In 2001, a l4-year-old boy named William had a little wish. He loved reading. He wanted a light in his room so that he could read after dark. His big idea came while he was reading a book in the library. He saw a picture of a windmill (风车) and decided to make one.

    When he started building the first windmill in 2002, people thought he was crazy. But they all came to see his creation made from broken PVC pipes and old car and bicycle parts. He dreamt of using wind to produce electricity. Later he built two more windmills in his home town, the 60-person village in Malawi. Africa.

    William wants to build windmills across Malawi, and perhaps beyond. Money to help with this project has come from all over the world, including China.

    Alan comes from New York, and now he is having a great time visiting his aunt in China. Today is Sunday. It's his eleventh birthday. He gets up early and wants to make a cake for his birthday party in the afternoon.

    When he comes out of his bedroom, he sees a big bowl of noodles on the table. It's a bowl of tomato and egg noodles. Alan usually has bread and milk for breakfast in America. Alan likes the tomato and egg noodles, but he still wants to know why his aunt cooks noodles this morning

    "It's your birthday today," his aunt says, *in China, many people eat very long noodles on their birthdays. It's a symbol of long life. We never cut up the noodles, and we call the long noodles changshou noodles.”

    "Thanks. I think it's my first special gift I get for my birthday," says Alan.

    The mystery(悬疑) stories of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle are famous all over the world.

    The detective in his stories is called Sherlock Holmes. He solves mysteries in a most surprising way. Through it all, his assistant, Dr Watson, watches with admiration(钦佩). Watson then writes up the story of the mystery afterwards.

    This is a useful story writing skill. Because Watson is not very clever, the story remains a mystery until the end. The readers can sometimes pick up some clues before he does! Then, to make Watson understand the mystery, Holmes has to explain it all, step by step. So we, the readers, get to see it step by step too. Watson is almost as good a character in the story as Sherlock Holmes!

    The very first time they meet, Holmes greatly surprises Watson. When they are first introduced, Holmes says to Watson, "How do you do? I see you have been to Afghanistan.”

    Watson is too amazed by this to ask Holmes how he knows this. Watson has, indeed, been to Afghanistan. Later, he asks Holmes about it. Holmes explains that there is nothing magical about what he does. He gets to know it all by very, very careful observation (观察).

Observation One

    Watson was introduced to Holmes as a doctor. Yet Holmes thought that the way he stood and walked made him seem like a soldier. So, this meant he was probably an army doctor.

Observation Two

    Watson's face was quite dark skinned. But his wrists(手腕) were pale. So his dark face was probably sunburnt. This meant that he had been to a hot, sunny country. As he was a working doctor, this was not a holiday. He must have gone with the army.

Observation Three

    At the time, the British army had soldiers at bases in many parts of the world. So there were still a lot of places to choose from. However, Holmes saw that Watson looked very tired and he was always holding his left arm, as if it was painful. So, he had probably been with the army to a place where they were fighting. There was only one place where the British army was fighting at that time: Afghanistan.

    A young queen was given a magic box by a wizard(男巫). The box would bring happiness to the whole country whenever it was opened in a place full of the spirit of generosity(慷慨).

    The queen travelled all over the country, looking for the most generous people. If she collected them all, she could open the magic box.

    One day, when the queen returned to her palace，she saw a poor little boy begging. She would like to give the boy some money, but she didn't have any with her. So the boy asked her if she could give him the old box. Then he could sell it for a little money. At first the queen hesitated(犹豫)，because she had been told the box had magical powers. But seeing how poor the boy was, she gave it to him. The boy took the box and opened it.

    Immediately, all the most wonderful things one could imagine started flying out of the box and a voice said, “Why look for it in others? Goodness always starts in yourself. ”

    While enjoying all the wonders of the magic box, the queen learned to set an example for others, and she became the best queen ever in history.

It was the final（决赛） of the national high school basketball game. For the first time in their history，a team from a small town faced last year's best team. The players thought they couldn't win and wanted to give up. Seeing this，the coach told them a story. 

Peter was a woodcutter. He was afraid he would fall ill and die. His wife told him that as long as his hands and feet were warm，he wasn't dead. 

One day，Peter went out to cut down trees. It was snowy and cold. After finishing his work，he noticed that his hands and feet were completely frozen. He thought he was dead，so he stopped working and lay down on the ground. 

After Peter had been lying for a while, some wolves came over. They ate all the food in Peter's food bag. The wolves then noticed Peter lying quietly on the ground. They were getting closer to Peter. Peter thought， "If I weren't dead，I would kill you all. " When the wolves saw Peter doing nothing，they ate him. 

As the coach finished the story，the players talked about how silly Peter was. At the same time，they realized what their coach wanted them to understand：the opposing（竞争的） team was like the wolves，and they were like the woodcutter. They should fight till the end，whether they were "alive" or "dead".