1 . J.K. Rowling frequently shows there is magic every day. Her Harry Potter series has helped people through times of stress and depression and she is always there to deliver wise words of encouragement.

She is one celebrity who is very active on Twitter. So when a single dad named Matt Burke sent her a message thanking her for the series, she noticed. Her series had helped strengthen his relationship with his 9-year-old daughter Bailey.

He included a link to his article titled Being a Broke Parent. He explained how he hadn’t found a level of financial stability that allowed him to pay bills on time and take his daughter on more activities and events. The family also doesn’t have the Internet or TV, which means there’s no “digital babysitter”, and he has to rely on his own creative ways to bond with his daughter. Since he received the series, the main thing that has occupied them these days is reading books together.

Burke admits that he thought he was “too cool” for the books when they first came out and he was in his twenties, but he’s loving reading them now. “We switch off chapter by chapter reading them out loud,” Burke explains. “This not only allows her to get more used to reading aloud in front of someone, but it gets me directly involved in something she loves, and it gives me the chance to be very dramatic when I read my chapters and bring myself into the characters in the book, which has proven to be a ton of fun.”

After hearing Burke’s story, Rowling said how honored she was when Harry Potter was a part of his family’s life and offered Burke more signed books. Besides, people are also offering to send Burke more books as gifts. For Burke, this experience, far more than gifts, will be what he treasures.

2 . I lay in the hospital bed with my six-year-old daughter, Elizabeth, holding her in my arms. “Mommy, will you stay with me the whole time?” she asked, looking up. “You know I can’t be in the operating room,” I said carefully, not wanting to frighten her. “But Daddy and I will be waiting right outside.” Elizabeth nodded, but she stills looked anxious.

Elizabeth had broken her right leg in July. Seven months later, it still hadn’t recovered. In fact, it had gotten worse. She was here in the hospital for surgery.

I wanted to promise that this would be the last time she’d have to go through this and that everything would be okay. But what if something went wrong again? How could I comfort my daughter when I needed comfort myself?

There was a knock at the door. A nurse? I thought. Time to say goodbye already? But the woman who came in wasn’t a nurse. “Hi,” the woman said. “I’m a volunteer here, and I’ve got something for Elizabeth.” She handed a bright-blue box to my daughter.

Elizabeth sat up and took the box. She opened it and started pulling out goodies one by one--candies, stickers, a lovely toy in the shape of a star. She hugged the star, cheering up for the first time since she entered the hospital. “Thank you,” she said. “I love them.” There was a big smile on her face. It has been so long since I saw that big smile.

The gift was a great comfort not only to my daughter, but also to me.

3 . My work started in 2003 at my local animal shelter’s Adoption Department. It seems like such a long time ago. In the 13 years that have ______, more than 50,000 animals have passed the doors of the ______. Most of them, I do not remember. But ______ there are animals who stand out. Tabby was one such ______.

Tabby was one of the many ______ dogs. What’s more, she was blind and deaf. Tabby’s ______ to be adopted seemed small. But one day a woman ______ Loretta came to the shelter. Her son, Gary, who ______ epilepsy (癫痫) had seen Tabby’s picture ______ the shelter’s website. They were ______ in meeting her! Most boys would want a puppy, a dog who could ______ with him and run through grassy fields on summer days. Tabby would never be able to do that. But as they say, “love is blind.” After meeting her, they decided to ______ Tabby!

If Tabby’s story had simply ended with her ______ adoption, it would still have been something very ______ indeed. But it was ______ happened after her adoption that some might label as “magical”. They became inseparable. They got along well with each other so that Tabby could sense Gary’s seizures(疾病发作)before they ______, giving his family a ______ that one was about to strike. What’s more, Gary seemed to be having fewer and fewer seizures since Tabby’s ______.

How could it be? There are some things that challenge logic and understanding in this world. Sometimes the best that we can do is to accept a ______, which we couldn’t attempt to explain. Because when you try to ______ it, you lose the beauty and miracle of it all.

4 . For many people, bookstores are wonderful places. That’s because the books on the shelves can take you away to magical lands, help you learn a foreign language, or cook a delicious meal. But when your community is too small to house a brick bookstore, you have to come up with another idea. A mobile bookstore was the result. That is the case for Rita Collins, 70, who dreamed of opening a used bookstore after retiring from teaching.

A business planning class from the American Booksellers Association convinced Collins to give up her idea of opening a bookstore in the small town where she lives. Her town, Eureka, Montana, only has a population of 1,517. Collins asked her instructors about a traveling bookstore on wheels and they doubted her idea. But she insisted on it.

Collins was inspired by Dylans Mobile Bookstore, a traveling bookstore in Wales run by Jeff Towns. She contacted Jeff for advice but she was largely on her own when it came to building her bookstore. First, she had to find a vehicle large enough to stand in. Then she had to have it refitted with shelves that would hold the books at a 15-degree angle so that they would stay in place while traveling. Collins named her bookstore St. Rita’s Traveling Bookstore, which has been on the road since 2015.

At first, she drove through Montana and then she made her first cross-country trip in 2016. After she retired in 2017, it became a full-time job. Collins and her bookstore have visited 30 states, stopping at festivals and events along the way. Collins loves meeting people and making connections. While she loves what she does, Collins doesn’t think she can keep doing it. In several years, she hopes to pass her traveling bookstore onto another book lover who shares the same interest and will keep it on the road.

7 . Pearl Moss looked out her front window in Bethel Park, Pennsyvania. She was instantly _________. A major snowstorm over the weekend had dropped_________ a foot of snow in her driveway, and there was more on the way. She was recovering from shoulder surgery and didn’t have family members nearby who could _________ to dig her out.

A few hours later, there was a _________ on her door. Moss looked out and was surprised to see two teenage boys with shovels (铁铲). David Shelpman and Aidan Campbell _________ in the same neighborhood as Moss and are on the football team at Bethel Park High School. Head Coach Brian DeLallo had emailed his team members on Sunday to _________ them that their Monday’s workout in the school gym wasn’t going to _________. DeLallo also instructed them to find an elderly or disabled neighbor and shovel their driveway. Shelpman and about 40 other team members took their _________ seriously.

Helping elderly and disabled residents to dig out after snowstorms is a Bethel Park _________ that goes back two decades. In Bethel Park, community support of the football team is strong. “Our games are always well __________ so giving back is the right response,” DeLallo said.

Pearl Moss said she’s grateful for the teens adding that if they hadn’t shown up, she probably would have been stuck in her house for a while.

8 . 阅读下面材料，根据其内容和所给段落开头语续写两段，使之构成一篇完整的短文。

When I was little, I lived in a house with a beautiful garden full of all kinds of flowers, and roses were the most beautiful of them. There was nothing I enjoyed more than sitting in the garden with my mother as she read stories to me. When I was in primary school and old enough to read, I enjoyed reading stories aloud to her.

I will never forget one day when I was in the third grade. I had been picked to be the princess in the school play, and for weeks my mother had rehearsed (排练) my lines so hard with me. But no matter how easily I acted at home, as soon as I stepped onstage, every word disappeared from my head. Finally, my teacher took me aside. She explained that she had written a narrator’s (旁白、解说员) part to the play, and asked me to change roles. Her word, kindly expressed, still hurt, especially when I saw my part go to another girl.

I didn’t tell my mother what had happened when I went home after school that day. But she sensed my pain. Instead of suggesting we practice my lines, she asked if I wanted to take a walk in the garden.

It was May and roses were blossoming and, under the trees, we could also see yellow dandelions (蒲公英) in the grass, as if a painter had painted our garden with red, yellow and green. I watched my mother casually bend down by one dandelion. “I think I’m going to dig up all these weeds,” she said, pulling it up by its roots. “From now on, we’ll have only roses in this garden.”

“But I like dandelions,” I protested. “All flowers are beautiful --- even dandelions.”

My mother looked at me seriously. “Yes, every flower is beautiful in its own way, isn’t it?” She asked thoughtfully. I nodded, pleased that I had won her over. “And that is true of people too,” she added. “Not everyone can be a princess, but there is no shame in that.” Relieved that she had guessed my pain, I started to cry as I told her what had happened. She listened and smiled, patting me gently.

“But you will be a beautiful narrator,” she said.

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。

“But you will be a beautiful narrator,” she said,

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After the play, I took home the dandelions.

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It was the last game of the season. Cali had been playing soccer all summer. She really enjoyed chasing the black and white ball across the grassy field. But still, Cali had not scored one single goal. Cali was-pretty-good-at passing the ball, but she couldn’t kick the ball past the goalkeeper. She wondered if she should quit soccer.

“Don’t give up,” said her coach. “You just need to keep trying and you will get better.”

“Don’t give up,” said Uncle George and Aunt Lisa.

But it was half-time, and Cali was feeling frustrated. Every time she got a chance to kick the ball, it would go in the wrong direction or a player from the other team would take control of it. Maybe she would try a different sport next summer.

The break was over. The two teams walked back onto the field, both determined to win. Cali heard her aunt whisper in her ear. “You can do it.”

Cali smiled at her aunt and headed to her position.

The score was tied with one goal each. The yellow team was pretty good, but Cali’s blue team was fast. Cali was off to the side when the ball headed her way. She ran over to it and kicked it. She watched it land right in front of a girl on the yellow team who expertly stopped it and sent it back in the other direction. Cali sighed.

The little girl watched the ball go back and forth between the players. Her heart wasn’t in the game anymore. Cali decided she’d wait until the game was over and then she was going to hang up her soccer boots for good.

She was woken from her daydream by some music. It was the sweet, happy jingle of the ice cream truck. It was driving right beside the soccer field, playing its music loudly to attract customers. The truck stopped. The music kept playing.

The players on both teams turned to look at it.

By the time the other girls had noticed, Cali was positioned right in front of the net.

10 . I fell in love with the minister’s son the winter I turned fourteen. He was not Chinese, but as whitre as Mary in the manger. For Christmas I prayed for this blond-haired boy, Robert. and a slim new American nose.

When I found out that my parents had invited the minister’s family over for Christmas Eve dinner, I cried. What would Robert think of our shabby Chinese Christmas? What would he think of our noisy Chinese relatives who lacked proper American manners? What terrible disappointment would he feel upon seeing not a roasted turkey and sweet potatoes but Chinese food?

On Christmas Eve, I saw that my mother had outdone herself in creating a strange menu. She was pulling black veins out of the backs of fleshy prawn（大虾）. The kitchen was littered with shocking mounds if raw food: A slimy rock cod with bulging（鼓起的）eyes that pleaded not to be thrown into a pan of hot oil. Tofu, which looked like stacked wedged of rubbery white sponges. A bowl soaking dried fungus back to life. A plate of liquid, their backs crisscrossed with knife marking, so they resembled bicycle tires.

And then they arrived --- the minister’s family and all my relatives in a clamor（喧闹）of doorbells and rumpled（皱的）Christmas packages. Robert grunted hello, and I pretended he was not worthy of existence.

Dinner threw me deeper into despair. My relatives licked the ends of their chopsticks and reached across the table. Robert and his family waited patiently for patters to be passed to them. My relatives murmured with pleasure when my mother brought out the whole steamed fish. Robert frowned. Then my father reached his chopsticks just below the fish eye and plucked out the soft meat. “Amy, your favorite,” he said, offering me the tender fish cheek. I wanted to disappear.

At the end of the meal, my father leaned back and burped（打嗝）loudly, thanking my mother for her fine cooking. “It’s a polite Chinese custom to show you are satisfied.” explained my father to our astonished guests. Robert was looking down at his plate with a reddened face. The minister managed to bring up a quiet burp. I was stunned into silence for the rest of the night.

After everyone had gone, my mother said to me, “You want to be the same as American girls on the outside.” She handed me an early gift. It was a miniskirt in beige tweed（米黄色粗花呢）. “But inside you must always be Chinese. You must be proud that you are different. Your only shame is to have shame.”

And even though I didn’t agree with her then, I knew that she understood how much I had suffered during the evening’s dinner. It wasn’t until years later long after I had gotten over my crush on Robert ---that I was able to fully appreciate her lesson and the purpose behind her particular menu. For Christmas Eve that year, she had chosen all my favorite food.