Look at the light and beautiful snowflakes (雪花) falling. Ever wanted to hold them in your hands? They are always lost when they meet your hands.

    Well, this isn't just a problem for you. It was a problem for Wilson Bentley, too. In the 1870s, Wilson Bentley was just a teenager. His family lived in a small town in northeast America. Winters there were long and hard. Bentley's mother was once a school teacher. She taught him at home. Bentley didn't go to school until he was 14. He was a quiet boy, and loved reading his mother's books. But he was interested in his mother's microscope (显微镜). When the other boys were playing with balls, little Bentley was studying things like drops of water, flowers and snowflakes.     

    Bentley loved watching snowflakes. For the next two years, young Bentley spent many winter days in a cold room watching these ice crystals (晶体) under his microscope. The boy thought they were beautiful enough for him to start to draw pictures of them. But there were so many snowflakes that he couldn't draw them all.

    How could he keep their beauty all the time? Bentley thought of buying a camera.

    The boy and his mother asked his father to buy one. But, his father didn't agree. He thought the whole thing was a bad idea. He thought the only thing a farmer should do was farming.

    But finally Bentley did get a camera. For more than a year he tried to take pictures of snowflakes. On January 15, 1885, during a snowstorm, Bentley took the first ever photo of an ice crystal with his camera. “It was the greatest moment of my life,” Bentley said later.

    For 13 years, Bentley worked quietly and took thousands of photos of ice crystals. Later he became famous as “Snowflake” Bentley.

A Trip to the Forest

    One day Bob took two of his friends into the mountains. They put up their tents and then rode off to a forest to see how the trees were growing.

    In the afternoon when they were about ten kilometers from their camp（营地）, it started to snow. More and more snow fell. Soon Bob could hardly see his hands before his face. He could not find the road. Bob knew there were two roads. One road went to the camp, and the other went to his house. But all was white snow. Everything was the same. How could he take his friends back to the camp?

    Bob had an idea. The horses! Let the horses take them back! But what would happen if the horses took the road to his house? That would be a trip of thirty-five kilometers in such cold weather!

    It was getting late. They rode on and on. At last the horses stopped. Where were they?

    None of them could tell. John looked around. What was that under the tree? It was one of their tents!

There were some mice at Jack's house.They ran into the kitchen and ate food at night.In the day,they went back to their home.So it was difficult for Jack to get them.

"I need a good cat,"Jack thought.He knew Mr.Brown had a shop and there were many cats and dogs.

"I need a cat,Mr.Brown,"Jack said."The cat must be good for the mice."

"Well,I have such a cat,"answered Mr.Brown.

"I'll take it,"said Jack.He paid for the cat and went back.

A week later,Jack went back to Mr.Brown's shop with the cat."There are more mice at my house,"Jack said.He was very angry."Your cat doesn't want to catch them at all.But you said it was good for the mice."

"That's right,"said Mr.Brown."It's good for the mice.Come to think about it—it is good for the mice!"

A little turtle (乌龟) is climbing a tree. It is very 1 for him to do so. But he does his best to 2 . After a few hours, he gets to the 3 .

Then, he jumps into the air. He flaps(拍打) his front 4 . But in the end, he 5 to the ground (地面). He is badly hurt(受伤). 

A few days later, the little turtle feels much 6 . He slowly climbs up the tree again,  7 , and falls to the ground once more. 

The turtle tries again and again. At the same time, two birds are sitting in another 8 . They are watching this little turtle. Both of them feel 9 for the little turtle. 

Finally, one 10 says to the other, " Dear, I think it's time to tell our little turtle that he's adopted(被收养的). "

It's always a good thing to have a hobby. For Miss Patty, a school bus driver in Erie County, her hobby of knitting (编织) has made her really touch the community (社区). 

Miss Patty always wanted to do something with her free time to help the students. After a talk with one of the students, things took a turn from knitting one hat to knitting more hats. 

"The one boy gets on the bus, and he asks 'what are you doing?', I said, ‘I'm making a hat. 'He said, 'That would be great fun having such a warm hat in icy winter. 'So I said, 'What color would you like? That started everything, " Miss Patty told the local newspaper. 

Miss Patty has already knitted 7, 083 hats for students in her free time. Sometimes she will get the student's favourite color before she begins the project. 

What is more moving is that Miss Patty buys all the materials (材料) using her own money. Some people do give her gift cards around the holidays to help, but she still puts out a lot of her own money. 

Along with making hats for the students that will keep them warm, Miss Patty also gets praise (表扬) for being a trusted (可信的) friend to the students. 

When most people think of the Olympics, they don't think of science. But in the USA, each year students take part in a kind of competition called the Science Olympiad. It has a lot of different events. Students go there to show how much they know about the science of music, biology, chemistry and so on. My best event is forestry (森林学). This time, I went to the Olympiad with my school's team. We had worked hard, but this was the state competition. It would be hard to win. The Olympiad was out of town, so we got to ride on a bus and stayed in a hotel for a night. 

The Olympiad was in three big rooms. When we got there, we set up our team's "camp" off to one side. The big day had come at last! First, I went to watch the tower building competition. That's when students build small towers and put heavy things on top of it. They hope they can hold them up. One of my schoolmates was putting things on her tower. She was nervous, and in the end it was too heavy for her tower to hold it—it broke! I felt bad for her. After lunch, I helped some teammates with their events. One was geography, and the other was history. I don't know much about those things, so I just watched my teammates do most of the work. At last, it was time for my favorite event—forestry. Another student was also in the forestry event. The rules were easy. We had to look at more than 40 different kinds of leaves and find out which plants they were from. We also had to answer some questions about the uses of each leaf. I knew almost all of the leaves and could answer most of the questions. I had spent more than a month studying on the Internet to get ready. 

In the end, it was time for the awards (颁奖), l was nervous, because the forestry awards were last. We won second place in the whole state! A nice man gave me a medal and smiled at me. 

I had a great time at the Science Olympiad. I can't wait for next year!