1 . Every day on my birthday since I was 11, I received a white gardenia（栀子花）. I didn’t know who sent the flower to me, even no card came with ________. Calls to the flower shop were not helpful at all. After some time, I stopped trying to find out the ________ name and was just pleased with the beautiful flower in soft pink paper.

I couldn’t stop imagine who the giver might be. Some of my ________ moments were spent daydreaming about the sender. My mother encouraged these daydreams. She’d ask me ________ I had been especially kind to someone. Perhaps it was one of my classmates, or ________ old man who I once helped. As a girl, I felt happier when I imagined that it ________ be a boy I met.          

A month before my high school graduation, my father died. I was ________ sad that I became completely uninterested in my coming graduation dance. And I didn’t care whether I had a new dress or not. Though my mother was also very sad, she tried her best to deal ________ the problems for us. She wanted her children to feel loved, to be much like the gardenia: lovely, strong and perfect. And the flower ________ to me as usual on my birthday.

My mom ________ ten years after I was married. That was the year the gardenia stopped coming. I realized it was mom who sent the flower to me.

2 . I am a boy in South Korea. My English name is Tony. A month ago, a robot (机器人) named Mike ________ my new teacher.

Mike teaches us English. It looks like ________ human. It can move around our classroom when it reads books and talks ________ us. However, Mike’s voice is not its own. It needs an English teacher to make it work. ________ the help of a special camera in the body of Mike, the English teacher can see us. Mike also has different ways of teaching so that we can learn ________ .

Our robot teacher doesn’t need to have a rest ________ it never feels tired or gets ill. Also, it never gets angry with us. It is so interesting that everyone in my class likes Mike.

Now most students in our class like spending more time ________ English. And most of us get ________ grades than before. I hope there will be ________ robot teachers in our school one day. Then our teachers can do ________ work at home!

With a history of more than 1,800 years, dumplings are a traditional Chinese food. They are _________ a must for Chinese New Year. They are popular in China, especially in North China. Even some foreigners are interested in _________ them.

Chinese dumplings can be made to look _________ ancient Chinese gold or silver ingots（银锭）. It’s said that the more dumplings you eat during Chinese New Year, _________ money you can make in the coming year.

People usually put minced meat（绞碎的肉）and vegetables in thin round dough skins（面皮）to make dumplings. Popular fillings are minced pork, fish, chicken, beef, and vegetables. People cook _________ in different ways.

Some people believe _________ people shouldn’t eat sauerkraut（酸泡菜）dumplings during Chinese New Year. Because it means _________ poor and difficult future. People like eating Chinese cabbage dumplings, _________ “白菜” sounds like “百财”. It means one _________ a lot of fortune in the future.

When making dumplings, there should __________ a good number of pleats（褶）so that they will bring wealth. Sometimes a coin is put in a dumpling, and the one who eats it is supposed to become wealthy.

There was once a king. He had a great palace ________ a wonderful garden. In the garden, there lived all kinds of animals. All of them enjoyed ________ there. There ________ only one thing that the king didn’t like in the garden: an old tree in the centre of the garden. It was so ________ and dry. This made the king so angry that he finally asked some people ________ it down and turned the place into a swimming pool. However, the animals left the garden. Without the animals, the garden was not beautiful. The king was sad, but he ________ know what happened.

A young man went to the king, and said he ________ explain what happened. “This was because you cut the old tree down,” said ________ young man. “There were many moths（蛾）in the tree. Birds needed the moths to eat and then they produced waste for plants to grow. The plants then attracted（吸引）many other animals to your garden. ________ your garden became very beautiful. But when you cut the tree down, the animals had to leave.”

“I’m afraid it will ________ many years to finish it,” said the young man. The king was sad, but all he could do was just wait.

6 . Tom is thirteen years old. He studies in ________ middle school. He usually gets up at 7: 00 ________ the morning. But today he gets up at 6: 30 to buy a big cake.

After that he helps his grandparents make their rooms ________, because today is his grandpa’s birthday. His grandpa is going to be 78 years old.

Tom would like ________ two CDs of Beijing Opera (京剧) for his grandpa. He thinks his grandpa will like it very much, because listening to Beijing Opera is ________ hobby.

When Tom goes home at noon, his mother is making noodles with his grandma. They ________ laughing and talking about something happily. His grandpa is drinking tea and listening to Beijing Opera.

Tom says, “Happy birthday to you, Grandpa!” Then he cuts the big cake ________ gives Grandpa a big piece. Grandpa is very happy and eats it.

In the evening, Tom ________ TV with his grandparents together. He is a little tired but very happy, because he thinks he ________ make his grandparents happy. ________ sweet Tom is!

8 . When Emma and her family eat out, they always go to their favourite restaurant. They think it is ________ restaurant in their town.

One day, Emma’s father said, “I plan ________ to another restaurant today. We can’t choose the same restaurant all the time.” Then he drove all his family to a new restaurant. They never ________ it before. Emma and Josh both moaned(抱怨) when they arrived.

“You may like it if you ________ it a try. If you don’t like it, we’ll go back to ________ old one,” said their mum. Emma and Josh thought it was a good idea, ________ they sat down.

Emma looked around and found the restaurant pretty clean. Its service was nice, too. Then ________ food came. Emma and Josh had a try first, and then they got excited about what they tasted. “I think I have a new favourite restaurant. ________ delicious the meal is!” Emma said excitedly.

Josh also agreed and asked, “Can we choose ________ the two restaurants for our weekly dinner out?”

“Of course. Sometimes trying ________ is really interesting,” said Emma and Josh’s parents.

9 . Last Friday, Mike’s family decided to go ________ a picnic in the park. Mike’s mother put the picnic ________ in a black bag and told Mike to take it to the car. At the same time, his father asked him ________ away another black bag. It was full of dirty things. Before they left, Mike threw away one of the bags and put ________ in the car.

After driving for ________ hour, they got to the park. They took some ________ and went boating. Then it was time ________ lunch. Mike’s father went to the car to get the food, “________ is the bag with food, Mike? There ________ only a bag of dirty things in the car.” Everyone looked at Mike and he knew he threw away the wrong bag.

At last they had lunch in a restaurant. The food there was delicious and everyone was ________ except Mike.