It was my first day at Grade 6. And the first lesson was _________ English. When I was doing nothing, Mr. Gough, our new English teacher, walked into the _________.

To my surprise, he held up a book, The Collected Works of Edgar Allan Poe, and asked if anyone had _________ it. I put my hand up, because Poe was my favorite writer. Mr. Gough asked if I really understood _________ the writer tried to say in his book. My _________ made him smile, and he asked me to write an article on that subject.

After that, English classes became a new interest for me. Mr. Gough thought that students had to _________a play to understand it. "Don't just read it." he said.

As time _________ we developed a real friendship. He encouraged me to be a _________ in the future. When I left school, he said to me, "You have a gift for writing, Tony, and one day you'll come to realize how _________it is. Make use of it if you want your life to be complete."

Now I'm a writer and every time I sit down to write _________ I think of Mr. Gough. He was more than just an English teacher, because he also taught me useful lessons in life.