There was once a king who had a great palace with a wonderful garden. In the garden, there lived all kinds of animals. All of them

enjoyed living there.

 There was only one thing in the garden that the king hated: an old tree in the center of the garden. It was so old and dry. This made

the king so angry that he finally asked some people to cut it down and turned the place into a swimming pool. However, after the tree was cut down, the animals left the garden. Without the animals, the garden was not so beautiful as before. The king was sad, but he didn't know what had happened.

 A young man went to the king, and said he could explain what had happened. “This was because you cut the old tree down,” said the young man. “There were thousands of moths (飞蛾)which lived in the tree. Birds needed the moths to eat and then they produced wastes for plants to grow. The plants then attracted many other animals to your garden. So your garden became very beautiful. But as you cut the tree down, the animals had to leave.

“Excellent!” said the king, “I'll make you rich and you will try to make my garden beautiful again.”

“I'm afraid it will take many years to finish. It will take many years for the natural balance(生态平衡) to get back again,” said the young man.

 The king was sad, but all he could do was just to wait.

A long time before I was born, my grandma and grandpa moved into the house on Beechwood Avenue. They had a young family of 4 little girls. During that time, it was hard to find a job. So, on weekend grandpa and grandma cleaned the garden to grow some of their own food. They planted tomatoes, beans, cabbages, potatoes and strawberries to feed their growing family. All summer long, the family ate food from the garden.
The family grew up, and before too many years had passed, the grandchildren came to visit. Grandma and grandpa still planted their garden every spring. Everyone still enjoyed the good food from the garden and always took some home.
Then grandpa died in one summer when he was eighty-nine years old. It was a lonely winter for grandma. She sat near the window, looking out at the yard and wondering if she could plant the garden in the spring. It would be hard to care for it by herself. When spring came, she planted only a little.
One nice day in the early summer, grandma heard a noise in the front yard and looked out the window. There were thousands of bees in the air. Grandma wondered what she could do. She decided to wait and think it over. Before long, she decided the bees won't bother anyone, so she went about her business and didn't give them any other thought.
That summer, grandma's little garden grew and grew. The neighbors all puzzled why they grew so well. One day, grandma's brother Frank visited her. Frank said，"In my hometown, the farmers often hired beekeepers to set up bee houses near their fields. The bees helped them to grow." That was when Grandma realized that her bees had helped with her garden all summer.
From that Time on, grandma always believed that since grandpa couldn't be there to help her that summer, he had sent the bees to take his place and make grandma's little garden grow and grow.

    Mrs. Green had a young dog which was very clever. It often helped her buy a newspaper. One winter evening, the dog went out to play. It was snowing heavily. Soon the ground(地面) became white.

     “The dog never loses his way. Where is he now?” Mrs. Green thought. She shouted(喊) his name.

    But still the dog didn't come back. So she telephoned the police and told them a lot about her dog.

    “My dog is very clever. He always goes out and comes back soon. Sometimes he plays with his friend, Mickey. He can buy a newspaper. He almost talks.”

    The policeman was tired and said, “I think you'd better put your telephone down. Maybe he is trying to telephone you now.”

How do you keep cool during summer? Air conditioning(空调) and electric fans are good tools in modern society, But before that, people could only use tans.

Over 3, 000 years ago, the first fans began to be used. They were made of feathers(羽毛) bamboo or silk. They came in different shapes, including round and square.

Later, with the invention of paper, folding( 可折叠的) paper fans became popular during the Song Dynasty. There are usually beautiful pictures on fans. Some are landscapes(风景). Others are flowers and animals. Moreover, many great people including Su Dongpo, a calligrapher(书法家) and painter of the Song Dynasty, and Tang Yin, a poet and painter of the Ming Dynasty, once painted their masterpiece (杰作) on fans. The made fans not only useful tools in daily life but also great artworks.

Therefore, with its value of beauty, people take the fan as a symbol of status (地位). That's why in old China, emperors(皇帝) and scholars often held fans.

Today, fans are also great collectors' items and gifts. On the opening ceremony of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, folding fans were given to leaders and officials of other countries, as well as other audience. While they were waving fans to get cool, they were also experiencing Chinese culture.

Hello! I am Liu Tian. I am 13 years old. I live {#blank#}1{#/blank#} Baoding now. My favourite animals are cats {#blank#}2{#/blank#} dogs. I also like eating chicken and {#blank#}3{#/blank#} (potato) very much. Black is my favourite colour.

This is my new friend. {#blank#}4{#/blank#} (she) full name is Sally White. Sally is her {#blank#}5{#/blank#} (one) name, and White is her family name. We are in{#blank#}6{#/blank#} same school. But we are in different {#blank#}7{#/blank#} (class). She is also 13 years old. She is from London, the UK. Now she {#blank#}8{#/blank#} (live) in Baoding with her parents. She likes{#blank#}9{#/blank#} (China) food a lot. Her favourite food is Mapo tofu. Sally and I {#blank#}10{#/blank#} (be) good friends.

It is true that people with better education* are usually able to get better paying jobs. In other words, they have more chances to choose a good job while people with little or no education don't. It seems that the purpose* of education is to make people get jobs. But not all the people agree with this idea.

Some people may think that a person should spend the best years of his life to get education in order to make more money in the future. This was probably one of the earliest purposes of education. In fact, if education is just a way to make a living, people don't need to spend so much time in school. They can get education for a living in a short time. Subjects like history and geography need not be taught to everyone. And people don't have to learn maths and languages so carefully. So it is clear that education is much more than teaching a man to get a way of living.

So what is education for? Education is well-rounded and it should improve a man in many ways. It is not only to teach him to speak, read and write, but also to develop his creative* thinking and other abilities. After that, it is to make him a wise man and thankfully enjoy the achievements of human. Education is to make a man lead a better life. Educated people are expected to be able to listen to good music, read good books, watch plays and most of all, take an interest in the world.

I would agree that making a good living is an important reason for education, but certainly not the most important or the only reason.