Stories play a vital role in the growth and development of children. The books they read and the ________ they get to know can become like friends. It’s also good for children to understand that books are a useful ________ of information and that good reading skills are important for ________ in their future lives.

Children who can read well are more likely to have higher confidence levels. This will ________ them in school as they’ll feel able to participate ________ in activities. Another part of ________ confidence is to know where you ________ the world. Stories can help with this process by showing children what people’s lives are like where they live and in other parts of the world.

Stories are a great way to ________ new words and ideas into a child’s language—starting with picture books for the very young, working up to more ________ novels for teenagers. Fiction based on real life can also help children with their own life experience—it shows them how ________ the world is and that some people’s lives are greatly different from theirs. And the process is done in a ________ way. There’s no actual teaching ________ at all, but they learn from simply reading the story.

Reading helps children understand that there are other children who feel the same way and they are not alone. This helps children understand that feelings are normal and should be ________. Watching their ________ to the feelings of the characters in the stories will give you some idea of how a child feels about certain ________ and emotions. For example, how the child responds to the character in the story feeling sad or ________ will give you some idea of how the child thinks.

As you can see, children’s stories are important for a number of ________ and form a vital part of the growing process. Being part of that process can bring children a sense of ________ as well as being great fun. ________, go and get your children some wonderful books to ________ them to enjoy a relaxing bedtime story.

I will never forget one summer in my childhood. While walking in the attic(阁楼), I stepped on something and ________ down, with my hand landing on a floorboard that popped up and almost hit me in the head. When I________ and looked inside the open space, I could not believe my eyes: There was gold in there!I seized a handful of shining gold cubes, ran to the bottom stair and ________. “Mama. I found gold up here under the floor!”

Back up the stairs I dashed.________ my brothers almost knocked me back down as they ran right by me. When Mama opened the door and ________ her head out, she simply said, “Honey, that’s insulation(隔热材料). Now put it all back. ”

I felt really disappointed. I had thought I made a real ________.

When I ________ inside to put the fake gold back, my hand touched what felt like a book. I pulled it out. It was old and small: Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, which I’d never heard of. And now that I was bored, I decided to see what was inside this little book. To my ________, it was a book of passages, phrases, and proverbs and I could tell that this was going to be ________.

So I spent quite much time on it and found ________ in these pages, As I didn’t know how to express things clearly, I often ________ to talk about them. This book helped me ________ that I didn’t need to feel ashamed or embarrassed, because other people had similar experiences.

When I went to college, Bartlett’s came with me. Over the years, I’ve kept my original ________, which to this day I often ________. Although it was a ________ to find the book, it liberated me in a way. It helped me see more than my young mind and heart were able to understand.

The book discovered under those floorboards was, indeed, gold.

I grew up in libraries, or at least it feels that way. I was ________ in small town of Cleveland, just a few ________ from the public library. I went there several times a week with my mother. She and I would walk in together, but ________ we passed through the door, we each headed to our ________ section. The library might have been the first place I was ever given ________.

Even when I was maybe four or five years old, I was ________ to head off on my own. Then, after a while, my mother and I would reunite at the checkout counter with our ________. Together we’d ________ as the librarian pulled out the date card and stamped it with the checkout machine.

When I was older, I usually walked to the library by myself, ________ back as many books as I could. Sometimes, I did go with my mother, and the trip would be as happy as it had been when I was ________. When I ________ my mother these days, since she died two years ago, I like to ________ us in the car together, going for one more impressive trip to our library.

My parents valued books. They believed that you read a book for the ________ of reading it. You didn’t read it in order to have a(n) ________ that had to be housed and looked after forever. The reading of the book was a journey. There was no need for ________.