13．The Skateboarder
　　Near Hannah's house there's a new skatepark. A lot of young people in the town go there after school with their skateboards.
　　These days Hannah often goes there with her cousin Justin. With the new skatepark, she's very interested in skateboarding. The only thing is — Hannah has no (1)      !
　　Sometimes Justin asks Hannah, "Hey, do you want to get on my skateboard?" So she does — but not for long. She doesn't want to fall off in front of everybody. Justin is a good skateboarder. He can do a lot of tricks (技巧). Hannah thinks, "I want to jump and do tricks, too. My (2)       is coming. Maybe I can talk to Mom and Dad."
　　On Hannah's birthday morning, she opens her presents excitedly. There's a big present from her parents. "Wow! A skateboard! Thanks! I have my skateboard now. So I can do more." Hannah says (3)      .
　　That weekend, Hannah takes her new skateboard to the skatepark with Justin. Hannah is excited. They begin skateboarding. Justin does a trick. "Maybe I can jump now," Hannah thinks. She goes faster and jumps — but she falls off her skateboard. When she is on the ground, somebody laughs. "Oh, no! This is (4)      ! No more skateboarding for me!" she thinks. She gets up quickly and (5)      .
　　The next day, Hannah sees a woman sitting on the grass with her baby boy. The little boy is trying to stand. "Good boy, Michael." his mother says, "Stand up now." Michael stands up slowly. He takes one little step and falls down. "Don't cry. Try again." his mother says. Michael stops crying. He takes his mother's hand, and stands up again. Hannah (6)       them for five minutes. "He doesn't stop falling. But it doesn't matter." Hannah thinks.
　　One Saturday afternoon, Hannah goes to the skatepark with Justin. At the skatepark, Justin says, "Everybody falls off sometimes." "Sure, how do you do that trick? I want to (7)       it." "Put your right foot here, then push with your left foot." "OK." Hannah says, "I need some more practice." "You' re a(n) (8)       skateboarder now, Hannah." Justin tells her quietly.

15．　　With a round face, short hair and a big nose, my dad is a hardworking worker in a factory in Beijing. He is very serious, but I know that everything he does is for the benefit of our family. He likes playing football, just like me. We always talk about football and play it together on weekends.
　　A few days ago, something interesting happened at home. It was a sunny Sunday and my dad didn't go to work. After lunch, my dad was asleep and I felt a little bit bored. Suddenly, I had a funny idea. I decided to draw on my dad's face while he was sleeping to surprise him and make him laugh.
　　I took four colored pens and walked into my father's room quietly, trying not to make a sound. Then, I slowly drew on his face with my yellow, blue, red and green pens. It took me about 10 minutes to finish my dad's "makeup", but it didn't wake him up.
　　Then I went back into the living room and pretended (假装) to watch TV. About half an hour later, my dad woke up, looked at himself in the mirror and asked me, "Am I the coolest Dad in the world?" It really made us laugh. Fathers don't necessarily have to be serious all the time.
　 　Now I live at school, and I really miss the little tricks I like to play on him. Fathers play important roles in our mental development. To kids, the name of father is another name for love. As the old saying goes, "A father's love is like a mountain."

16．　　At 29, Rubik created a toy that became a global (全球的) hit and an icon (象征物) of the 1980s — the Rubik's Cube, one of the world's most successful puzzles.
　　He thought of the idea in 1974, when Rubik was a professor of architecture (建筑学). In an effort to help students make out three-dimensional (三维的) problems, he tried to build a set of cubes that stayed together but could also move separately. Finally he came up with a six-sided structure with nine interlocking cubes on each side. He painted each side a different colour. But after he twisted (扭转) it, he realized that he could not easily return it to its first state.
　　 In the end, it took him a month to solve the problem. He realized it was more than a teaching tool — that it might be a toy with commercial potential( 潜在商机). The Rubik's Cube was born, and it is considered as an icon of logical (合逻辑的) thinking, a way of life. He patented (申请专利) his creation in 1975. By 1979, Rubik had sold 300000, and the following year he was offered the chance to take his invention to a toy fair in New York. From there, it spread across the world, with some 100 million Rubik's Cubes being sold in only three years (not to mention tens of millions of knock-offs that can be hardy differentiated from the real ones). Millions of global fans showed great interest in it in the early 1980s. Up to now more than 450 million have been sold.
　　Rubik was thankful for the widespread acceptance of his creation. Even today, people fight in global "speed cubing" competitions to shorten the record time for solving the puzzle, which now stands at 3. 47 seconds.
　　Rubik loved puzzles as a child, and studied sculpture, architecture and the applied arts before becoming a university professor. After he got the global fame (名声), people were amazed on the fact that the man who had invented the world's most popular toy was still in his position.
　　When he was asked if he thought the Cube would have been received differently if it had been created in the age of computer games and mobile phones, he answered, "The Cube is between two big worlds: one is the digital (数字的) world, the other is the real one, and the Cube is on the border."

17．　　You can understand how to speak and understand speech during your first few years of life. No one taught you how to do it. Learning to read and write took a lot more effort. Reading doesn't come naturally to people, but most of us have learned how. Eighty-six percent of the world's population is literate (有读写能力的), and the number has been increasing for centuries. Literacy makes it possible to make a world filled with books, websites, text messages, road signs, and more.
　　But the world of information is changing. Why send a long letter or text when you can share photos or videos instead? Why learn from a book when you can learn from a video online or practice a skill in virtual (虚拟的) reality? Why read magazines when you can listen to podcasts (播客)?
　　Could a growing number of people take part in today's world without reading or writing at all? Technology makes it possible. Most of our devices (设备) now talk to us and take spoken commands (指令). Smart cars ask where we will go and then give directions. Software can also read text aloud or turn speech into text. These interactions aren't perfect — the software still makes silly mistakes. But it's getting better and better. It's possible to imagine a future world where all of our communication with our devices and each other is spoken.
　　But reading and writing are powerful tools. For one, most people read faster than they speak. A podcaster or audio book teller speaks at around 150 to 160 words per minute, while a strong reader can read through a text at 300 to 400 words per minute. That's twice as fast! Research has also found that people remember more information and stay more interested when they read as compared to listening.
　　Learning to read also creates new connections in the brain. With the invention of reading, human beings rearranged the very organization of our brain, which in turn expanded (扩张) the ways we were able to think, which changed the intellectual evolution (智力进化) of our human beings. Would we really choose to give up that progress?
　　What do you think? Do you hope people keep on reading and writing, or will technology make literacy out of date?

18．Humor
　　If you see humor as a certain form of entertainment (娱乐) that people are able to choose or not, you're missing some of its biggest benefits: Humor makes average-looking (外表普通的) people look cute and uninteresting people seem entertaining. Studies show that a good sense of humor even makes you seem smarter.
　　Best of all, humor raises your energy, and that can have an effect on everything you do at school, at work, or in your personal life. The increase energy will even make you more willing to exercise, and that will raise your total energy even more.
　　Humor also transports your mind away from your daily troubles. Humor lets you better understand life and sometimes helps you laugh at even the worst of your problems.
　　In my experience, most people think they have a sense of humor, and to some degree that's true. But not all senses of humor are created the same as other people and therefore I thought it would be useful to include some humor tips for everyday life.
　　◆Not trying to be a joke teller.
　　You don't have to be the joke teller in the group in order to show your sense of humor. You can be the one who directs the conversation to fun topics that are ripe (成熟的) for others to add humor. Every party needs a straight person. You'll appear fun and funny by association (交往).
　　◆Effort counts a lot.
　　When it comes to in-person humor, effort is treated as a necessary part. When people see you trying to be funny, it frees them to try it themselves. So even if your own efforts at humor fall short, you might be freeing the long kept humor in others. People need to be allowed to be funny in social settings because there's always a risk that comes with humor. For in-person humor, whether it is humorous or not isn't as important as you might think. Your attitude and effort mean a lot.
　　Some people — and I was one of them — believe that humorous complaints about the little problems of life make humor, and sometimes that is true. However, the problem comes when you start doing too much complaint-based humor. One funny observation (观察) about problem in your life can be funny, but five is just complaining, no matter how smart you think you are.

19．题目①
假如你是李华，你校的手拉手国际学校的学生下周末将要来访。你校正在招募接待国际学生的志愿者，陪他们度过周末。你想成为志愿者，请用英语给活动负责人李老师写一封申请信，在信中说明你的申请理由，以及你打算为他们安排哪些周末活动。
提示词语：friendly, climb the Great Wall, Chinese culture, traditional food
提示问题:
•Why would you like to be a volunteer?
•What do you plan to do during the weekend?

20．题目②
2020年是不平凡的一年，我们战胜了疫情。在2021年新年贺词中。习近平主席说："平凡铸就伟大，英雄来自人民。每个人都了不起！"
某英文网站正在开展以"每个人都了不起"为主题的征文活动。假如你是李华，请用英语写一篇短文投稿，谈谈你做了哪些了不起的事，你将如何让自己变得更好。
提示词语：online lessons, housework, donate (捐赠), make progress
提示问题:
•What did you do to make you feel proud of yourself?
•How will you become a better person?