C   

    Ricardo Semler became the boss of his father's company in Brazil at the age of 21. The name of the company is Semco. It sold parts for ships. Semler worked like a mad man, from 7:30 in the morning to midnight every day. One afternoon, while he was visiting a factory in New York, he fell down. The doctor said, “ There's nothing wrong with you. But if you continue like this, you'll find a new home in our hospital.” Semler got the message. He changed the way he worked. In fact, he changed the ways his workers worked, too.

    At the same time, Semler changed the office. Instead of walls, they have plants at Semco, so the boss can't shut himself away from everyone else. And the workers are free to decorate their workplace as they want. As for uniforms, some people wear suits and others wear T-shirts.

    Semco has flexible working hours: the workers can decide when they need to arrive at work. Also, Semco lets its workers use the company's machines for their own projects, and makes them take holidays for at least thirty days a year.

    It sounds perfect, but does it work? The answer is in the numbers: in the last six years, Semco's revenues (收益) have gone from $35 million to $212 million. The company has grown from 800 workers to 3,000. Why?

    Semler says it's because of “peer pressure” (同辈压力). Peer pressure makes workers work hard. It means if someone isn't doing his job well, the other workers will not allow the situation to continue. In other words, Semler treat his workers like adults rather than children, and expects them to act like responsible (负责任的) adults. And they do.

    The book I would like to talk about is The Merchant of Venice. The book is a dramatic work by Shakespear, an English famous writer in the 16th century. It talks about something happening between merchants in Venice. The main characters are Bassanio, Portia, Shylock and Antonio.

    The drama begins with Antonio, who helps Bassanio borrow money from Shylock, and then brings out other stories. Bassanio is a poor merchant. He needs money to follow his dream to marry Portia—a very beautiful and rich lady. He first wants to borrow money from his friend Antonio, also a merchant in Venice. Antonio borrows the money from a Jewish rich merchant Shylock. Antonio does much harm to Shylock before because Antonio really hates Jewish. Shylock is a little mean and loves money very much. He always gets interest from the people who borrow money from him. Antonio promises he will pay the money back in three months, or Shylock will be allowed to cut out 1 pound of flesh out of Antonio's body.

    Bassanio successfully wins the love of Portia but soon realizes his friend can not pay the money back to Shylock on time. Bassanio returns to Venice as fast as he can and attends a trial(审讯).The reason why Antonio isn't able to pay is because his ships are caught in storm. Portia, dressing up as a young lawyer, claims (声称) that the words " 1 pound of flesh" not "1 pound of flesh and blood". She says that Shylock is only allowed to remove flesh, but not any blood, which is impossible. Thus, she helps make Antonio safe and make Shylock fail. At the same time, Shylock loses most of his money. At the end,          .

One morning, there suddenly comes a loud cry from a village school—a young bear walks into one classroom! 

"Don't be 1 !" says the bear, " I won't hurt (伤害) 2 of you. I just want to learn here."

"Oh! You can 3 ?" Mrs. Green asks in surprise, "But this is a school for children, not 4 ."

"What a 5 bear!" the children love this bear very much, and they cry, "Mrs. Green, please let him6 !"

"You must know, children," says Mrs. Green, "7 follows rules while bears not."

"But I can 8 to follow rules!" the bear cries, "Bears can 9 be good listeners."

"Well," Mrs. Green now says, "you 10 stay here today. But you must follow our rules."

"No problem!" the bear gets excited, "If my animal friends followed rules, we wouldn't 11 so much. That's 12 I'm here—I want to learn your rules."

Then he runs to a seat but suddenly 13 and shouts, "But what if I have a question to ask?"

Mrs. Green smiles, "You must 14 your hand until I speak to you."

The bear's hand 15 goes up. 

"Any questions?" Mrs. Green asks. 

"Yes!" the bear says, "If I follow the rules today, can I come back to school tomorrow?"

All the children laugh, and so does Mrs. Green! 

My problems started after I went to a new school far from home. I was only 14, and at first I missed my family a lot. I often called them and cried on the phone. But after two weeks, I found I enjoyed being with my classmates at school. 

I had many friends who were boys. I thought of them as my best friends—but only friends. I never guessed my friendship with boys would become a problem. 
    Then, three months later, my friends told me that some teachers and girls said I was hanging out（闲逛）with boys all day long in order to get attention from them. Seven months after that, the head teacher Mr. Wang asked the class to choose（选择）some students to join the Student Union. I thought I could win for I was doing well in school. I'd already won prizes（奖励） for the best in math and English exams. A week later, the list came out and it didn't include（包括）me. I was sad.

Mr. Wang came to me and said. "Don't be sad. I know you're excellent! Maybe you're a little distant（远） from the girls in our class. They don't know much about you, so some of them didn't choose you. It doesn't matter. Do your best to get along well with everyone and I think you'll make it next time. "

One day, a fox was walking through the tasty grapes hanging from a branch (树枝) high above him. He was quite hungry. 

 First, the fox tried to jump in the air and reach the grapes. But with each jump, he was just inches(英寸) away from getting the grapes. As he jumped and jumped, he was getting farther and farther away from the grapes. After a short rest, he tried taking a few steps back and doing a running jump at the grapes— but again, he could not reach them. 

 He even tried to climb the tree to reach the grapes, but his paws weren ' t strong enough for him to pull himself up the tree. How he wished he had the same paws as a monkey ! He sat and looked at the grapes angrily. 

 Just then, a bear happened to walk by the fox. He saw the fox look ing at the grapes. The fox turned to him and said, " Never mind. Those grapes probably don 't taste good anyway. " And with that, he turned once more and left. 

 The bear reached up, got the grapes and ate them. They were, of course, quite delicious. " Why not ask me for help?" the bear thought. 

Many teenagers feel that the most important people in their lives are their friends. They believe that family members, and particularly(尤其是)their parents, don't know them as well as their friends do. In large families, it is quite often for brothers and sisters to fight with each other and then they can only go to their friends for advice. It is very important for teenagers to have one good friend or a circle of friends. Even when they are not with their friends, they usually spend a lot of time talking among themselves on the phone. This communication is very important in children's growing up, because friends can discuss something difficult to say to their family members. However, parents often try to choose their children's friends for them. Some parents may even stop their children from meeting their good friends.