2 . There was once a boy called Mario who loved to have lots of friends at school. However, he wasn’t sure whether or not his schoolmates were his real friends, so he asked his grandpa for help. The old man told him, “I just have what you exactly need, and it’s in the attic (阁楼). Wait here a minute.” Grandpa left, soon returning as though carrying something in his hand, but Mario could see nothing there. “Take it. It’s a very special chair. It’s rather tricky to sit on because it’s invisible (无形的), but if you take it to school and you try to sit on it. you’ll be able to tell who your real friends are.” Grandpa said.

Mario was curious to know whether it was true or not, so he took the strange invisible chair and set off for school. At break time he asked everyone to form a circle, and he put himself in the middle, with his chair. “Nobody move! You’re about to see something amazing.”

Then Mario tried to sit on the chair. But he missed and fell down onto his back. Everyone had a pretty good laugh. Mario wouldn’t be beaten. He kept trying to sit on the magic chair, and kept falling to the ground…until, suddenly, he tried again and didn’t fall. This time he sat, hovering (悬浮) in mid-air…

Looking around, Mario saw George, Lucas and Diana—three of his best friends, holding him up, so he wouldn’t fall down. Meanwhile, many others he had thought of as friends had done nothing but make fun of him, enjoying his every fall.

Leaving with his three friends, he explained to them how his grandfather had so cleverly thought of a way to show him that true friends are those who care for us, and not just any acquaintance (熟人) who happens to be passing by. Even less would a friend be someone who takes joy in our misfortunes.

3 . One summer night in a seaside cottage, a boy felt himself lifted from bed. Then, with the swiftness of a dream, he was held in his father’s arms out onto the nearby beach. Overhead the sky blazed with stars. “Watch!” Incredibly, as his father spoke, one of the stars moved. In a line of golden fire it flashed across the astonished heavens. And before the wonder of this could fade, another star leaped from its place, then another, plunging towards the restless sea.

“What’s this?” the child whispered.

“Shooting stars. They come every year on a certain August night. I thought you’d like to see the show.”

That was all: just an unexpected glimpse of something mysterious and beautiful. But, back in bed, the child stared for a long time into the dark, knowing that all around the quiet house, the night was full of the silent music of the falling stars.

Decades have passed, but I remember that night still, because I was the fortunate boy whose father believed that a new experience was more important for a small boy than an unbroken night’s sleep. No doubt I had all the usual childhood entertainment, but those are forgotten now. What I remember is the night of the shooting stars, and the day we rode in a caboose (列车末尾的职工车厢), the telegraph we made that really worked, and the “trophy table” in the dining room where we children were encouraged to exhibit things we had found — anything unusual or beautiful — snake skins, seashells, flowers, arrowheads... I remember the thought-provoking (引人深思的) books left by my bedside that pushed back my horizons and sometimes actually changed my life.

My father had, to a marvellous degree, the gift of opening doors for his children, of leading them into areas of splendid newness. This subtle art of adding dimensions to a child’s world doesn’t necessarily require a great deal of time. It simply involves doing things more often with our children instead of for them or to them.

6 . On March 25,2010, Kate and David Ogg heard the words every parent fears: Their newborn wasn’t going to make it. Their twins—a girl and a boy—were born two minutes apart and 14 weeks premature, weighing just over two pounds each. Doctors had tried to save the boy for 20 minutes but saw no improvement. His heartbeat was nearly gone, and he’d stopped breathing. The baby had just moments to live.

“I saw him gasp, but the doctor said it was no use,” Kate told the Daily Mail five years later. “I know it sounds stupid, but if he was still gasping, that was a sign of life. I wasn’t going to give up easily.”

Still, the Sydney couple knew this was likely goodbye. In an effort to cherish her last minutes with the tiny boy, Kate asked to hold him.

“I wanted to meet him, and for him to know us,” Kate told Today. “We’d resigned ourselves to the fact that we were going to lose him, and we were just trying to make the most of those last, precious moments.”

Kate unwrapped the boy, whom the couple had already named Jamie, from his hospital blanket and ordered David to take his shirt off and join them in bed. The first-time parents wanted their son to be as warm as possible and hoped the skin-to-skin contact would improve his condition. They also talked to him.

“We were trying to persuade him to stay,” Kate told the Daily Mail. “We explained his name and that he had a twin that he had to look out for and how hard we had tried to have him.”

Then something miraculous happened. Jamie gasped again—and then he started breathing. Finally, he reached for his father’s finger.

The couple’s lost boy had made it.

“We’re the luckiest people in the world,” David told Today. Eight years later, Jamie and his sister, Emily, are happy and healthy. The Oggs only recently told the kids the story of their birth. “Emily burst into tears,” Kate said. “She was really upset, and she kept hugging Jamie. This whole experience makes you cherish them more.”

7 . It is natural that young people are often uncomfortable when they are with their parents.     1     They often think that their parents are out of touch with modern ways, that they are too serious and too strict with their children, and that they won’t give their children a free hand.

It is true that parents often find it difficult to win their children’s trust and they always forget how they themselves felt when young.    2     It is one of their ways to show they have grown up and that they can face any difficult situations. However, adults worry more easily and most of them plan things ahead.

Young people often make their parents angry with their choices in clothes, in entertainment and in music. But they do not mean to cause any trouble. They just feel cut off from the adults world, and have not yet been accepted into their world.     3     By doing so, they will feel pleased or even proud even if their parents do not like their music, entertainment, clothes or their way of speech.

Sometimes young people are so proud of themselves that they do not want their parents to say yes to what they do.    4     It is natural enough, after being a child for so many years, when they were completely under their parents’ control.

    5     Parents should treat their children as independent individuals. And young people need to communicate with their parents from time to time to narrow the gap between them. If young people have a high sense of responsibility, their parents are certainly glad to see them do what they like to.

9 . Dad’s car pulled into the driveway. I ran to the door. Dad smiled as if he had a secret. “It feels cold to us, but it’s warm and attractive to see a frog. Are you coming?” he asked. I agreed with excitement and then put on my raincoat.

“Hey, look at this one,” Dad shined his light on a green frog the size of his thumb. The frog jumped, its four legs sticking straight out. I found my first frog on a driveway. A bright-green one with shiny skin. I wondered what it would feel like. I could see the frog breathing.

I could imagine a car running over it. I said, “Dad, can you move this one?” “You do it,” Dad said. I looked at the frog. I didn’t want to touch it. But I didn’t want it to get squashed (压扁的). I reached down. It jumped through my fingers. I tried again. Cupping one hand around the frog, I picked it up with the other hand. Its skin felt cold and soft. The frog moved. I walked to the grass and held out my hand. The frog climbed up my wrist. I laughed. Then I gently placed the frog onto the grass.

We walked a couple of blocks. We found lots of frogs-brown ones, green ones and spotted ones. I got better at finding them. If they were on the road, we moved them when traffic was clear. I actually started to like picking them up.

I was ready to go home. Then I saw something moving near a stone wall. Something bigger than a frog. Dad and I shined our lights and crouched. “Is it a lizard (蜥蜴)?” I asked. “No, it’s a salamander,” Dad said. “Hey, I just realized something,” I said. “The animals out tonight—frogs and salamanders—are amphibians (两栖动物). We’d learned about amphibians in school.” “Great observation,” Dad said.

10 . Living on the Florida Emerald Coast, people view a hurricane (飓风) ‘as a common thing. So it is not unusual for a family to have several full gas cans and bottled water stored in their houses all summer.

Though unwilling to evacuate (撤离) from a hurricane, on September 15, my family was forced to leave our home for my grandfather’s house several miles away. We spent the early part of that evening watching the hurricane draw closer on the Weather Channel. Around nine o’clock, a loud sound shook the house, turned over the roof and carried it off. Soon came an indoor rainstorm.

Realizing the damage, my grandfather began to be afraid. The storm had started, but he still ran out into the heavy rain and wind to see how much of the roof was left. We got him back inside. I had never seen him so scared. Mom finally asked him to lie down in his room.

The leak (渗漏) had progressed rapidly. It soon became a race against time to protect what to be saved. Some people may think it necessary to save material things, but I hoped to save those items with emotional value, such as the photos. I still feared the storm, but I more feared the influence it brought.

The next morning, it started to clear up. Thankfully, my family came safely through the storm, though the same could not be said for the house. Only the wooden beams (梁) remained, but inside many of the things were safe. My mom and I had worked tirelessly through the night.

It was late, but we were still unwilling to go to bed. We discussed the rebuilding of the house. Under the beautiful sky, we suggested looking after my grandfather more often in the future. After this disaster, I realized the truth that the hurricane itself was not so terrible if we loved each other.