You may be familiar with the following famous people, but have you heard of their graduation speeches, in which they either share their unforgotten experiences or give you some great inspiration(启迪).

    Michael Dell, University of Texas at Austin

    And now you've accomplished something great and important here, and it's time for you to move on to what's next. And you must not let anything prevent you from taking those first steps. ... You must also commit to the adventure. Just have faith in the skills and the knowledge you've been blessed (赐予)with and go.

    J.K. Rowling, Harvard University

    Half my lifetime ago ,I was striking an uneasy balance between my ambition and the expectation from my parents who were not rich...But what I feared most for myself at your age was not poverty(贫穷), but failure. The fact that you are graduating from Harvard suggests that you know little about failure, you might be driven by a fear of failure quite as much as a desire for success.

    Steve Jobs, Stanford University

    Sometimes life's going to hit you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith...Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work, and the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking, and don't settle.

    Bill Gates, Harvard University

    We need as many people as possible to have access to the advanced technology to lead to a revolution in what human beings can do for one another. They are making it possible not just for national governments, but for universities ,smaller organizations, and even individuals to see problems, see approaches and deal with the world's inequities（不公平）like hunger, poverty, and so on.

    We walked in so quietly that the nurse at the desk didn't even lift her eyes from the book. Mum pointed at a big chair by the door and I knew she wanted me to sit down. While I watched, mouth open in surprise, Mum took off her hat and coat and gave them to me to hold. She walked quietly to the small room by the lift and took out a wet mop (拖把). She pushed the mop past the desk and as the nurse looked up, Mum nodded and said, "Very dirty floors."

    "Yes, I'm glad they've finally decided to clean them," the nurse answered. She looked at Mum strangely and said, "But aren't you working late?"

    Mum just pushed harder, each swipe of the mop taking her farther and farther down the hall. I watched until she was out of sight and the nurse had turned back to writing in the big book.

    After a long time Mum came back. Her eyes were shining. She quickly put the mop back and took my hand. As we turned to go out of the door, Mum nodded politely to the nurse and said, "Thank you."

    Outside, Mum told me, "Dagma is fine. No fever. "

    "You see her, Mum?"

    "Of course. I told her about the hospital rules, and she will not expect us until tomorrow. Dad will stop worrying as well. It's a fine hospital. But the floors! A mop is no good. You need a brush. "

    Gabriella's family immigrated to the US from Peru when she was two years old. As a compound bilingual (双语使用者), Gabriella develops two linguistic codes at the same time, with a set of concepts, learning both English and Spanish. Her teenage brother, on the other hand, might be a coordinate bilingual, working with two sets of concepts, learning English in school, Spanish at home. Finally, Gabriella's parents are likely to be subordinate bilinguals who learned a second language by translating it into their mother tongue.

    Regardless of accent and pronunciation, all types of bilingual people can become fully proficient in a language. It seems that the difference may not be apparent. But recently brain imaging technology has given a glimpse into how specific aspects of language learning affect the bilingual brain. It's well known that the brain's left hemisphere (半球) is in charge of logical processes, while the right hemisphere is more active in emotional and social ones. Language involves both types of functions. "Critical Period Theory" says children learn languages more easily because their developing brains let them use both hemispheres in language learning, while in most adults, language relies on one hemisphere, usually the left.

    Before the 1960s, bilingualism was considered a handicap that slowed the children's development by forcing them to spend too much energy distinguishing between languages. But a recent study did show that bilingualism may make you smarter. It does make your brain more complex, healthier, and more actively engaged, and even if you didn't have the good fortune of learning a second language like a child, it's never too late to do yourself a favor and make the linguistic leap from "Hello" to "Hola" "Bonjour" or "nihao" because when it comes to our brains, a little exercise can go a long way.

    On average, Americans spend about 10 hours a day in front of a computer or other electronic devices and less than 30 minutes a day outdoors. That is a claim made by David Strayer, a professor of psychology at the University of Utah. In his 2017 TED Talk, Strayer explained that all this time spent with technology is making our brains tired.

    Using an electronic device to answer emails, listen to the news and look at Facebook puts a lot of pressure on the front of the brain, which, Strayer explains , is important for critical (有判断力的)thinking , problem-solving and decision-making.

So, it is important to give the brain a rest. And being in naure, Strayer claims, helps get a tired brain away from too much technology. More than 15,000 campers from around the world attended an international camping festival in September. That is when friends and family take time off and escape to nature for several days. They take walks, climb, explore, swim, sleep, eat and play. Camping may be just what a tired brain needs.

    Take Carl for example .He lives in West Virginia and enjoys camping. He says that staying outdoors makes him feel at ease. It also prepares him for the work he must do. Kate Somers is another example who also lives in West Virginia. She says she enjoys camping with her husband and two children. She calls it a “regenerative” experience.

    At the University of Utah, David Strayer has studied both short-term and long-term exposure to nature. He found that spending short amounts of time in nature without technology does calm the brain and helps it to remember better. However, he found, it is the long-term contact with nature that does the most good. He and his research team found that spending three days in nature without any technology is enough time for the brain to fully relax and reset itself.

    Each year there are at least five million people around the world who develop serious flu (流感), and almost half a million deaths. When someone we know gets the flu virus, we expect them to be very careful not to pass it on to others. Doctors and nurses working with flu patients also need to protect themselves from the virus. But what is the best way to do this? This is the question that flu expert Professor Jonathan

    Van-Tam at Nottingham University is trying to answer. He wants to find out how flu is transmitted, so that he can stop doctors and nurses getting sick.

    Van-Tam explains their method, "There are 41 volunteers in my experiment. Some healthy volunteers are made to get flu first. When they show symptoms (症状), other volunteers, usually called recipients(接受者), enter the house. Everyone lives together in the small space for four days. Some of the recipients wear face masks, and wash their hands every 15 minutes, but some have no protection. In this way we can study who catches the flu and which ways of transmitting flu are important. During the four days when they are in contact with the virus, and for the ten days after that, the flu recipients are checked regularly."

    The experiment is not simple and it is very expensive. It is difficult to design correctly, and it is also difficult to plan and carry out. Just one study like this takes about 18 months to organize and needs hundreds of people working on it. But Van-Tam believes it is worth because the results will help to decide what type of protection is needed for people working in hospitals with large numbers of flu patients around the world. And perhaps it could reduce the number of deaths from flu each year.

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