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Inventive Minds Inventions can change the world, you may say. But did you know we are inventors today? And now just like Orville and Wilbur Wright, Our ideas are starting to take flight! We all have inventive minds. We are thinking of new ideas all the time. Yes, kids have inventive minds. We are thinking of new ideas all the time. Yes, kids have inventive minds. We're using them ev'ry day of our lives! Words and music by Steve and Kathy Hoover |
*Orville and Wilbur Wright brothers were the inventors of the early plane.
**The word "flight" is the noun（n.）form of the verb（v.）"fly".
***The word "ev'ry" stands for "every".
Do you know the word migrate? It is a word usually used to talk about certain animals such as birds, fish and so on. When animals migrate, they travel a long way from one part of the world to another according to the season. For example, swallows (燕子) migrate south in winter. Many animals migrate - they do this often at the same time and to the same place each year. They move to places where conditions are better — where the weather is warmer, where there is more food and water, or where their young will be safer.
People also migrate. When people migrate, they go to live in another area or country, especially in order to find work. In English, when people leave their home country in order to live in another country, we use the word emigrate instead of migrate. From migrate and emigrate come the words migration and emigration. However, if people move from their home country to another to live there forever (永久地), the word changes from emigrate to immigrate in the English language. Then the word immigration is born.
Isn't word-making of the English language interesting? And can this process (过程) of finding out the relationships between words and learning them in a group or groups be a way for you to learn the language?
Based on Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, 6th edition
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INTRODUCTION It's hard to believe that I wrote Number the Stars more than twenty years ago. It seems like yesterday that I answered the phone on a snowy January morning and received the news that it had won the 1990 Newbery Medal（美国纽伯瑞儿童文学奖）. I think readers of every age may match themselves with the important persons in the books they love and ask themselves: Would I have done that? What choice would I have made? And ten-the age of Annemarie in Number the Stars-is an age when young people are beginning to develop a strong set of personal ethics（道德观；价值观）. …They are beginning to realize that the world they live in is not always good and safe. So they follow a story about a ten-year-old girl who is caught in a dangerous situation, and she must make decisions. Young readers become cheerful when Annemarie takes a deep breath, enters the woods, faces the danger, stands up to the enemy and wins her victory. Today, the book has been published in many countries and translated into many languages. It found its way into the hands and hearts of children who had read about but never experienced war… Books do change lives, I know; and many readers have told me that Number the Stars changed theirs when they were young, that it made them think about both. Cruelty (残酷；残忍) and courage. "It was something that shaped my idea of how people should be treated, "wrote a young woman recently, telling me about her own fourth-grade experience with the book. The Danish friend who first told me the story of her childhood, and who became the Annemarie in my book, is an old woman now. So am I. We both love thinking of the children reading the story today, coming to it for the first time and realizing that once, for a short time and in a small place, a group of prejudice-free (不存偏见的) people created a touching story of love and kindness towards others. Lois Lowry |
New Zealand offers free school lunches to thousands of kids
WELLINGTON, Feb. 20 ( Xinhua) – “Thousands of children have begun receiving a free lunch on schooldays under the government's free and healthy school lunch program," Prime Minister (首相) Jacinda Ardern said on Thursday.
"The program is for 7 ,000 students at 31 schools right now. The number will extend to 21,000 students in 120 schools by the start of 2021 ,"Ardern said while she was serving up lunch at a school in Hawke's Bay.
"A full stomach makes all the difference to a child's learning," Ardern said.
"Providing a free and healthy lunch at school is one way to help New Zealand become the best place in the world for school children. And people can see that difference right away," she said. She added that providing these lunches was also a great way for local families to have jobs.
"The program is one of 75 plans from New Zealand's CYWS (Child and Youth Wellbeing Strategy). It started last year and developed with the money from 10,000 New Zealanders including 6,000 young people," said Education Minister Chris Hipkins.
If you walk into a bookstore, you might see shelves of books labelled(标注)"self-help". You may not know what these books are about. In fact, more and more people are turning to self-help books for advice these days. You can't imagine that sales of these books in the UK reached 3, 000, 000 last year.
Self-help books are usually written by psychologists (心理学家), famous writers or successful businessmen. They teach you how to deal with problems in your life, for example, how to get on well with your classmates or friends, how to plan your time well or how to find happiness.
Paul sweet man, the owner of City Books in the UK. Said that social problems might be the reason why more people are reading self-help books. "They come into the shop and look for ways to deal with these problems in their life, "Paul said. Besides, it seem to be easier for young readers to find their mistakes, especially those born after 2000. They want to improve themselves by reading self-help books.
Self-help books used to be something people laughed at. Many people didn't take chicken soup stories and "success theory(成功学)"books seriously. But now they are recognized by young people.
No matter why there is growing interest in self-help books, it's good to know that help is at hand if we need it. But are these books truly helpful? Read one and find out.
