My Family Is Very Poor
    A little boy comes to a new city. His name is Peter. Of course（当然）, he lives with his mother and father. His family is very rich（富裕的）. They have a driver（司机） and a lot of servants（仆人）.
    Peter is going to a new school. On the first day his parents say to him, "peter, be modest（谦虚的）at your new school. Don't say we are rich. "And Peter says, "Yes, Dad, mom. ”
    So Peter goes to school. He sees his new teacher. And he sits down with the other children. The teacher says. “Good morning，children. The first exercise today is a composition（作文）. The topic（题目） of the composition is "My Family".So every child writes a composition. This is Peter's composition:
  “My name is Peter. My family is very poor（贫穷）. Both my father and my mother are very poor. Our driver is very poor and all the servants are poor…”

    This year the US will honour(纪念) one of the country's most famous writers—Mark Twain (1835-1910). Most readers know that his real name was Samuel Longhome Clemens, but how many know where the pen name “Mark Twain” came from?

    The answer shows Clemens' colorful early life before he became a writer. “Mark Twain” was the cry shouted on a ship when the ship entered a part of a river that was two fathoms (6 feet) deep. “Twain” is an old-fashioned way of saying “two”. Twain trained as a ship pilot on the Mississippi river for two years, a time that he wrote about in the humourousLife on the Mississippi (1883).

    The famous river would become an important theme in many of his works—who could forget the journey of the Huck and Jim along it in his most famous book. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884)?

    With little education, he had to teach himself how to write stories. Whenever possible, he would go to public libraries. There he spent much time reading and thinking, which greatly helped him with his writing.

    On the other hand, his life experiences gave him wonderful material to write about and attract readers. Twain wrote in a style that has been called “local colour” because it shows great knowledge of local people and their customs.

    Look at this. What's this in English, do you know? Ah, it's a photo. Who's that in the photo? It's Li Yan. Li Yan is my good friend. She is a beautiful girl. Who's that? The boy in black? It's Jim. He is an English boy. He is very cool. He is my friend, too. We are all in Class 3,Grade 7. I like Jim and Li Yan.

B

    It's 14:00. The house is quiet(安静的). "Tom?" Mom says. No one answers.

    Mom comes to Tom's house. He is not in the bed. But his model plane is on the desk. "He is not in his room, and he is not in the yard(院子)," Mom thinks. Then Mom comes to his grandparents' room. Tom likes to play with Grandpa's tape player. But he is not there.

    Mom looks for(寻找) him everywhere. But where is Tom? Mom is worried. She wants to call Dad. She comes to the living room to get the phone.

    "What's that?" Mom sees something(某物) black under the sofa. Oh, it's Paul, Tom's dog. It loves sleeping(睡觉) there. But what is next to Paul? It's Tom!