1 . There once was an ordinary street in the suburbs where no one cared much for their gardens. The lawns were overgrown, the weeds were taking over and the hedges(树篱)_________ needed to be cut back. It looked very terrible. _________ when the neighbors saw their gardens, they just looked at each other and laughed.

It seemed too hard to clear all the gardens and no one could be _________ to make them better because everyone’s garden was equally _________. No one felt it was urgent to change anything. Then a gardener named Bill _________ in the small town. Bill was a _________, hard-working and patient man who started working in the garden as soon as he moved in the street. He took his lawn mower(割草机) out to cut back the grass and pulled out all of the _________. Finally, he took up his gardening and started _________ his hedges, making them look like flowers, plants, stones, balls, etc. It was a huge project but his hard work _________ and his garden looked inviting.

__________ by the beautiful scenery, the neighbors walked by and admired the __________ manicured(修整的) garden. Before long, something __________ happened. One by one, the neighbors started to put in more effort in their own gardens and the sounds of lawn mowers could be heard again. After a few months, the street was transformed from a dirty, __________ collection of houses to a beautiful street that wouldn’t be out of place in a stylish magazine.

One person’s action showed everyone what could be achieved with a little hard work. It’s easy for us to __________ the environment around us because no one else cares about it. Remember what you positively do not only benefits yourself, but also __________ a change to the whole world.

2 . It was the first night of a tiring seven-day 250km race across the Gobi Desert a year ago. Mr. Leonard___________a little dog going around his camp trying to ___________herself.

“Cute, but I’m not giving you any,” Leonard thought. Like all ___________, he had packed just enough for the whole ___________. He’d been running competitively for three years, and he had a___________ to win.

The next day, at the starting line, the dog ___________ him again. He waved her away, worried that she might be stepped on by the runners. ___________, the dog followed him all the way until the day’s race ___________. That night the dog snuggled (偎依) up to Leonard and even___________ to get a little food from him. By then, he was determined to name her Gobi.

The pair went on to finish the seven-day race, with Gobi____________ a distance of 125km on her own, and winning Leonard over, enough for him to make a____________ — he would take her home to Edinburgh. “Seeing Gobi on the race ____________my attitude to things. It made me think more about stopping and helping her, rather than just focusing on winning, ” said Leonard, who finished second. “It also made my running more enjoyable , giving me a lot of pleasure.”

As Leonard was preparing to get Gobi home, she was missing. With a group of 20 local volunteers coming to his ____________ , he finally found her. After that, Leonard never let Gobi out of his____________. Now Gobi’s favorite activity is still running, and she__________ does at least 8km a day with Leonard up the hills.

4 . I woke up by my dog barking in the early morning. I went outside to find a koala(考拉) at the yard gate wanting to enter. It was the first time that I had ___ a koala in my neighborhood. What a welcome ___!

I was wondering why he was here,   as koala ___ came down from the trees and didn’t like walking,   either. Then again,   there was ___ eucalyptus(桉树)around. Was he hungry or lost?   Or maybe the bushfire across Kangaroo Island __ him here?

He just sat there,   apparently ___ ,   and sort of looked at me with a look,   like helping me out of my suffering. At a(n) ___ look,   I discovered a long cut at his back with bloods,   ___ of attacks or cuts of something sharp in some other way.

I rushed into my room and came out with some iodophor(碘伏药水).   It was not a ___ problem as I was a nurse. This poor soul seemed to quite ____ my kindness when I ____ the cut with the liquid. It ____ me that he came to seek my ____!

After the treatment,   I watched the koala finally ____ in the wild,   hoping he was able to ____ the hard time and live his life as he should.

5 . You just can’t imagine what a brave mother is like. She was a mother of three, who just _______ an earthquake, couldn’t tell if her children were _______ for help. Or what if you knew you couldn’t yell at her for help because she couldn’t _______ you? That was what happened to Connie and her three children _______ the 6.1-magnitude earthquake rocked Napa, California. Connie is _______ and communicates with her children using sign language.

At midnight, Connie and her three children were _______ on the first floor of their two-story home. She and her 16-year-old son, Juan, were shaken awake. Instantly, they realized there were no disaster supplies downstairs. Connie, also _______ one-month-old Raul and 8-year-old Adriana, called Juan to come close to her in the darkness and _______ for him to go upstairs to get a _______.

Juan slowly __________ the stairs. He heard a loud creak (嘎吱声). Arriving on the top floor, he moved quickly but __________ to get what he needed. Using the flashlight to guide his steps back __________ the stairs, the family was able to take a few items from the first floor and __________. Their home was almost in ruins.

Being deaf was not deterrent (妨碍物) for this __________ mother. The family made it to the __________ safely, which comforted everyone.