“What will we be singing for competition this year?” a student from my high school choir asked eagerly. I was really worried about this moment. “I was thinking,” I said, “maybe we’ll skip the competition and just work hard on the concerts this year.”
“NO!” the kids disagreed. “We want to compete! For the First Place! It’s a tradition!”
This was true. Medals on the front wall of the music room were won by my former excellent students. But they had graduated, leaving me with only twenty-two young students, inexperienced kids who couldn’t read music, and could sing only a simple melody (乐章).
“Maybe we could win the Second Place this year,” I suggested. I knew even that would be a near-impossible task, thinking our competitors: two famous schools with fifty members each. “No!” the kids screamed. “The First Place!”
I shook my head. “First Place is extremely difficult.”
“We can do it!” they shouted. “We can do it!”
“I’ll think about it,” I said, hoping their eagerness would die off in a couple of weeks.
But that didn’t happen. Instead, the class became more determined. Every day they asked and begged. As a teacher, I couldn’t tell them they weren’t good enough. To cool their eagerness, I showed them a difficult piece of music from the competition list, but it simply ended with “It’s okay, Mrs. Pliszka. We’ll make it. ”
I struggled to make a decision. If I destroyed their hope, would I destroy their spirit? I remembered one of my college professor’s saying, "Every child will learn if the teacher is willing to try his or her best as the student.” I wasn’t afraid of hard work, and I enjoyed a challenge. But I wasn’t a magic worker. And so, I think seriously over this challenge.
注意：
1. 续写词数为150词左右;
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
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Finally, one morning I made the decision.
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When my group stepped on the stage, I could clearly notice distrust from the audience saying my group was so small.
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My husband and I recently made a cross-country move to Florida with our young child Dave. It was a quiet street with few people living there. Our neighbor was an old couple, Mr. Smith and Mrs. Smith, both over seventy years old and energetic. They were kind enough to help us clean our house and yard, for our new home was in a mess.
Weeks before Thanksgiving arrived, my anxiety about it increased. “We should start thinking about plans for Thanksgiving dinner,” I suggested. “Don’t worry about it,” my husband said, “Heat up some hot dogs, maybe some cheese, and the kid will be happy.” That sounded great. I was in relief!
In the past holidays, I had never been responsible for cooking a full Thanksgiving dinner. My job was always to bring drinks or a side dish and help clean up after the meal. But one day my son Dave happily showed his newly-created turkey crafts. “Let’s go on a walk and try to find a rock that looks like turkey!” Dave shouted to me, “Take me on a walk, Mommy!” The excitement was building, and I had a feeling that hot dogs were not going to be enough for my child on Thanksgiving.
“I’m going to try and prepare Thanksgiving food, Leonard,” I said to my husband late one night. He eyed me incredibly. “Are you sure?” Then he said, “Okay, then, if you think you can do it.”
I went to the grocery store early Thanksgiving morning. Unfortunately, only a huge turkey remained, so I had no choice but to buy a thirty-pound turkey. I dragged (拖拽) the bagged turkey home. When my family saw it, they got a big surprise at its size. Seeing the surprise on their faces, I realized there was no way we could finish the turkey. It’s too big for my family. “There was only one turkey left in the store.” I explained. “But how could we finish the turkey?” I asked my husband and Dave. Dave said we could invite our neighbor, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, to share with us. It seemed a good idea.
注意：
1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
We reached the agreement on inviting the couple.
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Seeing my husband and I were clumsy (笨拙的) at preparing dinner, the couple offered to give us a hand.
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One sunny afternoon in June, my sister Jenny and I were walking home from school when we heard a strange sound coming from an empty box. We walked over to it and looked inside. A sad little sparrow(麻雀)was sitting at the bottom of the box and its right wing was broken. Jenny held it in her hands, cooing(咕咕地叫)to it, so it wouldn’t be afraid. And then Jenny and I took it home.
My mom took one look at the little bird and said, “No way! I’m not having another animal in the house.” But when she got a closer look at the big and sad eyes, she changed her mind.
Mom set the sparrow on the kitchen table to get a better look at it. She said its right wing was seriously broken, so she designed a splint(夹板)and carefully put it on its wing. Our dog, Buttons, kept trying to get a look at the bird, but we drove it away. Once the splint was on, we fed the bird water and gave it bits of bread and berries. At first it wouldn’t eat, but after a while, it wouldn’t stop.
The little bird got the name Peep. We kept it in a cage. Every morning, we put its cage outside, so it could get some fresh air. Peep couldn’t fly, which seemed to make it sad.
After a period of time, Peep’s wing got better. We put Peep on the kitchen table, and Mom took off the splint. Peep started flapping(拍打)its wings like crazy, and the next morning when we opened the cage, it flew about fifty feet into the air before coming back. We watched from the ground like proud parents. From then on, we left its cage outside with the door open, and Peep flew further each morning, but it always came back.
注意：
1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Then one morning, another sparrow stopped on the Peep’s cage.
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A few months later, a sparrow landed on the window of my home.
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It was around 7 p.m. on one of the hottest days of the summer. I’d just poured myself a tall glass of lemonade when my phone rang. “Mom, you have to come,” said my 14-year-old daughter, Alliana. “I found a hurt bunny on the road.”
What a coincidence! When I was eight, I found a baby rabbit too—outside our Bronx apartment building. A rabbit is one of the least likely things you’d find in the Bronx and my sister and I marveled at our good fortune. My parents scooped the rabbit into the car and we sped off to the Zoo, proud to have found him a good home. Now Alliana had stumbled across a bunny, and I figured that rescuing rabbits was some sort of a rite of passage (成人礼). Except my bunny had been healthy; Alliana’s had two seriously broken hind legs.
“I’m sorry, honey, but there’s not much we can do,” I said as I stood in the middle of the road redirecting traffic around the rabbit. On the sidewalk, tired and overheated neighbors heading home from the train station didn’t seem eager to stop to think over rescue options.
I called my husband, Martin, who took the Darwinian view. “Tell Alliana it’s the circle of life,” he said, not unkindly. “Some animals aren’t meant to survive.” Still, Alliana stood firm, so I called the police, who told me to call the humane society—which gave me a number for a wildlife hotline. “Whatever you do, don’t leave the bunny outside overnight—the raccoons (浣熊) will rip off his skin and eat him alive.” As the woman at the hotline said that, Alliana burst into tears.
Moments later, I flagged down a passing police car. The policeman pulled on a pair of rubber gloves as I grabbed a wastepaper basket out of a neighbor’s recycling bin. He swooped up the rabbit and placed him in the basket. Then, along with my daughter, I walked down the block to our house with the tiny creature curled up in the basket.
注意：1．续写词数应为150词左右；
2．续写部分分为两段，每段的开头语已为你写好。
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At home, Alliana fed it some organic carrots.
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By the second day I was still no closer to a solution.
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