If you have a brother or a sister, you already know you are different from each other. You live together in the same house and have the same parents. {#blank#}1{#/blank#}． Why is this? One possible reason is the way your parents treat you.

    First—born children receive all the attention from their parents. Most families have much more photos of a first—born than any other child. Parents give them more responsibility（责任）.{#blank#}2{#/blank#}． As a result, first—borns are often responsible, hard—working and serious. They often want to do well at school and work.{#blank#}3{#/blank#}． For example, Gorge Bush, George Washington, and Lyndon Baines Johnson are all first—born.

    When a second child arrives, parents are more relaxed. The second child is allowed to be more independent. But he also has to compete with the first—born for the parents' attention and love. These children often choose different sports and hobbies to show independence.{#blank#}4{#/blank#}． They are often adventurous（爱冒险的）, fun—loving, and outgoing, but can be jealous（好嫉妒的）and get angry easily.

    The youngest child is the happiest. He has fewer responsibilities and more freedom. These children do not feel pressure to do well at school and work, but have to be creative to get their family's attention.{#blank#}5{#/blank#}．So, many famous talk—show hosts and comedians were born last.

阅读短文，根据短文内容，选择适当的句子完成短文，使文章通顺。

A. There are more first-born American presidents than second or last-born children.

B. They are often friendly,humorous and calm.

C. But you have different personalities(个性）.…

D. And they develop different personalities.…

E. They depend on the first-borns to look after younger brothers and sisters?

    Stephen Hawking was born in Oxford, England on 8th January, 1942. He went to school in St Allbans, a small city near London. ⑴尽管他做得很好，但是拿不到第一名。

    After leaving school, Hawking went first to Oxford University where he studied physics and then went to Cambridge University where he studied cosmology(宇宙学). As he himself admits, he didn't work hard. He was a very lazy student, and did very little work. However, he still got high marks.

   ⑵ 在他20岁的时候，他的身体出毛病了。 He started to knock into things. When he visited his family at Christmas time, his mother was so worried that she made him see a doctor. Hawking was sent to hospital for tests. Finally, the result came back. Hawking had motor neuron disease（运动神经元病）. ⑶The illness would make him unable to speak, breathe or move without the help of a machine. Doctors said they had no way to help him. He would die before 23.

    At first, Hawking became very sad. After a while, though, he began to see his life in a different way. As he later wrote, “Before my illness was diagnosed(诊断), I had been very bored with life. There had not seemed to be anything worth doing. But shortly after I came out of hospital, ⑷I suddenly realized that there were a lot of valuable things I could do.” Then Hawking got married and found a job at Cambridge University as a professor. ⑸He strongly believes that his story shows that nobody should lose hope, no matter how bad their situation is. “Life is not fair.” He once said. “You just have to do the best you can in your own situation.”

⑴{#blank#}1{#/blank#}⑵{#blank#}2{#/blank#}⑶{#blank#}3{#/blank#}⑷{#blank#}4{#/blank#}⑸{#blank#}5{#/blank#}

The seed vault(种子地窖)

    A lot of countries need different kinds of seeds so that they can plant them again. There is an important reason for this, Sometimes plants can't grow in a country because of bad weather or disease, so farmers need new seeds.

    You can keep seeds in a" seed vault". It's a place at a special temperature. The seeds don't grow, but they can live for a long time. Norway has the biggest seed vault in the world ﹣the Svalbard Global Seed Vault﹣and it has seeds from a lot of different countries.

    The vault is on the island of Spitsbergen. The island is about one thousand kilometers from the North Pole. It's a very cold place so it's good for seeds. Above the ground, the doorway is small, but inside, the building is huge. You walk down a long corridor (走廊), which is one hundred and thirty meters inside a mountain. At the end of it, there are three large areas with seeds.

    There are about half a million kinds of seeds inside the vault. For example, there are kinds of seeds for rice from Asia and Africa, 32 kinds of seeds for potatoes from Ireland and seeds for different tomatoes from the USA.

    The seed vault has space for a lot more seeds. You can put about 2.2 billion(十亿)seeds inside. The seeds can live here for thousands of years because of the cold temperature of ﹣18℃. So in the future, humans can grow any seed they want. In other words, the seed vault is the difference between life and death.

    Alice and John are in the music club at their school. Alice plays the violin and John plays the drums. There are two groups in the school music club: the training group and the concert group. Everyone starts in the training group!

    "When I first started to play the violin it sounded terrible!" Alice said. "My family asked me to practice outside."

    After a year's practice, Alice and John play much better. Now, they are both in the concert group and they are learning more difficult music. "We're learning the music from the film Pirates of the Caribbean. It sounds fantastic!" John said. "Playing in the club with other kids is a lot of fun."

    Playing an instrument (乐器) is not only fun. It also helps children learn to concentrate (集中注意力). "I have to concentrate when I'm practicing," Alice said. "And now it's easier for me to concentrate on my schoolwork."

    Playing an instrument can also help children become more confident. As John said, "I was scared when I played in front of a lot of people for the first time. But now I really enjoy it."

    The salmon (大马哈鱼) is a very strange fish. It is born in a river. But the young salmon takes two years to swim down the rivers towards the Pacific Ocean. {#blank#}1{#/blank#} Then it returns to the river where it was born. A grown-up salmon weighs about 25 pounds and is nearly three feet long. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} When it is almost time to lay eggs，both male and female salmons begin a great journey. Each salmon is heading for the river where it was born. A salmon may be a thousand miles from where its life began. Yet it is able to return to that place.

    {#blank#}3{#/blank#}The salmons are food for some other fish. Some are caught by fishermen. The salmons that are left keep swimming. After they enter the rivers, they head upstream(向上游). If rocks and waterfalls are in their way, the salmons leap(跳) over them. {#blank#}4{#/blank#} It leaps by swimming at full speed under water, then rising to the surface. Almost the whole body of a salmon is made of muscles. It is these powerful muscles that make the salmon fit for fast swimming, quick turning, and high leaping out of the water.

    Some salmons reach the river in summer, others in the early autumn. {#blank#}5{#/blank#}

A.  As the salmons swim, larger fish attack them.

B.   For another two years it lives in the sea and becomes full grown.

C.  They have swum hundreds, even thousands of miles to return.

D.  The female salmon will not lay eggs in the Pacific Ocean.

E.   A salmon can leap up a fall as high as 10 feet.