There are many fruit and vegetable gardens across the countryside. More students, at Madison Elementary School, are growing their own food in the gardens.

 The vegetables are washed. Then kids can eat them at a salad party. They are also sold in the school dining hall for lunch. This month, students will plant tomatoes, potatoes, carrots, broccoli(西兰花) and strawberries.

 Why are students learning how to grow food? Teachers want kids to learn healthy eating habits. Healthy food gives us energy. We need energy to grow.

 Many kids are now trying new food and learning how to grow food. Lisa is the parent volunteer of the program. She says a lot of students have told her, “I like salad. I didn't think I liked salad!” Then those students have gone home and asked their parents to buy vegetables that they have tried at school.

 Lisa's daughter, Lucy, is one of those students. She is in Grade Two.“I love the garden,”she says.“I didn't really like vegetables before we had the garden. Then we found out that gardening is cool. Now I like vegetables. My favorite vegetable is carrots.”

    Several days ago, Brenda had a car accident that led to one of her legs being cut off. Since then she didn't talk to anyone.

     “I wish I could bring her friends to visit her,” said Brenda's mother. “But it's a long bus trip.” The nurse smiled, “Don't worry. We have a plan.”

    Later that day, the nurse had taken Brenda to another room. “Here's your new roommate, Annie Wiggle-Do,” the nurse introduced a dark-hair teenager on the other bed.

    As soon as the nurse left, she jumped out of her bed with her only foot and sat at the other end of Brenda's bed, “I lost my leg from bone cancer,” she said. “What happened to yours?” Brenda was so shocked that she couldn't say a word. “You're lucky.” Annie continued. “You've still got your knee. They had to take mine.”

     “I'd like to have a chat with you, but my friends are coming any time now, so I have to get ready.” Annie said when she took off her hair! Her head was completely bald(秃头的).

     “Oh, I forgot to tell you, the medicine they gave me to kill the cancer also killed my hair.” Annie looked out her wigs(假发), brown and yellow, short and long, straight and curly.

     “That's why I thought up ‘Annie Wiggle-Do'.” Annie smiled. “Get it? Any wig will do? Annie Wiggle-Do?” “When Annie's friends came, she introduced Brenda to them all. Before long, Brenda started chatting with Annie and her friends. They didn't make her feel like a strange person at all!

    The girls shared their names with each other. When it was time to go to bed, Brenda said, “Good night, Annie-Wiggle-Do. Can't wait till morning.”

    Once upon a time, there was a tree which wanted to become a treasure box. One day, a farmer cut it down and sold it to a carpenter(木匠). The tree was happy because he thought the carpenter would make it into a treasure box.

    To its surprise, the carpenter made it into a feed box for animals. The tree felt very disappointed because that was not its dream. Several years later, the feed box was thrown away. Someone picked it up and placed it into an old temple. The tree forgot its dream little by little.

    One day, a couple came to the temple. The woman gave birth to a baby boy. There wasn't a bed in the temple. So they placed the baby in the feed box. They loved him and regarded him as their treasure. The tree suddenly realized that it became a real "treasure box" at that time.

    Sometimes you may think your dream will not come true. Don't forget your dream. It may be realized in another new way.

    Grace Murray was born on December 9, 1906 in New York City. In 1928 she finished her education in Vassar College in Maths and Physics. Since 1931, she had been teaching at Vassar and continued her study at Yale University, where she achieved a lot in Maths in 1934.

    In 1930, Grace Murray married Vincent Foster Hopper. They were happy together for 15 years. She taught at Vassar College until 1943, when she joined the United States Navy(海军)to help her country during World War Ⅱ.Then she was given a job at the Bureau of Ships Computation Project at Harvard University, where she worked on the Mark series of computers.

    In 1945, she began to do research in Applied(应用)Physics at Harvard's Computation Laboratory. In 1949 she joined the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation and worked with people working in it. Years later, she returned to the Navy. She retired in 1971 but continued teaching for the computer development. Brewster Academy, a school in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, the United States, gave its computer lab to her for free in 1985, calling it the Grace Murray Hopper Centre for Computer Learning. She had spent her childhood summer at a local family in Wolfeboro. She passed away in her sleep in 1992. Since her death, her workmate Elenor Briggs has been going on with her work.

    Grace Murray was a great woman and a leader in the computer development. Her work helped improve the use of computer languages. She practised her words" Dare and Do" in her lifetime.

    Ben lives in a big house in the country with his family. His house is not near a town. It is twenty miles away from the nearest town. There are a lot of people in his family. They are Ben, his two sisters, his brother and his parents. His house has two floors. There are four bedrooms, a living room, a dining room, a kitchen and two bathrooms. He'd like to have his own bedroom but he shares a bedroom with his younger brother, Simon. His two sisters, Gina and Annie have their own bedrooms. Their house has a big yard with lots of flowers. He likes playing in the yard with his brother and sisters. At weekends his school friends often come to visit. They play in the yard, or in his room if it rains. Their house is a nice place to live in. He has a lot of fun with his family and friends in his house.

    Long ago, Bluebird's feathers were the colour of dust. She did not like her ugly colour. She was attracted by the colour of the lake near her home. It was as blue as the sky after a storm. Bluebird wanted to be the colour of that beautiful lake very much. Flapping her wings one morning, Bluebird flew from her tree to the blue lake. Then she bathed in the water three times. After each bath, she sang, "Blue water. Still water. I went in. I am blue." Bluebird repeated this every morning. On the third day, she came out of the lake with beautiful blue feathers.

    Now Coyote was a trickster(骗子)—and hungry too. He stayed behind Bluebird's tree for a long time every day and watched her go to the lake. He pretended(伪装)to be interested in everything she did. He wanted Bluebird for lunch, but he was afraid of the blue water. On the third morning, Coyote saw Bluebird come out of the lake with beautiful blue feathers. Impressed, he sat next to Bluebird's tree and waited for her. When she returned, he asked, "How did you get blue feathers? I want to be blue like the mountains too." Bluebird didn't believe Coyote, but she taught him how to bathe three times each morning and how to sing her song. Coyote did what she said, and after three days of bathing in the lake, his white fur turned deep blue.

    Convinced(确信的)that blue fur was even more beautiful than blue feathers, Coyote forgot all about being hungry. He ran as fast as he could to the top of the hill. Standing on his back legs, he raised his front legs off the ground and howled. But Coyote slipped(滑倒)and rolled down the hill. He couldn't stop himself, and the dust and dirt covered his new blue fur. He rolled and rolled until he hit into Bluebird's tree heavily. No matter how much he tried, foolish Coyote could not shake the dust from his fur. And so the fur of all coyotes had the dull colour of dust to this very day.