An old farmer lived with his grandson. Each morning, the ________ got up early and read the Bible(圣经).

One day the grandson asked, “Grandpa! I try to read the book like you, ________ I can’t understand it, and I forget it easily. What’s the ________ of reading it?” The grandfather said, “Take this coal(煤炭)basket down to the ________ and bring me back a basket of water.” The boy did as his grandfather ________, but all the water ran when he got home. The grandfather ________ “You’ll have to move faster next time.”

This time the boy ________ faster, but again the basket was empty. He told his grandfather that it was ________ to carry water in a basket. He wanted to use a bottle instead, but the old man said, “I just want a basket of water. You’re not ________ hard enough.” The boy wanted to show his grandfather that the water would surely run. He again put the ________ into the river and ran hard. But there wasn’t anything in it again. He said ________, “Look, grandpa. It’s useless!” “Watch the basket.” said the grandfather.

For the first time the boy ________ the basket was different. It had changed from a dirty coal basket into a ________ one, inside and out.

“Boy, you might not understand or remember ________ when you read the book, but when you read it, you will be ________, inside and out. That’s what you got from it.”

Yellow Dress

By Janet Lee

Mary had a yellow dress

Bought from the department store.

It looked as beautiful as the moon,

And as bright as the sun.

Mary wore all the time

The yellow dress I felt so right.

Every day from day to night

I saw her in the dress so bright.

“Buy me a yellow dress,”

I cried to Mom and Dad,

“As beautiful and bright

As the dress the girl living near has!”

I cried and cried and cried,

Until they said with sad eyes,

“We need food for your baby sister,

And clothes for your coming brother.”

Since then I’ve learned

Mary’s yellow dress

Is better to dream of

Than to ask for.

With her eyes always feeling tired as she prepared for an exam, 16-year-old Sun Ran went to the hospital with her parents in January. She was shocked when she found out that her eyesight dropped from 5.0 to 4.6. “Some of my friends have had the same experience recently,” Sun said.

In fact, poor eyesight among Chinese primary and high school students went up from 59.2 percent to 70.6 percent in the first six months of 2020, according to the Ministry of Education (教育部).

To protect students’ eyesight, the Chinese government has worked out new requirements (要求) that will take effect on March 1st, 2022. For example, according to the requirements, the size of text in students’ textbooks should not be too small. Teachers should also avoid using projectors (投影仪) or other teaching helpers that are too bright, Beijing Daily reported.

There are also requirements for desks and classroom lights. For example, these lights should give off as little blue light as possible. Blue light is bad for our eyes, as it can kill the photoreceptor cells (感光细胞) we need for vision, according to Harvard Medical School. Many of the electronic products (电子产品) we use every day, such as our phones and computer screens, give off blue light.

What about other rules? The government has taken action to protect students’ eyesight in China. In May 2020, the National Health Commission (国家卫生健康委员会) asked schools to make sure that students should have at least two hours of outdoor activities a day.

One day, I saw a boy shop alone at the shop I worked. He chose some school things he wanted and went to the checkout.

The young shop assistant told him he needed to pay $37.60. The boy became very sad and said he only had $20. He took out one thing at a time, and at last he got down to his $20. With eyes full of tears, he asked if he could call his mom to get him home. When he got through, it sounded like his mom was too busy to arrive at once.

He tried not to cry and walked outside to sit on the chair in front of the shop. This was too much for the young assistant. She kept looking outside to see if the boy was all right. Then she said, “I wish I could pay for the rest of his things.” One of the other girls said she had a few dollars. Then two others said they could help, too.

These four young girls pooled their money and found they had more than enough to pay for the boy’s things. Then they chose more school things, and gave them all to the boy. The boy laughed happily. His mom arrived much later, but he didn’t just run to the car, he ran back into the shop and called out, “Thank you!”

I was so proud of my team that day. They did something wonderful for that boy and also found the happiness of giving.

In 2003, China sent its first astronaut, Yang Liwei, into space. Since then, 13 Chinese astronauts have “reached for the stars”. Zhai Zhigang, Wang Yaping and Ye Guangfu are three of them. They carried out the latest Shenzhou XIII mission. And they gave us a wonderful live class from the Chinese space station on 9th this month. Have you ever dreamed of becoming an astronaut like them? How did they get there?

To be an astronaut, you need to be very healthy. Good eyesight, a strong heart and lungs are important. You’d better not have other small problems. For example, a decayed tooth could get worse in space and bring trouble to astronauts, as Pang Zhihao, a space scientist, told the Beijing Morning Post.

You also need to become stronger with hard training. You must fly more than 600 hours without accidents. Besides, you need to build your muscles as strong as athletes by running and swimming. You will also wear a 200-kilogram suit and do tasks underwater for six or seven hours without eating or going to the toilet. This is like doing tasks during a spacewalk.

Knowledge is important as well. Astronauts take 60 courses to get ready for a mission, including math, English, spacecraft design, physics and many more. So they will know what to do when emergencies happen during the mission.

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Nowadays Wechat is more and more popular. I often talk to my English friends     46     Wechat to help me speak English better than before. And I can read lots of information. However, Wechat brings me some trouble     47     well. Some friends use     48     of the real things to tell what they sell is really good, but I am     49     angry about those advertisements(广告). Because some of them may be not true. As an old saying goes, “    50     is believing.” I know people are cheated(被欺骗) by some news easily. So I am thinking about never using Wechat on my phone again. Every coin has two sides, what’s your idea about Wechat?