Soft winds blew throughout the Windy City today. We welcomed the winds, as it was another hot day in Chicago. The wind blew, bringing us some coolness and making the weather not that hot. But it was a beautiful summer day with a blue sky.

    Chicago is a great city for eating, and we have enjoyed tasting the different foods. Last night, we tried one of the city's most famous foods: deep-dish pizza. Chicago claims credit for the rich and cheesy thick-crust pizza, covered with a sweet tomato sauce. We topped it with olives and green peppers.

    We were touring the city, mainly looking for delicious local foods. Today, we enjoyed a Polish specialty at lunch: Pierogis, an Eastern European dumpling-like dish, filled with foods like potatoes, cheese, mushrooms, cabbage and meat. Polish immigrants started settling in Chicago in the 1850s, and the city has one of the largest Polish communities in the U.S.

    We took a break from exploring the city to talk with some of you! Ashley and Caty logged onto the Internet for an on-the-road version of TALK2US. We spoke to an English teacher in Tokyo, Japan, and a graduate student in India.

    Meanwhile, Adam searched for some locations around the city to shoot some video. He chose a spectacular spot: Navy Pier, Chicago's most-visited attraction. The winds from Lake Michigan keep visitors cool, and the view of the Chicago skyline never fails to impress. In fact, the view made all of us head over heels!

    Our time in Chicago has come to an end. Tomorrow, the true journey begins, as we pass through Illinois and into Missouri via Route 66. Springfield, the home of Abe Lincoln, and St. Louis, the "gateway to the West," wait for us.

    The National Air and Space Museum in Washington，DC has thousands of objects on display，including the 1903 Wright Flyer，Charles Lindbergh's Spirit of St．Louis，the Apollo 11 Command Module Columbia，and a lunar rock you can touch．In addition to our exhibition galleries，you may want to visit the Albert Einstein Planetarium，Lockheed Martin IMAX Theater，and the Public Observatory on the east end．There are many things to do at the Museum in DC．We offer daily tours and educational activities for both children and adults．We also have scheduled lectures and events throughout the year．

Hours & Admission：Open every day except December 25．Admission is free．

    Regular hours：10：00 am to 5：30 pm

    Extended Hours：10：00 am to 7：30 pm

    December 26-30，2016

    March 30-April 20，2017

    Fridays and Saturdays，April 24-May 16，2017

    May 17-September 7，2017

    VISITING TIPS：

    Limit the Number of Bags：All visitors are screened through metal detectors upon entry．The fewer items you bring inside the Museum，the faster your entry．Before you visit，please review the list of prohibited items，which include pocket knives and tripods（三脚架）．Visitors carrying prohibited items will not be allowed inside the museum，so please leave them at home or in your car．

    No food and Drink：Only bottled water is permitted in the Museum．You may only consume food and other drinks in the Food Court，not in the Museum．Groups who bring food are encouraged to picnic on the National Mall．

Please Take Photos：You are welcome to take photos for personal use．However，tripods and monopods（单脚架） are not permitted without approval．

    First Aid：The Museum has a First Aid office and a nurse on duty．Please contact the nearest security officer or the Welcome Center for assistance．

    Visit the Welcome Center：At our Welcome Center in the South Lobby，staff and volunteers can answer any questions you have during your visit．

    Phone：202-633-2214

    E-mail：NASM-VisitorServices@si．edu

    94% of 3-and 4-year-olds have been spanked(打屁股) at least once during the past year, according to one study.

    74% of mothers believe spanking is acceptable for kids ages 1 to 3, says another study.

    61% of parents take spanking as a "regular form of punishment" for young children, according to a different study.

    Sometimes children do not do what their parents tell them to do. When this happens, a parent tries to help the child to do the right thing. When this does not work, the parent usually punishes the child.

    There are many things that a parent can do. One thing that people have done is to spank the child. When a parent spanks a child, they will use their hand or a hard object to strike them on their bottom. This is meant to show the child that they have done something wrong.

    One parent remembers being spanked when he was a child. His parents used a wooden spoon. When he spanked his own children with his hand, he saw that he put a red mark on his child's leg. He never did that again.

    One problem with spanking is that it teaches the child to hit someone when they do not like what the other person is doing. Another problem with spanking is that the parent is usually angry and can hit the child too hard. Sometimes parents will use spanking for everything and not try other ways to get the child to do the right thing.

    Many parents are not sure of what to do instead of spanking. Some people think that their religion tells them that spanking is okay. Some think that the law lets them do it. The courts say that parents have the right to teach their children how to behave.

    Other things should be tried before a parent decides to spank a child. Telling the child exactly what is wanted from them can be one thing. Giving a child more than one choice is another thing that can be tried. Getting down to the child's level and taking a more child-friendly approach can help as well.

    Many people discover Roald Dahl through his stories and poems. His books have been translated into several languages. He has also inspired TV and radio shows and movies. With his help, kids all over the world can imagine strange candies, friendly giants, and frightening villains(反派主角). Indeed, Roald Dahl led a life full of adventures (冒险). Yet, we can have a better understanding of him from other things, too.

    More than Just Words: The Roald Dahl Foundation

    Roald Dahl became interested in helping people who had serious injuries and diseases. As a writer, Roald cared about helping children read more. To carry out these goals, his family set up the Roald Dahl Foundation. The foundation helps people, hospitals, and charities by giving money for medical and educational needs. It continues the spirit of giving that Roald expressed throughout his life.

    Stories for All Ages: The Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre

    Roald Dahl's wife, Felicity Dahl, wanted to set up a central place to protect all of Roald's writings. She helped create the Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre in Buckinghamshire, England. It holds a collection of Roald's writings and recordings for the public to visit. His personal letters and postcards can be found there, as well as photographs and many of his awards. As you can see, one can get a pretty complete picture of Roald Dahl's life by visiting this library. The museum also encourages people to write creatively.

    Now, people of all ages are learning about Ronald Dahl through his works. Through his stories, the foundation, and the museum, Roald Dahl will continue to have a great effect on readers around the world for years to come.

    The next time your brain refuses to recall a simple fact or name, be thankful. That could be a sign that your brain is getting rid of unnecessary information so that it can operate more efficiently, and help you make better decisions.

The researchers say there are numerous neurobiological(神经生物学的)studies conducted on how the brain stores information, a process called persistence (暂留). However, scientists also assumed that our occasional inability to recall facts was due to a are an the brain. In 2013, scientists discovered that as new neurons combine with the hippocampus(海马区)—a region of the brain that plays a significant role in learning and remembering—they overwrite old memories, making them harder to access. There is also evidence that the brain weakens or removes connections between neurons, in which memories are encoded.

    The scientists have a theory on why the brain spends so much energy erasing memories. They say what the brain decides to forget is determined by our daily life. An example is that our brains remember phone numbers according to the need. Instead of storing this irrelevant information that our phones can store for us, our brains are freed up to store the memories that actually do matter for us. They also believe that memorizing too much detail could prevent us from making good decisions.

    So the next time you are unable to recall a seemingly important fact, don't be hard on yourself. Just throw it to your brain's “rubbish can” to make room for information that can contribute to making you smarter! Remember, even Albert Einstein was absent-minded!

You've probably heard it a dozen times by now. But here it goes again: Sleep is important. Your mental health and immune (免疫时)system are connected to your sleeping habits. So are your grades, a new study finds. Sleep accounts for nearly one-fourth of the difference among students' grades in a class. So even if you spend hours studying for a test but get too little sleep, you might still do poorly.

Typically, people's sleep schedules are messy and can not be known in advance. Professor Jeffrey Grossman of Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge wanted to see if sleep links to people's learning performance even when a study was done with people who kept such true-to-life schedules at home. So he turned to Fitbits, which can check how long people sleep and how frequently they wake up. And the researchers looked for 100 students. They focused on these students' sleep patterns in the days and weeks before exams and then compared them to these students' test scores.

"How much time a person sleeps the night. before an exam doesn't affect that person's grade," Grossman says. "A student who sleeps 7 hours every night will do better than a student who sleeps 7.5 hours one night and 6.5 hours another night."

"It's important for people to know that if their Fitbits tell them that they have terrible sleep, that may not actually be so," Michael Scullin, a sleep scientist at Baylor University says. Grossman also raises this point. Fitbit, Inc. makes this advanced tool. But it doesn't share how its tool works. This leaves a question about whether the tool is really correct when checking a student's sleep. Even so, Scullin emphasizes that there are enough data supporting ties between sleep and how well someone performs.

"Students need more sleep and less late evening use of phones and other screens. Even with after-school activities and schoolwork, they need to get enough sleep," Grossman says.