1 . Parents feel that it is difficult to live with teenagers. Then again, teenagers have ________ feelings about their parents, saying that it is not easy living with them. According to a recent research, the most common ________ between parents and teenagers is that regarding untidiness and daily routine tasks. On the one hand, parents go mad over ________ rooms, clothes thrown on the floor and their children’s refusal to help with the ________. On the other hand, teenagers lose their patience continually when parents blame them for ________ the towel in the bathroom, not cleaning up their room or refusing to do the shopping at the supermarket.

The research, conducted by St. George University, shows that different parents have different ________ to these problems. However, some approaches are more ________ than others. For example, those parents who yell at their children for their untidiness, but ________ clean the room for them, have fewer chances of changing their children’s ________. On the contrary, those who let teenagers experience the ________ of their actions can do better. For example, when teenagers who don’t help their parents with the shopping don’t find their favorite drink in the refrigerator, they are forced to ________ their actions.

Psychologists say that ________ is the most important thing in parent-child relationships. Parents should ________to their children but at the same time they should lend an ear to what they have to say. Parents may ________ their children when they are untidy but they should also understand that their room is their own private space. Communication is a two-way process. It is only by listening to and ________ each other that problems between parents and children can be settled.

2 . After their business trip, John and Mary returned, eager to see their lovely children. As they drove into their hometown feeling glad to be back, they noticed ________, and they went off their usual route to see what it was. They found a ________ in flames. Mary said, “Oh, well, it isn’t our fire, let’s go home.”

But John ________ closer and screamed, “That home belongs to Fred Jones who works at the plant. He wouldn’t be ________ work yet, maybe there is something we could do.” “It has nothing to do with us,” Mary ________.

But John drove up and stopped and they were both horror-stricken to see the whole house in ________. A woman on the lawn was screaming, “The children! Get the children!” John ________ her by the shoulder saying, “Get a hold of yourself and tell us where the children are!” “In the ________,” cried the woman. “Down the hall and to the left.”

In spite of Mary’s disagreement, John ________ for the basement which was full of smoke and ________ hot. He found the door and two children. ________ he left he could hear some more sobbing. He ________ the two badly frightened children into ________ arms and started back asking how many more children were down there. They told him ________ more and Mary grasped his arm and screamed, “John! Don’t go back! It’s ________! That house will fall down any second.”

________ he ran into the smoke-filled hallway and at last he found both children. As he climbed up the ________ stairs, the thought went through his mind that there was something strangely ________ about the little bodies next to him, and at last when they came out into the ________ and fresh air, he found that he had just ________ his own children.

The baby-sitter had left them at this home while she did some shopping.