Have you ever dreamed about sending a letter to yourself or your friends in the future? While express mail(快递) is a fast way to send your letters, there is another type of mail appearing in China as a new business—future mail.

     “The letter should be sent next Mother's Day and not a day earlier!” Lin Xiaofan, acollege student in Shanghai, tells one of the companies offering the service.

Lin Xiao fan wrote the letter to her mother nearly a year earlier to express her love to hermother for next Mother's Day.

“Offering thisservice makes people slow down and lets them understand the meaning of ‘time'in another way,” said Zheng Zhimin, manager at a “future mail” company. Zheng thinks “future mail” letters help remind us of care, friendship and love.

      While “futuremail” is becoming more and more popular, some people are wondering what will happen if the postal address changes or if the company goes broken before theletters arrive.

     Zheng said customers are glad to sign a contract(签订合同) to make sure that they canbe compensated if their letters are lost or damaged.

    Most of the customers are college students and young white-collar(白领) workers. Psychologists (心理学家) said that young Chinese might have a new way to express their feelings through this service. Most peopleput their hopes and wishes in the letter so that they can experience the connection(联系) between the past and the present when they receive theletter.

    Our children and grandchildren may not have a chance to visit many of the most famous places around the world. War, weather, age, traffic and pollution damage (破坏) these famous places. If we do nothing, they may even no longer remain. But looking after these places often costs more than one country can afford.

    In the early 1970s, world governments decided that if they joined together, they would be able to preserve (保护) our history. If every country paid some money, they said, it would be possible to look after important historic places. For this reason, countries around the world united to form the World Heritage Organization in 1972. Today, the organization helps to protect and rebuild the most important places from our history.

    However, one of the biggest problems for historic places is vandalism. That is to say, people sometimes enter these places and damage the buildings. At some places, such as Stonehenge in England, governments have built high fences to protect it from vandals.

    There are many different ideas about how to solve the problem of vandalism. Some professors say that if guards keep walking around these places, vandals won't be able to get in. Some professors say that if they fix more television cameras, they won't need so many guards. Others say that the best way is education. If people learn to respect history, they won't damage it. They will also want to spend money looking after old places. For this reason, the World Heritage Organization helps to spread information about the value of historic places.

    Australia's Great Barrier Reef(礁) is the world's largest reef system. It is over 2,600 kilometers long. The reef is home to many animals: fish, birds, turtles, sharks and even whales. Unfortunately, the reef that all these animals call home is in danger.

    Climate(气候)change, over fishing and water pollution are damaging(毁坏)the reef every year. Coral(珊瑚)reef experts at Australian universities say that if we do nothing to stop it, the coral reef could be destroyed before the year 2030.

    Everyday things like driving cars, using electricity and running a factory give out greenhouse gases into the air. These gases make Earth warmer and warmer. This is a problem for the Great Barrier Reef and other reefs around the world.

    Coral is very fragile, and even a 2-degree increase in water temperature is enough to kill it, according to Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, reef researcher at the University of Queensland, Australia. If the water temperature doesn't go down, the coral dies.

    But it's not only the coral that's in danger. One quarter of all sea life lives on coral reefs.

    If air pollution is not slowed down or stopped, then the water will warm by at least 3 degrees in the next 20 years, according to reef experts in a report from University of Queensland. This would spell the end for the Great Barrier Reef and all its sea life.

Athletes from various countries displayed the charm of competition sports during Beijing Winter Olympics. One of the reasons why this Winter Olympics can be successfully held is the robots who work hard behind the scenes. 

In the dining hall, instead of human waiters, food arrives from the ceiling. To our surprise, the cooking robot can make delicious dishes according to the programs; food even like burgers are being prepared automatically. 

It doesn't stop there. Elsewhere in the media center, a robotic arm is serving up cocktails. It takes just 70-90 seconds to measure, shake and serve. 

Look at this robot. Although it is only 140 cm tall, it only takes one minute to sterilize（灭菌）36 square meters. The space even more than 1,000 square meters can be easily dealt by itself. The robot can hold 16 liters of disinfection（消毒）water at one time, and spray（喷雾）around through the small fan above its head. 

In China, the Spring Festival is the most important of all the holidays in the year. Two important things help to make this holiday different 1 all the others: giving presents and spending it with the family.

Many weeks 2 the Spring Festival, we know it is coming. In the shops, goods for this special holiday appear and outside them are the special New Year decorations. The advertisements in all the newspapers 3 us that there are" only five more shopping days to the Spring Festival".4 you go, you will realize that the Spring Festival, which comes" only 5 a year", is coming again. Giving 6 to one's family is a very sweet custom(风俗). The spirit behind the present matters most, not the present 7 . It is good during the Spring Festival to go8 and meet parents, grandparents and as many aunts, uncles and cousins as possible.

In the past, on New Year's Eve, all the members of a family 9 stay at home to make dumplings together. Now many people enjoy watching TV. During the day, children wear their new clothes. The evening is usually spent on games, talking, eating and10 .

How can you remember a song for a long time? Why does your teacher use songs to teach you English? Do you know there is a scientific (科学的) reason for this?

Scientists are studying the relationship between music and remembering a foreign language. They found that remembering words in a song is the best way to remember even the most difficult language. 

"Singing could be a new way of learning a foreign language. The brain (大脑) likes to remember things in a catchy and relaxing way. For example, children can remember difficult words quickly when they are in a song," said Dr Lude. "If children find it difficult to learn foreign languages," Dr Lude wrote, "a listen- and- repeat (重复) singing method can support foreign language learning, and open the door for future research in this area."

Many language teachers know the importance of music and they often use it in teaching and learning. Hua Zhuying, a teacher at a Chinese language school in America, likes using songs to teach Chinese. " We usually use English songs but teach them the Chinese lyrics (歌词), so it's easy to start because they know the music, " she said. "Sometimes I think if I learnt English that way when I was young, maybe I could speak English much better than now."

Our brain likes music in learning languages. especially (尤其) for remembering. If you are still having some problems in learning a language, why not try singing it out?