【推荐1】A man is sitting in the doctor’s office. He looks very tired and worried.

The doctor asks the man why he is unhappy, he tells the doctor about his problem. “Please help me, doctor, “he says, “I like football very much. And my life is never such a good one when I become interested in football. But it is getting worse now. I can’t even sleep well at night. When I close my eyes, I’m out there in the football field running after a flying ball. When I wake up, I’m more tired than I was when I went to bed. What can I do?”

The doctor says. “First of all, you have to do your best not to dream about football. Before you are falling asleep, try to think about something else. Try to think you are at a party, dancing with a beautiful girl, and someone is going to give you many dollars!”

“Are you crazy（发疯的）? ”The man shouted, “Then I’ll miss the ball!”

【推荐2】A young man went to the boss (老板) of logging crew (伐木队) and asked for a job.

“Let me see you fell this tree first,” said the boss. The young man took his axe and fell a big tree in a short time. The boss was happy and said, “You can start the job on Monday.”

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday went by, and Thursday afternoon the boss went to the young man and said, “You can get the pay (报酬) today.” The young man was very surprised. He answered, “I thought you would pay on Friday.” “Usually we, ” the boss said. “But I’ll let you go today because you’ve fallen behind (落后). You have dropped (降) from the first place on Monday to the last place today.”

“But I’m quite hard-working.” the young man said, “I am the first to arrive, and the last to leave, and even work during my coffee time!” The boss thought for a minute and asked, “Have you sharpened your axe (磨斧子)?” The young man answered, “No, sir, I work too hard to take time for that!”

Our lives are like this. We sometimes get so busy that we don’t take time to sharpen the axe. There’s nothing wrong with working hard. But we all need time to relax, to think, to learn and to grow. If we don’t spend time relaxing, we will feel bored and fall behind.

Bill is only fifteen years old, but he’s already very rich. Two years ago, Bill began a football website (网站)for young people. “I became interested in computers when I was eight because my father’s job is with computers. As a little boy, I also loved football.    1    

Bill started the “football OK!” website two years ago, and now more than 20,000 people visit it every day.    2     He usually gets up at six and looks at his e-mails. Then he goes to school from nine to fourteen. In the evenings, he always works for about four hours on his website.

    3    “At the moment I am thinking about a new website on American football, maybe for next year,” he said.

And is Bill the same person that he was three years ago?    4    “I have met a lot of interesting people on the website and I have traveled all over the world.” Bill doesn’t know about the future. “Maybe I will sell the website, I really don’t know. I will just wait and see.”

When he is 21, Bill will be a millionaire (百万富翁).    5    

【推荐1】I am Dave. Some of my classmates are talking in the classroom.

Jill: My grandparents live on a farm. I went there with my sister last month. We stayed for seven days. The weather was usually sunny, so most of the time I played outside with my sister. On the farm, I milked cows, fed chickens and rode horses. I had a lot of fun. I think my trip was great.

Mark: I went to Shanghai with my parents. I wanted to visit some museums, but my parents wanted to go shopping. I didn’t like going shopping. So I stayed in the hotel and watched TV all day long. It was really a boring trip.

Anna: I think the best place for a holiday is the beach. I went to Sanya with my brother last year. The sand there was white, and it looked very beautiful. We made a big house with the sand. We swam and enjoyed the sunshine. We ate many kinds of seafood. They were delicious. The trip was great. I hope I can go there again one day.

【推荐2】The World Tourism Organization says that space will soon become a popular place to go on holiday-possibly by 2020. One Japanese company is planning a space holiday centre. It will look like a bicycle wheel and have a very modern hotel for 100 people and a park. It will travel round the Earth at a height of 300km. The company hopes the centre will be ready in 2017. The company manager says he thinks that flying to the centre will probably be quicker than flying from Hong Kong to Singapore. After they arrive at the centre, tourists can take trips to the moon or go for walks in space. What about the cost? Well, the company believes that people will be happy to pay about $100,000f or a trip. But they think that as more people want to go, the trip will become much cheaper.

An American company is also thinking of building a very modern hotel, called the Lunar Hotel, on the moon. Most of the hotel will be under the ground, so it won't become too hot or too cold. The rooms will look just like they do on Earth. The guests will eat normal food for lunch. The cooks will just push a button (按钮) to mix dried food with water to become a meal! There will be little or no dirt (尘土) and there won't be much water. So the hotel won't wash the towels and sheets (床单)-they will be thrown away.

【推荐3】Once Amy said to me, “Travelling alone is a life changing experience.” I travelled alone a lot when I was in my early 20s and I loved it. The experiences of travelling alone really make me more adventurous (有冒险精神的). I think everyone should try at least once in their lives. Now I’m married. I go everywhere with my husband and it’s just not the same. The feeling of being on an adventure has gone. I miss travelling alone.

I then thought of my first solo (单独的) trip to South America. I went to South America and stayed there for six months. I find travelling with other people is not as exciting as travelling alone.I don’t meet adventures with them but I can experience a lot when travelling alone. When travelling by myself, I can choose what I will do next at any time. I can visit a place that I didn’t plan to see before. I can go there without having to agree with anyone first. I try to work out all my problems on my own and I become more independent.

However, there is just one thing that is not so good for me. I always hope that there are good hotels and safe transport routes (路线) in the places I will visit. So every time before I begin my solo trip, I have to make sure the hotel is good and that the transport routes are safe.

【推荐1】I come from Canada and now live in Shanghai, China. I love planes very much and have a lot of model planes. A model of the C919 passenger plane is one of my favourites. The C919 is the first China-made passenger plane. It made its first commercial flight (商业飞行) from Shanghai to Beijing on 28th May this year. The next day, it started regular service (服务), flying between Shanghai and Chengdu. As soon as I heard about the first regular flight, I decided to buy a ticket online. Luckily, I bought one just before they sold out.

However, the flight was so popular that I could only choose a middle seat (座位) on the day of the flight. There were 164 passengers on the plane that day. You could see that everyone was happy to take their home—grown passenger plane. I sat with two plane lovers. To my left was a young man from Chengdu. He flew to Shanghai just to take the first C919 flight back to his home town. To my right was a young plane lover from Hong Kong. He made his way to Shanghai to take pictures of the first commercial flight of the C919. When he knew that the C919 started its service to Chengdu, he quickly bought a ticket.

It was a wonderful flight. But it was too short for me. Luckily, I will take a C919 flight back to Shanghai the day after tomorrow. I can have that wonderful flight again!

【推荐1】I’m Jason. As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a cook. To me, being a cook is better than being anything else in the world. I don’t know why. Neither of my parents has good cooking skills. They both work in a school.     1    

When I was in middle school, once our English teacher asked us to talk about our dreams .I said I wanted to be a cook.     2     I still remember she said that she didn’t believe I would become a cook.

But I did it. I started to work as a cook when I was sixteen, and I am still a cook. I have worked in good restaurants as well as common ones. I’ve seen different kinds of people from different social classes (社会阶层).     3     Even if it’s not such an easy job, it is not the worst, either.

Now I often encourage my children to cook at home. I teach them how to cook and how to appreciate (欣赏) great food.     4     But I’ve never pushed them to choose my job.

I love my job. I love to cook for others.     5     After all these years of hard work, I would still not change if I could go back to the past.

【推荐2】Last Sunday I saw the heaviest storm in years. It came suddenly and went on for more than three hours. After lunch, I went into my room to have a rest. The air was hot, and all was quiet.

Then the strong wind started blowing into my room. Pieces of paper on my desk flew high into the air and some flew out of the open window. As I ran out to catch them, big drops of rain began to fall.

When I came back into the house, it was raining harder. I tried hard to close the window. Then I heard a loud crashing (撞击) sound from the back of the house. I ran out of my room to find out what it was a big tree had fallen down and broken the top of the back room.

【推荐3】The 21-year-old student from the college of Special Education of Changchun University, Jilin Province, Zhan Junyi has been deaf since birth. But he has overcome great difficulties to achieve his dream of becoming a professional dancer, and is now able to hear music through an artificial cochlea(人工耳蜗).

When he was 2, his parents took him to some training courses, and he learned to understand people by reading lips (嘴唇). During the slow and hard process, not only his parents but also some teachers from the training center offered great help to him. Thanks to their lasting efforts and help, Zhan had the chance to achieve as much as someone who can hear Zhan had an artificial cochlea implanted(移植)when he was 4 years old. Then he was able to better understand people with its help.

In the summer of 2008, Zhan watched a dance show of Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva(千手观音)by the China Disabled People’s Performing Art Troupe(剧团)at the closing ceremony of the Beijing 2008 Paralympic Games(残奥会)on TV. Deeply moved by their excellent skill and energy, he began to watch videos of performances and competitions, learned to copy the movements and dreamed of becoming a dancer like them.

After graduating from primary school in 2015, Zhan passed the exam for the troupe and began to learn dance with the other members. To help him keep up, his teacher repeatedly played the drum and told him where the beats and rhythm(节奏)points were. Then, the teacher also guided him by using sign language. What’s more, as his artificial cochlea could easily fall out, he had to wear a headband to help keep it in.

Through lasting efforts and hard work, Zhan came to be perfect at dancing and entered Changchun University to study dance in 2021. In recent years, Zhan has built up lots of experience performing at events such as the opening and closing ceremonies of the Beijing 2022 Winter Paralympic Games and the 2023 Spring Festival Gala(春晚).

After he graduates, Zhan wants to return to the troupe and become a national-level dancer. He hopes to help other children like him to learn how to dance and feel its joy.