I am Canadian. I started learning French when I was 10 years old. But my whole experience with the language was in the classroom. All of that changed, however, during my last summer of high school. As a 17-year-old girl, I flew across the country by myself for the first time! I headed for Quebec to live in the province with a French-speaking host family, who didn't speak any English. And I would learn French at a local school.

    On the first day of school, all of us students were given a test to determine (测定) our language level. We were required to speak only French all summer.

    I made every effort to communicate in a second language by making new friends, seeing movies and even ordering food from restaurants in French. Though I couldn't understand most of it at the very beginning, the whole experience was exciting and refreshing.

    On weekends, my classmates and I took trips to different places around the province. On one trip, we went whale watching on the St. Lawrence River. Even though it was raining, we could see huge whales swimming around our boat. The most memorable part of our trip was a visit to historic Quebec City. I walked along the stone streets, took pictures of the European-style (欧式的) buildings, and learned some stories there.

    Finally my efforts paid off! At the end of the summer, I was able to communicate pretty well. I couldn't wait to go back to school and talk with my French teacher. Being fully immersed (沉浸)in a French-speaking environment was a valuable learning experience. And it could be the main reason for my improvement in French.

On March 5, Emory University （艾莫里大学）reported that Zhang Yide, a first-year Chinese student committed suicide(自杀) and died at the age of 19. The excellent student suddenly died without warning. 

When Zhang Yide was one year old, his parents divorced(离婚). His mother left him, and he was raised by his father Zhang Yue alone. His father, a former corporate executive(企业高管), left his job to accompany his son. After returning to the countryside, Yide's father taught Yide to read and write. His father recorded all the experiences of Yide through photos and words, and built a "growing up museum cabinet"(成长博物柜) for his child. Yide is an intelligent child. When he graduated from high school, Yide was admitted to Emory University, which is known as "Harvard in the south of the United States". He scored 118 in TOEFL. And he also did very well in some competitions. Everybody thought he was excellent, hard-working and self-disciplined(自律的).

We don't know why he chose to commit suicide. But we have to think about a question: how should we correctly face our problems and difficulties and deal with them?

I have a good friend. {#blank#}1{#/blank#} (he) name is Mike Brown.Here is a photo {#blank#}2{#/blank#} him. Mike is fat because he likes eating {#blank#}3{#/blank#}(hamburger) and ice-cream. Mike and I are in the same class, {#blank#}4{#/blank#} he is my classmate, too. We always do {#blank#}5{#/blank#}(sport) after school. Mike likes playing soccer. He {#blank#}6{#/blank#}(think) it's interesting. He has a soccer ball, {#blank#}7{#/blank#} I don't have one. I think soccer is too difficult. I like ping-pong. It's easy for {#blank#}8{#/blank#} (I). Sometimes, we play baseball with {#blank#}9{#/blank#}(we) friends. It's fun. We don't play basketball. We only watch basketball games {#blank#}10{#/blank#}TV. It's relaxing.

Hello, I'm Susan. This is my schoolbag. {#blank#}1{#/blank#}. They're my favorite colors. There are many things in it. Look! {#blank#}2{#/blank#}. What color is the pencil box? It's yellow. {#blank#}3{#/blank#}. The pen and the ruler are blue. {#blank#}4{#/blank#}. The CD is white. It's David's CD. The jacket is black. It's my jacket. {#blank#}5{#/blank#}. What color is it? It's blue and red.

Dreams. Ambitions (抱负). Everyone has them. 

Some people dream of winning a big prize. Others want to travel around the world...Ellie Stevenson dreams of being a singer. 

Ellie is a seventeen-year-old girl. She lives in a quiet village in the beautiful Yorkshire Dales. She goes to school, has a part-time job in her Dad's shop and enjoys spending time with her best friends, Cassie and Skye. This is the story of Ellie. 

"Pencils down, please!"

I quickly try to finish writing one last sentence but Miss Jones sees me. "Ellie Stevenson! The exam is over!"

"Please, Miss...another thirty seconds... five?"

"Humph!" she says and takes my paper. 

There is nothing that I can do now. I hate biology! I dream of being a singer, like Murphy. I want to study music at A level. 

"You can't study music!" said Dad when I told him at the start of the sixth grade, in September last year. "If you want a good career, you need to study science."

"He's right. The sciences are important, Ellie," agreed Skye. "I'm going to study chemistry, biology, physics and math." 

"Boring! Why don't you study French like me?" suggested Cassie. "Mr. Lake, the French teacher, is great!"

I never told anyone about my dream after that. 

Now here I am trying not to fall asleep as Miss Jones finishes collecting the answer papers after the biology exam. I'm really tired. I close my eyes. I only want to rest for a minute. But soon I'm not in the exam room...

I'm on stage in front of thousands of fans. My fans! They are shouting my name... I start to play the guitar and they all cheer... they sing the words to my latest hit...

"Ellie! Ellie!" Miss Jones's angry voice wakes me up. 

"Eh...? Sorry?"

"It's time to go home!" she says, shaking her head. 

I'm the only person left in the room. Everyone else has already gone. 

I was dreaming... again. 

I feel stupid as I pick up my bag and walk towards the exit. 

Outside, it's raining. It's spring but the sky is grey and miserable (令人难受的). It seems like it will rain forever and I haven't got an umbrella. 

①. . . 

When I look into Murphy's eyes, I know that maybe my dream is just beginning...

I opened our old fridge in the garage and glanced (瞥见) inside, looking for some vegetables to make for dinner. For the past year, we' d lived on my 1 pay while my husband, Mike, was away at graduate school. With three hungry teenagers to 2 , it was a challenge to expand(扩大) our daily cost. Now, one glance at the half-empty fridge made me 3 what I'd done crazily a week earlier.

The Tuesday before 4 , Kathy, my 14-year-old daughter, said that one of her friends wasn't celebrating the holiday because her mother couldn't 5 it. "We could give them our turkey, Mom," she said. "We don' t need 6 since we' re going to Uncle Pat's." How could I explain to her that I was 7 our turkey for Christmas? We didn't have enough money for Mike to come home for Thanksgiving. The kids and I were going to my brother-in-law' s 8 I wouldn't have to spend on a big dinner. How could I afford another 9 before Christmas? We taught our kids to help others. But to help someone else when we could 10 help ourselves? Still, I knew I couldn't say no.

We prepared a bag of vegetables— and the turkey. When we brought Kathy's 11 the food, her mother cried tears of joy. At the time, their happiness made me feel 12 about giving away our turkey. But now, looking into our freezer, I wondered, who' s going to 13 us?

I pushed aside some bags of green beans and corn. Suddenly, something caught my eyes. Lying among the vegetables was a 14 turkey.

I never found out who the kind 15 was. Does it matter? Whoever it was knew exactly what we needed, when we needed it.