Last Saturday David was taking a walk in the park near his home when he noticed a woman with a boy of about eight years old. When David passed them, he heard the woman yelling: “How stupid you are! You’re good at nothing.” David stopped and looked at the little boy. The boy said nothing. He just stood there, looking upset.
David was reminded of his English teacher Mrs. Brown in middle school. After he entered middle school, David lacked self-confidence because he was often made fun of by others. He was often told that he was good at nothing, which David believed.
But one day it all changed. That day, in an English writing class, Mrs. Brown asked them to read a novel. They were asked to write a new chapter of the novel after they finished reading it. A few days later, David handed in his story. He didn’t give it much thought. But the next day to his surprise, the comment “well done” from Brown came into view the moment he turned to the page where the story was written. When David read that, he almost burst into tears. He had never expected to be praised. He suddenly gained some self-confidence.
That day after he returned home, he wrote another short story and gave it to Mrs. Brown the next morning. And again he was praised. David became very interested in writing. He often wrote short dories and asked Mrs. Brown to read them and correct them for him. Mrs. Brown always gave him good advice to improve them. One year later, David joined the school newspaper and became an editor of it. He gained his confidence and was hopeful about his future.
He succeeded in entering college and kept writing. Several years after graduating from college, he had his first book published, becoming famous as a writer in his country. And he owed his success to Mrs. Brown’s encouragement. Without her encouragement, his life might be very different now.
注意：1. 续写的词数应为150左右。2. 请按照如下格式在答题卡相应位置作答。
Inspired by his own life story, David decided to do something for that boy.
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_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Christmas I Remember Best
I was 9 years old when Dad passed away and left Mom and me. Since Mom was disabled (残疾), we depended on kind-hearted neighbors.
During the first Christmas season without Dad, my expectations were high, but deep down in my heart there was an idea that the man in the red suit would not come to our little two-room house. He stopped only at houses that had fireplaces.
At the same time, there would be no gifts under the tree. In fact, there would be no tree. But that didn’t seem right. At least, a tree would help with the hurt. On Christmas Day I hurried to Petersen’s Market. A fresh layer of news now lay on the street unmarked bypassing cars; not a person was moving.
I thought that the store was closed and the unsold trees were usually thrown away. As I walked among the snow-dusted trees beside the store, old man Nels Petersen appeared out of nowhere. He drove me away.
Nels Petersen was a mean (吝啬) old man and lived alone. The following year, he setup a fence (篱笆) around the Christmas tree lot and locked the gate every night. I accepted the challenge.
On that night, I climbed the fire ladder that hugged the store wall. The next day, old Nels knew one tree was missing; he had counted them. The next year, the ladder was moved away.
Then came a Christmas that I shall always remember with warmth. My teacher at school asked our class to make Christmas cards for our favorite person, not counting our families, so I made a card for Nels Petersen. Why I included him as my favorite person, I didn’t know.
I made a beautifully decorated green tree on the card. I believed that it would be the only card he would get from anybody. I signed it and put it in his mailbox. Late Christmas Eve, when the stores were closed and everybody was home, I walked around the corner of the back of Petersen’s Market. It was in darkness. I moved along the fence secretly.
注意: 1.所续写短文的词数应为150左右；
2.续写部分分为两段，每段的开头语已为你写好。
To my great surprise, the gate was open!
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Just as I was about to run away, I saw the large lettered sign on the tree, which read: DON’T FORGET TO LOCK THE GATE — MERRY CHRISTMAS!
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Every Day’s a Gift
One day, while I was watching Good Morning America, the news reporter, Robin Roberts, closed the morning show with this, “All you gentlemen, fifty years and older, should make it a point to get a PSA test. It is a simple blood test and could save your life.”
I called my doctor’s office that very morning to confirm what Robin had said. So, I made an appointment to have it done. Ten days later, my doctor told me, “Ray, you are a very healthy seventy-two-year-old. However, we got the result of your PSA test. It is high, and you probably have prostate (前列腺) cancer. I want to do a couple of biopsies (活检) to confirm it.”
When the biopsies came back, I was called into the office once again. “You definitely have prostate cancer,” the doctor said. He explained to me the various treatment options that were available. After hearing the various treatments and their after-effects, I decided to have the prostate removed and get rid of the cancer entirely, as it had not spread yet.
After going through several pre-surgery tests, I was scheduled to be the first one to undergo the new Da Vinci method of removing prostate operation. Due to my old age and the first operation of its kind in the local hospital, a medical expert had been assigned to monitor the situation.
My surgery was successful. All the cancer had been removed. The next day, I was allowed to leave the hospital with the post-operative instructions and directions on how to do exercise to strengthen my muscles. I soon learned that all my functions were working well. What was even better was that my PSA level was zero.
One morning afterward, my wife and I spotted a sign by the road requesting volunteers for Suncoast Hospice (收容所) of Florida. We decided it was time to give back for our good fortune and recovery from the operation.
注意：1. 续写词数应为150左右;
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
After six informative classes, we became volunteers for Suncoast Hospice.
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With the permission of the patient’s nurse, we might bring cookies, books or flowers to the resident.
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It took place in a teacher’s family. One day, Ben was playing basketball in the living room after school, when he accidentally threw the ball at a vase sitting on the shelf. The vase dropped to the floor and a large piece broke off. What made Ben more upset was that the vase was not a common decoration but an antique (古董), which was handed down through generations from the 18th century. It was also his mother’s favourite possession. To cover his terrible action, the terrified boy glued the pieces together hurriedly and put the vase back to its place.
As the mother herself dusted the vase every day, she naturally noticed the cracks (裂纹) that evening. To her surprise, the repair work was actually very good. At dinner time, she asked her boy if he broke the vase. Fearing punishment, the suddenly inspired boy said that a neighbour’s cat jumped in from the window and he couldn’t drive it away no matter how hard he tried. It raced around the living room and finally knocked the vase off its shelf. His mother was quite clear that her son was lying, for all the windows were closed before she left for work each morning and opened after she returned. However, in the face of her son’s nervous eyes and the suspicious looks of the other family members, Ben’s mother remained calm. She realized she shouldn’t just simply blame and punish her son for lying. She came up with another idea.
Before going to bed, the boy found a note from his mother in his room, asking him to go to the study at once. The boy thought he would now be punished but, as he had already lied, he was determined to deny everything to the end, no matter how angry his mum became.
In the study, calmly bathed in the light, his mothers face showed no sign of anger. On seeing her son push open the door and cautiously enter, she took a chocolate box out of a drawer and gave him one.
注意：1.续写词数应为150左右;
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
The mother said, “This chocolate is a reward for your imagination: a window-opening cat!”
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Now with some chocolates in hand, the boy’s bad attitude disappeared.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________I remember the hot summer when my friends and I discovered ice cream sandwiches at the corner store. They were ten cents apiece, a lot of money back then. I don’t remember how we came to buy one and taste it, but we were mad after that. Of course, none of us had any money. Whether we rode our bikes, or played ball, or sat and played cards, we talked and dreamed about those soft, creamy sandwiches.
My dad worked nights, coming home to join us for breakfast, and then sleeping till late afternoon. When he came home one morning, I heard the jingle (叮当声) of change in his pants and something ugly slowly came into my mind. That change was just what we needed, what I had to have. All day long I kept coming into the house and listening at his door. When I heard his sleeping sounds, I cracked the door. And there hanging at the foot of the bed were those pants. I slipped in and took a handful of change. It was enough for my friends and me to buy an ice cream sandwich, which we ate like greedy pigs. And I became a hero to my band of friends.
That went on every day for about two weeks. I had gotten good at slipping in and slipping out, and then ran to my friends and we headed to the store.
One day there was no change in dad’s pocket so I felt for his wallet, hesitated a moment, and then took out two whole dollars. I had been okay with taking the change, but those dollars made my face hot. Even before we began enjoying sandwiches, my stomach felt sick. The importance and joy I had felt buying for my friends was gone. If dad knew what I had done, he’d kill me.
注意:1.续写词数应为150左右;
2.开头已给出。
Paragraph 1:
Early that afternoon, I hid myself in our basement, crying.
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Paragraph 2:
In a moment I would never forget, he said, “Son, I’ve known since the first day you took the money.”
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Brutus had everything in the world: good food, good toys, and good clothes. But the problem was that he had to share them all with his three other brothers, Mack, Jack and Robert.
Brutus had to share his favorite cookie box with Mack, who always finished the whole box before Brutus could take a bite. He also had to share his toys with his youngest brother Jack, who always ended up breaking them. Brutus also had the unfortunate privilege of being given his older brother Robert’s hand-me-downs of old clothes.
Brutus hated sharing and wished he had nobody to share his belongings with. “Why can’t I be the only child?” Brutus sighed as he stared at the stars. “I wish I had no stupid brothers,” Brutus demanded at one sparkling star.
To his surprise, the star suddenly twinkled and fell towards his direction. The star inched closer and closer to his bedroom window. He screamed and tried to wake his brothers up but it was too late. The star crashed inside their room, followed by an ear-splitting explosion.
The next day, Brutus woke up with a bad headache. He rushed to his brothers’ beds to ask them if they were okay but was quickly shocked to see that their beds had been empty. They were nowhere to be found.
Brutus had the fortune of spending the whole morning playing with his toys. He put on his brother’s brand new clothes and sneakers which fit him perfectly. As he was checking himself in the mirror, he suddenly realized that his wish had come true. His brothers were gone and he had the whole world to himself.
“I can get used to this,” he said to himself happily
注意：
1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
When he felt hungry, his mother came back with a full box of cookies.
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In this way, he spent five days as an only child before he felt the empty house was too quiet.
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When Derek and Sophie’s daughter was born, they understood that they would need a car. Before, Sophie would walk her kids to school, and Derek would take a bus to his workplace, but with a newborn, Sophie couldn’t manage everything alone.
They bought a used car after a year of saving. The car was old, and had old leather (皮革) seats with holes in them. Sophie decided to clean the car before they started using it. As she lifted the front seat, she discovered a letter hidden under it. She stopped and began reading it.
“Hi! Thanks for buying this car. I know you might find it stupid, but please call it Julia. My daughter Emma had given it the name Julia,” the letter began.
“I had three kids, and we used to travel together with Julia. We lived happily until one day when everything changed. My children and I were driving home from school when we met with a terrible accident (车祸).
“I repaired Julia as a memento (纪念品) of my children and the happy times we shared. However, over time, I realized that it would be better to sell it because I couldn’t stop crying every time I looked at it. I have looked after it for 30 years, and now it’s your turn. I may not be alive when you read this letter. Please take good care of Julia. Love, Marla Arnolds.”
Sophie’s eyes welled up as she finished reading the letter. She could imagine the pain Marla must have felt as a mother, as she had lost her first child.
She decided to help the lady if she was still alive. She said to Derek, “Don’t you think we should help her? I mean, she must be old and lonely. I feel terrible for her.”
“I understand, Sophie. If you want to do it, let’s give it a try. Let’s ask the police about it, okay?”
“Alright! I hope the lady is safe and alive.”
Sophie asked the police to help find Marla Arnolds. After a week, Sophie received a call from the police telling her that they had finally found Mrs. Arnolds.
注意： 1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在相应位置作答。
Sophie rushed to the address the police had given her.
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But one day, Marla passed away unexpectedly.
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One late afternoon, Tina was driving on a highway when a severe snowstorm hit without warning. In a short time, the heavy snow, coupled with the strong wind, turned everything into white and made the road extremely dangerous.
Tina later found out that this kind of storm is called a “Saskatchewan screamer”, which comes on extremely fast with high winds. It’s really frightening and deadly to be caught in such extreme weather.
Unable to see the road clearly, Tina had to stop her car and call 911. The operator told her that phone calls for help kept flooding in and all the rescuers had been called out. She suggested that Tina should wait out the storm in her car rather than risk driving on or going out. She took Tina’s information and told her that an officer would call her back. Tina waited anxiously for almost two hours, but nobody called her yet to check in. “The storm showed no sign of stopping. What was worse, it was getting dark. I couldn’t see anything outside the car since the snow had covered all the windows. The wind was still howling and the temperature was getting lower and lower in the car. I had no idea whom I could turn to for help,” Tina later wrote in a Facebook post. “Alone and cold, I began to panic, worrying about getting hit by an oncoming vehicle, getting buried (埋没) in a snowbank, having my tailpipe blocked by the snow... I was really worried I couldn’t ever make it home to my family.”
That was when Tina realized that it was no use waiting passively for help. She decided to do something herself. So she took out her cellphone, logged on to the Google Map and determined her location. She found online a neighborhood Facebook group for the area that she was passing through and shared a comment about her trouble with her location marked on the map. Then all she could do next was sit in the car, praying someone could make a response to her as early as possible.
注意：1．续写词数应为150左右；
2．请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Tina’s request reached 80-year-old retired rescuer Frank.
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Frank’s wife prepared a rich meal for Tina.
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I’d just returned from a beautiful fall early-morning walk with my dog. At the front door, I dug around in my pockets for the keys. When I discovered I didn’t have them, I decided to return to the paths we’d taken. I would surely spot them in plain sight. My little dog ran in circles of excitement that we would do a repeat of our just-finished outing. I spent an hour looking, brushing aside tall grasses, but the keys remained lost. I was beginning to get upset as I thought of the results of losing them, so I continued to look for them but failed.
Back home again, I pulled the backup key from its hiding place, let myself in the house, and fell on the chair in tiredness. The house key wasn’t that important as I had an extra. The mail key was a big deal because getting a new one takes a lot of time. I had a spare car key, but there was often something wrong with it, and the key would be expensive to replace. But the iron heart made by my grandson was precious beyond measure. For some reason, thinking of it being gone forever made tears come to my eyes.
That night, it turned colder and we had a snow. I enjoyed a comfort-food dinner, played soft music, and settled into a peaceful evening until I heard the noise of my car alarm from the garage (车库). I rushed to the car, put the extra key into the door and finally opened it, and then I hurriedly tried my best to stop the alarm. I felt red-faced as I imagined my next-door neighbors being disturbed and annoyed.
I went back in the house but the alarm started again. I turned it off, went back inside, and the alarm sounded again. I repeated the process. Back in the house, I waited, but the next sound was the front doorbell. Thinking it was a neighbor ready to shout at me, I opened the door slowly and turned on the light with apologies ready.
注意：1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
In the light snow stood three neighbors from several streets away.
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What a clever idea with which the neighbors found my home!
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In 1992 my father bought a 1968 Pontiac GTO from a local man and began to tear the car down to the frame in order to properly restore it. Over the next 2 years and change, he built the car back up from the frame, replacing everything that needed to be replaced, He rebuilt the engine, and cleaned everything up, and put it all back together. In the summer of 1994, the car restoration was finally completed!
In the fall of 1999, after having kid number 5, my father decided to sell the car in order to better support the family. The day that he sold this car is the very first memory that I recalled as a child. I remember the very last ride that we took in the car, on the day when it was sold. I remember the mixed expression on my father’s face. Growing up, every time my father and I went to a car show, I was always told to keep aneye out for the GTO. It never showed up.
In the spring-summer of 2019, 20 years after it had been sold, I decided to start looking for the car. I dug up a few pictures of the car showing the old license plates, and sent them to a few cop friends to see if anything would turn up, all in vain.
I finally posted the pictures to a few more Facebook pages, and after some searching, I was able to find One Facebook page that was titled in English “GTO club Denmark”. The page had 82 members. I shared the story again, hoping that somebody would recognize the car.
注意：
1. 所续写的短文词数应为150左右；
2. 续写部分分为两段, 每段开头语已为你写好。
Paragraph 1:
One day, I woke up to a video of the car from a man saying he knew the owner.
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Paragraph 2:
In January 2021, Martin informed me that the owner was willing to sell the car.
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