Mr. and Mrs. Albino, with 64 children, have the world's largest family. Not one of their children is adopted(领养).

When people hear about the Albinos' large family, the first question they ask is, "How is it possible? How can one woman give birth to 64 children in her lifetime?" The answer is simple: {#blank#}1{#/blank#}

Soon after the Albinos got married, the children came quickly, in twos and threes. The first 21 children were boys. Mrs. Albino loved her sons, but she wanted a daughter very much.

The Albinos spent the early years in Argentina. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} To travel from Argentina to Chile, they had to cross the Andes Mountains. Mr. and Mrs. Albino and their 21 sons made the difficult, two-week journey on mules. {#blank#}3{#/blank#}

During the snowstorm, Mrs. Albino gave birth to triplets, a boy and two girls!

The oldest Albino children are in their thirties and forties. They are on their own now, but 18 of the Albino children still live with their parents. {#blank#}4{#/blank#} The shack has electricity but no toilet or running water. The children wash in a small bowl in the dusty backyard.

At times there is very little food in the Albinos' small house when there is not enough food for everyone, Mrs. Albino makes sure the youngest children do not go hungry. "The smallest eat first, and then the bigger ones. We've always done it that way," she says. Obviously, the Albinos do not have enough money for their big family, then, do they continue to have children?

The Albinos do not use birth control because it is against their religion(宗教). They could let other people take care of their children, but Mrs. Albino will not allow it, "When my two brothers and I were babies," she says, "our mother left us at an orphanage(孤儿院) and never returned. We lived there together until we were five. Then a couple adopted my brothers and I was left behind. I was heartbroken.{#blank#}5{#/blank#} Even if I didn't have much money, I would always take care of my children by myself." Mrs. Albino has kept her promise.

My dad lost his job a few years ago. At the time, I thought it didn't matter much, but I was wrong. That event 1 my life.

We were sitting at dinner when my older brother Jack and I heard the 2 . Dad said that his company wasn't making enough money. They had to let a lot of people go. He said, "We are going to make some changes." Jack and I looked at each other. At first, we didn't know what they meant. Mom 3 that I would have to stop taking dance lessons for a while. Jack couldn't go to the summer camp, 4 . Mom and Dad said that we would have to save some money by cutting out things that weren't 5 .

The next few months we all helped out. Mom went back to work full-time. We had to cut out going to the movies and restaurants. Jack got a part-time 6 to make money in his free time. I took on the responsibility of doing 7 when my mother was busy doing her work. Though things were kind of hard, no one 8 and we encouraged each other.

After a few months, Dad found a job in the city. Dad thanked us for helping out. He said, "We all came together as a family."

Later on, I thought about what Dad said and 9 he was right. We were all upset about giving things up, but we did what we could to help each other. Even though it was 10 that my dad lost his job, it showed me what a family is all about.

This story is about a young man. He worked hard at his lessons. He was too busy. He didn't have time to rest, so he was ill. Every night, when he went to bed, he closed his eyes and tried to sleep. But he couldn't. He thought, "I must go to see the doctor." He said to the doctor, "I can't go to sleep at night." "Try counting numbers. When you reach one thousand, you'll be asleep."

The next day the man came back to the doctor's office. "Well," said the doctor, "how are you today?" 

"Yes," he said. "I tried counting one, two, three … up to （直到)one thousand. But when I reached five hundred and sixty-nine, I began to feel sleepy. I had to get up and drank some tea. Then I went on counting up to one thousand. But I still couldn't fall asleep." 

The Everybody Experiment(实验), written by Lisa Moore Ramée, is about an 11- year- old girl named Kylie. Kylie has just {#blank#}1{#/blank#} sixth grade. She's very shy. She cries a lot, which makes her worry that she's not strong enough for middle school. She's also {#blank#}2{#/blank#} that her feelings might embarrass her friends.

 Kylie loves science, so she asks herself:" What would a scientist do to solve this problem?" She comes up with the idea for an experiment. She calls it the Everybody Experiment. She decides to act stronger {#blank#}3{#/blank#} copying the actions of her friends Nikila, Mara, and Naomi. Every day, she writes down what happens with her experiment and then review s the results. After a {#blank#}4{#/blank#}, Kylie realizes she's just as cool as her friends— she just {#blank#}5{#/blank#} her feelings differently. She gains the confidence to be herself.

My cousin Sam is a middle school student. He is twelve years old. He loves1 a lot. Every morning, he runs around the playground for half an hour. Now he looks 2 and tall.

Sam likes reading. He also likes writing a lot. He wants to be a writer. He often borrows books and reads them in the school 3 . In his free time, he often 4 some stories for his school newspaper, School Times. Many students like reading this newspaper very much. They all think his stories are very 5 . They want Sam to tell them more stories.

Sam doesn't do well in 6 . He thinks English is a little  7 and difficult, so he doesn't like it. One day, he finds his sister sitting in the study after he comes back home from school. She is 8  the computer. She is watching a video（视频）9 . It's about how to learn English well. He 10 it with his sister. He finds the teacher is cool in the video and his classes are so interesting. Then he makes a decision (决定) to learn English well.

My friend and I are very different in many ways. She prefers {#blank#}1{#/blank#}(watch) movies, but I love reading books. She prefers rice{#blank#}2{#/blank#} noodles, while I prefer pizza. However, we both like to travel. And both of us prefer {#blank#}3{#/blank#}(travel) in China rather than {#blank#}4{#/blank#}(go) to a foreign country.