My father was a highly educated, intelligent gentleman. He could debate or discuss for hours on almost any topic and hold your 1 in the process. I thought there was nothing he wasn't 2 to do.

    A few days before my younger brother's 7th birthday, Dad planned to assemble（装配）a new  3 as a special birthday surprise. After nearly an hour of  4 the instructions, Dad was still unable to 5 the new bike together. Later he 6 the paper of instructions, 7 up his tool box, and decided to take the bike back to the local toy store and pay extra 8 to have it correctly assembled there. 9 an idea came to him, as he called out to Lovett, the quiet little man who cut our grassland.

    “Lovett, have you ever assembled a boy's bicycle?”

    As Lovett walked towards the bike, Dad handed him the 10 . Lovett handed it back to him, saying, “No, thanks. I can't read. When you can't read, you have to 11 .” Less than 15 minutes later, the new bicycle was 12  assembled, with no 13  parts remaining. Dad shook Lovett's hand, patted him on the back, thanked him, and hid the bike.

    On the night after my brother received his shiny new gift, Dad announced at the family dinner table what had happened several days earlier. He took great 14  in telling it over and over again — he used it as an example of thinking.

    He did not refer to illiteracy（文盲）, but strongly taught us to use our  15  . The joke was on my father,  16  he was able to turn it into a learning tool, and I liked him even more after that incident. I also gained a new  17  for Lovett. To me he had  18  been the old yard man who didn't 19  much, but after that day, he seemed to smile 20  , even walk taller. It's amazing what a real nod of approval can do to lift people up.

The Best Nutrition of Life

    A little boy always thought himself unfortunate because of his disability. He 1 played with his classmates. When the teacher asked him to answer questions, he always 2 his head without a word.

    One spring, the boy's father asked his children 3 to plant a young tree. “Whose tree grows best, I will buy him or her a favorite gift.” The boy wanted to have a try. But seeing his brothers and sisters watering the trees 4, anyhow, he 5 an idea: he hoped his tree would 6 soon. After watering it once, he never 7 it.

    A few days later, when he 8 his tree again, he was 9 to find it grew some fresh leaves 10 that compared with other trees, his appeared 11. His father bought him his favorite 12 and said that from the tree he planted, he would become an outstanding botanist（植物学家）.

    From then on, the little boy slowly became 13. One night, enjoying the bright moon-light, he went to see the tree. When he came to the courtyard quietly, he found his 14 was watering his tree with a ladle（长柄构）. 15 he understood: his father had been 16 fertilizing his small tree! He returned to his room, tears 17 in his eyes.

    Decades passed. The little boy didn't become a 18 as expected, but he was 19 President of the Untied States. His name was Franklin Roosevelt.

    20 is the best nutrition of life. Even it means a ladle of water, a thin and small tree can grow into a towering tree.

    It's a family tradition to go to dinner at my grandmother's house for all major holidays. After the meal, the youngest children go to the basement to play games, 1 the remainder of my family withdraw to the living room. For several years, I'd remain at the 2 dinner table, reading whatever book had caught my interest. I'll never forget the day when this all 3. My aunt came into the dinning room and said, “4 that book and talk to me before I hit you with this fork!”

    I'd been content to remain the attentive listener, 5 nothing, but hearing everything. Then came the 6 that I was antisocial, to which I 7 with a silent smile. There was a time when I foolishly believed my family would accept my preference；8, they seem to believe that they should encourage me to 9. In my opinion,  I'm the only one that has adapted well to the familial（熟悉的）talkativeness. What would be the 10 of all these voices if there weren't someone to shut up and 11?

    My 12 isn't the only thing my family finds puzzling. I would scream “No!” at 2 a. m. 13 a character was horrifically killed. I become active at night in summer so I can listen to music, read, and write without the 14 of my brothers and sisters, who seem to think if I want to  be 15 they should come near me and make as much 16 as possible.

    My family doesn't completely 17 all of my actions. They're well aware of what makes me 18 is reading while sitting in one of the black comfortable chairs. I've 19 that reading a book of any great length would make it extremely 20 for my parents to get me from the chair. Fortunately they have learned to accept my actions.

    Several weeks ago, our headmaster, Mr. Gaudi, told us that our school had been chosen to compete on Smart Aleck—a game show which my best friend Carla and I both love. Carla has a good imagination, 1 I know a lot of history. So we thought we'd be good 2 for the team.

    A few days later, Mr. Gaudi held a meeting with everyone interested in the 3 . He told us that Smart Aleck uses a five member team. He also said that three more people would be needed as backup (替补). 4, four times that many students were at the meeting. So Mr. Gaudi said we would have a 5 among all the students present and the top 6 scorers would become the team and the backup. Everybody agreed that this was a 7 way to decide.

    Yesterday, all of the hopefuls went to the dining hall after school. We would have to 8 the starting line-up（阵容）. Mr. Gaudi acted as the 9. After a couple of hours, all the 10on the team were set except one. Carla and I 11 for that last position. We had to hold a one-on-one competition 12 the two of us. The winner would be on the team and the loser would be the 13.

    Midway through our two-person competition, I was starting to pull ahead. 14 I saw the look on Carla's face. I waited for a second and knew what I had to do. As much as I wanted to be on Smart Aleck, Carla wanted 15 even more. So, starting with my next question, I held back and let Carla 16, just by a little bit. Her expression as she 17 she would be on the show made up for my not being on the team. And since I will go as backup, I'll still have the 18 of seeing the show up close.

    Was I 19 by not trying as hard as I could? I don't think so. No one noticed, and Carla and I didn't 20 it. It won't hurt the team because Carla will be a very good competitor on the real show. I think that making my best friend happy was the right thing to do.

    Regardless of the weather or the distance, Paul Wilson will make sure low-income students in his neighbourhood arrive at their college classes on time.

    A retired engineer, 76-year-old Wilson has been 1 free rides to college students for the past eight years. Since he first started 2 his car to the young people. Wilson has 3 am astonishing 64, 000 miles, and has had countless pleasant and often humorous 4 with the students he transports to and from school. The students who he's 5 have gone on to become physicians, teachers and engineers, but what they've also got out of their time in school is finding a role model and a friend in Wilson. Some students 6 call him "Grandpa".

    Tina Stern 7 rides from Wilson for all her four years in college, and the trips meant much more to her than just free 8. "It's not just a ride；you're not just sitting there in 9 silence or with your headphones on." Stern said. "He asks you questions and actually 10 the answers, so the next time you ride with him, he'll 11 those things."

    Wilson first worked as a driver through a student-support programme of the non-profit organisation. On Point for College. Although the 12 asks the members only to drive students to and from their classes, Wilson often goes 13 to ensure the welfare and safety of the students. If they have problems with registration.

    Wilson is there to 14 them. If they run out of certain daily necessities. Wilson will drive to the nearest store and purchase what's needed. If a student gets hungry on the long drives to and from school, Wilson never 15 to buy them a meal.

    For many students, Wilson's help is not only appreciated, it's also entirely 16 for them to be able to complete their college education. Some students don't have a reliable car, while others have to 17 vehicles with parents who work six days a week. For them, riding with Wilson has 18 them to complete their education—but according to Wilson, he benefits just as much from the 19. "I just love driving and I love these kids, "Wilson said. "It's such a(n) 20 to be a part of these kids' lives, even just for a few hours, getting to know them and hearing their stories."

Dave McNee met Claudia Mandekic 14 years ago. When she told McNee how hard it could be to get students excited about math, her favourite discipline, he made a surprising suggestion: "Why not throw in something they enjoy, like sports?" The idea of mixing basketball and mathematics got its first shot in 2011, when the now colleagues — who had launched a tutoring non-profit — were invited to run a summer-school program for kids who'd failed Grade 9 math at Georges Secondary School.

When the students showed up for their first day, they weren't exactly excited. Over the next few hours, Mandekic and McNee gave the kids techniques to improve their shooting while also helping them calculate their field-goal percentage — which, in turn, taught them about fractions and decimal (分数和小数) points. At the end of the game, the winning team was determined based on which group had the highest total percentage and had done the most efficient math. "When the bell rang, they were so fixated on collecting their data and figuring out which team won that they didn't leave," says Mandekic. "I realized we might be onto something."

The classes, later named BallMatics, soon spread to other schools. "I was terrible at math," says Douglas, who enrolled in a fast-track summer program. "But once I started BallMatics and realized the sport I loved was directly tied to math, it made me a lot better at it. Every time I played basketball, I was thinking about math."

Almost any math problem, McNee and Mandekic realized, can be taught on the court. Kids can learn how to navigate an X-Y grid to find their next shooting spot or absorb the basic principles of trigonometry based on the angle at which they release the ball. In 2019, McNec and Mandekic established a private high school called Uchenna Academy. At the school, kids with top basketball skills can study all subjects, train at their sport and work part-time helping out with the BallMatics afterschool programs.

Douglas, now 20 and earning a degree in education believes the school's commitment to academics is the key reason it's been a winner. "If we didn't do our work, we weren't playing at the game," he says, adding that coaches would bench kids who didn't keep up in class. "At Uchenna, we were student athletes, not athlete students."