Tom has a strong and faithful(忠诚的) dog, Bruce. The dog likes playing with Tom. Sometimes he also follows Tom's father to work.

    One morning when Tom's father worked in the field, he took off his coat and put it on the ground under a big tree. He turned to the dog and said, "Watch my coat, Bruce!"

    Bruce sat down on the coat. Later Tom's father remembered he had to buy some food. So he hurried to the shop. After shopping, he went home directly and forgot all about his coat and the dog.

    Late in the evening Tom looked for his dog everywhere in the house, but he couldn't find him. At this time Tom's father suddenly remembered his coat and the dog. He went back to the tree at once. He found that Bruce was still sitting on the coat!

    It's seven o'clock in the morning in Chennai, India Lavin always has her morning bath before school. But she doesn't have a bath at home. She has a bath in a small river outside with her best friend, a baby elephant.

    Lavin lives at Arignar Anna Zoo with her parents, brothers and sisters. Her father works at the zoo and he is a special keeper for the baby elephants. Lavin is only six years old, but she can control(控制)the elephants and she has a very special friendship with them.

    At eight o'clock in the morning, Lavin goes to school, but she doesn't go on the school bus. She rides an elephant to school. After school, Lavin plays football with her elephants.

    Now it is the evening, and the baby elephants are tired Lavin sits next to them and sings to them. Sometimes, they all sleep together-friends together in the day and friends together at night.

    Hello, my name is Judy. I am a girl. I live in a house with my family. This is Anna. She is my friend. She lives in a house on Park Road. Anna is 11 years old. I'm 12 years old. I'm order than Anna. Anna is 1.5 metres tall. I'm 1.55 metres tall. Anna and I live far from the school, so we go to school by bus. Anna likes to listen to music. I like to read books. We are good friends.

Stupid but serious

You see a cat sunbathing on the playground. "Hello, kitty!" You smile and walk away. About100 years ago, a scientist saw the same scene(场景). But he stopped and thought. Later, he won the Nobel Prize(诺贝尔奖).

The scientist was Niels Finsen from Denmark(丹麦). He saw a sick cat sleeping in the sun. When the sun moved, the cat moved, too. Why did the cat love the sun so much? To find out the answer, Niels kept watching the cat for days. Amazingly, the cat got better after lots of sunbathing. The sunlight could cure diseases! Then, Niels invented a light to cure human diseases and won the Nobel Prize in 1903.

In fact, many great scientific findings start from "stupid" questions and small things in life.

Scientists may ask: How many lies does a person tell in a day? How many licks(舔)does it take to eat up a lollipop? Why do roses smell good? What can we learn from animal poop(粪便)? And they take it seriously. They watch, think, and do experiments(实验) until they find an answer.

"It's such a waste of time!" You may say.

But think of the great scientist Newton(牛顿). If he just said "Ouch!" and walked away after he was hit by the apple, what might our world be like?

Peggy used to say very little with others. But that all changed when her family moved to a new house.

When they got there, she found 1 old book outside their house. To 2 surprise, the book shone(发光) in the dark. "How strange! What is the book 3 ?" she asked her parents, but they had no idea.

That night, she started reading the book with her pet dog beside her. But she could hardly understand it. Just then, her dog started speaking, "4 interesting book you've found!" She couldn't believe it, 5 the dog continued telling her all kinds of interesting things. After some time, she asked, "So how can you be talking?" "I don't know." said the dog.

Peggy 6 to find out the truth. So she showed the book to some other animals. All of them started talking with her 7 a friendly way, telling her some pretty interesting stories.

During the next several days, Peggy was having fun with her new friends. However, one day, the book disappeared and so did the "voices of the animals". She 8 looked everywhere, but she couldn't find 9 the book was.

When she returned to school again, Peggy was surprised 10 most of her schoolmates special. Little by little, she started talking more to them. And now she has got more friends than anyone else in school.

 Three years ago, I started working at the University of Leeds and I was looking for things to do. I noticed that a community school was {#blank#}1{#/blank#}(提供) Chinese evening classes. I paid fora beginner class {#blank#}2{#/blank#}(没有) much thought. 

I had no plans to move to China. I just wanted to learn a new l{#blank#}3{#/blank#} , which is also a good chance for me to know more about Chinese culture and Chinese {#blank#}4{#/blank#}(传统习俗). I used to speak fluent English and Spanish. But I think there should be a huge difference between learning something new as a child and learning as an adult. 

I had Chinese lessons {#blank#}5{#/blank#}(严肃). There was only one lesson a week and each lasted 90 m{#blank#}6{#/blank#} . Mr. Kong, the teacher, was energetic. For each class, he would teach us what seemed   like hundreds of new words. After {#blank#}7{#/blank#}(数个) months, I got used to this. Through weekly classes, my mind would reorder and make sense of the chaos. 

 There are more than 6, 000 international students. It was not difficult to find Chinese students who want to {#blank#}8{#/blank#}(练习) English in exchange for Chinese. My new Chinese friends helped me go over everything I had learned in class. 

 Now I'd like to describe Chinese grammar as an easier one than that of English or Spanish. I am ready to overcome any difficulty and become fluent in Chinese.