Humans are mammals (哺乳动物). Most mammals are born able to do many things.

Some can walk within a few minutes of being born. They have to be able to run away if 1 is near. But human babies are born 2. They need the care of adults to live.

In the first month of life, babies can not smile or sit up. They can not even hold up their own heads 3 some help from grown-ups.

In the next few months, babies grow a lot. They learn to roll over, support their heads, and 4 sit up while being held.

Babies also have to learn to use their 5. It takes months for them to learn to reach for objects. At around six months old many babies can 6 an object from one hand to another.

Babbling is 7 a human baby learns to speak. Babies all seem to make similar sounds by babbling. They try to imitate (模仿) the sounds they hear from adults. It will take about nine months 8 a baby can say real words.

Somewhere around a baby's first birthday he or she may stand or walk with help. Soon the baby will 9 around on his or her own!

The first year of a baby's life is a time of growing and 10. Growing sure takes a lot of work!

    Many students think that learning a new language is very difficult. But if your brain (大脑) is only the same size as a bird's, you will know how difficult it is to learn English. That is what some birds can do.

Many birds can copy (模仿) the sounds of language. A type of African parrot is very good at doing this. This kind of parrot has grey feathers and people say they are clever.

Every December in London, the National Cage and Aviary Bird Show tries to find the best "talking" bird in the world. One bird named Prudle stood out (突出) among the " talking birds"  by winning this prize every year from 1965 to 1977. In 1958, somebody took Prudle from his nest in Uganda, and then sold it to a woman named Iris Frost. She then took care of him at her home in Seaford, England. Before he died in 1994, aged 35, Prudle knew almost 800 words in English. Prudle was also the oldest bird in the world that lived in a cage.

Another parrot named Puck was tested in 1993. It turned out that Puck knew even more words than Prudle. Puck knew more than 1,700 English words. In the 2003 Guinness Book of World Records, Puck was listed as knowing more words than any other bird in the world.

    Near the village, there is an old famous temple. Some people want to build a new house where the temple now stands, because they can find no other area to build them, while others disagree with them. They meet to decide how to solve the problem. Here are their opinions about it.

The expert wants to protect the temple and believes that there are some interesting things buried in the ground. If it is destroyed or moved, people may never learn about how people lived in the past.

The businessman thinks that the houses should be built. History is important, but we must think about the future. The village needs development and building new houses will offer jobs to hundreds of people.

Villager A says, "We should build the new houses because we need houses to live in."

Villager B says, "We should protect the temple because it can attract many tourists to come for a visit. If the temple is destroyed or moved, we will lose a lot of business."

The village leader thinks that he has a duty to make life better for the villagers. They need jobs and new houses. He also thinks the cultural site (遗迹) is important and they should be careful with it as well.

    As more information comes out about 10-year-old Cindy Smith's death(死亡), worries about amusement park safety(游乐场安全性) grow.

Cindy is not the first child who died on an amusement park ride. 25 years ago, the mother of a 14-year-old girl waited to pick up her daughter outside Worlds of Fun. Laura Barry never saw her daughter Rosie alive again.

"My heart goes out to the Smith family more than they can ever possibly know," said Barry. She is one of the few people who truly know the hurt that family is feeling.

In 1995, Rosie's mom said that something went wrong on the Timber Wolf the night Rosie died. Police found no evidence(证据). Two men told the police that they saw Rosie standing before she fell out of the car.

"I couldn't believe that such a thing could happen still and again," said Barry. She believes Rosie's death should have been a wakeup call for amusement park safety.

She finds that not much has changed in the past years. Amusement parks race to build bigger, taller, faster rides. In her opinion, amusement parks just try to bring in visitors and give them the idea that riding is good, safe and fun. She believes that parks should have put safety first.

There is no exact number of amusement park deaths each year. It is quite low according to some websites. But Barry doesn't accept that. "My daughter was the only person that had ever been killed at Worlds of Fun in all of the years, among all of the thousands and thousands of people that went there. The number doesn't mean anything, you know, because when your child is the one, that's one too many," she said.

can you paint the house blue?

he cut the rope?

Last week, little Tom didn't go to school because of .

" birds for any reason," the zookeeper told the visitors.

Dear sister,

I've been happy here in New York. But when holidays are coming near, I really feel "There's no place like home", just like the English proverb says, "East, west, home is the b."

You must be doing well in English class. The letter you sent to me was written in good English.

Well, I want to i my friend Diana to our home. I dare not tell Mama directly. If Dad and Mum say that will be all right, please write to me as soon as possible.

Diana is a poor girl whose parents died last month in a terrible accident. She has to spend the holidays alone. She wants to see China and try e that we Chinese do. She p speaking Chinese for two years and can speak a little now. She has great curiosity about our family life and will ask you many questions about it. Isn't it a good chance to u each other? I'm sure you'll learn many things from her.

Please give my love to our father and mother!

Your sister,

Mei

Give water, save lives

A bottle of water may not seem like much to you, but thousands of bottles will be of great help for people who live in drought-hit(遭受旱灾) areas in China.

Since last autumn, there has been very little rain in Southwest China. Some places, especially in Yunnan, Guangxi, Sichuan, Guizhou, have experienced a serious drought. Crops (庄稼) died, the land cracked(裂开), and wells (井) and rivers dried up. More than 20 million people are having difficulty in finding safe drinking water.

After learning about the drought, many people around the country helped by giving water, money and other things.

Last week, every member of the Communist Youth League (共青团员) and Young Pioneers(少先队员) were encouraged to give one bottle of water to the drought-hit areas. Students in primary schools and middle schools quickly joined the activity. In Yuhua Primary School in Xi' an, 900 students bought over 1,000 bottles of water with their pocket money. They also wrote their wishes on the bottles.

The serious drought has also made students realize the importance of saving water. Students from Nanshan Middle School in Huizhou, Guangdong went on the street to tell people to take part in water-saving activities.

"I've heard that some children in drought-hit areas don't have enough drinking water. They have to drink muddy ( 含有泥土的 ) water. I feel really sad about that," said one student. "I decide to take a shower twice a week instead of every day to save water," he said.