the society and show no mercy on those in need, part of which owes a lot to the fact that schools lay more emphasis on cultivating students’ academic abilities and downplay the importance of developing their overall qualities. Traveling to those places in poverty can give students a sight of those impoverished families to call on the sense of responsibility. Besides, by paying a visit to some places of interest like the Great Wall or the pyramid in Egypt, students can approach the greatness of diverse culture. What’s more, the direct access to the natural world can appease students’ inner uproar. Accordingly, a gap year can be a great asset for high school graduates.

Secondly, by taking part-time jobs, not only can students accumulate sufficient social experience but also earn some money to reduce financial stress on their families. Though economy in China keeps growing at a rate of almost 9 percent in the recent, average citizens still suffer huge pressure especially when the slump of stock market took a heavy toll on them and the majority of stock investors withdrew their money and reinvest to the real estate, further increasing pressure on the ordinary because of the increasing prices of housing. For most families from small cities and rural areas, college tuition still appears to be a great burden on them and by taking part-time jobs, students can earn some wages to relieve financial pressure, such as serving as a restaurant attendant that enables students to better develop their communication techniques and learn more about how to meet the demands of consumers or working as a salesman that will be an entirely different experience from high schools and can lead to the cultivation of the ability of presenting customers the advantages of products. Obviously, a gap year means a lot to high school graduates.

Admittedly, there is another voice that high school students are supposed to start their campus life immediately after graduation from high schools. To be more specific, maintaining high-efficiency study can lead students to be better acclimated to their college life. Instead of going to college soon, a gap year may disrupt their study schedule and weaken their learning skills. It appears to be sensible, however; the ultimate goal of attending a university is to seek a decent job and gaining social experience in advance makes students more conscious of which kind of area they are more interested in in the near future such as the serving industry or high-tech fields.

In conclusion, high school graduates had better live a different life temporarily before they go to college.

写作参考二:

Gap year, a break between high school and college, has become a trend among many American and European students theses years. As the popularity of gap year has grown, so to has its appeal. Generally, it can be constructed (working in a company, taking time off to improve coding skills, learning a language, working on personal projects) or unconstructed (travelling, figuring out what to do as it comes). The idea of gap year has been strongly questioned by some nervous parents, however, some supporters contend that it will be a lifelong treasure which enables one to have the full command of his life. From my perspective, taking a year to work or travel before college brings about more advantages than shortcomings.

To begin with, a gap year helps guide students’ future education and life goals. Most of young students do not know exactly what they wanted to do once they left high school or even half way through college. Working or travelling a year will give them some “real world experience” as well as insight into their interests and strengths which will help them shape a path to a successful career. Once students learn a whole lot about themselves, they are likely to take full advantage of college. Take an Australian boy for an example. Enjoying his gap year in Nepal, he helps the locals in Pokhara to build their organic farms. He is so passionate about what he is doing now and he decided to pursue environmental science after he comes back to university. The internships and professional experience gained over the gap year will have much more influence on the development of one’s future than college.

In addition, taking a year off can refresh the tired-out high school graduates. In general, it will take at least ten years before jumping into the long and challenging years of university. There is no doubt that studious students will spare no effort to improve their academic performance with the expectation that they will receive offers from their dream schools. Under the competitive pressure of high school, they will not only prepare for exams such as SAT or ACT but also seek for voluntary opportunities to enrich their Curriculum Vitae. My younger sister used to travel to Cuba to volunteer with brown bears for three months. After that she went to Europe driving her Vespa across more than 20 cities. She said it was so different from school. She won’t have to attend a test at then end of the trimester, which means that there is no peer pressure or any pressure from outside. At the same time she can reorganize her mind which was full of chemical equations, historical events as well as verses from poems.

It is true that students who choose to drop a year are more likely to lose their study skills. During the gap year, there will be less chances for them to participate in actual classes in college. Without attending lectures given by famous professor and communicating face-to-face with classmates, the whole learning process will be incomplete. Many of study skills could not be developed and trained, which leads directly to the deprivation of both academic ability and motivation. However, it won’t be a potential problem nowadays because most of top universities offer MOOC (Massive Open Online Courses). Students can study random topics through free online classes. Although they don’t have any college credit, they learned a lot, met wonderful people, and keep their brains in shape for college.

Ultimately, the benefits of gap year far outweigh the only drawback because it can help exhausted students relax both mentally and physically and provide them with the opportunities to take a step back to focus on their goals, leading to a stronger sense of direction once they’re back in the classroom.!

写作参考三:

Under the educational system of many western countries, taking a gap year, a period of time when students can take a break from formal education, has become quite common. When it comes to the pros and cons of spending at least one year working or travelling before attending university, people’ preference may vary from one to another. As for me, it is advisable for high schoolers to have a year off to work or travel, in order to relax themselves and gain new skills.

In the first place, spending a year travelling will provide high school students a good chance to escape the daily grind. As is common sense, the life of high schooler are filled with countless assignments, various quiz and exams, which nearly drive them to be stressed out. Obviously, what they need most is the vent for releasing all the tensions and pressures accuring in the rapid rhythm campus life. Consequently, taking a break from educaion and going away for while can fulfill this function well. During the gap year, students can surf in Hawaii, wake boarding in Italy, go bungee jumping in New Zealand and enjoy the sunbath on the seashore of Miami. Such a short escape from the daily bustle and hustle will be conducive to their mental and physical wellbeing. Not only this, but travelling during a gap year can provide a renewed vigor for stuy and a more focused approach to learning.

In the second place, taking a year off to do some internship can help high school students acquire more new pratical skills and thus adapt to the university life more smoothly. Many gap year students choose to do voluntary work. This could include teaching in the mountains in Nepal, a conservation project in Madagascar, an expedition in Costa Rica or an internship in Japan. All these experiences of taking voluntary jobs during a gap year will provide you with much more than any classroom setting ever can. We can learn a lot in the classroom, but it isn't until we put it into practice in the real world that we really understand what's going on. To be specific, throughout school we are surrounded by the same folks at similar ages. However, while working in a company, we are bound to discover others, make new friends, and interact with people from all walks of life, which will defnitely hone our social skills. It is undoubted that people with strong interpersonal competence can enjoy great popularity among classmates and teachers.托福口语练习

In a nutshell, it is a wise move to spend at least one year travelling or working for the sake of taking a break from daily routine and acquire new skills.