Hello! I'm Bill Smith. I'm twelve. This is my sister, Jenny. She's ten. We are from the USA. But now we are in China. My father is an English teacher in a school. My mother is a doctor. They work hard.

    At school I have a friend. His name is Ben Jones. He's twelve, too. He's from England. We all like China.

    My holiday with grandma and grandpa is great! They lived with us in New York, but they moved to Ariz when I was five. Dad usually visits them. He is sending me to stay with them for a two-week holiday.

    This is my first time to travel by myself. On the plane, I study the picture from grandma. It's a picture of an old village and the village is on top of a tall hill. It looks high, and I am not sure I can climb so high.

    Grandpa meets me at the airport. When we drive away from the city, I look at the beauty of the place new to me. Soon we get to my grandparents' village. We are so high up, I feel like a bird!

    Grandma is waiting for us at the door of a building. "Joe, this is called a „pueblo'. The buildings are made from stones（石头）and earth（泥土）," she says.

    Grandma and grandpa's rooms feel cool after standing under the hot sun. Grandma says that the stones keep the rooms cool. After dinner we take a walk outside.

    I really like meeting the people here. One man helps me make an earth vase（花瓶）for Mom.

    The children ask me to their ball games. Sometimes I help grandpa and his friends work on the farm.

    I feel I am part of a big family in our village in the sky. It is hard to leave my grandparents when my two weeks are over.

    When Abe Lincoln was just a boy, he had to help his father to look after his farm. It was hard work and there weren't any interesting things for him. Abe wanted to go to school, but there was no school there. Abe was sad most of the time.

    Mrs Lincoln loved the boy very much. She tried her best to make Abe happy. One early morning, she got up early and went to the town. That was a long way and it took her a long time to get to the town. She bought something there and went back. And it was late in the evening when she got home.

    The next morning Mrs Lincoln said to Abe, "Today is your birthday. We're going to have a party. "She put some food on the table, and then brought out a present. "A book！"Abe cried. It was an old book, but he liked it. A smile came to his face. He looked up at Mrs Lincoln and said, "Thank you, Mum."

Jessica Green is a middle school student. She is a great 1  lover. She keeps a little 2  at home, and its name is Max. She likes the dog and often 3  with it in the park 

This morning, Jessica is really happy because she is going to a zoo with Max by 4 . She likes having 5  to different zoos and taking photos of different animals 

"Come on, Max! We can 6 new friends today!" Max comes to Jessica, running here and there. They 7 the bus quickly and go to the zoo. All kinds of animals are in the zoo, such as giraffes and elephants. Jessica likes pandas best (最), 8 they go to see them 9 are the pandas doing? Some pandas are sleeping, some are 10 bamboo, and some are even waving (挥手) their hands. Jessica and Max stay there for 3 hours and have a good time. What a nice day!

Last year, I went to a town to visit my friend John. When we took a walk on the street, I saw many teahouses. Then we walked into Fenglai Teahouse. {#blank#}1{#/blank#}[ɪn][fækt], it is one of the oldest teahouses in the town. In Fenglai Teahouse, everything was as {#blank#}2{#/blank#}[ˈprɪtɪ] as a picture. There were very big seats made of wood, so we could sit {#blank#}3{#/blank#}[ˈkʌmfətəbli] in this teahouse.

{#blank#}4{#/blank#}

[aɪ  ˈwʌndə  wɒt  laɪf  wɒz  laɪk  hɪər  ɪn  ðə  pa:st].

John told me that teahouses were the most popular places in his town. In the teahouses, people can forget their worries and enjoy themselves. I also found more people played Chinese chess and card games here than those in other places. What {#blank#}5{#/blank#}[fænˈtæstɪk]places the teahouses are!

I was in the classroom. This was 1 first lesson in junior high school. It was 2 . I used to feel bored in Chinese classes, so I hoped my new Chinese teacher would be 3 . 

Here came a woman teacher. She 4 " Li" on the blackboard. "This is my family name, " she 5 . "You can call me Ms Li. Now tell me what you want me to do in my lessons. " We were surprised. 6 could a student ask a teacher to do things? Everyone was in silence(沉默). 

Ms Li smiled and said, "Don't be 7 . Just tell me what you really want to say about our Chinese 8 . I will try my best to meet all the needs of 9 . " Hearing what she said, we were excited and started to say our needs 10 worries. "Not too much 11 ";"Finish class on time";"Make the class fun". We talked a lot and Ms Li didn't stop us. 

When we finished, Ms Li said, "First, you will not have much homework, but you should 12 it on time. Second, my classes will be fun, 13 you can't play too much. Third, I will finish class on time. But you must 14 me carefully(认真地) in class. All right?""OK!" all of us answered happily. 

I think Chinese is very useful in our life, so it is really 15 to learn Chinese well. I'm sure our Chinese classes will have a lot of fun because of this interesting teacher. I may never get bored with Chinese classes.