When it comes to the letter grade on your test or homework, you might notice that there is no letter E. Have you ever thought about why that is so?

    In the A. B. C. D and F grading system, the first four letter are typically considered passing grades. An F in this system simply stands for "fail". The word "fail" happens to start with the letter F, which seems to leave out the letter E, The fact of the matter is that any letter can mean "not-passing" or "fail". Some schools have U grade for unsatisfactory", or I grade for "incomplete."

    Even with all this said, we should also point out that E grade actually has been used pretty commonly throughout the history of letter grades in the US.

    The first college in the US to use a letter grading system like the ones we use today is Mount Holyoke College. In 1897, they began to use the following grading scale:

A: 95-100% (excellent)   B: 85-94%(good)   C: 76-84%(fair)

D: 75%(barely passed)   E: below 75%(failed)

    We can see the inclusion of E instead of F.

    Gradually, the letter grading system became more popular throughout the US. However, many schools decided to drop the E grade and go straight to F. There is no evidence(证据)to really support this, but one possible explanation is that teachers were worried that some students and parents might mistake E for "excellent".

    Why do we have letter grades? Well, part of the reason is that they made grading simpler during n time of great change for schools. As the 20th century began, growing cites and an increase in immigration led to larger school classrooms. Most teachers at that time thought this new letter grading system was an easy, fair and clear way to grade students.

    Today, more and more people argue that letter grades don' t fully reflect(反映)student learning. However, as teachers try to improve grading methods, many parents continue to favor the letter grades they got as kids. They are familiar(熟悉) and easy for parents to understand. So while they might not be perfect, the letter grades probably aren't going away any time soon.

    The Beijing International Horticultural Exhibition（世界园艺博览会）,which is running from

    April 29 to Oct 7, will be attended by 110 countries and international organizations. It has 41 outdoor exhibition centers that will host about 2,500 activities. It is expected to draw around 16 million visitors from home and abroad.

    The theme of the expo is "Live Green, Live Better", aiming to introduce the world to a green, innovative（创新的）and harmonious（和谐的）China. Flowers and herbs from all over the world will be displayed at the expo.

    In addition, wildflowers will also be a highlight at the expo.

    Katelyn Clarkson, an 11-year-old girl, loves baking(烘烤）very much. Three years ago, {#blank#}1{#/blank#} In her spare time, Katelyn often cooked cupcakes for her family and friends.

    A few months ago, Katelyn's teacher had a serious disease. Soon Katelyn had an idea of helping her teacher by selling cupcakes. Katelyn told the idea to her best friend Mattie who also loved baking cupcakes. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} They spent the whole afternoon making over 60 cupcakes and sold them to their friends and relatives. Their teacher was moved when she received money from the two little girls. Within days, the two girls got the idea of Cupcakes for a Cure. {#blank#}3{#/blank#} They were excited about their idea. Katelyn and Mattie later found they also needed someone to manage the money. They found Charlie. Charlie was happy to join them. He wrote down where the money was from and even set up a bank account(账户）. Also, Charlie made a website for their work. {#blank#}4{#/blank#} Of course, they made advertisements about their money-raising activities and called on people to join them.

    Last month, they held their first money-raising activity.  {#blank#}5{#/blank#} Katelyn and Mattie baked more than 300 cupcakes. All of them were sold during the two-hour activity.

    Every month, junior high schools in China choose one hero of the month. This person is a hero because he or she has done something to help protect animals in danger. Huang Jing decided to write a letter to the President of China.

Dear Mr President.

    I have been doing a project at school recently about animals in danger. I think the situation all over the world is really terrible. I am writing to you to suggest what China should do to help protect animals more.

    I know that there are nearly 2, 000 nature reserves in China, which is good. I live in Beijing and there are about 30 reserves outside the city. We visited one of them last month to sec for ourselves.

    I feel so sorry for the giant panda. It's one of the most popular animals in the world and a real symbol of China. We learned that pandas mainly live on bamboo, and that a panda can eat half its body weight of bamboo in 24 hours！That's a lot of bamboo. I think we should try to do more to stop cutting down forests. Pandas are already a rare animal and it would be so sad if they became extinct(灭绝)forever.

    The other animal we should try to protect more is the Chinese alligator(场子努). These creatures live in some parts of eastern China. These beautiful animals live in freshwater rivers and lakes but the water in some places isn't clean enough for them to live in. It's really dirty in fact. The government should stop factories polluting the lakes and rivers.

    If we protect these beautiful animals in China, more foreigners may wish to visit China to see them. They could be an important tourist attraction. It would be good if more people came to visit our beautiful country, especially to see the quieter areas in the country. Now most visitors just see the cities.

    I hope you will encourage more people to think about such an important subject.

Sincerely yours,

Huang Jing

    A long time ago, there was an old, poor fisherman who could not catch enough fish for him and his family to eat. One day, when he pulled in his fishing net, he found a bottle inside that looked valuable,{#blank#}1{#/blank#}But he was also curious to see what was inside, so he took the top off the bottle. Smoke came out of the bottle and then out came a big, powerful genie(怪物).

    The genie had been in the bottle for 400 years and was very angry. At first, he told the fisherman that he would kill him and the fisherman had to choose how he wanted to be killed. Scared, the fisherman decided to trick the genie. He told him that he did not believe he could fit inside the little bottle because he was so much bigger than it was. {#blank#}2{#/blank#}The fisherman told the genie that he had tricked him and then said he would only let the genie out again if the genie promised to help him instead of hurting him.

    {#blank#}3{#/blank#} The genie then took the fisherman to a lake where there were many special fish. The fisherman caught four of these fish and the genie told him to take these fish to the king. The fish were special because they could talk! {#blank#}4{#/blank#}The king was very impressed by this and he paid the fisherman a lot of money for the fish.

    The King also gave the fisherman's son a very important job and married one of the fisherman's beautiful daughters.