There are campus museums all over China that offer various collections and make for eye-opening visits.
Beijing Air and Space Museum at Beihang University
Admission: free
Opening hours: Tuesday and Saturday, 9:00 am -12:00 pm
Highlights: Included among the more than 300 historic aircraft and space artifacts are one of the two Northrop P - 61 Black Widows in the world and China's first light airliner, Beijing 1.
Fudan University Museum
Admission: free
Opening hours: Tuesday to Friday, 9:00 am - 11:30 am and 1:30 pm - 4:30 pm
Highlights: A unique collection of native artifacts from the Gaoshan aborigines in Taiwan. Some of them, such as pearl vests, are rarely seen even in Taiwan.
China Ichthyic Culture Museum at Shanghai Ocean University
Admission: 10 yuan
Opening hours: Monday to Friday, 9:00 am - 11:30 am and 1:30 pm - 4:00 pm
Highlights: In this collection of more than 40,000 specimens of about 3,000 ocean-dwelling species, the most eye-catching one is an 18. 4-meter-long sperm whale skeleton.
Yifu Museum of China University of Geosciences
Admission: 40 yuan; half price for students
Opening hours: Monday to Friday, 8:30 am - 12:00 pm and 2:30 pm - 5:00 pm; weekends and holidays, 9:00 am - 4:30 pm
Highlights: It houses a collection of more than 30,000 mineral and rock specimens, more than 2,000 of which are rare ones like the museum's well-known dinosaur fossils.
China Academy Museum at Hunan University
Admission: 50 yuan
Opening hours: Monday to Sunday, 8: 00 am - 6: 30 pm in summer and 8: 30 am - 6:00 pm in winter
Highlights: China's only museum to feature the history of academies and cultural education in the country.
Thomas Cheatham had planned to study Latin during his time at Hebron High School in Texas. But when he learned that the school district was going to offer a Mandarin(普通话) class, he quickly changed his mind.
"I thought Mandarin would be more beneficial than Latin," said Cheatham, who is now in his second year of studying the language.
He speaks Mandarin to order food at Chinese restaurants and can read social media posts from his Chinese-speaking friends. While it's a difficult language to master, the high school junior, who plans to study computer engineering, thinks it will be important for his career. "Chinese is a good language to know, especially with China becoming a growing power," he said.
Many experts agree that proficiency(熟练) in a language spoken by a billion people worldwide will give American students an edge in the global economy.
"People are looking at China as our next economic competitor, and interest in Mandarin is growing fast," said Marty Abbott, director of the American Council(议会) on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. "We're seeing it in all parts of the country."
Abbott predicts that as many as 100,000 students are now studying Mandarin in public and private schools throughout the US. She said the US government has designated (指定) Mandarin as an "important needs" language and provides professional development programs for teachers. "Our government wants to increase our language ability for national security and economic competitiveness," Abbott added.
At the same time, the Chinese government is spreading knowledge of the Chinese language and culture through Confucius Institutes set up in many US states. For example, the Confucius Institute at the University of Texas in Dallas has been the home of a Confucius Institute for 10 years. It sponsors Confucius Classrooms at 21 local public and private schools, where tens of thousands of students are learning Mandarin.
People have different ways of dealing with a common cold. Some take over-the- counter(非处方的) medicines such as aspirin while others try popular home remedies(治疗)like herbal tea or chicken soup. Yet here is the tough truth about the common cold: nothing really cures it.
So why do people sometimes believe that their remedies work? According to James Taylor, professor at the University of Washington, colds usually go away on their own in about a week, improving a little each day after symptoms peak, so it's easy to believe it's medicine rather than time that deserves the credit, USA Today reported.
It still seems hard to believe that we can deal with more serious diseases yet are powerless against something so common as a cold. Recently, scientists came closer to figuring out why. To understand it, you first need to know how antiviral(抗病毒的) drugs work. They attack the virus by attaching to and changing the surface structures of the virus. To do that, the drug must fit and lock into the virus like the right piece of a jigsaw(拼图), which means scientists have to identify the virus and build a 3-D model to study its surface before they can design an antiviral drug that is effective enough.
The two cold viruses that scientists had long known about were rhinovirus(鼻病毒) A and B. But they didn't find out about the existence of a third virus, rhinovirus C, until 2006. All three of them contribute to the common cold, but drugs that work well against rhinovirus A and B have little effect when used against C.
"This explains most of the previous failures of drug trials against rhinovirus," study leader Professor Ann Palmenberg at University of Wisconsin-Madison, US, told Science Daily.
Now, more than 10 years after the discovery of rhinovirus C, scientists have finally built a highly-detailed 3-D model of the virus, showing that the surface of the virus is, as expected, different from that of other cold viruses.
With the model in hand, hopefully a real cure for a common cold is on its way. Soon, we may no longer have to waste our money on medicines that don't really work.
Scientists think that growing garden grass could be the secret to solving our energy needs, and we may soon be able to replace our gasoline with "grassoline".
The team, including experts from Cardiff University in Wales, has shown that hydrogen can be taken from grass in useful amounts with the help of sunlight and a cheap catalyst(催化剂) —something that speeds up a chemical reaction without being used up.
It is the first time that this has been shown and it could lead to a sustainable(可持续的) way of making hydrogen, reported Asian News International. This could be an important kind of renewable energy because it is high in energy and it does not give out harmful gases when it is burned.
Study co-author Michael Bowker said, "This is really a green source of energy. Hydrogen is seen as an important future energy carrier as the world moves from fossil fuels to renewable energy, and our research has shown that even garden grass could be a good way of getting it."
Cellulose(纤维素), which is a key part of plants and the biopolymer(生物聚合物) found in the largest numbers on the earth, could be a great source of hydrogen.
In its study, the team looked at the possibility of getting hydrogen from cellulose using sunlight and a simple catalyst.
This is called photocatalysis(光催化作用) and in it, the sunlight starts the catalyst, which then makes cellulose and water into hydrogen. The researchers studied the effectiveness of three metal-based catalysts, of which nickel(镍) especially interested the researchers, as it is a much more common metal than gold and palladium(钯) and it saves more money.
According to Bowker, producing hydrogen from cellulose using photocatalysis has not been studied in detail. The team's research shows that large amounts of hydrogen can be produced using this method with the help of a bit of sunlight and a cheap catalyst.
The study shows that it is effective to use real grass taken from a garden. "This is important as it avoids the need to separate and clean up cellulose, which can be both difficult and costly," said Bowker.
Word travels quickly in the small fishing village of Port Washington, Wisconsin. So when Mardy McGarry wanted to build a playground for kids with special needs, she knew it wouldn't take long to create interest in the project. But she never expected that a third of the town people would join in it.
"A lot of learning comes through play," says McGarry, a special education teacher for 28 years. She'd seen the wood chips and sand of traditional playgrounds stop wheelchairs dead in their tracks.
When a piece of land became available, the city council agreed to choose a part for a playground.She asked classrooms of kids for their wish list. She also asked experts for help. And she brought on board her friend Sue Mayer, whose eight-year-old son, Sam, has a serious disease.
Her Kiwanis Club chapter came through with $ 7,000, and that's when the grassroots movement really got started. One woman gave $ 25,000 and had her company donate the same amount.There were silent auctions(拍卖) and T-shirt sales. The local Pieper Family Foundation offered to donate half of the remaining $170,000 balance if McGarry could raise the rest. The $ 450,000 covered materials, but the actual construction would cost an additional $ 900,000. Not a choice. But the community could build it.
On September 16, 2008, the first day of construction, they came. Two women heard about the project on the radio on the way to work and took the day off to help.Ten-year-olds sanded surfaces.
Today, Possibility Playground is one of the most popular destinations in Ozaukee County. There's a giant pirate ship, a rock-climbing wall, high and low rings, monkey bars, sandboxes, swings, slides, bridges and so on.
It's exactly what McGarry wanted. People used to ask why she wanted to build a playground just for children with disabilities. "They didn't get it. It's only when you build a playground for children with disabilities that you build one for all children," she said.
A. Soon smaller businesses were helping.
B. All children play shoulder to shoulder.
C. But her students were too often left out.
D. Everyone thought it was really a great wonder.
E. A couple in their 80s operated their own trucks.
F. McGarry started researching play equipment and contacting design firms.
G. They rolled up their sleeves and used their weekdays to bring her idea to life.
My father was born in a small town in the US. He wasn't sure what he wanted from1, but something told him to2and begin a new adventure.
He began that adventure traveling to cities in the US before going on to Australia, New Zealand and the Philippines. He took my mother and us three daughters with him and went wherever the road3him.
It's easy to feel4when you're on the road. We made lots of new friends on our trip - most of them are mechanics, since we often5hours in repair shops. But that was a way much6than sitting by the roadside while waiting for the engine to7when it was 40℃ outside.
Getting along well sometimes seemed8. There were always a lot of9, especially among us back-seat passengers about who had to10in the middle. But even if it was hard, we learned a lot about11. When we were traveling in the Philippines, we drove to Quezon City one day. It should have been an hour's drive but was nearly three thanks to bad roads and12traffic. "Did you put our suitcases in the car?" my father asked my mother as we arrived there. From the back seat, we saw her13turn toward my father. "No," she said. "I thought you did." That was how a seven-hour car trip turned into a 16-hour one, which was mostly spent in14.
On occasions like that, we had to learn to let go of our anger because we were15in a rolling box with the same people for the rest of the16. Even if I sometimes felt like opening the car door and17one of my sisters out, I kept my feelings to myself.
This is why road trips were like18universities to us. We19our PHDs(博士学位) in how to get along with other people just by traveling in our old car.
If we were20given a second chance at life, we would do it all over again. Only this time would I put the suitcases in the car myself.
Zhou Shihao, 17, from Shanghai Yichuan High School, was shocked by the statistics he had found.he was looking into the use of handheld cellphones by drivers, he found that more than 30% of them reached for their phones on the road.
"Any use of handheld devices(设备) should(firm)be forbidden while driving," said Zhou. "It's not a daily chore, but a serious social issue."
The teenager's concerns led to his drafting a proposal on this issue – something he did together with five other schoolmates in the Mock Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference competition in the Putuo District of Shanghai.
Zhou and his schoolmates were not alone. In January, many Shanghai youngsters, even elementary school students, took part in Mock CPPCC competitions (hold) in their local districts and handed in proposals on issues ranging from network security and the future city to the protection of(tradition) culture.
"The competition really encourages us students to focus on social issues and play an active roletaking responsibility for our country," said Zhang Simin, 17, from Shanghai Nanyang High School.
The senior student used to think that the handling of state affairs was just for politicians. But thinking on the "3:30 problem" changed her mind.
Kids usually finish school at 3:30. However, most parents work until 6:00, (make) it hard for them to pick kids up. "This is a problem we've all been through," said Zhang.
To help students, Zhang's school(invite) deputies (代表) to the National People's Congress to give students instruction.
"Thanks to the deputies, we finally understand it's not who is to blame that(matter), but finding the best solution," said Zhang.
"The competition aims to encourage a sense of citizenship among China's post-00s generation," said Xia Jing, a teacher from Shanghai Jinyuan Senior High School. "Through this channel, students can let their(voice) be heard."
增加：在缺词处加一个漏字符号(∧)，并在其下面写出该加的词。
删除：把多余的词用斜线(＼)划掉。
修改：在错的词下划一横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。
注意：1．每处错误及其修改均仅限一词；
2．只允许修改10处，多者(从第11处起)不计分。
I used to be a person who hates exercising. But after I started playing baseball, I attracted by the sport. Therefore, I cut down on most of my spare time, like shopping. Though it wasn't the hard process for me, I needed to make more of an effort than others. I enjoy the feeling of work with my teammates as well as the time we spend it together. There is a proverb that goes, "The process is much beautiful than the outcome."
I am a beginner in this sport. Sometimes people will look down on me, and it doesn't matter. It will only make me keep trying. Only with practising over and over again do I believe I can catch up with other fantastic player one day. The challenge encourages myself to go on.
注意：
1）词数100左右；
2）可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯；
3）开头和结尾已为你写好，不计入总词数。
Dear Peter,
Best wishes,
Li Hua
