Parents often believe that they have a good relationship with their teenagers. But last summer, Joanna and Henry noticed a change in their older son: suddenly he seemed to be talking far more to his friends than to his parents. “The door to his room is always shut”, Joanna noted.

    Tina and Mark noticed the same changes in their 14-year-old daughter. “She used to cuddle up (依偎) with me on the sofa and talk,” said Mark, “Now we joke that she does this only when she wants something. Sometimes she wants to be treated like a little girl and sometimes like a young lady. The problem is figuring out which time is which.”

    Before age 11, children like to tell their parents what's on their minds. “In fact, parents are first on the list,” said Michael Riera, writer of Uncommon Sense for Parents with Teenagers. “This completely changes during the teen years.” Riera explained. “They talk to their friends first, then maybe their teachers, and their parents last.”

    Parents who know what's going on in their teenagers' lives are in the best position (位置) to help them. To break down the wall of silence, parents should produce chances to understand what their children want to say, and try to find ways to talk and write to them. And they must give their children a mental (精神上的) break, for children also need freedom, though young. Another thing parents should remember is that to be a friend, not a manager, with their children is a better way to know them.

    The FBI is investigating the disappearance of a visiting Chinese scholar from a central Illinois university town as a kidnapping（绑架）as her whereabouts（下落）have remained unknown since Friday.

    Zhang Yingying, 26, was last seen on June 9 near the north end of the campus of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign（UIUC）, wearing a charcoal-colored baseball cap, a pink and white top, jeans and white tennis shoes and carrying a black backpack. She boarded a Champaign-Urbana Mass Transit District bus and exited the West Springfield and North Mathews avenues at 1:52 pm local time（1852 GMT）, police said.

    The FBI has labeled the case as a kidnapping but isn't ruling out anything, said Campus police spokesman Patrick Wade. The suspect appears to be a white male who was in a car and stopped to talk to Zhang on Friday afternoon, the FBI said. Almost one month into a yearlong appointment at the UIUC campus, Zhang's friends told police that she was heading to an apartment complex in Urbana to sign a lease（租约）.

    Security camera footage（连续镜头）on Monday released by university police showed that Zhang talked to the driver of a black Saturn Astra, about five blocks from where she got off a bus in Urbana on Friday afternoon. She entered the car shortly thereafter. Zhang has not been seen or heard from since then and attempts to contact her by phone remain unsuccessful. Authorities have asked the public to help identify that vehicle.

    A massive search has been launched in Urbana in the US state of Illinois since Zhang's disappearance. Police are interviewing with her colleagues, checking local hospitals and coordinating with ride-hailing（打车）companies as part of their investigative efforts.

    In an interview with Xinhua through Wechat on Thursday, Zhang Ronggao, father of the missing visiting scholar from China's Fujian Province, expressed gratitude to all the people involved in the search and asked US police to accelerate the search.

    David Beckham was born in 1975 in London, at a place called Leytonstone. When he was a young boy, his greatest passion was in football. He played it whenever he had the chance. Sometimes he would go and watch a game with his friends. When David Beckham was 12 years old, he won the Bobby Charlton Soccer Skills award. This was an important step forward for this young boy, and it led him to go for a visit to a football training camp in Spain. As a boy he played for schools of Essex and also for his county team.

    In 1991, he became a trainee with Manchester United. This meant that he could practice football as much as he wanted to and play for the highly successful Manchester United Youth Cup team and Under-21 team. In April, 1995 he played his first football league game against Leeds Untied. During 1995 and 1996, David became a regular member of the team and Manchester United won in both football seasons, with David scoring many goals（进球）.

    His goals made him a household name. In the first game of the 1996-1997 season, he scored a surprising goal from beyond the halfway line and became famous overnight. He continued to score astonishing goals, especially from free-kicks. The speed of one of his shots was timed at 157 km/h. He also had the ability to make the ball go from left to right, or right to left, whenever he chose. Goalkeepers were never sure where the ball was going, and it regularly ended up in the goal.

    Everyone looks forward to progress, whether in one's personal life or in the general society. Progress indicates a person's ability to change the way he is living at the moment. Progress must lead a better way of doing things. All these, however, remain true only in so far as people want to accept technology and move forward by finding new and more efficient ways of doing things.

    However, at the back of the minds of many people, especially those who missed the “good old days”, efficiency comes with a price. When communication becomes efficient, people are able to contact one another no matter where they are and at whatever time they wish to. The click of a button allows people miles apart to talk or to see each other without even leaving their homes. With the communication gadgets, such as mobile phones and ipads, people often do not take the effect to visit one another personally. A personal visit carries with it the additional feature of having to be in the person's presence for as long as the visit lasts. We cannot unnecessarily excuse ourselves or turn the other person off.

    With efficiency also comes mass production. Such is the nature of factories and the success of industrialization today. Factories have improved efficiency. Unskillful tasks are left to machines and products are better made and produced with greater accuracy than any human hand could ever have done. However, with the improvements in efficiency also comes the loss of the personal touch when making these products. For example, many handcrafts are now produced in a factory. Although this means that supply is better able to increase demand, now that the supply is quick and efficient, the demand might fall because mass production lowers the quality of the handicraft and it is difficult to find unique designs on each item.

    Nevertheless, we must not commit the mistake of analyzing progress only from one point of view. In fact, progress has allowed tradition to keep up. It is only with progress and the invention of new technology that many old products can be brought back to their old state. New technology is required for old products to stay old.

    It is people's attitude towards progress that causes the type of influence that technology has on society. Technology is flexible. There is no fixed way of making use of it. Everything depends on people's attitude. The worst effects of progress will fall on those who are unable to think again about their attitudes and views of society. When we accept progress and adapt it to suit our needs, a new “past” is created.

    ⒈Part of northern California had become an inferno(火海) in the latest big fire. A nearby town, Paradise, was reduced to ash. Nearly 50 people are confirmed dead and over 200 missing. Six of the ten most destructive fires in California's history have occurred in the past decade. Last year was the most destructive year on record, until this year. Why is the Golden State so flammable?

    ⒉There are three reasons why California has been surrounded by flames. First, the climate is becoming warmer. This has led to snow melting earlier, drier landscapes and a longer season when fires are likely to occur.

    ⒊A second reason is that more people live in flammable places. Since the 1990s 60% of new homes in California, Washington and Oregon have been built in spaces next to nature. These areas, which environmentalists call the "wildland-urban interface", are at higher risk of wildfire.

    ⒋A third reason is that there is more fuel. Before western settlers arrived, fires used to happen often and naturally, which made less fuel available for future fires. For the past century fires have been controlled well. This has led to a build-up of dry brush, and makes the average wildfire much likelier to turn into a big one.

    ⒌Putting out the flame is the most immediate task for California, but not the last. Many survivors will want to rebuild their homes exactly where they were. Californians will also want to ensure that utility companies(公用事业公司) are acting and investing responsibly. Investigations into what caused the fire are still going on, but some reports suggest it may have begun with sparks (火花) from lines owned by an electricity company.