Beethoven, a famous musician in the world, was born in Germany in 1770.

In his childhood Beethoven didn't have a happy life. His father was a singer. When he was only four, his father began to make him practise hour after hour on different musical instruments (乐器). If he did not put his heart into it, his father would beat him or make it hard on him.

Beethoven loved music and he learned so fast that he was able to go around to give concerts, when he was only a boy of eleven. At the age of seventeen, lie won high praise from Mozart, the greatest musician at that time.

    Beethoven was often poor and in during his life. After one illness, lie suddenly found he couldn't hear at that time, he was only thirty-one. It was a great blow (打击) to him.

    But he still went on working and writing music pieces. To people's surprise, he wrote some of his best pieces after he lost his hearing.

In 1827, the great musician died. He leer more than 300 pieces. But people still remember his name today.

    A little girl thought she was not as beautiful as other girls, and nobody liked her. So she was 1 happy. She always stayed at home by herself and didn't talk to 2 .

    One day, her mother gave her a beautiful hair clip (发夹). When she 3 it, she looked much more beautiful than before. She decided to go to school in the beautiful hair clip.

    On her way to 4 , she found that everyone who saw her smiled (微笑) at her. Most of her schoolmates said hello to her, 5 this never happened before. She thought that the beautiful hair clip 6 them all to her. She was so happy 7 all of the wonderful things.

    Though all her classmates wanted to know 8 happened to her, she didn't want to tell 9 about her beautiful hair clip.

    When she went back home after school, her mother asked her, "Did you know you 10 your hair clip at home?" I found it by the door this morning.

    She was 11 to hear what her mother said. She understood that she didn't wear the hair clip to school 12 .

    It's not important what we wear or how we 13 . The most 14 thing is how we think about ourselves (我们自己). 15 we want to do a thing successfully, first try to be confident (自信). If we think we can, we can.

It's 5 o'clock. SeanMurphy is on his way home from work. He is tired and the bus is full, but whenhe thinks of seeing his lovely family at home, his heart is full of joy again.

"I want to see mywife, my children and my mother," he thinks. "But first of all I wantto sit on the sofa. I want to relax and read a good book."

Finally Mr. Murphy isat home. He is very tired now but he is happy. He says hello to his family.Then he sits down on the sofa, stretches(伸展)hislegs and lifts up his book.

"Now I canrelax," he thinks and smiles. But Mr. Murphy is not alone in the room. Hismother is playing the guitar and his wife is playing the piano. His two youngerchildren are fighting and his two older children are arguing about thetelevision. And the pots and pans are bubbling on the cooker(炊具).

It's the same everyday. Poor Murphy is very unhappy. He talks to his friend about his problem at abus stop.

Mr. Murphy's friendlistens to him carefully. Then he says: "Go and see Linda McCormack! Sheis a very clever woman. She knows the answer to everything."

Mr. Murphy thinks itworth(值得)a try. The next day, whenhe gets home, he doesn't go into the house as usual. He goes to the garage(车库)and gets on his bike.

    Here is a picture of my birthday party. My friends and I are all very happy at the party. Peter is eating the birthday cake. My mother makes it for us and it's delicious. My sister Molly is singing. And Selina is playing the guitar for her. Selina's father is a music teacher and he teaches Selina to play the guitar. Dave is talking about basketball with my brother. Where am I? I'm in front of Dave.

Vincent van Gogh was born in the Netherlands on March 30, 1853. During his 37 {#blank#}1{#/blank#} (year) lifetime, Vincent painted some of the most famous paintings of our time. 

Vincent van Gogh left school {#blank#}2{#/blank#} he was only 15 and then he went to England. There he began {#blank#}3{#/blank#} (work) as an art dealer (经销商). After seven years, Vincent became {#blank#}4{#/blank#} (happy) with his work and decided to be an art teacher at a school for boys. In the following years, Vincent went from job to job, living in different {#blank#}5{#/blank#} (city) in Europe. Finally in 1880, he went {#blank#}6{#/blank#} russels to begin studies in art. During {#blank#}7{#/blank#} next ten years, Vincent van Gogh painted 872 paintings. 

Vincent van Gogh is a world-famous {#blank#}8{#/blank#} (art) today, but not many people thought his paintings were great while he was alive. He only sold one painting during {#blank#}9{#/blank#} (he) lifetime For most of his life he was very poor, often {#blank#}10{#/blank#} (spend) his money on art supplies (用品) but not food. 

Tom Avery is one of the only 41 people ever to have reached both the South and North Poles. He was born in December 1975 and brought up in England, Brazil and France. His passion(强烈爱好) for adventure began when he was just seven years old and first read about the expeditions(探险) of famous explorers.Perhaps this was the start of his plan to put together the ultimate(终极的) joumey —— to the very top of the world, the North Pole, following the route taken by Robert Peary in his 1909 adventure.

Both Peary and Avery set off from Cape Columbia in Canada. Peary had a larger team and in fact had four support groups. Every 160 kilometers, a group would leave plenty of food and then turn back. The team therefore got smaller the further north they travelled. While Avery didn't have as many on his team, they did have food dropped by plane for them at four locations.

Avery's team also had the obvious benefit of modern technology, but Avery doesn't believe this made a big difference. He credits (把……归功于) his team's success to the 16 Inuit dogs that pull the sledges(雪橇)."It wouldn't have been possible without them,"he said."Your speed depends on the dogs and how quickly you can get a sledge through the ice."His team were travelling at the end of winter and this meant that the ice was thinner and could easily break under a person's weight. This was an added danger.

Another difference between both men's journeys was that Peary was far more experienced than Avery and had already been on several trips to the Arctic.

Peary claimed(声称) to have reached the North Pole in 39 days, but some historians argue that this was not possible. Avery's team actually beat this time and became the fastest to get there on foot. Avery says,"We told everyone we could do it and that we wouldn't fail. But it certainly wasn't easy."