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（嬰兒）, 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（遺傳的）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（涂鴉）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.
小題1: What does the writer want to tell us in the first paragraph?
Children should choose toys by themselves.
Children like playing, but they don’t need any toys.
Children should be given different toys as they grow up.
Children should be given the same toys as they grow up.
58．According to the passage, we can give the child every kind of toys ________．
| A．when he is two | B．when he is around four |
| C．when he is six | D．when he is eight |
小題2:When a child is seven years old, what is the main source of learning?
| A．Toys. | B．Books. | C．Jigsaws. | D．Paintings. |
小題3: What is the article mainly about?
| A．The importance of schooling. |
| B．The choice of toys for children. |
| C．The importance of pre-school education. |
| D．The role of play in a child’s development. |
d, it needs care all year. In the summer it must be cut many times to keep its shape. This cutting also helps the bush grow. In the winter the bushes don’t grow. The gardeners have to brush snow of the plants, or snow may hurt some parts of them.
