Clara Barton，founder of the American Red Cross，gained worldwide honor for her dedication to easing human suffering and earned the nickname  “Angel of the Battlefield.”

    Barton was born into a liberal (开明的) freethinking family in 1821. Her elder brothers and sisters happily tutored her in math and reading, so when she entered school at three years old, she could read and spell three-syllable words. {#blank#}1{#/blank#}

    Concerned about Barton's difficulty in making friends, her parents sent her to a boarding school, hoping it would make her more comfortable with her peers. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} Barton lost her appetite and cried constantly. After only one term, she had to be brought home. Then, Barton stayed out of school to nurse her older brother through a serious injury and also volunteered to care for poor families during a smallpox (天花）outbreak.

    In 1861，the Civil War broke out. The sight of wounded soldiers touched Barton deeply. She began to collect and distribute food, bandages, medicines, and other supplies for the Union army.

    {#blank#}3{#/blank#} There, with little concern for her own safety, she cooked meals, assisted surgeons, and comforted wounded soldiers.

    Eventually，because of working too hard，Barton collapsed，ill with typhoid fever (伤寒症). {#blank#}4{#/blank#} It was there that she learned of an organization based in Switzerland — called the International Red Cross, whose work mirrored her own.

    Shortly after Barton arrived back home in 1873，her sister died. {#blank#}5{#/blank#} When recuperating (休养）at a health facility in New York，she began planning for the establishment of an American wing of the International Red Cross. Although at first the government resisted，her efforts finally paid off. The American Red Cross was officially organized on May 21, 1881. Her influence lives on today in the work of the organization she founded.

    The jobs of the future have not been invented, {#blank#}1{#/blank#} By helping them develop classic skills that will serve them well no matter what the future holds.

⒈Curiosity

    Your children need to be deeply curious. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} Ask kids, “What ingredients (配料) can we add to make these pancakes even better next time” and then try them out. Did those ingredients make the pancakes better? What could we try next time?

⒉Creativity

    True creativity is the ability to take something existing and create something new from it {#blank#}3{#/blank#}There are a dozen different things you can do with them. Experimenting with materials to create something new can go a long way in helping them develop their Creativity.

⒊Interpersonal Skills

    Understanding how others feel can be a challenge for kids. We know what is going on inside our own head, but what about others? Being able to read people helps kids from misreading a situation and jumping to false conclusions. {#blank#}4{#/blank#} “Why do you think she is crying?” “Can you tell how that man is feeling by looking at his face?” “If someone were to do that to you, how would you feel?”

⒋Self Expression

    {#blank#}5{#/blank#} There are many ways to express thoughts and ideas ¡ª music, acting, drawing, building, photography. You may find that your child is attracted by one more than another.

    Successful students are highly motivated(激励) by an inner drive to study well.They have a specific career goal in mind.{#blank#}1{#/blank#} So they form their own good study habits, plan ahead and stick to their study timetable on their own initiative.

    If you want to be a successful student, motivate yourself and know that it is only you who are responsible for your study.There are some great ways to improve your motivation.

    You should write down your educational goals, which makes them become clear. Imagine your success. Experience the feeling of reaching your particular goal.{#blank#}2{#/blank#}

    Seek advice and learn from the good students in your class.

    Successful students tend to study hard.They pay attention to class as well as taking notes.{#blank#}3{#/blank#} Outside class they find a quiet place to study, because they know that academic life comes before their social life.

    Set your goals. After setting goals it is important to write them down for many reasons. Goals that aren't written are only wishes. It helps you make a commitment(承诺) to yourself.

    {#blank#}4{#/blank#}

    No one wants to regret not doing something they could have done.

    Successful students manage their time well by setting up a weekly timetable. They make the best use of their study time. {#blank#}5{#/blank#} Most of the suggestions mentioned above can improve your motivation.

A.Give yourself rewards.Each time you complete a lesson, do something special for yourself.

B.It gives you a way to see your progress.

C.They make study time productive and not necessarily long.

D.You will be proud of yourself when you achieve success.

E.They know that they are responsible for their success or failure.

F.When you set your goals,make sure that your goals are specific and realistic.

G.They arrive at the classroom early and sit in the front.

    {#blank#}1{#/blank#}Friendships between Americans can be close and real, yet disappear soon if situations change. Neither side feels hurt by this. Both may exchange Christmas greetings for a year or two, perhaps a few letters for a while — then no more.{#blank#}2{#/blank#}. This can be quite difficult for us Chinese to understand, because friendships between us develop more slowly but then may become lifelong feelings, extending (延伸) sometimes deeply into both families.

    Americans are ready to receive us foreigners at their homes, share their holidays, and their home life. They will enjoy welcoming us and be pleased if we accept their hospitality (好客) easily.

    There is another difficult point for us Chinese to understand.{#blank#}3{#/blank#} This is usually the opposite of the practice in our country where we may be generous (慷慨)with our time. Sometimes, we, as hosts, will appear at airports even in the middle of the night to meet a friend.{#blank#}4{#/blank#}. The Americans, however, express their welcome usually at homes, but truly cannot manage the time to do a great deal with a visitor outside their daily routine. They will probably expect us to get ourselves from the airport to our own hotel by bus. And they expect that we will phone them from there.{#blank#}5{#/blank#}. We will find ourselves treated hospitably(好客).

    For the Americans, it is often considered more friendly to invite a friend to their homes than to go to restaurants, except for business matters. So accept their hospitality at home!

A.Americans don't show their politeness if it requires a great deal of time.

B.Friendships between Americans usually extend deeply into their families.

C.Americans always show their warmth even if they are very busy.

D.Once we arrive at their homes, the welcome will be full, warm and real.

E.We may take days off to act as guides to our foreign friends.

F.If the same two people meet again by chance, even years later, they pick up the friendship.

G.America is a mobile society.

    Lindsay Renwick, the mayor of Deniliquin, a country town in New South Wales, misses the constant whir（嗡嗡声）of the rice mill whose giant fans dried the rice. The Deniliquin mill, the largest rice mill in the Southern Hemisphere (南半球), once processed enough grain to meet the needs of 20 million people globally. But six years of drought have had a destructive effect, reducing Australia's rice crop by 98 percent and leading to the mothballing of the mill last December.

    Drought affects every agriculture industry based in Australia, not just rice – from sheep farming, the country's other backbone, to the cultivation of grapes for wine, the fastest-growing crop there, with that expansion often coming at the expense of rice. The drought's effect on rice has produced the greatest impact on the rest of the world, so far. It is one factor contributing to skyrocketing prices, and many scientists believe it is among the earliest signs that a warming planet is starting to affect food production.

    Researchers are looking for solutions to global rice shortages – for example, rice that blooms earlier in the day, when it is cooler, to fight against global warming. Rice plants that happen to bloom on hot days are less likely to produce grains of rice, a difficulty that is already starting to emerge in inland areas of China and other Asian countries as temperatures begin to climb. 'there will be problems very soon unless we have new varieties of rice in place,” said Reiner Wassmann, climate change director at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI). The recent reports on climate change carried a warning that could make the news even worse: that existing models for the effects of climate change on agriculture did not yet include newer findings that global warming could reduce rainfall and make it more variable.

    Yet the effects of climate change are not uniformly bad for rice. Rising concentrations (浓度) of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, can actually help rice – although the effect reduces or disappears if the plants face unnecessary heat, inadequate water, severe pollution or other stresses. Still, the flexibility of farmers here has persuaded some climate experts that, particularly in developed countries, the effects of climate change may be relieved, if not completely avoided. “I'm not as negative as most people,” said Will Steffen, director of the Fenner School of Environment and Society at Australian National University. “Farmers are learning how to do things differently.”

    Meanwhile, changes like the use of water to grow wine grapes instead of rice carry their own costs, as the developing world is discovering. “Rice is an essential food,” said Graeme Haley, the general manager of the town of Deniliquin. “Wine is not.”

Four Secrets to Steve Jobs' Success

    How is it that a college dropout, who was once kicked out of his own company, became one of the world's foremost innovators?

    Carmine Gallo lists the four ways Jobs managed to succeed in the face of discouraging circumstances. {#blank#}1{#/blank#} 

    Do what you love, no matter what it happens to be.

    This is what Jobs told Stanford University graduates in a speech in 2005, Gallo says the famous talk show host Rachael Ray agrees with this advice. Rachael Ray does what she loves. {#blank#}2{#/blank#}  She did that because she loved cooking.

    Say no to 1000 things.

    Simplifying his business was the key to Jobs' success, Gallo says. In 1997, when Jobs returned to Apple, Apple was close to bankruptcy（破产）. He took 300 products and condensed them to 10 within a two-year period.

    {#blank#}3{#/blank#}  In his latter years, he decided he would wear the same dress every day so that he didn't have to think about it.

    Kick-start（启动）your brain by doing something new.

    Doing new things helped Jobs, in the words of Apple's own slogan, “Think differently.”

    The inspiration for the Apple Store came from the Four Seasons Hotel. That's why when you walk into an Apple Store, you will not find a cashier. {#blank#}4{#/blank#}  Walk to the back of the store and there's a bar. It doesn't serve alcohol, but it collects advice.

    {#blank#}5{#/blank#} 

    “For Jobs, it wasn't just about selling 29 million iPads this summer but entertaining the customer at the same time,” Gallo says. “Whether you run a multi-billion dollar tech company or a pizza restaurant, innovation means creating a new experience for your customers,” Jobs says.

A. Do what you are curious about.

B. Create fresh experiences.

C. Instead, you'll find a doorkeeper.

D. Carmine Gallo says that you can do the same.

E. She was giving cooking lessons at Macy's for free.

F. Simplicity also extends to Jobs' personal life.

G. Jobs explained that iPad was not just a phone but a lifestyle.