The evidence for harmony may not be obvious in some families. But it seems that four out of five young people now get on well with their parents, which is the opposite of the popularly-held image of unhappy teenagers locked in their room after endless family quarrels.

    An important new study into teenage attitudes surprisingly shows that their family life is more harmonious than it had ever been in the past. “We were surprised by just how positive today's young people seem to be about their families,” said one member of the research team. “They're expected to be rebellious(叛逆的) and selfish but actually they have other things on their minds: they want a car and material goods, and they worry about whether school is serving them well. There's more negotiation(商议) and discussion between parents and children, and children expect to take part in the family decision-making process. They don't want to rock the boat.”

    So it seems that this generation of parents is much more likely than parents of 30 years ago to treat their children as friends. “My parents are happy to discuss things with me and willing to listen to me,” says 17-year-old Daniel Lazall. “I always tell them when I'm going out clubbing. As long as they know what I'm doing, they're fine with me.” Susan Crome, who is now 21, agrees. “Looking back on the last 10 years, there was a lot of what you could call negotiation. For example, as long as I'd done all my homework, I could go out on a Saturday night. But I think my grandparents were a lot stricter with my parents than that.”

    Maybe this positive view of family life should not be unexpected. It is possible that the idea of teenage rebellion(反抗) is not rooted in real facts. A researcher comments, “Our surprise that teenagers say they get along well with their parents comes because of a brief period in our social history when teenagers were regarded as different beings. But that idea of rebelling and breaking away from their parents really only happened during that one time in the 1960s when everyone rebelled. The normal situation throughout history has been a smooth change from helping out with the family business to taking it over. ”

    We considered a list of the best American books — but we'd need a whole issue to do them justice. Here are 5 that helped define the national character. Most from a century or so ago, they still entertain, teach and inspire American people.

    Moby-Dick by Herman Melville

    First published in 1851, the book tells the adventure stories of Captain Ahab and his continuous hunting for the white whale and draws us into a universe full of fascinating characters and stories.

    The Education of Henry Adams by Henry Adams

    Awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1918, the book provides insight into Adams' family, including his experience as a private secretary to his father, minister to England during the American Civil War.

    Leaves of Grass by Walt Whiteman

    When Whiteman published Leaves of Grass in 1855, he wanted to define the American experience— sing for the new country in a new voice, reflecting the great changes in the American literary world that had taken place during his lifetime.

    Poems by Emily Dickinson

    An enthusiastic poet whose works have had a considerable influence on modern poetry, Dickinson's frequent use of dashes(破折号)，sporadic(零星的)capitalization of nouns, and unusual metaphors(隐喻) has contributed to her reputation as one of the most innovative poets of the 19^th-century American literature.

    The song of Hiawatha by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

    First published in 1855, this is Longfellow's most popular and most recognized poem, showing the heroic life and death of a magic American Indian sent by the Great Spirit to guide the nations in the ways of peace.

    Now many young people are traveling around the world on their own, not because they have no one to travel with, but because they prefer to go alone.

    Kristina Wegscheider from California first traveled alone when she was at college and believes that it is something everyone should do at least once in their life. “It opens up your mind to new things and pushes you out of your comfort zone.” Wegscheider has visited 46 countries covering all seven continents.

    In foreign countries, with no one to help you read a map, look after you if you get ill, or lend you money if your wallet is stolen, it is challenging. This is what drives young people to travel alone. It is seen as character building and a chance to prove that they can make it on their own.

    Chris Richardson decided to leave his sales job in Australia to go traveling last year. He set up a website, The Aussie Nomad, to document his adventures. He says he wished he had traveled alone earlier. “The people you meet, the places you visit, or the things you do, everything is up to you and it forces you to grow as a person,” said the 30-year-old man.

    Richardson describes traveling alone like “a shot in the arm”, which “makes you a more confident person that is ready to deal with anything”. He said, “The feeling of having overcome something on my own is a major part of what drives me each day when I'm dealing with a difficult task. I walk around with my head up because I know deep down inside that nothing is impossible if you try.”

    The great 19^thcentury explorer John Muir once said, “Only by going alone in silence can one truly get into the heart of the wilderness.”

    After a morning hike in the Saneum HealingForest,46-year-old firefighter Kang Byoung-wook has tea made from the bark of an elm tree, practices yoga (瑜伽),and makes a picture with dried flowers. He is one of 40 firefighters taking part in a three-day program, the aim of which is to offer“forest healing" (森林治愈);the firefighters all have posttraumatic stress disorder (创伤后应激障碍).

    Saneum is one of three official healing forests in South Korea. Soon there will be 34 more. South Koreans-many of whom suffer from work stress, digital addiction, and great academic pressure have accepted the medicalization of nature with great enthusiasm.

    There is increasing evidence that being outside in a pleasant natural environment is good for us. But how many of us get to enjoy nature regularly? Fewer and fewer, it seems. According to Lisa Nisbet, a psychology professor at Canada s Trent University, evidence for the benefits of nature is pouring in at a time when we are most disconnected from it.

    "We don't think of being outdoors as a way to increase happiness," says Nisbet."We think other things will, like shopping or TV." But South Korea is starting to challenge this opinion.

    So what are some of the benefits of nature that Nisbet refers to? Being surrounded by nature has one obvious effect: It calms us and reduces our stress levels. This has been shown to lower blood pressure and heart rates.

Another experiment conducted by psychologist Stephen Kaplan found that people who took a 50-minute walk in a park had better attention and short-term memory than those who took a walk along a city street.

    Perhaps what's more surprising is that nature may also make us more creative. David Strayer, a psychologist at the University of Utah, showed as much with a group of participants, who performed 50 percent better on creative problem-solving tasks after three days of wilderness backpacking.

In fact, we may never know exactly what nature does to the brain. Something mysterious will always remain, and maybe that's as it should be.

    I was given the book Running on Faith written by Jason Lester as a birthday gift last month. After I started reading, I really couldn't keep my eyes off it. It is always inspiring to read a story of someone who has gone through obstacles to reach his goals.

    Jason Lester is a disabled (残疾的) extreme athlete. When he was twelve years old, a fast car ran a red light and hit him. Then he was sent into the hospital with twenty broken bones and. a famous baseball player, but at that a seriously injured arm. Jason had always wanted to become a time that dream was gone.

    However, Jason loved sports and he still wanted to be a good athlete. He began running and taking part in duathlons(铁人两项) in high school. Years later in 2004, he decided to start training for the Ironman, and has competed in many extreme races since then. In 2008, Jason became the first disabled athlete to complete the Ultraman (320 miles of biking, swimming and running) ,and it led him to an ESPY award (奖项) for Best Male Athlete with a Disability in 2009.

    If you are in a bad situation and don't know what to do now, Running on Faith is a good book for you. If you love running and want to reach some race goals, this book is good for you, too. Anyway, this book is worth reading for everyone who loves reading and wants to turn dreams into reality.

After years of teachers asking for the right answers, students aren't used to someone asking for the wrong ones. Students' failure tends to create mental burden that negatively affects learning. Lifting the burden requires us to face failure bravely and encourage students to accept it as a natural part of getting educated. While educators have to make sure that students have the right content and support to avoid long-term failure, it is just as important to accept mistakes as a normal part of education.

Sadly, our culture is so focused on success or perfection that students generally aren't taught about failure. To fill the gap, I share with students a Samuel Beckett quote "Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better". It suggests one becomes better after each failure. I also play a video on game designed by Extra Credits, which shows people can quickly declare their ways as a failure if they don't work out and then learn from. them to move on. Both the quote and the video can help students get a more positive attitude towards failure.

Teachers can help students accept failure better. In her piece "5-Minute Film Festival: Freedom to Fail Forward", Edutopia author Amy Erin Borovoy had a set of videos-and articles on the subject of failure. Borovoy reminds readers that "a true thinker learns as much from failure as from success." Taking these short videos as monthly or weekly reminders can, be a great way to start "how have we failed and what have we learned" discussions with students.

Teachers can actually use a technique called "Effective Failure" to teach about failure at any time. In my writing class, I often have students volunteer to pick out the worst writing of their own. This lets writers deepen their understanding of why a sentence, word choice, or paragraph construction has failed, and it inspires a sincere interest in better writing. This makes failure work well in class.

Also, remember that students are not the only ones who can learn from their mistakes. As those who teach students, we should do that too.