2 . In October, I told the eight-year-olds about my plan. “I’d like all of you to do extra jobs to _________ some money. Then we’ll buy food for a Thanksgiving dinner for someone who might not have a nice dinner _________.” I wanted the children to _________ that it’s more blessed to give than to _________. I wanted them to understand that kindness is _________ nice ideas and that people somehow have to make it come _________.

Early in the week, the boys and girls arrived in class seizing their hard-earned money and couldn’t wait to go shopping. I watched _________ they ran up and down the supermarket aisles. _________, we headed toward the checkout. Then someone _________ a “necessity” that sent them racing.

“Flowers!” Kristine cried. The group rushed toward the holiday __________. I pronounced, “You can’t eat flowers.” “But Mrs. Sherlock, we want flowers.” __________, I sighed as the children moved a pot of purple daisies (雏菊) into the cart.

Then we set off for the house of a needy grandmother and finally __________ in front of a small house in the woods. A woman with a tired face came to the door to __________ us. My little group hurried to get the turkey and the trimmings. As each box was carried in, the old woman thanked us — much to children’s __________. When Amy put the daisies on the counter, the woman seemed __________.

We returned to the car. Fastening seat belts, we could see the kitchen window. The woman inside waved goodbye, then turned and walked across the room, past the turkey, past the trimmings, __________ to the daisies. She put her face in the flowers. When she raised her head, there was a __________ on her lips. She was transformed before our eyes. The children were quiet. In that one brief __________ they had seen for themselves the __________ they possessed to make another’s life better. The children had __________ that sometimes a person needs a pot of funny flowers on a dark November day.

6 . Trackers on Ice

Just because a scientist puts a GPS tracking collar on a wild polar bear does not mean the animal will willingly keep it on.   _______, these huge collars are purposefully loose so that if one becomes annoying, a bear can _______it. But scientists have now found a way to use signals from the discarded(丢弃的)devices.

“These dropped collars_______would have been considered garbage data,” says Natasha Klappstein, a polar bear researcher at the University of Alberta. She and her colleagues instead used_______from such collars, left on sea ice in Canada's Hudson Bay, to track the ice itself. For their study, published in June in The Cryosphere, the researchers _______twenty collars that sent movement data consistent(与······一致的)with ice drift rather than polar bear _______between 2005 and 2015. The resulting records of how melting ice typically drifts in Hudson Bay are unique; there are no easily _______on-the-ground sensors, and satellite observations often cannot _______capture the motion of small ice sheets.

The team compared the discarded collars' movements with widely used ice-drift modeling data from the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC). Collar data indicated that the NSIDC model underestimates the speed at which ice moves around in Hudson Bay--as well as the overall _______of drift. Over the course of several months the model could drift away from an ice sheet's location by a few hundred kilometers, the researchers say.

This means the bears may be working harder, when moving against the direction of the ice, than scientists had   ________ .“Since we're underestimating the speed of drift, we're likely underestimating the energetic effort of polar bears," says Natasha Klappstein. The research reveals________insight (洞悉) into how highly mobile ice moves. As melting increases in coming years, such ice will likely become more ________farther north, in the central Arctic. Scientists had known NSIDC data could underestimate drift speeds, but “any time we can find a data ________,it is a good thing.”

Plus,such data could improve predictions about how oil spills or other pollutants may spread in seas ________ with drifting ice, says Walt Meier, a senior NSIDC research scientist,who was not involved in the study. The findings may even ________future NSIDC models. “It's a really nice data set,” Meier says."And certainly one we’ll take consideration.

7 . Speed-reading is a crucial skill in the Internet age. We skim over articles, e-mails and tweets to try to _________ key words and the essential meaning of a certain text. _________ with information from our electronic devices, it would be impossible to cope if we read word by word, line by line.

But a new trend calls on people to _________ and enjoy reading slowly, using the linear (线性的) pattern, left-to-right sequence.

A recent story from The Wall Street Journal reported on a book club in Wellington, New Zealand, where members meet in a cafe and turn off their smartphones. They _________ comfortable chairs and read in silence for an hour.

Unlike traditional book clubs, the _________ of the Slow Reading Club isn’t exchanging ideas about a certain book, but to get away from electronic devices and read in a quiet, _________ environment. According to the Journal, the Wellington Book Club is just one example of a movement _________ by book lovers who miss the old-fashioned way of reading before the Internet and smartphones.

Slow readers, such as The Atlantic’s Maura Kelly, say a regular reading habit sharpens the mind, improves concentration, _________ stress levels and deepens the ability to empathize (有同感).

Some of these benefits have been backed up by science. _________, a study of 300 elderly people published by the journal Neurology last year showed that regular engagement in __________ activities like reading slowed the rate of memory loss later in life.

Another study published last year in Science showed that reading novels helps people understand others’ mental states and beliefs, a crucial skill in building __________.

Slow reading means a(n) __________ to an uninterrupted, linear pattern, in a quiet environment free of __________. Aim for 30 minutes a day, advises Kelly from The Atlantic. “You can squeeze in that half hour pretty easily if only during your free moments — whenever you find yourself __________ firing up your laptop to check your favorite site, or scanning Twitter for something to pass the time — you pick up a meaningful work of literature,” Kelly said. “__________ your e-reader, if you like. Kindles make books like War and Peace less heavy, and also ensure you’ll never lose your place in the book.”

8 . I was making a stop on my book tour. A sweet woman approached me, and pleasantly _______ she wouldn't buy a book. She said she _______ wanted to ask me a question: How did I get into acting and how did I _______ to stay in it? I was _______the performance, so I didn't want to waste energy with a long response. I said, "Persistence," without thinking.

She laughed and said, "Well, sure. That's true with everything, right?"

A light came on in my brain. She was righter than she knew. I said, "Yes, but not how you mean. Success is a _______of persistence. So is failure. We become whatever we're persistent at. I had friends who were always exactly 20minutes late－persistently late. You could set your _______by them. I know actors who persistently destroy their own chances. They don't _______ enough. They don't learn their lines. Persistently."

A lot of the time our methods of working are a series of habits, good and bad, we _______sometime in the past. Habits feel_______. My ex-acting teacher once said, "Comfort is the enemy of the artist."

I wasn't crazy about his statement back then, because I was uncomfortable, but still wasn't an artist. I see the ________ of it now. People________take the easy path. It's human nature to look for the________ at the back of the book. We often see the effort in finding better habits as a problem to be avoided, but in doing so, we persistently waste our ________.

As actors, we know we can become anything with enough rehearsal. ________look at what you do persistently. If you don't like your habits, change them. No matter what your passion is the power to ________the map of your life is essential.

9 . Our lives changed tracks the day our daughter was born. My wife and I felt _______in the UK-we'd even bought a house 6 months earlier—but the _______of our daughter forced a moment of _______.We wondered whether we should _______to our native Brazil.I remembered looking down at our newborn baby and thinking about how _______her life would be there.In our native country, we'd be closer to our family and _______.But in the UK, I had the funding and lab resources I needed for my _______and highly specialized research program.Would such a move_______career?

Then, a few weeks later, I received a call from my brother, who told me that our father had passed away.The great_______I had about my daughter's birth suddenly gave way to a deep sadness.I felt that I was ________precious time with my loved ones.After that,we had no ________that it was the right time to move back to Brazil.We applied for the professorships in our hometown and both received________

It wasn't ________to start my research in Brazil, however.I didn't receive any start-up funding for my lab.I was able to perform a few experiments myself ________the expensive reagents(试剂）I had brought with me from my lab in the UK, as well as equipment I__________with other Brazil professors.Eventually, I________Brazilian funding, which allowed me to ________a team of bright undergraduate and graduate students and buy reagents and lab equipment on my own.

Looking back, I'm ________that my wife and I made the ________to move back to our home country.I was able to ________Brazilian jujitsu (柔术）training, which I hadn't been able to do during my years abroad.

10 . Another person’s enthusiasm was what set me moving toward the success I have achieved. That person was my stepmother.

I was nine years old when she entered our home in rural （乡下的）Virginia. My father _______ me to her with these words: "I would like you to meet the fellow who is _______ for being the worst boy in this county and will probably start throwing rocks at you no _______ than tomorrow morning. "

My stepmother walked over to me, _______ my head slightly upward, and looked me right in the eye. Then she looked at my father and replied, "You are _______ .This is not the worst boy at all, _______ the smartest one who hasn't yet found an outlet（释放的途径）for his enthusiasm."

That statement began a（n） _______ between us. No one had ever called me smart, My family and neighbors had built me up in my _______ as a bad boy. My stepmother changed all that.

She changed many things. She _______ my father to go to a dental school, from which he graduated with honors. She moved our family into the county seat, where my father's career could be more ________and my brother and I could be better ________ .

When I turned fourteen, she bought me a secondhand ________ and told me that she believed that I could become a writer. I knew her enthusiasm, I ________ it, and I saw how it had already improved our lives. I accepted her ________ and began to write for local newspapers. I was doing the same kind of ________that great day I went to interview Andrew Carnegie and received the task which became my life's work later. I wasn't the ________ beneficiary（受益者）.My father became the ________ man in town. My brother and stepbrothers became a physician, a dentist, a lawyer, and a college president.

What power ________ has! When that power is released to support the certainty of one's purpose and is ________ strengthened by faith, it becomes an irresistible（不可抗拒的）force which poverty and temporary   defeat can never ________ .

You can communicate that power to anyone who needs it. This is probably the greatest work you can do with your enthusiasm.