At the age of 16，Julia left school and worked at a restaurant. For many years, she was only interested in making money. Then one day she had a serious car accident which changed her life.“I had a terrible car accident in August 1996.It took me 10 months to recover （康复) from the accident. During that time，I realized I wanted to find a more meaningful reason for being here in this world，”said Julia.

    As soon as she recovered，Julia gave up working at the restaurant and traveled to California. One day she found a big company wanted to cut down part of a forest. In the forest there were lots of redwood trees. One of the trees was more than 1,000 years old.

Then Julia learned a group called Our Earth was trying to save the redwood forest from the company. They decided to find someone to live in a redwood tree and hoped this would stop the company from cutting the trees down. Julia volunteered.

    Julia lived in the tree for over two years without ever going down. It was cold and wet in a redwood tree. There were even very serious winter storms while Julia was in the tree.

Finally the company decided to protect the tree Julia lived in. They agreed never to cut down the big redwood tree or the trees around it. When Julia put her feet on the earth，she began to cry. But she continued to do other things to protect the environment.

    Ben was hoping for a video game for his birthday. He also wanted a board game. And he wanted some CDs too.

    He got the board game and some CDs, but what was in the last package (包裹)? It was from his sister. He slowly opened the package. It didn't feel like a video game.

    It was a purple sweater. Purple was Ben's least favourite colour. He smiled and thanked his sister nicely, but he didn't want to wear that sweater. He couldn't wear purple!

    He quickly put the sweater away in his room. Then he ran off to play the new board game with his family.

    The next day, Ben's mother asked him about the sweater.

    "Why don't you wear your purple sweater today?" she said. "Your sister made it just for you!"

     "I am not cold," Ben said without thinking. In fact, he was lying. He shivered (发抖) all day.

    Then one day they were going out to dinner as a family. Ben's mother asked him to wear the sweater again. "I don't want to wear it. I hate (讨厌) purple," he said.

    "Ben," said his mother, "I know it's not the nicest sweater in the world, but think about how important Karen is to you. You know she will be very happy if you wear it to dinner."

    Ben walked slowly to his room. He knew his mother was right. He wore the sweater to the restaurant. His sister smiled all night.

    Michael Perham (born on 16^th March, 1992 in Hertfordshire, England) is a boy who, at the age of 17, became the youngest person to sail around the world in the 50 feet racing boat, completing his journey on 7^th August, 2009. He started the world trip on the 15^th of November 2008 from Portsmouth, England.

    Just six days after Michael Perham set sail from Portsmouth, he started having serious problems with the boat, which he was unable to fix himself on the sea. He had to stop in Portugal. Just one day later, he set sail once again, with the hope of breaking David Dick's world record for the youngest person to sail around the world.

    Michael met many challenges（挑战） along the way, including rough seas and knock-downs in the Southern Ocean, terrible loneliness and fighting storms, but the largest difficulty Michael faced was the boat itself. It caused one problem after another. Funnily he celebrated his birthday in March last year among the dolphins in Indian Ocean.

    Michael Perham has entered the record books after becoming the youngest person to sail around the world. The teenager already holds the record for being the youngest people to sail across the Atlantic, aged just 14.

    Michael Perham plans to create the Sail Michael Fund to encourage young people to take to the water. He is also aiming to take part in the 2012 Olympics.

    Once Mr. King had a cat, and he loved it very much. He called it "Sky", because he thought "Sky" was the strongest name in the world.

    One day he had a meal at a restaurant with his cat. He met his old friend. He told him about his lovely cat and its name. His friend said, "How foolish you are! Sky is not the strongest thing in the world. My cat is called „Cloud' because cloud is stronger than sky." After hearing this, Mr. King called his cat "Wind" because he thought wind was stronger than cloud.

    After a few days he suddenly thought that "Wall" was stronger than wind. And "Mouse" was stronger than wall. So he went to his friend to ask for an idea. His friend said, "Don't you think Cat is stronger than mouse？" "Yes, but..."

    The man thought and thought and then decided his cat's name had better be "Cat" because a mouse was always afraid of a cat. Don't you think Mr. King is very silly or funny？

    Money makes the world go round. But money isn't anything when people don't know how to use it. And no one is better at using money than American investor(投资者)Warren Buffet. He is one of the richest men in the world.

    Buffet was born in Nebraska in the US in 1930. As a child, he loved making and saving money. He used to go door-to-door selling his own products(产品).

    After university, Buffet went on buying and selling shares(股票). Shares are small part of a company. He is good at predicting changes in companies. By 1962, he became a rich man. In 1990, he went one step further and became a billionaire(亿万富翁).

    In 2008, Warren Buffet became the richest man in the world. He has promised to give 99% of his wealth to charity(慈善) after he dies.

    Mandy Harvey is a 29-year-old singer from Florida. She lost most of her ability to hear when she was 18.

    Harvey became a singer in her teens. _________ But she decided to start singing after she learned how to feel a song's beat through the wooden floor of a stage or theater. She watches carefully to make sure her musical instruments are tuned correctly and she is singing in the correct pitch.

    Harvey is now a professional singer. But not many people in the United States had heard of her until Tuesday night. That changed when she appeared on the television show “America's Got Talent”The show has four judges who watch people perform and decide if they should continue in the competition.

    Harvey said, "I gave up singing after I lost my hearing. But I want to do more with my life than just give up." As she was singing, one camera cut away to capture images of people in the theater. Many were seen crying. At one point, everyone stood up and cheered. By Wednesday afternoon, a video of Harvey's performance had been played 46 million times.

    Why? Shortly after she finished singing, Simon Cowell, one of the judges, gave her a golden star into the air. That meant Harvey could move on to the final round of the talent competition. Cowell said," I've done this a long time, and that was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen and heard."

    Many people wrote online that Harvey's performance was encouraging, and they will not give up on anything they want to do, either.