1 . Several years ago, Cindy and her kids noticed that two robins (知更鸟) had built a nest in one of their trees. As they paid attention to the robins’ _________ they realized there were eggs in the nest.

Soon four baby birds hatched. Cindy and her kids took _________ of the baby birds. They loved to watch them and would check on their condition _________.

Then one day as Cindy was _________ clothes in one of the kids’ rooms—she saw something she’d never seen before or since. More than a dozen birds were flying around the tree with the robins’ nest. Cindy _________ out to see what the trouble was and saw all different types of birds were _________ the tree. Instinctively, Cindy ran to _________ the baby birds and what she found was _________.

The birds were dive-bombing (俯冲攻击) the tree because a snake had _________ itself around the tree and was trying to get to the baby robins. The birds were doing everything they could to __________ the baby birds.

Cindy thought quickly and took a __________ and used it to pull the snake off the tree. It slid away and when Cindy eventually __________, all of the birds were sitting on the branches of the tree looking at her as if to say thank you. Then they flew away.

There is something remarkable that happens when we have a __________ cause. When we have a common __________, just like the birds, we forget our __________. We begin to work together and focus on common objectives and we fight for our cause.

2 . I'm Karol Lainez, a 29-year-old from Honduras. For me, volunteering has been like a(n) _________ of life where I've learned a lot about myself and _________ a world I never knew. When I was 15 years old, I _________ my volunteer work by helping with street libraries. Later I joined a worldwide volunteering organization and came to Guatemala at 21 to help people in _________ . It has been a journey that has influenced me deeply because all the people I've met there have _________ me how to learn from others and work with others. Through volunteering, I've _________ the meaning of "being together" after seeing so many people try their best to _________ a better world.

One day, a local woman _________ me to go with her to the town hall to get a birth certificate for her daughter who was two years old by then. She couldn't _________ the paperwork until that day because of her inability to read and write. When she __________ the certificate, she said, “Finally, my daughter exists(存在), not __________ for me but for the whole world. It's you who came to help me to do it". Her words really made me realize the __________ of my work for the first time. I felt so __________ to have helped someone change his life forever.

To be a volunteer has been like a __________ for me. I have realized my dream to help change the world. At the same time, I am __________ by the local people who never stop helping themselves even though they are living in a very poor condition.

3 . I hated travelling by plane.Whenever I was on board, I could see the other passengers'__:“God, Please.Don't let that fat guy sit next to me!” After I   __ squeezed (挤) into my seat,the seat belt wasn't __ enough to fit around my waist. I once wished my life would just__.

I knew I needed to __.A doctor recommended I adopt a dog to __ for exercise. So there he was: a black-and-white dog with a big round body. He looked up at me and then dropped his head with a clear look of   __ , as if saying “Really? This loser?” I looked at him, __ him in silence. Poor thing like me. I named him Peety.

We walked together every day and it   __. I could roll out of bed   __.He appeared thinner too. Then he looked up at me and smiled.

I started taking Peety to different parks. He kept___ himself at the end of the rope, trying to run ahead. Maybe it was time to let him experience what __ really felt like. I removed his rope.Peety __ like a racer at the Olympics,beaming(笑)with __ and excitement.

At that moment, I realized I loved him. He looked up at me like I was the greatest guy in the world. He'd come into my life, and he___ me.

“Want to keep walking?"I asked him.

4 . All eyes were on me as the other moms quieted down. Someone had just asked, “Are you going to _________ us?”

“Yeah, you should dance with us,“ another_________ .I was waiting for my daughter's dance class to finish while the other moms got_________ for their adult dance class.

"No," I said. I'd_________ these moms from the sidelines through the years. However, I didn't have a dancer's body.

But my husband said to me, "You’ll never know if you don^’t try." So I_________ for ballet. At my first class, I was the_________ woman in the room. What did the others think of me?

The instructor started us with basic, simple steps. _________ nobody made comments about my size and till the end of the class, I realized I had_________ the night. So I kept going each week.

The instructor moved on to more_________ steps. My muscles were painful, but I__________ it. The steps continued to be harder, but I__________ at home with my daughter. Later, I realized something __________ My legs weren^’t painful anymore.

I saw a(n) __________ in the way I carried myself too. I was stronger. My muscles weren't the only part of me that had been__________. " I don't care what others think when I'm dancing," I told my husband with my new__________. "Anyway, I've learned ballet!"

5 . My life as a tax-paying employed person began in middle school, when, for three whole days, I worked in a baking factory.

My best friend Betsy’s father was a manager at Hough Bakeries, which, at Easter time, _________ little bunny (兔子) cakes for all its _________throughout Cleveland. It happened that the plant downtown needed eight kids for _________ help during our spring break, for which I had no_________ beyond listening to my favorite records. I’d _________ minimum wage. I’d see how a factory_________. My parents thought all of this was a grand idea and called Betsy’s dad with their _________.

Our_________in the factory were simple: Place cakes on a moving belt. Attach icing (糖霜) ears. Apply icing eyes and nose._________ bunny from the belt. This was ____________ than it sounds.____________ a bit and the cakes pile up. As I told my parents at dinner that first night, it was all a little more high-pressure than I’d   ____________ .

Dad __________. The son of a grocer, he’d spent the summers of his childhood____________ food in Benardsville, New Jersey. This was the sort of work that made you____________ the dollars you earned and respect those who did the work, he told me.

6 . Last night I was walking on the beach to enjoy the sunset and watch the whales playing lively and happily right offshore. Their blow spouts (水柱) can be seen three miles away, which looked like those _________ at the Bellagio in Vegas.

So I was _________ and thoroughly enjoying myself when I saw an elderly man get knocked down by a _________ . It happened very suddenly. Realizing the next waves could drag him _________ , I just started _________ towards him. Finally, I got to him and lifted him onto his _________ from his underarms. He was _________ like a leaf, and couldn't even take the smallest steps away.

Some men arrived right behind me, maybe alerted (警觉)to the _________ by my running. Together, we got him to a sand dune(沙丘) , where he could sit down and _________ .

Those men left and I started to walk away, too. But it ____________ me that if he were my parent I wouldn't leave him alone. So I ____________ and said to him, “I want to make sure you get home ____________ . I'm going to ____________ you home.” And so I walked him very ____________ back to his house. As we waved goodbye, I could see big smiles on his face that also ____________ my day.

7 . I was driving into my little town in Newlands when I blew a tyre. Fortunately almost outside our local garage, unfortunately after 5pm it was _______.

There was a young couple sitting in the open door of their _______ in the garage’s car park, with the hood (折叠式车篷) up, looking a bit _______. I knew I had a spare tyre in the _______ of my car but no tools, and I’m pretty unconfident with the old tyre _______ anyway. So I was sort of _______ wondering what to do next when the guy _______ next to me and asked if I _______ a hand with the tyre.

I was so grateful, and he _______ out some basic tools quickly and got things started. It turned out that they were on a tour around the country and their truck had just ________ from something expensive and slow to fix. Thus, they were forced to ________ in the car park of the garage that night.

Well, he fixed my wheel up lovely and I took them both home to my cottage, to a homemade ________ and apple cakes and a cosy little spare room, and ________ them back into town the next day.

What was a pain in the trouble for all of us ________ into a fun night of laughter and good food and nice company because they generously offered a ________ hand to a lady meeting with difficulties.

8 . I tightly held the seat under me as the jeep raced forward, bouncing me into the air. I, a bookish Manhattanite, ____ solo north of the Arctic Circle to the Swedish Lapland. I didn't want to ______ my fortieth birthday as a day I was chained with my office work. Feeling an urgency to live life to the ______ , I answered the call of the wild.

I booked a Husky sledding tour and ______ myself that I would be safe on the journey. Yet, I still doubted my ability to steer the ______ dogs. What if the sled stopped halfway and the ______ began to crack under us?

After struggling into multiple layers of clothing. I boarded and looked like a fat monster. With the pack of Huskies, ______ in the noise of barks and howls, I hit the open rough road. While speeding down, I could even hear the snow crunching under us. With ______ eyes, I tried to avoid any possible dangers. I didn't want to put my own life ______.

Eventually, the pack of Huskies had brought my ______ into the unknown. A vast stretch of wild opened before us. Tall conifers（松柏）______ a tunnel of trees. I desired to catch a glimpse of the native wildlife-the quiet moose. the arctic fox, the magical reindeer,which seemed straight from a storybook. I was searching, like the Huskies, all senses ______ , eager for adventure.

I strained my eyes as far as they could see ______ paths met milky-white sky. Perhaps the earth and the heaven were one. Perhaps life wasn't so much about ______ the reins（缰绳）but letting go and trusting the adventure. Perhaps we even need a little rough weather, the slippery snow, to experience the ______ of challenging the wild.

9 . A Chicago woman's act of kindness helped homeless people stay warm.   Candice Payne _________20 hotel rooms on her credit card with a group of strangers following her.

Payne booked the hotel rooms after_________how life-threatening the sub-zero   temperatures would be for the Chicagoans without _________. She posted about it on social media and soon the_________ and   offers to   help   bring food   came   flooding in.   "_________ they didn't   know how to   or where to start to help, so I'm glad that I was able to be that_________," she said.

When temperatures_________to 22 degrees below zero, a   group of   homeless people   had to   abandon their tents near a highway. Payne and other volunteers dug_________into their pockets and paid for 60 rooms at a hotel on Chicago's South Side. And the volunteers built_________friendships even though most of them just met.

When Jermaine and Robert got the offer for a(n) __________bed, they were getting ready to sleep on the__________. "We don't get that type of help," Jermaine said. "I really needed them at that __________, so they came right in time." They hugged Payne and thanked her, touched by the__________kindness.

This volunteer group has been able to__________three nights at the hotel for about 80 people.

They're hoping to continue working together to help________ a more long-term solution.