My name is Jerry Zhang, and I am a father of two young daughters -- one is about four years old and the other is only about one.我来自中国，现在住在美国。

    One day, my older daughter, Madison, told me she didn't want to be Chinese. Those days she was quite interested in the book characters (角色) Madeline and Eloise. She asked me all the time why she was Chinese and they weren't, and how she could have yellow or red hair like them.

    This made me look for books with Asian (亚洲的) characters for Madison to read. However, I only found a few, and they were heavily cultural (文化的) and Madison didn't connect herself with any of the characters in them. And she wash' t interested in them at all Then she told me again that she didn't want to be Chinese, and it made me sad.

    In most of the books for children in the US, the characters look like Americans. There are over 17 million Asians and Asians and Americans in this count, but few of them have Asian faces. I think it's important for Asian children to see themselves in books as interesting and clever kids.

    So I created (创作) a book for Madison. Pepper Zhang in the book is an Asian girl. Her imagination (想象) takes her on a trip to creativity and art I want my children to know that being Chinese or being Asian is a great thing too.

    A month ago the Brown family, who lived in Lyndhurst, had a special experience. {#blank#}1{#/blank#} She was making coffee while her husband, Frank, was watching a comedy program on television. Upstairs(在楼上) their young daughter, Ruth, was asleep in her room and their son, Mark, was doing some homework on his computer. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} However, at the end of the afternoon, it started to change. Soon, it began to rain very heavily. Tina looked out of the kitchen window and saw big storm clouds in the sky. The Browns' dog, Tilly, was in the back garden. {#blank#}3{#/blank#} Shortly afterwards, Tina saw lightning(闪电) in the sky and then everything in the house went dark. Frank was unhappy because the television didn't work. {#blank#}4{#/blank#} Then they heard baby Ruth crying. Frank went upstairs to look after the baby but when he climbed the stairs(楼梯) , there was a loud sound and the house seemed to shake. {#blank#}5{#/blank#} A big tree from their garden fell through the window of Ruth's room！Luckily it missed the baby by just half a meter!

    May: I'm 35. I like shopping, but shopping with young children is not an easy thing. I have to look after them while I'm shopping. Shopping with my husband is not fun, either. I only go shopping with my husband when I need to buy something for him. If I look at dress for myself, he always says something like "the queue is too long" or "you don't need to buy that right now". I often go shopping with my friends. It's fun. I like shopping alone, too.

    Lisa: I'm 26. I like shopping very much, but I never go shopping at weekends. There are too many people in the shops. I don't like shopping with other people. It usually takes me a lot of time to choose things because I never buy the first things I see. I always look around other shops to find the clothes with the best price. I'm good at finding the best deals. I don't like buying food in small shops and street markets. I think food in the supermarket is fresher and cheaper. So I usually shop there.

Information Card

{#blank#}1{#/blank#} Alex does well at school. He is always ready to help teachers and his classmates.

{#blank#}2{#/blank#} Ben plays most ball games well. He is also the leader of the school football team.

{#blank#}3{#/blank#} Ellen often does housework at home. She wants to make the classroom clean and tidy.

{#blank#}4{#/blank#} Sarah likes talking with foreigners in English. She can get good scores in the English test.

{#blank#}5{#/blank#} Edward is good at playing the violin. Last year, he played it in the school Art Festival.

A. The cleaning monitor              B. The music monitor

C. The class monitor                  D. The PE monitor

E. The English monitor                F. The math monitor

Do you know from what English people get their family names? (你知道英国人的姓是怎么来的吗？)Finish the sentences after you read the story.

    Everyone has a family name. But what does it mean? From what do family names come?

    First, some family names come from the place of their homes. If a man lives on or near a hill, his family name may be Hill. In England people's names may be Wood, Lake, because they live near the wood or lake.

    Second, family names come from a person's job. If a person is a cook, he may be Cook.

    Third, many people get their family names from their father's given name. If you hear the name "Jackson", you know that he is the son of Jack.

Once upon a time, there was a young man called Ma Liang He was poor. But he was kind and hard-working and liked drawing. One night, he dreamed(梦见)that an old man gave him a magic paintbrush(神奇的画笔)and asked him to use it to help poor people. When he woke up, he found the magic paintbrush in his desk.

From that day on, he used the paintbrush whenever people needed help. When he saw that people had no water to use or drink, he drew a river and the river came to life. People could bring water from the river.

Then many people knew about the magic paintbrush. But a few days later, a rich and bad man heard that the magic paintbrush could turn everything to life. He took the magic paintbrush away from Ma Liang's house and put Ma Liang into prison(监牢). Then he drew a lot of pictures with the paintbrush, but they could not become real.

So he said to Ma Liang, "If you draw some pictures for me and make them real, I will make you free."

The young man agreed and drew a sea first. Then he drew a golden mountain which was far away from the sea. The bad man said, Draw a big ship quickly. I want to go there to get the gold."

After the young man drew a big ship, the bad man jumped into the ship with his family and friends quickly. When the ship moved to the middle of the sea, the young man drew a large wave(波浪)and they never came back.