1 . Rehan Staton was close to giving up on his dreams. His father, who was his family’s mere provider, struggled to make _________ meet. There were times when Rehan was_______ meals and went to school on an empty stomach, as his dad was always at work.

His education suffered because of all the _______ his family was going through. By the 7th grade, Rehan’s grades rapidly_________. Instead of bringing him down, this hardship_________ him to turn to sports. It was at this point that Rehan became _______ about athletics and boxing. At the time, his father met an engineer, who offered to _______ the boy for free. This chance seemed like the light at the end of the tunnel(隧道). Unfortunately, just when things were starting to ___________, Rehan’s dreams of becoming a boxer were _______by a severe injury.

The young boy was________ by every college he applied to. He was forced to get a ________to help his family keep the________over their heads. His job as a garbage collector at the trash company________to offer him more opportunities than he could ever imagine.

At the company, he finally found people that saw his great________. Most of his colleagues encouraged the bright boy to continue with his________. A higher-up from Rehan’s work heard about his story and helped him register at Bowie State University.________, he was admitted into Harvard Law School.

The 24-year-old’s success story now ________   many young people to never stop following their dreams. Rehan himself started ________ youngsters facing adversity(困境), in a________to help them use their full potential________the difficulties they’re going through.

2 . When my experiments didn’t produce the exciting results they were supposed to, I thought I just needed to work more, for the idea that I would be ______ if I worked hard enough was deeply rooted in me. It was late in the evening. A postdoc (博士后) ______my suffering and gently asked how I was doing. I told him about my ______ with the experiment. He said, “I think it’s time to go home and get some sleep. Taking a break is also hard work, you know?”

Those comments planted the seed of a new ______. Previously, when my friends questioned whether the “always working” view that is _______among academics was normal or healthy, I had __their concerns. Now, I ____ that they were on to something. I started to go __ on myself, trying to make being in the lab from early morning to late evening the exception rather than the ______. Pushing back against the______that long working hours are the ______of a good researcher was hard, and I ______ back into my old routine more than once. In the back of my head I still felt __ for not working “enough”. I hadn’t_______ understood what the postdoc was trying to ______ to me.

During my Ph.D., the penny _____ the rest of the way. One day, my adviser said, “We need to work smarter, not harder.” The conversation helped me ____ it —that novel ideas do not come from a mind constantly under _______. My best ideas almost always come after I allow my mind to_______—whether that’s playing video games with my brother or cooking a nice dinner. Part of working smarter, I realized, can be taking a _____.

3 . Five years ago, I was a trail ride leader at a holiday farm in Victoria. My favourite horse was a warmblooded called Holly, a chestnut mare. Aged seven, she was _________, sweet-natured and well-trained; the only _________with Holly was her vivid imagination. I was constantly surprised by Holly’ s ability to be_________ by rabbits, the wind or even shadows - sometimes her own shadow!

One day, as we headed back from a ride on the beach, Holly and I were_________the way over the hilly area. When we got to one particularly long, steep hill, Holly began to twitch (抽动) her ears and step in place. So, when she_________ to sniff(嗅) and give all the _________that she believed the ‘horse-eating monsters’ were close, I became a little worried.

At the bottom of the hill as we rounded a corner, Holly_________with caution, and so I followed her gaze to the path ahead. There, sunning itself in the middle of the track, was a brown_________. This time it was my _________to get scared; I was on a nervous horse, leading a group of eight inexperienced pre-teen riders. Unexpectedly, Holly was firmly__________, ears forward. With the snake in her sight, she was no longer worried.

I have heard that horses have a better sense of__________ than dogs. I hadn't seen it __________ before that moment.__________, while we waited in reality for just a second or two - but for what felt like a century - the snake awoke and glided calmly off into the bush.

Holly then__________, leading the horses with caution and care. She had been alert to danger and had been __________for the safety of us all. Following in the footsteps or their lead mare, not one of the other horses showed any fear.

4 . What does it mean to leave something better than you found it? For Breon Dennis Jr. , it ______lots of hard work, flexibility, unity, and passion.

Breon is from Louisiana, and came to Dallas Baptist University in the late 2000s to ______his undergraduate degree. While at DBU, Breon began ______at the Rangers Baseball Club. Following this, he______his Master’s degree from DBU. Currently, Breon worked as the Vice President of the Roughriders Foundation. During the 6 seasons with the RoughRiders, he has already seen his ______in the community.

As the VP of the RoughRiders Foundation, his ultimate ______is to mentor (指导) others and see others mentored, both professionally and ______. As a leader, through the ______he puts on, such as food drives and environmental outreach (环保宣传), Breon ______to help others reach their full potential. He allows them to feel comfortable in their own skin. He also ______them to grow in leadership themselves.

A key part to Breon’s philosophy in helping others to ______is to embrace (接受) their failures. He has learned to ______his failures and grow from them, which he tries to ______along to others. Through his time at Rangers Basebal Club, and now the RoughRiders, Breon has made foundational ______of servant leadership and intentionality in the community. That has guided him to lead others to be the ______they can be—to embrace their failures, and use the growth they experience to help others do the same.

5 . We had just completed a unit on heroes, and I had given my kindergarten class a task to ________ their favorite hero. Each child was ________ with the task, creating colorful masterpieces.

However, one little boy was having ________ with the task. Cameron was with autism, but that didn’t matter to me or his classmates. We all ________ him just the way he was. I sat and watched as Austin, a precocious little boy, ________ with Cameron. Within a few minutes, Cameron quickly began drawing and then coloring his paper.

Finally, it was time for everybody to share their pictures. I listened as each student ________ stood in front of the class, picture held high, and ________ his or her hero. It was finally Cameron’s ________. He stood up and anxiously placed his drawing in front of his ________ to avoid eye contact. We all fixed our eyes on the picture.________ to know who it was. He then said it was a picture of me. He added that I helped him learn things and then ________ sat down. Tears began to form in my eyes, but nothing could have ________ me for what happened next.

When Austin stood up, he proudly held up a picture of Cameron. Austin shared that Cameron was his hero because Cameron had this ________ that made it really hard to learn, but he was like Superman and was really smart.

Cameron immediately stood up, and put his arms up in the air as if he were going to ________, yelling out, “I’m Superman!” The entire class began striking Superman poses, too. Within minutes, we were all laughing as though we had truly discovered the secret of becoming ________.

6 . Tanner and Brandon have been good friends for many years. However, Brandon has a _________ time getting through the hallways. Since Brandon uses a push wheelchair, he says his arms start to _________ after using it for a longer time.

_________ spending his hard-earned cash from his part-time job, Tanner determined to buy Brandon an electric _________ model. Little did he know Tanner has spent the last two years _________ saving up money. Tanner finally managed to buy the wheelchair last month. When he used it to _________ Brandon in class last month, the shocked teenager could barely _________ his emotions.

“They came in together and my face just blew up,” Brandon said. “I was just _________ everywhere. I was like, Wow I can’t _________ he did that for me.” “It’s been my __________ to just have one of these,” Brandon added, “and my dream came true.”

The boys have been happy to receive __________ from people for the moving story, especially Tanner. Tanner has had some __________ experiences over the last year, so his being able to __________ somebody else has really brought him out——being able to know that he made a great __________, Carmack, Tanner’s mother said, “And I can see a difference in him—like wanting to __________ and do more.”

7 . One of the roles of the Nobel Prize for literature is to shine a light on someone who has been less visible than they deserve. That role was _______ this year in the announcement of Abdulrazak Gurnah as winner.

Unlike previous popular recipients living in Britain, he is not a _______. He could, as he said after the announcement, have reached more readers, but his publications _______ to grant him that. His publisher felt sorry for the fact that he “is one of the greatest living African writers; yet no one has ever _______ him,” but with this he did not agree: “I didn’t think I was ignored.”

There is a(n) _______ , here, that has to do with who is doing the looking, and what counts as officially being noticed. There is also a point of _______: calling Gurnah an African writer. In fact, while that seems to broaden horizons, it narrows and distances what he is doing. Gurnah was born in Zanzibar, and left for Britain when he was 18, _______ regional conflicts for what he hoped would be calmer waters, which turned out to be stronger dark current. He has lived in Britain ever since.

He began and stuck to writing to _______, to himself, of the shock -- of racism, rejection, poverty and loneliness. His ten novels return to it _______, which begins in 1996’s Admiring Silence. His work exists because of Britain as well as Zanzibar; it may ________ both or wholly neither. It arrives out of a(n) ________ of English literature (Gurnah is professor of literature at the University of Kent), and his first language, the rhythms and stories of Islam.

________, many of the UK's thirteen Nobel-winning writers were born elsewhere as by 2019, 14% of the UK’s population were born abroad. People might also be astonished at how many of those countries were once part of the British empire. Gurnah has spoken of how much of the world is still processing the wounds that colonialism ________, especially the experience of “losing your place in the world”-- where place is not just ________, but also belonging, status and culture.

In this sense, Gurnah’s work, which ________ those who might not have been remembered in history--shopkeeper, homemakers, students and refugees, could not be more British. But, more importantly, it could not be more universal.