It's the holiday season, the time when we connect with family and friends. Social media sites like Twitter and Facebook are full of festive pictures, featuring parents' catching and sharing those special family moments, their child's wish list, and maybe even a cute video of their child dancing to “Jingle Bell Rock” while wearing a diaper (尿片) and Santa hat. Swelling with pride, parents can't wait to get approval with a “thumbs up” or better yet a personalized message on their treasured post.

    Adults should be able to post what they want online. However, when exposing family moments online, are they sharing too much information? Do parents have the right to share those cute now, but embarrassing later moments about kids? Have children willingly given their agreement to sharing their cute but funny video online?

    A recent study found that 75% of parents turn to social media for parenting-related information and social support. There is even a term used to describe the overuse of sharing too much information about kids on social media: “sharenting”. Research also finds that “sharenting” isn't going anywhere anytime soon. What's troublesome is that a typical parent has about 150 Facebook friends and only a third of them are actual friends. So that brings up good questions – Who are we really sharing our information with and why? Who knows when and where that photo could resurface in the future?

    While there's no reliable information on how young children feel about things posted online, we do have information about how teens feel. According to a report by the Family Online Safety Institute, 76% of teens are concerned about their privacy. Many teens constantly search for new apps that allow anonymity. When names are required, they use screen names that don't reveal real information. If our teens are doing a better job of protecting themselves online, shouldn't parents take the lead and do the same? Plus, with more and more college admission representatives and potential employers surfing the internet for potential candidates, we'd hate for one of our posts to change an important decision. Think about it … online reputations are now becoming inseparable with real life ones.

    Of course, we can secure our privacy settings, only allowing our friends to view pictures, posts and videos, but that doesn't stop others from uploading our pictures. Adults need to be cautious of sharing information online, especially information about children.

    So, this holiday season, enjoy family time and share those special memories with family and friends. Before clicking the app to upload photos or videos, stop and think twice.

    From The 12 Days of Christmas to See You in the Cosmos, these children's books are ideal for holiday giving.

    The 12 Days of Christmas by Greg Pizzoli

    It's a classic Christmas reading material! It's a counting lesson! It's a crazy tale of elephant love. Have you ever wondered how all those calling birds, turtle doves and French hens fit in one room? Pizzoli, a Theodor Seuss Geisel Award winner has your answer. ($ 15.99, ages 3—5) Amazon. com

   Here We Are by Oliver Jeffers

    Yes, this book by the illustrator (插画家) of the great hit “The Day the Crayons Quit” is for kids ages 3—7, but don't let that fool you.     Inspired by the birth of Jeffers1 first child, this is a father's “welcome to the earth” letter to his baby, filled with the heady wonder of parenthood .A great gift for new parents. ($ 19.99. ages 3—7) Amazon. com

    Wishtree by Katherine Applegate, illustrated by Charles Santoso.

     When a towering oak tree learns that she may be cut down, she starts getting extraordinarily involved in the lives of the humans below her, particularly a girl who is being escaped due to her ethnicity (种族). A lovely tale about common ground and the power of community. ($ 16.99, ages 8 —12) Amazon. com

     See You in the Cosmos by Jack Cheng

    Eleven-year-old Alex is too busy trying to communicate with space aliens to worry about his troubled family life. When Alex runs away from home to launch his homemade rocket, he finds himself sidetracked by new friends and hints of a family secret. ($ 16.99, ages 10 and up) Amazon. com

    DINERS

    TONY SOPRANO'S LAST MEAL

    Between 1912 and the 1990s, New Jersey State was home to more than 20 diner manufacturers who made probably 95 percent of the diners in the U.S, says Katie Zavoski, who is helping hold a diner exhibit. What makes a diner a diner? (And not, say, a coffee shop?) Traditionally, a diner is built in a factory and then delivered to its own town or city rather than constructed on-site. Zavoski credits New Jersey's location as the key to its mastery of the form. “It was just the perfect place to manufacture the diners,” she says. “We would ship them wherever we needed to by sea.”

    VISIT “Icons of American Culture: History of New Jersey Diners,” running through June 2017 at The Cornelius House/Middlesex County Museum in Piscataway, New Jersey

    GOOD FOOD, GOOD TUNES

    Suzanne Vega's 1987 song “Tom's Diner” is probably best known for its' frequently sampled “doo doo doo doo” melody rather than its diner-related lyrics. Technically, it's not even really about a diner — the setting is New York City's Tom's Restaurant, which Vega frequented when she was studying at Bamard. Vega used the word “diner” instead because it “sings better that way,” she told The New York Times. November 18 has since been called Tom's Diner Day, because on that day in 1981, the New York Post's front page was a story about the death of actor William Holden. In her song Vega sings: “I Open /Up the paper/There's a story /Of an actor /Who had died/While he was drinking.”

    LISTEN “Tom's Diner” by Suzanne Vega

    MEET THE DINER ANTHROPOLOGIST

    Richard J.S. Gutman has been called the “Jane Goodall of diners” (he even consulted on Barry Levinson's 1982 film, Diner).His book, American Diner: Then Now, traces the evolution of the “night lunch wagon,” set up by Walter Scott in 1872, to the early 1920s, when the diner got its name (adapted from “dining car”), and on through the 1980s.Gutman has his own diner facilities (floor plans, classic white mugs, a cashier booth); 250 of these items are part of an exhibit in Rhode Island.

    READ American Diner: Then & Now (John Hopkins University Press)

    VISIT “Diners: Still Cooking in the 21st Century,” currently running at the Culinary Arts Museum at Johnson & Wales University in Providence, Rhode Island

    Sometimes people call each other “scared-cat”. But have you ever thought about this expression? When a cat is frightened, its heart starts beating faster, its muscles get tense, and there are changes in the chemicals in its blood stream. Although the cat doesn't realize this, its body is getting ready for action. If the danger continues, the animal will do one of two things .It will protect itself, or it will run away as fast as it can.

    Something like this also happens to people. When we are excited, angry or seared by other feelings, our bodies go through many physical changes. Our hearts beat faster, and our muscles get tense. All of these changes make us more alert and ready to react. We, too, get ready to defend ourselves or run.

    Human beings, however, have a problem that animals never face. If we give way to our feelings and let them take over, we can get into trouble. Have you ever said something in anger or hit somebody and regretted it later? Have you ever shouted at a teacher, told someone you were lonely, or said you were in love, and then wished later you had kept your mouth shut? It isn't always clever to express your feelings freely.

    Does this mean that it's smarter always to hide our feelings? No! If you keep feelings of anger, sadness hidden away or bottled up inside, your body stays tense. Physical illnesses can develop, and you can feel disturbed badly inside. It can actually be bad for your health. It isn't good to keep pleasant feelings inside either; all feelings need to be expressed.

    Feelings that you keep all bottled up inside, don't just go away. It's as if you bought some bananas and put them in a cupboard. You might not be able to see them, but before you'd smell them. And if you opened the cupboard, chances are that you'd see little fruit flies flying all over them. They are bad.

    You can try to treat feelings as if they were bananas in the cupboard. You can hide them and you can pretend they don't exist, but they'll still be around. And at last you'll have to deal with them, just like those bananas.

    Being forgiving to yourself and others can protect against stress and the harm it does to mental health, according to a new study in the Journal of Health Psychology.

    Researchers looked at the effects of lifetime stress on a person's mental health, and how more forgiving people got along compared with people who weren't so forgiving. To do this, they asked 148 young adults to fill out questionnaires that assessed their levels of lifetime stress, their tendency to forgive and their mental and physical health.

    No surprise, people with greater exposure to stress had worse mental and physical health. But the researchers also discovered that if people were highly forgiving of both themselves and others, that characteristic alone almost removed the connection between stress and mental illness.

    "It's almost entirely erased—it's zero," says study author Toussaint. "If you don't have forgiving tendencies, you feel the immediate effects of stress in a severe way. You don't have anything to cushion you against that stress."

    How a forgiving personality protects a person from the influence of severe stress is hard to determine. The researchers infer that people who are more forgiving may adopt better skills to deal with stress, or their reaction to major stressors(压力源)may be slow.

    Though more research is needed to fully understand the benefits of being more forgiving, Toussaint believes"100％"that forgiveness can be learned. His own previous research has shown that saying a short prayer on forgiveness can help people take the edge off. "I think most people want to feel good and forgiveness offers you the opportunity to do that," he says.

You would want to make a good impression when you introduce yourself on the first day in class at your school wouldn't you? In this post, it will cover what to include in your introduction.

The start

You can start with the obvious (明显的) information — your name.{#blank#}1{#/blank#} You can be a bit creative by starting with something different. You can start with an unusual experience or an interesting fact about your city or an unusual hobby.

{#blank#}2{#/blank#}

The city you come from. You may add a sentence or two about the city as well if there is something interesting to talk about.Maybe the city is known for its historic monuments (历史遗迹).{#blank#}3{#/blank#} And if you've lived in different cities, you may briefly (简洁地) mention their names and,as mentioned above, a sentence or two on the most interesting parts of them.

What are your interests and hobbies?

Playing a sport? Traveling? Reading? Kite flying? Or something unusual,such as toy collecting?{#blank#}4{#/blank#} For example if you' ‘re into reading, mention your favorite books, your favorite author, and how reading has influenced you.

Where can you help others?

If you have a strength (长处) others in your class can benefit (受益) from, feel free to share it.For example, if you're good at dancing, you can teach anyone who's interested. If people know your strengths, they'll readily turn to you when they need help.{#blank#}5{#/blank#} And if you think helping others may be a waste of time, you should remember that you too may need help in areas where others are stronger.

A. Where are you from?

B. But that's a common start.

C. Where did you last attend the school?

D. Maybe it's famous for its natural beauty.

E. This is an easy way to make friends in high school.

F. Describe small facts if you've followed the hobby with serious interest.

G. The organizer may ask to include your family and the place you come from in the introduction.