He was an old manwho fished alone in a small boat on the sea and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish. In the first forty days a boy had been with him. But after forty days without a fish, the boy's parents had told him that the old man was now salao, which is the worst form of unlucky, and the boy had gone with another boat which caught three good fish the first week. It made the boy sad to see the old man come in each day with his boat empty. The sail looked like the flag of failure forever.

      The old man was thin with deep wrinkles (皱纹) in the back of his neck. His face was terribly brown because of the strong sunlight on the sea every day and his hands had the deep scars (伤疤) from dealing with heavy fish on the lines. But none of these scars were fresh. Everything about him was old except his eyes and they were the same color as the sea and were cheerful.

      “Santiago,” the boy said to him as they climbed the bank from the sea. “I could go with you again. We've made some money.”

        The old man had taught the boy to fish and the boy loved him.

      “No,” the old man said. “You're with a lucky boat. Stay with them.”

      “But remember how you went eighty-seven days without fish and then we caught big ones every day for three weeks.”

      “I remember,” the old man said.

     “It was papa who made me leave. I am a boy and I must follow him.”

     “I know,” the old man said. “It is quite normal.”

       "He hasn't mush faith(信心)"                       

     “No,” the old man said. “But we have. Haven't we?”

     “Yes,” the boy said. “Can I offer you a beer on the Terrace?”

    “Why not?” the old man said “Between fishermen.”

A

    My name is Peter. I was born in Paris. When I was three, my family moved to London. We stayed there for one year then my dad had to move to New York. We spent about two years there. I moved to Shanghai last May and I like the new country very much.

    I study at an international school in Shanghai. There are people from nearly all parts of the world. I like my school very much and I can learn many things. I love learning Chinese and keep practising it with my classmates. After school, my favourite sport is football. I like drawing and painting, too.

    Shanghai has four seasons and I like spring best here, because I can go out in the evening and play with my friends. In my hometown, the summers are hotter than Shanghai but the winters are not so cold as t hey are here.

    Shanghai is like a small world where all kinds of people and food can be seen. I like being part of it and I am very happy to stay here.

    One night in November, Itzhak Perlman gave a concert in a theatre. If you have ever been to a Perlman concert, you know that becoming a violinist is not a small 1 for him. He had to walk 2 the help of two walking sticks as a result of the disease he caught as a child.

    People sat 3 while he made his way to his chair and began his play. But this time, something went 4. Just as he finished the first few parts of the music, one of the wrings(弦) on his violin 5. We thought that he would have to stop the concert. But he didn't. 6, he waited a moment, closed his eyes and then 7 the conductor(指挥) to begin again. The orchestra(管弦乐队) began and he played with such strong feeling and purity as they had 8 heard before.

    Of course, everyone knows that it is 9 for a violinist to play a pleasant work with just three strings. I know that, and you know that, 10 that night Itzhak Perlman didn't want to accept that.

    When he finished, there was a terrible 11 in the room. And then people rose and 12 from every corner of the theatre.

    Perlman was excited. He smiled and said, "You know, sometimes it is the artist's task to 13 how much music you can still make with what you have left."

    So, suppose our task in this fast-changing world is to make 14, at first we should try out best with all that we have. And then,    15 it is no longer possible, try to play it with what we have left.

    Can you write down a Chinese word being read to you? Sometimes it can be difficult when you find the word is not included in most dictionaries.

    Lu Jialei, 14, from Hangzhou Foreign Language School, won the CCTV Chinese Character (汉字) Spelling Contest on Oct 18^th, 2013. About 160 people competed. The host read a word to the contestant, explained its meaning and gave sample sentences. The contestant was required to write down the word.

    Winning the contest was a “surprise” to Lu. “I was not the smartest one,” she said. “But I paid attention to details.” To prepare for the contest, she and her teammates studied the Modern Chinese Dictionary for 10 days. There are more than 56,000 entries (词条) including characters, words and phrases in it. She also had a secret weapon. She studied how Chinese characters were formed.

    “When others paid attention to the plot of a story, she looked at how authors use words and sentences to express themselves,” said Su Yunsheng, Lu's Chinese teacher. Su is happy to see students like Lu find the beauty of Chinese language.

    “Besides using something Chinese and having Chinese traditional festivals, learning to write Chinese characters is also an important part of inheriting (传承) Chinese culture,” said Su.

    Bruno was a boy of eight. His father worked in a cinema and his mother worked in a shop. He lived not far from his school. He always walked there and walked home. On his way to school, he had to pass a playground. It was very wet after it rained. One day, when he got home, his clothes were all wet. His mother became angry and said, “Don't play in the water on your way home from school!”

    On the next day, Bruno came home with wet and dirty clothes. His mother became even angrier. “I'll tell your father if you come back wet again,” said his mother. “He'll punish(惩罚) you, you know.”

    The third day the little boy was dry when he came home.

    “You're a good boy today”, his mother said happily. “You didn't play in the water.”

    “No,”the boy said unhappily. “There were too many older boys in the water when I got there this afternoon. There wasn't any room for me at all!”

    My name is Sam. I joined a club called "passing help" last month. Now let me tell you why I joined it.

    One evening this May, on my way home my old car broken down. It was 25 miles from my home. I wanted to get a ride(搭便车), but there was no car. It was also hard to take a taxi. I decided to take a bus home. I went to a bus stop nearby.

    After a while, a bus came, but it did not go to my town. The bus driver was a young woman. She was kind and she told me which bus I should take. I waited there for about thirty minutes, but no bus came. At last a car came to me and a woman came out of the car. She was just the bus driver.

    "When I reached the bus station, I got to know that the bus to your town couldn't come, so I returned here. I just can't leave you here," she said, "Get in my car and l will take you back to your home."

    "It is a long way." I said.

    "Come on, sir," she said, "Let's go."

    On the way she told me a story. A few days ago，there wasn't gas(汽油)  in her car. An old man drove her up to a gas station and then back to her car.

    When we got to my home, I wanted to give her some money to thank her, but she didn't accept. "I only want to help others and do something nice for somebody. Pass it along." she said.