When my kids were young, I would sometimes wonder what I had done wrong when child after child was born into our family with far too high a dose (剂量) of “strong will”. I would_______observe other families whose children seemed so understanding and so easy to please. My kids, _______, were “spirited”. They hardly ever obeyed me, constantly testing my_______. It was their way or the highway or at least a lot of screaming and other such nonsense if their way was not acknowledged. I began to wonder if strong will was a genetic trait (遗传特性).

One Sunday, I was out in the hallway at church with Andrew, who was about 3 years old at the time, but who was so_______active and excited about small things. While he was screaming, a sweet elderly woman came up to me and said, “Your kids are so_______.”

I glanced down at my screaming baby, and_______if she was talking to the right person.

“They are brave and determined,” she went on, “which means that they will_______great things.”

I told her that I hoped she was right, and she_______repeated, with a loving smile, that she was. Quite_______, I was a little shocked at her timing. She had seen me come to church week after week, and watched me__________with my noisy troublemakers. She knew that I spent more time walking the halls__________ trying to keep them quiet than actually sitting in the meetings. I did not understand why she had picked that particular moment, when my patience was running out and my child was screaming, to tell me that my kids were full of __________.

As I realized not too late, “Strong-willed children are a__________, not a curse (诅咒)!” Yes, there have been times when I have__________wanted to throw my hands in the air and scream, and times when I have done just that. But there have__________been moments when I have felt like I was the student instead of the teacher.

No one is born a winner. People make themselves into winners by their own efforts.

I learned this lesson from a(n) ________ many years ago when I took the head ________ job at a school in Georgia.

It was a tradition for the school’s old team to ________ the new team at the end of spring practice. The old team had no ________ and they even didn’t prepare for the game. Being the coach of the new team, I was excited because I knew we were going to win, but disappointedly, we were defeated. I couldn’t ________ I had got into such a situation. Thinking hard about it, I came to ________ that my team might not be the number one team, but they were ________ me. I had to change my attitude about their ability and potential.

I started doing anything I could to help them build a little ________. Most importantly, I began to treat them like ________. That summer, when the other teams enjoyed their vacations, we met every day and practiced.

Six months after suffering our defeat, we won our first game and our second, and continued to ________. Finally, we faced the number one team in the state. I felt it would be a ________ for us even if we lost the game. But my boys beat them, giving me one of the greatest ________ of my life!

From the experience I learned a lot about how the attitude of the leader can ________ the team. Instead of seeing my boys as losers, I pushed and ________ them. I helped them to see themselves ________, and they built themselves into winners.

Winners are made, not born.

Teaching is one of those jobs where people expect you to constantly be “on”. It’s a job that you can never _________ at work: there’s always planning, marking, or thinking about your _________ 一like when it’s 9：00 pm and you’re _________ if the feedback you gave on a class _________ was a little too constructive (有建设性的), and make a mental note to check in with them the next day.

Sometimes, I felt that teaching becomes my _________ life.

In the beginning of my first year teaching in China, I did not have a life outside of work. I was constantly thinking about the next day’s _________ my students are going to take part in, or planning for the _________ lesson. For the entire two months of the first term, I was a living _________: I would wake up, go to work, stay late after school to mark or plan, come home to _________ and then get back to planning until bedtime. I did not ____________ take one day off for the first 5 months.

I knew that I should not let work ____________ my life, but despite how much effort I was putting in, I would sometimes still feel unprepared. The thought of not putting in that effort made me ____________ about going into the classroom the next day.

As the months went on, that gradually ____________ I wouldn’t stay so late after school and I would ____________ more at home. I would take days off for my mental health. Sometimes, I wonder if all that is a( n) ____________ of getting better with experience, or if it’s just laziness . . . I say it’s mostly experience.