What is “Dads Make a Difference”?

    A service-learning opportunity for teens that deals with fatherhood, parenting, and so on.

    Older teens, grades 10—12, teach younger teens, grades 6—9, about the importance of fathers in children's lives, the legal and financial responsibilities of parenting.

Teen teacher training goals & objectives

    The goal of the teen teacher training is to better understand the complex problems surrounding legal fatherhood in our society. By discussing what makes healthy families, explaining the meaning of paternity（父亲的身份）, and examining the risks people take in their lives, teens will develop the skills needed to make informed decisions in their own relationships and, finally, teach this information to others.

What's in it for me?

An opportunity to:

Learn life skills like communication, decision making, and problem solving.

    Get the chance to use knowledge in meaningful and effective ways.

    Develop leadership, planning, teamwork, time management, and organizational skills to help you in every aspect of your life.

    Forming lasting relationships with adult mentors（导师）.

Comments from teen teachers

    “ 'Dads Make a Difference' made me realize how permanent and expensive parenthood is.”

    “Speaking in form of groups and directing people in activities, I feel, is a valuable skill to have that I will use throughout my life.”

    “I wish I would have gone through this program when I was in Junior High. I know it would have helped me to really think about the future and to make good decisions.”

    “ 'Dads Make a Difference' has helped me to know the effects of my actions before I take them and I know what risks not to take to protect my future.”

    When Sarah Hansen first came to Bonnie Schlachte's ballet studio, she jokingly called herself a “weeble-wobble,” telling her ballet teacher that when she tried to walk, she would fall. “She couldn't walk across the room without holding on to something,” recalls Schlachte. “She would immediately fall.”

    Hansen was only in middle-school, but a progressive neurological disease was hindering her ability to walk, let alone do ballet. But Hansen had a tenacious spirit and desperately wanted to learn ballet. Hansen joined in weekly group classes at Schlachte's ballet studio called Ballet for all Kids, a studio that teaches children with disabilities. Soon after she began classes and private lessons, her family saw a vast improvement in her ability to move.

    She worked tirelessly in the studio, focusing on what her instructor wanted from her. “At the time, her foot wouldn't fully rest on the floor,” explains Schlachte. “That's why she couldn't stand on her own, there was no support.”

    Schlachte pushed her student, explaining to Hansen that her brain has neuroplasticity(可塑性) so eventually it will receive the message.

    As a mom, a classically trained ballerina, and holding a degree in psychology, Bonnie Schlachte was the perfect person to push Hansen to do her best. Schlachte put herself through college with dance and theater scholarships. After graduation, she came across an opportunity with children with developmental disabilities. She fell in love and chose to focus on jobs in that field.

    Years later, Schlachte found herself watching and celebrating Hansen, who at one point could barely walk, was now moving across the floor on her own two feet. “One day, her ankle dropped, and she put her whole foot on the ground,” says Schlachte. “I was crying, her mom was crying, it was a great moment.”

    You can love them or hate them, but no matter which tourist destination you visit, chances are you'll see someone with their head buried in a Lonely Planet guidebook.

    Lonely Planet is one of the world's largest travel guide brands, publishing more than 500 different guides in eight languages. The popular brand also produces television shows, websites and podcasts (播客) all devoted to travel.

     Some people praise Lonely Planet books because they make traveling easy and affordable. They also save time and make sure you don't miss the best things.

    They also provide the reviews of hostels, hotels, restaurants and ticket information about your destination.

    This can be great if you're a nervous traveler, or if you haven't traveled by yourself before. If you're in a country where you don't speak the language, sometimes there's nothing better than getting into a taxi and opening up a guidebook. You simply point to a map that directs the taxi driver to a hostel that's cheap and clean, with friendly staff and cold beer.

    But others criticize Lonely Planet and other travel guide publishers like them. They say guidebooks take the fun and spontaneity (自发性) out of traveling, and that part of the enjoyment of travel comes from the fact that anything can happen. They also regret that if you follow a guidebook, you'll end up doing the same thing and having the same experience as everyone else. You might end up seeing the same group of people over and over, because everyone is reading the same book and following the same route.

    Another criticism of travel guides is that they have a large impact on local communities. For example, some locals devote their lives to behaving in ways that attract tourists. They pretend to live a traditional lifestyle, wear traditional clothes and live in traditional houses in order to attract the tourist dollar.

    There are many reasons why people can't get a good night's sleep and as with any other health conditions, things are not likely to improve until you find a way to break the cycle.

    These are some of the main factors that need to be addressed.

    Worry and stress

    We have all been kept awake by many factors that cause worry and stress in our lives. Money problems, relationship issues and work stresses can have you sitting up all night. A useful habit is to download your thoughts at the end of the day. Keep a pen and paper next to your bed and before you go to sleep, write down your thought and worries, create a to-do list for the following day or set down solutions and ideas that relate to work.

    Diet and eating patterns

    What and when you eat can have a major impact on your ability to sleep. Eating too late or indulging in a rich or spicy meal can keep you awake. These foods take a long while to digest and the after effects of indigestion and heartburn are not going to set you up well for a good quality sleep.

    A research suggests that both calcium and magnesium may be linked to poor sleep. Even low intakes of magnesium found in green vegetables, beans, nuts and seeds have been shown to make it harder to stay asleep. Calcium is found in dairy foods, soybeans and green vegetables and low levels have also been shown to make it more difficult to nod off.

    Alcohol and caffeine

    Tea, coffee and energy drinks contain caffeine that helps to stimulate the nervous system and make you more alert, which is great if you need a pick-me-up. Dosing up on caffeine during the day can affect your ability to sleep later on in the evening. Try limiting your intake of caffeine to the morning and switch to decaffeinated options such as herbal teas. Alcohol is a double-edged sword when it comes to sleep. While a little may help to induce slumber, even in small amounts it can cause fragmented sleep patterns.

    Bedroom environment

    “Your bedroom should be dark once the lights are switched off because melatonin, a sleep-regulating hormone, is very light-sensitive. Maintaining the right temperature can also help with sleep as a room that is too hot may prevent your core temperature from going down, which is essential for switching on the sleep mechanism within the body.

    How to fight California's wildfires? It's an “all of the above” respond.

There might, indeed, be a need to make it easier to thin dying or dead trees out of thickly forested areas, reducing the fuel for wildfires. But the problem is actually more complicated. Even if dead trees are removed, the dry bushes act like kindling (引火物) when wildfires spread.

    Even more to the point, thick forests were not a factor in these recent California's fires. “They're using these fires to talk about forest management that has nothing to do with the landscape in which the fires are occurring,” says Chur Miller. W. M. Keck Professor of Environmental Analysis and History at Pomona College in Claremont, California.

    Climate change is making wildfires worse. The resulting unpredictable weather patterns have created shorter, wetter winters in California, producing a sudden, heavy growth of brushes, grasses and trees. After winter, the state's ongoing drought and record- high summer temperatures draw water out of the plants, making them near-perfect kindling. With the hot and dry Santa Ana winds of fall, fires explode out of control.

    Yet these tragedies can't be blame only on global warming. Wildfires are actually a vital of the state's ecosystem. Lodgepole pines (松树), for example, grow well in fire-prone areas where millions of structures have been built in rural areas of California since the 1940s.When they bum, the cost in lives and treasures skyrockets.

Answering these disasters with a one-dimensional solution helps no one, although it might score short-term political points. The proper response includes placing limits on residential expansion into wildlands; better management and removal of dry brushes and continuously addressing the growing concern of climate changes.

    In other words, the solution isn't either/or. It's all of the above.

    One day after school, Bill walked past the shop on the street corner as usual. He stopped to look at the front row of shoes, and he felt sorry for himself.

    He really wanted to have a new pair for his birthday. He sadly walked away and

    thought of how to tell his mother. He knew she would give him anything if she could. But he also knew she had little money. He decided not to go home at once, because he looked worried and he didn't want his mother to worry about him. So he went to the park and sat on the grass. Then he saw a girl in a wheelchair. He found that the girl moved the wheels with her hands. Bill looked at her carefully and was surprised to see that the girl had no feet.

    He looked down at his own feet. "It was much better to be without shoes than without feet," he thought. It was not right for him to feel so sorry and sad. He went away and smiled, thinking he was luckier in life.