Book Review by Patricia Ann Turner

    It is school holiday time and Mitch Morrow's family have just moved to a new home in a new place. Mitch can't stop worrying about what his new school is going to be like. He  is not even sure about the neighbours. Next door live the Bull family and they have two children, Di and Bruce.  

    The older of the two,  Bruce,  is a large boy,  about Mitch's age. Mitch. Watches him carry big rocks. He looks really strong and unkind. Mitch gives him the name Bruiser（彪形大汉） because he has a black eye. Did he get it in a fight? Mitch imagines all the worst possible things about Bruiser. He is probably the class bully (恶霸). In his mind Mitch thinks of him as the enemy.

    Things seem to get more worring for Mitch. He finds out he will be in the same class as Bruiser. Then on the first day of school he learns that Bruiser is his buddy for the day.

    This is a lovely story for young readers to read or listen to. It has a wonderful message for all children about facing their fears —real and imagined.

    The pictures in the book catch the worry Mitch feels and make Bruiser rcally look like a bad guy.

    My only complaint is the colour of the printing of the text. Why there are pages of different coloured print I cannot tell. They may create problems for children with poor eyesight.

    I give it four stars.

    Taiwan lies in the southeast of China. It's the largest island in China. It has an area of about 36, 000 square kilometres and it has a population of over 20, 000, 000.It is rich in natural resources. Bananas, rice, tea and so on are famous at home and abroad. Clothes, food and so on are also well known all over the world. Its beautiful scenery, such as Sun­Moon Lake and Mount Ali, and its wonderful climate make more and more travelers come to Taiwan.

    Taiwan has been part of China since ancient times. Most people of the island came from Fujian and Guangdong. All the people on both sides of the strait (海峡) have a strong wish to unite our motherland.

    The Internet nowadays opens a wide world to people, including teenagers, but many parents worry that their children may meet with something unhealthy when searching online. In order to solve this problem, a new search engine for children called Kiddle has appeared.

    Search results are filtered（过滤）,so only safe website are shown and descriptions are written in simple language. Searches with bad words are shut off, too.

    Kiddles uses the same colors as Google in its logo and a similar design on its homepage, too—with an extra robot picture.

    The top three Kiddle search results show safe websites and pages written specially for kids, and those websites and pages are well chosen and checked by Kiddle developers.

    The fourth to seventh results will be safe and trusted websites that are not written specially for kids, but have content written in a simple way. These results are also chosen and checked.

    Results on the eighth and owwards pages are safe and famous websites that are written for adults. They provide expert content, but are harder for kids to understand.

    Unlike on Google, most results appear along with large thumbnail pictures（缩略图）to make it easier for children to find what they are looking for. For example, when searching for "meow meow". Google produces pages for information about a drug（毒品）that has "meow meow" as its nickname（绰号）,but Kiddle lists information only about cats, even with some cartoon pictures.

    The company explained, "Websites which appear in Kiddle search results satisfy family-friendly requirements, as we filter websites with unhealthy content."

Dear Xia Yu,

    Do you know that there are two special days for parents in America? One is Mother's Day on the second Sunday of May, and the other is Father's Day on the third Sunday of June. On these two days, American children often give gifts to their parents or take them out for lunch or dinner. Common gifts are flowers and cards for mothers and shirts or ties for fathers. I heard that it is becoming more and more popular to celebrate Mother's Day and Father's Day in China. I wonder if children over there also give similar gifts to their parents. I believe that there, are many ways to show our love. Actually, we don't have to spend a lot of money. It is also a good idea to help parents to do something instead.

—June

Information card

    Soccer is much loved by people all over the world. Nowadays, our country is taking action to get soccer games to enter schools.

    For the activity "Soccer Enters School", different people have different opinions. Some people think this activity is good for students. It helps them become better and stronger. It not only can help students improve their psychological quality (心理素质) but also can develop the spirit of teamwork. Especially for some students, they may have a chance to become professional soccer players and play an important part in China's soccer field.

    Other people think this activity will take up plenty of time of students and get in the way of their study. Sometimes it's dangerous because they may get hurt while playing soccer. What's more, it's hard to become a professional soccer player.

    Each coin has two sides. What about your idea?