Sam’s     2     usually came to pick him up, but today she wasn’t there. Sam had waited for fifteen minutes before he walked home     3    .

When he arrived, he knocked     4     the door because he didn’t bring his keys. He was surprised that no one answered the door. He thought his mother was in the bathroom,     5     he waited patiently.     

After a few     6    , Sam knocked again but still no one answered the door. He decided to go to the shop where his father worked to get the keys. Then, he heard the friendly voice of his neighbour, Jackson, “You can come to     7     house.”

       Sam stayed there until his mother came back. He     8     Jackson and his family. His mother explained she had a backache and that she had to go to the     9    .

From this experience, Sam learned an important lesson—Neighbours can     10     each other. He is lucky to have a good neighbor.

5 . Taking a bus or subway, making payments online, or just walking—these daily activities can help turn China’s deserts into forests if you are using Ant Forest.

Ant Forest is a feature in the Alipay mobile payment app. It records users’ low-carbon (低碳) activities—taking a bus to work instead of driving, for example—and gives users “green energy”. When the user’s green energy gets high enough, Ant Forest and its partners will plant a real tree for the user.

Ant Forest received the 2019 Champions of the Earth award, the UN’s highest environmental honor, for encouraging people to live greener lifestyles and protect the environment.

About half a billion people have used Ant Forest since it came out in August 2016. Ant Forest and its partners have planted about 122 million trees in China’s driest areas, including parts of Inner Mongolia, Gansu, Qinghai and Shanxi. The trees cover a total area of 112,000 hectares. This makes Ant Forest China’s largest tree-planting project started by a private company.

Executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme Inger Andersen said that Ant Forest shows us how we can use technology to solve environmental problems. Ant Forest has “redesigned (重新设计) how we interact (相互影响) with the planet,” said Anderson.

6 . Have you ever found yourself waiting at the bus stop and a stranger comes to ask a usual question? Or perhaps when queuing for a coffee, you just look at the person next to you and ask about the weather.

This is small talk but in fact it’s a big part of our daily life. “Small talk may seem trivial (微不足道), but it’s a natural way for people to connect. It may seem like a waste of time, but big relationships are built on small talk,” Lindy Pegler, who has a master’s degree in psychology, wrote on Medium.

In fact, we spend a lot of our time making small talk. Often, we find ourselves making small talk with the same people. Having small conversations is the foundation of these relationships. In a study cited (引用) by The New York Times, researchers found that keeping these relationships bring us happiness and a sense of belonging to a community.

So how does one start making small talk? It can be as easy as praising one’s shirt, asking about their day or talking about the traffic. “Small talk is an act of politeness,” Pegler noted. “Our small talk at our first meeting is a chance to show who we are,” she added.

So the next time you find yourself waiting for the bus or checking your watch while you wait in a line, take the chance to look up and talk to someone around you. But remember to be polite.

7 .

Last Friday, Eric’s teacher gave his class the homework: write a report about the childhood of someone over 60 years old. He had a(n) ______ with his grandma on Sunday.

“How old are you, Grandma?” Eric asked.

“I will be 65 years old next month,” Grandma answered.

“Did you go to ______ when you were a child?” Eric asked.

“Of course,” Grandma said.

“Did you take the school bus?” Eric asked. He doesn’t like taking the bus to school ______ it is crowded.

“No, dear. When I was a little girl, most children walked to school. ”

Then Eric asked, “Did you have smartphones and computers back then?”

“No. My family didn’t ______ get a TV till I was twelve,” Grandma said.

Eric was ______. “Then what did you do for fun?”

“We drew pictures or played card games. At weekends, we ______ our bikes and played outside with our friends. I read a lot of books too. Those were the good old days.” Eric tried to imagine ______ life would be like without TV, smartphones, or computers.

Just then Eric’s mum called out from the kitchen. Dinner was ______. After dinner, they would enjoy apple pie and ice cream!

Eric suddenly remembered another ______. “Grandma, did you have ice cream when you were at my ______?”

“Yes, we did,” Grandma answered. Eric laughed. “Then I think the ‘good old days’ were pretty good too.”