Mr. King is from America. He and his wife are teachers. They teach English in a middle school in Beijing. They have two daughters. They are twins. Their names are Lucy and Lily. They're twelve. They look the same. They are students, but they are in different schools. Their family has two bikes and a car. One bike is for Lily, the other is for Lucy. Mr. and Mrs. King go to work in their car. They have many friends in China. They sometimes go to the friends' home for supper（晚餐）.

    Two days ago, I had taken a test in Biology, and I knew that I would get my scores in the same class today.

    After the bell rang, every students sat in his or her seat impatiently. Then, one by one, the teacher called our names.

    As each paper was given back to the correct student, the front of the answer paper would always be turned to face the ground and the paper itself would be slightly folded (折叠) to prevent anyone from seeing.

    In fact, folding each test paper is a way to make sure that each student sees only his or her own scores. The scores are seen as private information not to be announced or shown to others. As a way to keep the students' score records secret, each student is given an online account (帐号) with which to check his or her grades posted on the official school website.

    Protecting students' private information always comes first in US schools that want to free students from unnecessary pressure. Academic (学业上的) reports are guarded closely to prevent poor academic grades from damaging a student's dignity and reputation (有损学生的尊严和声誉), which are for himself or herself only.

    However, some insist that although students' feelings and self-dignity are easily hurt, they cannot be forever protected. They say that school also teach their students to make themselves stronger in mind, and the classroom should show the reality of competition in society. Scores that everyone can see might better encourage students to work harder to be better than others.

    Hello. I am a dog and my name is Happy. My owner (主人) is Nancy. She loves me very much and she likes to dress me up. So I have many nice clothes.

    In the morning, Nancy always gets up early and makes breakfast for me. I usually get up at eight and then enjoy breakfast. I eat quickly so I can take a walk with her in the park after breakfast. At nine, we get back home. She cleans her room and then goes to work. I stay at home and play with my ball. When Nancy doesn't work, she takes me to go out to have a good time. When we go somewhere, Nancy usually puts (放) me in a bag. It is easy for her to take me in that way. I live a happy life with Nancy and I love her very much.

    It's Monday today. When Alice gets up in the morning, she finds everything is white. It's snowing. It looks very cold. So she puts on a warm sweater. After having some milk and bread for breakfast, she wants to ride her bike to school. But her mom tells her not to do that because there's too much snow on the road. Then she walks to school. There's a P. E. class on Monday. Alice is very happy because she can play with snow with her friends.

    On 19th September 1783, Pilatre De Rozier, a scientist, sent the first hot air balloon. The passengers were three animals and the balloon stayed in the air for about 15 minutes before hitting back to the ground.

    The first manned(载人的) flight was about 2 months later, with a balloon made by 2 French brothers. The balloon flew for a period of 20 minutes.

    Sailing through the sky in the balloon, high above buildings and trees, you can't feel or hear the wind because you're traveling in the same direction and at the same speed as it is.

    A hot air balloon has three main parts: the balloon, called an envelope; a basket, where passengers ride; and a burner system, which supplies the hot air.

    Most balloon envelopes are made of strong, lightweight nylon(尼龙). They are different in size and shape, but they have to be really, really big to lift even one person. Most weigh more than an adult man.

    The basket is usually made of wicker(柳条), which is strong but not too hard. It needs to bend a bit for a soft landing, just like a good jumper bends her legs instead of keeping them straight when she lands.

    The hot air balloon works on the theory that hot air rises faster than cooler air. When the burner system is turned on, it makes a noisy sound, but once the balloon is flying, the burner can be turned off. The air in the envelope will then cool, and the balloon will slowly go down unless the pilot starts the burner system again.

    To control a hot air balloon, a pilot adds hot air to it to go up or lets the air out to go down until he finds a wind blowing in the direction he wants to fly. But no matter which way the wind blows, the passengers have an amazing bird's-eye view of the world.

    Have you ever seen Korean writing before? In many people's eyes it looks lovely but difficult. Do you know the history of this special alphabet?

    Long ago, Korean people didn't have its own alphabet. At that time, Koreans used Chinese characters. Because Chinese is hard to learn, only rich people had the money and time to find teachers to teach them.

    One of their kings was called Sejong. He decided to invent a Korean alphabet.

    He thought hard. One day, on October 9,1446, he looked at a window frame and shouted: "I know what our alphabet should be!" He got the idea from the frame and invented characters of all the same size, like they were put in a frame.

    Hunmin Chongum, the earliest Korean alphabet was born.

    King Sejong said," Chinese characters can't express Korean meanings. These letters are very easy to learn. It is my hope that they can help all people learn to read."