Liu Wei is very famous in China because he can play the piano with his toes(脚趾).One day when Liu Wei was only 10 years old, he played a game with some friends. He lost both his arms because of electricity. Liu Wei was very sad when both his arms were cut off after the accident. But soon he had to make a choice.“For people like me, there were only two choices. One was to give up all the dreams, which would cause a quick death. The other was to work hard without arms to live an excellent life.” says Liu Wei. Liu’s dream was to be a pianist. His excellent life included a show on China’s Got Talent and a wonderfulperformance (表演) playing the beautiful Marriage D’amour with his two feet on the piano.

Liu Wei learned to play the piano with his feet. And teaching himself to play the piano with his feet was very hard. Many times he wanted to give up, but his parents went on encouraging him and he wanted to make his parents proud. Maybe you cannot believe that Liu Wei is able to play well only with his toes. The audience were deeply moved and very excited when they watched his performance.

What do you usually do in your free time? Play sports? Watch TV? How about reading books? A famous saying goes like this “Knowledge (知识) is power. And the knowledge is in the books.” Books are important in our life. Reading books is good for us. It can help us to be good at our subjects. Also, it can help us see a new and different world. All the great men like reading, like Zhou Enlai and Lu Xun.

Books are treasure (财富) and we must love them. But before you read, choose (选择) a good one. Ask your parents or teachers about the books to read. Be sure you are interested in them. There are many different kinds of books. I like history because I can learn something from it.

What about you? Young friends, please love books and read them. They are very helpful to you.

Reading is a good habit, but the problem is, there’s too much to read these days, and too little time to read every word of it. There are many skills to help you read more in less time. Here are two skills that I think are quite good.

Preview — if it’s long and hard. Previewing is very useful for getting a main idea of heavy reading — like long magazine articles and business reports.

Here’s how to preview.

Read the first two paragraphs and the last two paragraphs carefully.

Then read only the first sentence of the other paragraphs.

Previewing doesn’t give you all the details (细节). It keeps you from spending time on things you don’t really want or need to read.

Skim — if it’s short and simple. Skimming is a good way to get a main idea of light reading — like popular magazines or the sports and entertainment of your daily paper.

Here’s how to skim.

Get your eyes to move fast. Sweep them across each line.

Pick up only a few key words in each line.

Everybody skims differently. You and I may not pick up the same words when we skim the same piece, but we’ll get a similar (相似的) idea of what it’s all about.

【推荐3】Reading makes one wise, but many adults seldom read. They say they are too busy to have time to read. Sure. They have work to do. They have families to support. But these are only excuses. The fact is that they don’t have a reading habit. A reading habit isn’t something natural. It needs to be trained. And it’s never too late to develop a reading habit. Scientists believe proper books are very important for children to develop a good reading habit. A book in rich colors and with simple patterns(图案) such as lines and circles is a good choice for babies of three months old. They will become interested in the rich colors.

Reading makes one wise, but many adults say they have     1     time to read. They have too many things to do. The fact is that they aren’t     2    to reading. A reading habit needs    3    .Whenever you want to develop a reading habit, it isn’t late. Scientists think even if a     4    baby will also take an     5    in the rich colors.

【推荐2】The Dragon Boat Festival is the day to remember a Chinese national hero, Qu Yuan, who threw himself into the river and died over 2,000 years ago. Old story has said that people, in order to save Qu Yuan, beat drums to drive fish away, and threw zongzi into river to keep the fish from eating his body.

For thousands of years, people have spent the festival by eating zongzi and holding dragon boat races, especially in the southern provinces where there are many rivers and lakes.

The dragon boat races show that many people want to save Qu’s body. Those races are the most exciting part of the festival, with very large crowds of people watching them. The special boats, more than 10 meters long, have colorful “dragon” heads and tails, and each boat carries a team of 20 or 22 players. Every year dragon boat races take place in southeast Asian countries and some western countries, including America, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

【推荐1】Almost every day, we discuss the topic of health, especially for kids. But what is health? Health means eating well, getting enough exercise, and having a healthy weight. Let’s read the following rules. They can help you stay healthy.

①________

We all know that eating fruit and vegetables can help us stay healthy, but many of us only eat our favorite food. Remember that we can only get the nutrition (营养) we need by eating different kinds of food, especially fruit and vegetables.

Drink water and milk most often

Everyone knows that water is important. Besides that, kids need plenty of calcium (钙). To grow strong bones, and milk is rich in it. Every day, you should drink at least three cups of milk, when you are 9 years old or older, you should also try to have less sugary drinks, like soda and coca. They include a lot of sugar. Sugar only includes calorie(热量), not important nutrition.

Listen to your body

When you are eating, notice how your body feels, when your stomach feels comfortably full, stop eating. Eating too much makes you feel uncomfortable. If you do it too often, it can make you unhealthy and fat.

What’s screen time? It’s the amount of time you spend watching TV, movies and playing computer games. 3.The more time you spend on the sitting, the less time you spend playing sports, like basketball, and doing other activities like riding and swimming. Try to spend no more than 2 hours a day on screen time.

【推荐3】Maybe you are an average (一般的，普通的) student. You probably think you will never be a top student.

However, anyone can become a better student if he or she does his or her best.

Here is my advice:

★Plan your time carefully. You should plan your time for such things as eating, sleeping and dressing. Then make a good regular time for studying. But don’t forget to set enough time for tests.

★Keep your study quiet and clean. The study should have a desk, a chair and some study materials, but no games, no radio and no television! When you sit down to study, you can put your heart into it. Make good use of your time.

★Listen to everything that the teacher says. Listening carefully in class means less work later. Taking notes will help you remember what the teacher says.

★Develop a good attitude (态度) to test. The purpose (目的) of a test is to show what you have learnt about a subject. It helps you know what you are not good at. The world will still go on even if you fail in a test, so don’t be too worried.