Pack Up and Fly Away

    Hainan Island

Hainan Island is a wonderful place of sun, sand and sea. It is in the south of China. It's famous for its underwater beauty. Tianyahaijiao is also very famous. It attracts lots of tourists around the world every year.

    Thailand

Thailand is in the heart of Southeast Asia. Its capital Bangkok has some of Thailand's greatest buildings, like the Grand Palace(大皇宫). Chiang Mai(清迈) is a big city in Thailand. There are many historic temples(寺庙)there, such as Wat Phra Singh. The temple has a history of over 650 years.

Australia

This country is the land of beauty and diversity(多样性). It is famous for the Sydney Opera House and Ayers Rock(艾尔斯岩). Ayers Rock is 3, 600 meters long and 348 meters high. What's more, children can also see many animals here like koalas, kangaroos and sheep.

    South Korea's Jeju Island(韩国济州岛)

As a volcanic(火山) island, Jeju once was chosen as one of the New Seven Wonders(奇迹)of Nature. Besides that Jeju attracts children with its Teddy Bear Museum. There, people show historical events with teddy bears.

    Emily and Alex were happy when their family moved to a house with a very big garden. They could climb up trees, grow flowers and even play badminton. They liked to watch the birds flying among the trees in the garden. They even started to put food out to attract（吸引） more birds.

    Everything was fine for a few days until one afternoon there was a strange bumping noise on a window. Emily went outside and found a small bird dead on the grass. Its neck seemed to be broken.

    "It must have flown into the window," Alex said when his sister Emily called him to have a look. "Ah, yes, look here. You can see the mark where it hit the window. There are a couple of tiny feathers stuck(粘贴) on the window."

    "Poor thing!" Emily said.

    During the next month, another five birds died in the same way. "Why would they fly to the windows?" they wondered. Finally they found out the truth. When the birds were flying, they couldn't see into the rooms. All they saw was the reflection(反射) of the garden. They thought that they were flying into trees because they saw trees reflected by the window.

    "Something has to be done to save the birds." the parents decided.

    At first, he family tried keeping curtains（窗帘）across the windows, but this made the room dark. Then they bought some strong black paper and cut out the shape of a hawk. They made six hawks—one for each window. They stuck the hawks to the windows. They looked pretty and did not keep out much light. When the birds saw the hawks, they would fly away.

    After that, there were no more dead birds. The family were much happier.

Have you heard of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory? Do you know who wrote it?

Roald Dahl (1916-1990) was a(n) 1 English writer, seen as another Shakespeare in Children's Books and the one who was best at telling stories in the until he died world. He had written 19 children's books 2 he died at the age of 74. Over 200 million copies of his books have been sold so far. 

At the age of 13, he was sent to a boarding school. There, the boys at the school. There, the boys at the school were sometimes asked to be chocolate testers for a famous chocolate company and this experience later3 him to create the book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. He also put his 4 experiences into the book. Once he was terribly5 by the headmaster for putting a dead mouse into a teacher's bottle of gobstoppers(大块圆硬糖). This story tells of the importance of being honest and selfless. It also reminds us to 6 our dreams in the face of difficulty and failure. 

Roald Dahl had a great talent for seeing the world through 7 eyes. He liked encouraging children to read. He believed that children should be8 with a book, not bored. Books shouldn't be boring. 9 , they should be funny, exciting and wonderful. And learning to be a10 gives children a wonderful advantage. 

Dear Tony,

I go to a new school in Cambridge now. I like it very much. I'm making a lot of new friends. 

I'm studying new subjects, like science. It's very interesting. We're using computers and learning how to use the Internet. We write e-mails(电子邮件) to people in different countries. I'm learning how people live in different countries. It's great!

We do P. E. on Wednesday in the afternoon, Sometimes we stay in the sports hall to do sports and I like that too. I play basketball after school on Mondays. I like playing basketball a lot. I'm enjoying my new school!

Write and tell me what you're doing in your school in China!

John