Question:
Read the text and answer the questions.
Victoria married her first cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, in 1840. Their nine children married into royal and noble families across the continent, tying them together and earning her the sobriquet "the grandmother of Europe". After Albert's death in 1861, Victoria plunged into deep mourning and avoided public appearances. As a result of her seclusion, republicanism temporarily gained strength, but in the latter half of her reign her popularity recovered. Her Golden and Diamond Jubilees were times of public celebration.

Victoria later described her childhood as "rather melancholy". Her mother was extremely protective, and Victoria was raised largely isolated from other children under the so-called "Kensington System", an elaborate set of rules and protocols devised by the Duchess and her ambitious and domineering comptroller, Sir John Conroy, who was rumoured to be the Duchess's lover. The system prevented the princess from meeting people whom her mother and Conroy deemed undesirable (including most of her father's family), and was designed to render her weak and dependent upon them. The Duchess avoided the court because she was scandalised by the presence of King William's bastard children, and perhaps prompted the emergence of Victorian morality by insisting that her daughter avoid any appearance of sexual impropriety. Victoria shared a bedroom with her mother every night, studied with private tutors to a regular timetable, and spent her play-hours with her dolls and her King Charles spaniel, Dash. Her lessons included French, German, Italian, and Latin, but she spoke only English at home.
1. Did Victoria live a long life?
2. Who did she share a room with as a child?
3. Did she attend a regular school as a child?
4. How was she educated?
5. What toy is she known to have used as a child?
6. Did she have any pets as a child?
7. What was the name of the dog?
8. What language was spoken in her home as a child?
9. How many other languages did she study?
10. What were they?

Numbered answers:
1. unknown
2. Her mother.
3. No
4. Studied with private tutors to a regular timetable.
5. Dolls
6. A King Charles spaniel.
7. Dash
8. English
9. Four
10. French, German, Italian, Latin

Question:
Read the text and answer the questions.
Edda, a Little Valkyrie's First Day of School

Written and illustrated by Adam Auerbach.

32 pp. Christy Ottaviano/Holt. $15.50.

Edda's home is in Asgard, "a land full of magic and adventure." But Edda, the littlest Valkyrie, doesn't have quite enough to do, until her father flies her "all the way to Earth for the first day of school."

The contrast between home and school is hard to get used to (in one, she can ride reindeer; in the other she gazes guinea pig through glass at the classroom). In his first picture book, Auerbach mixes the two worlds perfectly. Children are likely to appreciate the joke.

Planet Kindergarten

By Sue Ganz-Schmitt. Illustrated by Shane Prigmore.

32 pp. Chronicle. $14.99.

After careful preparations and a successful blastoff, a boy finds himself in a very unfamiliar environment. "We're aliens from many galaxies on Planet Kindergarten," he reflects as he sees his very varied classmates for the first time.

Prigmore, who designs for the movie industry, uses black backgrounds and bright colors to give this space adventure visual excitement and humor.

The Smallest Girl in the Smallest Grade

By Justin Roberts. Illustrated by Christian Robinson.

42 pp. Putnam. $18.99.

It makes sense that the author of the long, rhyming lines in "The Smallest Girl in the Smallest Grade" is a children's music performer. The story is about the power of one small person to fight prejudice.

Sally, whom no one ever seems to notice, is "paying super extra special attention" to the "terrible stuff" happening around her. When she decides to take action, she's not alone for long.

And Two Boys Booed

By Judith Viorst.

32 pp. Margaret Ferguson/Farrar, Straus & Giroux. $16.59.

Ever felt quietly confident one minute, and a shaking mess the next? In Viorst's story about determination, a little boy wakes up thinking about singing his song in the class talent show.
1. Who is a writer of "Eda, a Little Valkyrie's First Day of School"?
2. Where is Edda's Home?
3. Is she bored?
4. Where does her dad flies her?
5. Who is the illustrator of "Planet Kindergarten"?
6. How much is the cost?
7. How much is the cost of first book?
8. Who is the writer of third one?
9. How much is the cost of it?
10. Who is the illustrator?

Numbered answers:
1. Adam Auerbach
2. Asgard
3. unknown
4. Earth
5. Shane Prigmore.
6. $14.99
7. $15.50
8. Justin Roberts
9. $18.99.
10. Christian Robinson.

Question:
Read the text and answer the questions.
On 17 March 2003, Robin Cook, Leader of the House of Commons and former Foreign Secretary, resigned from the Cabinet in protest against the coming war in Iraq. His resignation speech inspired the first long applause in the history of the House and marked the end of the ministerial career of one of Labor's most brilliant politicians.

For the previous two years, Robin Cook kept a diary, a personal record of the life of Labor's second term, a diary that forms the center of the narrative . The Point of Departureis Robin Cook's plain account of this extraordinary period in our political history, the most important political publication of the decade. Though surprised by his abrupt dismissal as Foreign Secretary, he became determined to bring about some changes in Parliamentary democracy that he believed was essential if Parliament was to move into the 21stcentury. As Tony Blair told him, "This is the job for you."

Drawing on first-hand experiences in the Commons and the Cabinet, of encounters in conferences, and late night conversations, we follow his gathering disillusionment as the political compass of the government changes to directions which he believes to be completely mistaken: from its failure about Lords reform and its unwillingness to provide leadership for social change, to a foreign policy which has led us away from our responsibility in Europe, into closer relationship with the most right-wing government in American history, and participation in Bush's war on Iraq.

This is the story of a government in power and the tensions between those who govern. But above all it is a story of a politician who truly wanted to bring democracy closer to the people, but who saw a government increasingly separated from the values of himself and his party, and who developed a growing belief that on Iraq, its position was morally, diplomatically and politically wrong.

Robin Cook first entered Parliament as MP for Edinburgh Central in 1974. He held a number of senior positions in Opposition -- Shadow Foreign Secretary, Shadow Health and Social Services Secretary -- before becoming Foreign Secretary in 1997. In 2001 he was appointed Leader of the House of Commons, a position from which he resigned in March 2003 in protest against the coming war in Iraq.
1. Who quit?
2. What did he quit?
3. where?
4. What country was he from?
5. What did he do in his last two years of being in the cabinet?
6. What was he protesting?
7. what did he believe?
8. What happened in the House when he spoke his resignation speech?
9. When did he start working for the Parliment
10. What did Tony Blair say?
Numbered answers:
1. Robin Cook
2. Foreign Secretary
3. Cabinet
4. unknown
5. kept a diary
6. war in Iraq
7. peace
8. applause
9. 1974
10. This is the job for you.