Many hundreds of years ago, the moon was a mystery to people on the earth. What was that glowing ball came out at night? Why did it keep getting smaller, then larger? Why didn't it fall from the sky? Through the ages, people have tried to come up with answers.

    To the native people of Bolivia, in South American, the moon was a great chief who once lived on the earth. The Abaluyian people of Kenya, in Africa, believe the moon and the sun were brothers who fought in the sky. In other parts of the world, people believed they saw different pictures in the moon. The Haida Indians of Canada saw a woman carrying a bucket. The Chinese saw a road.

    People in the past also used the moon to mark time as a kind of calendar. In fact, in some languages, the word for moon meant “month”. A Native American nation called the Sioux made a calendar of 13 moons, or months. Each moon had a name, such as Moon of Black Cherries, Moon of Green Corn, and Moon of Severe Cold.

    Though people of the past found the moon was helpful, mysterious and interesting, they didn't know much about it. They only knew what they could see with their own eyes.

    Then almost 400 years age, an Italian scientist named Galileo made a new telescope(望远镜) that was more powerful than any telescope made before. Galileo decided to take his new implement to look at the moon. He discovered that the moon was not the smooth, shiny ball. The brighter places were mostly hills and mountains. The flat areas were lower, which is why they appeared darker.

    As more people saw the moon through telescopes, they discovered more about it. Yet, people still had much to learn about the moon.

    Zhalong is a nature reserve in Heilongjiang in northeast China. It is one of the world's most important wetlands*. The reserve offers food and places to live in for wildlife. It is an ideal home for different kinds of plants, fish and birds.

    Many birds live comfortably in Zhalong Nature Reserve all year round, but some only stay there for a short time. There are many fish in the wetlands, and the birds can easily catch them for food. Zhalong Nature Reserve is an important living area for red—crowned cranes*. There are not many red—crowned cranes in the world. Some of them live in Zhalong.

    Some people want to change the wetlands to make more space for farms and buildings. This means there will be less and less space for wildlife.

    More and more birds are in danger because they do not have enough living space. Many of them died. The Chinese government wants to protect these endangered* birds, and they can be safe in Zhalong.

    Every year, a lot of visitors go to Zhalong to watch birds. This year, members of our Birdwatching Club are going to study the different kinds of birds in Zhalong and the changes in their numbers.

    We do a bird count* once a year. We are now inviting middle school students to help. We need more people to help us count and do something to help the birds. Many people do not understand the importance* of the wetlands. We hope this information will help them understand and make them do something to protect wildlife.

    Stop reading for a minute and think about what you see when you look up at the sky on a clear night. You probably see many stars(星星). Long long ago, farmers watch some stars to know when to plant their crops. Travellers did so to find their way in the dark. Today stars are still important to some people.

    Scientists find that most stars are very big. In fact some stars are so far away that it would take millions of years to get to them even by spaceship.

    Another thing we know today about stars is that some are made up of(由……组成) hot gases. The gases are so hot that they send out light. If you watch a star carefully, you may notice that it twinkles(闪烁) sometimes. As you may understand, light from a star must shine through the air before you can see the star. Air is always moving, it makes light from the star move back and forth. When the light moves, it makes the star twinkle. Stars also have different colours. The colours of a star depend on how hot it is. To our surprise, the cool stars are red and the hottest stars are white.

New App Helps People Remember Faces

    Large gatherings such as weddings and meetings can be socially Q flooded with people. Learning people's names only adds to the stress. A new facial-recognition app could come to the rescue, but experts suggest people should be careful while using it.

    The app, called SocialRecall, connects names with faces through smartphone cameras and facial recognition, avoiding the need for formal introductions. "It breaks down these social barriers we all have when meeting somebody, "says Barry Sandrew, who created the app and tested it at an event attended by about 1, 000 people.

    After receiving an invitation to download SocialRecall from an event organizer, the user is asked to take two selfies and sign in through social media. At the event, the app is active within a previously set geographical area. When a user points his or her phone camera at an attendee's face, the app identifies the person, displays the person's name, and links to his or her social media information. To protect Privacy, it recognizes only those who have agreed to use. And the app's creators say it automatically removes users' data after an event.

    Ann Cavoukian, a expert who runs the Privacy by Design Center of Excellence praises the app's creators for these protective measures. She added, however, that when people choose to share their personal information with the app, they should know that "there may be unexpected results down the road with that information being used in another situation that might come back to bite you."

    The start-up project has developed the app for people who suffer from prosopagnosia, or "face blindness, "a condition that prevents people from recognizing people they have met. To use this app, a person first receives an image of someone's face, from either the smartphone's camera or a photograph, and then tags it with a name. When the camera spots or recognizes that same face in real life, the previously entered information is displayed. The collected data are stored only on a user's phone, according to the team behind the app.