Tom has two good friends. They are Jack and Mark. They have different hobbies. Tom likes football. He often plays football on weekends. He thinks playing football can make him strong and healthy. He is in the school football team.

    Jack doesn't like sports. He likes listening to music. He likes Jay Chow best. He buys many of his CDs. He often listens to music on the way home after school. He thinks music can make him happy.

    Mark likes taking photos. He has a good camera(照相机). When he is free, he often takes it out and takes some pictures. Some of his pictures are in newspapers(报纸) now. He thinks we live in a beautiful world. He wants people to see the beautiful world in his pictures.

    In 1945，6 planes and 17 men disappeared without a sign, all in one day. This was Flight 19. Flight 19's captain was Lieutenant Charles Taylor. Flight 19 was a usual flight. It took off at about 2:10 p.m. from Miami. The weather was very normal on that December 5th of 1945. A message was received at 4：00 p．m.that told about pilot Taylor not knowing the way to go because his compass(指南针) was running around and around.

    After that，it was never heard from again.While searching for it，a search plane was also lost.The search for the both continued until December 10th of that same year.None of the things from Flight 19's planes，or from the search plane，was ever found.It is one of the most infamous disappearances. Searching for Flight 19 lasted five days，and covered 380，000 square miles. Dr. Kripke suggests that the accident happened because of a vortex(涡流).

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    To protect the environment, China has put a ban(禁令) on thin plastic bag (plastic bag thinner than 0.025 mm). From June 1,2008, China stopped the production, sale and use of these plastic bags to the public.

    Plastic bags can cause "white pollution", because they can take 400-1,000 years to break down. They pollute the soil(土壤) and water. Plastic bags also cause a serious danger to animals. Animals often mistake plastic bags for food. Thousands of them die each year after eating plastic bags.

    So what kind of bags will be the best to use when we are shopping? Recently some students made their own shopping bags. Most students used old clothes to make their bags. They painted pictures like the Olympic rings on them. But Li Mei had a more traditional way to make her hag. She weaved(编织) a bamboo(竹子) basket. It was not an easy job. With her grandfather's help, Li Mei spent the whole afternoon making it.

    What can we do? Use environmentally friendly (环保的) shopping bags instead of plastic ones and try to recycle the ones we have.

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    Science fiction is a popular kind of writing. Many people think of Jules Verne as the father of science fiction. He was born in France in 1828. His father wanted him to become a lawyer. {#blank#}1{#/blank#} At first he wrote plays for the theater. Then, in 1863, he wrote a story called Five Weeks in a Balloon. The success of this book encouraged him to write more stories, such as A Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864) and From the Earth to the Moon (1865).

    In the 19th century, many people were interested in science and inventions. {#blank#}2{#/blank#}As a result, they were very popular. Verne's writing included many predictions (预言) for the 20th century and many of them came true. {#blank#}3{#/blank#}These books were very successful and they made Verne rich.

    {#blank#}4{#/blank#} 20 ， 000 Leagues Under the Sea was a successful movie for Walt Disney. It was the first Disney movie to use real actors instead of cartoon drawings. {#blank#}5{#/blank#}The main character is an Englishman called Phileas Fogg. For him, the most important thing is to be always on time!

    With their long tusks (象牙), elephants look strong. However, it is this feature that makes the animal endangered. Many of them are killed for their tusks. People make elephant tusks into crafts (工艺品) and jewelry and sell them to rich people.
    But can these priceless body parts grow back? The answer is no, Live Science said. The elephants' tusks are actually part of their teeth. Nearly all African elephants and most male Asian elephants have these long teeth. About one-third of the tusk is in the animal's skull (头骨). The tusk has a nerve (神经) running down its center. This makes it similar to your teeth. Once you lose a tooth, you will never grow a new one.
    Elephants use their tusks to protect themselves, lift things, dig water and gather food. But losing the tusk will not kill them. The way in which they lose the tusk is what matters. Usually, people get tusks by culling (限量捕杀), which means killing old and weak elephants. They also take tusks from the elephants that have died naturally.

    However, these sources aren't enough to keep up with the demand for ivory. Therefore, some poachers (偷猎者) kill healthy elephants and cut their faces open to remove the tusks. About 27,000 elephants are killed by poachers each year, according to National Geographic.
    As a result of poaching, some African elephants gradually evolved (进化) without tusks, which has allowed them to survive. In Mozambique, about 90 percent of African elephants were killed for their tusks and meat from 1975 to 1992, National Geographic reported.
    Scientists found that about a third of younger females—the generation born after 1992—never developed tusks.