Among all the pen productions, writing brush (máo bǐ) is a kind of special writing tool made in China mainly. Archaeologists(考古学家) said that writing brush or some pens like brush first appeared more than 5000 years ago. It wasn’t widely used until the Warring States Period (476BC—221BC). Hengshui, Xuancheng and Huzhou were three centers for making writing brushes in Chinese history. People in the hometown of writing brush—Hengshui—still celebrate the invention of brush every year.

A writing brush includes two important parts and materials used to make each part are quite different. Materials for the head part includes rabbit hair, horsehair, pig hair and soon. If you want to buy a Chinese brush as a gift for your friends, you can choose the one with soft hairs, mixed hairs or hard hairs according to their writing styles. There’s also a tradition that Chinese people like to make a writing brush from the first haircut a baby gets. It’s believed that a writing brush made from the hair of newborn babies will bring good luck while taking exams. As for stalks(笔杆), normal materials are usually wood, but we can also see some special ones made from ivory, gold and some other valuable materials.

It is considered that writing brush is the most important one among Four Treasures of Chinese Study. The other three are ink stick, paper, and ink stone. In Chinese calligraphy(书法) and Chinese painting, writing brush is widely used. In old China, children had to learn calligraphy and try to write a good handwriting. Even the emperors(皇帝) themselves were good at calligraphy. Nowadays, Chinese people still practice calligraphy with writing brush from a very young age. When writing, many people will forget all worries and even themselves, turning all thoughts into the beauty of art. People think it helps improve a person’s temper(脾气). It is not only a means of communication, but also a means of expressing a person’s inner world.

Beggar’s Chicken (叫花鸡) is a traditional dish in Changshu, Jiangsu Province. Is it a dish made for a beggar? Don’t be tricked (被欺骗) by its name.

Beggar’s Chicken is a dish with an interesting story. Once upon a time, a hungry beggar was looking for some food on the street but he couldn’t find anything. Suddenly, he saw a chicken, and he caught it. However, he was so poor that he didn’t even have a pot to cook it. Moments later he got an idea. He killed the chicken. Then he used lotus leaves and mud (荷叶和泥) to cover the whole chicken and put it on fire to cook. About two hours later, he took the chicken out of the mud and lotus leaves, and began to eat it. To his surprise, it tasted very delicious. Soon this new way of chicken cooking became popular, and people gave this dish a strange but interesting name—Beggar’s Chicken.

Today, Beggar’s Chicken is still popular for his special way of cooking and taste. Do you think it’s interesting? Do you like eating it?

Play is the basic business of childhood, and in recent years research has shown the great importance of play in the development of a human being. From earliest infancy(婴儿), every child needs opportunity and right materials for play, and the main tools of play are toys. The main function of toys is to suggest, encourage and play. To succeed in this, they must be good toys, which children will play with often, and will come back again and again. Therefore, it is important to choose suitable toys for different stages of a child’s development.

In recent years, research on baby development has shown that the standard a child is likely to reach, within the range of his inherited(遗传的) abilities, is largely determined in the first three years of his life. So a baby’s ability to benefit from the right play materials should not be underestimated. A baby who is encouraged, talked to and shown things and played with, has the best chance of growing up successfully.

In the next stage, from three to five years old, curiosity knows no bounds. Every type of suitable toys should be made available to the child, for trying out, experimenting and learning, for discovering his own particular ability: Bricks and jigsaws(七巧板) and construction toys; painting, scribbling(涂鸦) and making things; sand and water play; toys for imaginative and pretending play—the first social games for learning to play and get on with others.

But at the third stage of play development—from five to seven or eight years old—the child is at school. But for a few more years play is still the best way of learning, at home or at school. It is easier to see which type of toys the child most enjoys.

Until the age of seven or eight, play and work mean much the same to a child. But once reading has been mastered, then books become the main source of learning. Toys are still interesting and valuable, which lead up to new hobbies, but their significance has changed to a child of nine or ten years old, toys and games mean, as to adults, relaxation and fun.