In American schools there is something called Homecoming Day. Many high schools and colleges with a football team have a homecoming game. This can be the most important event of the year except graduation or commencement day(毕业典礼)．Students plan Homecoming Day for many weeks in advance.

    Several days before Homecoming，students start to decorate the school. There are signs to wish luck to the team，and many other signs to welcome all the graduates. Many people still come to Homecoming twenty or thirty years after their graduation.

    The members of school clubs build booths(摊位) and sell lemonade(柠檬)，apples and sandwiches. Some clubs help to welcome visitors.

    During the day people like to look for teachers that they remember from long ago. Often they see old friends and they talk together about those happy years in school.

    Everyone soon comes to watch the football game. When the game is half over，the band comes onto the field and plays school songs. Another important moment is when the Homecoming Queen or King appears. All the students vote a most popular student. It is a great honor to be chosen.

    Homecoming is a happy day，but it is not perfect unless the football team wins the game. Even if the team loses，the students still enjoy Homecoming. Some stay at the school to dance，and others go to a party. For everyone it is a day worth remembering.

    The popular smartphone application Instagram(照片分享)has changed the way we look at photography, even our world. The photo-worthy moments we share serve as an important function in cultivating the photographic artistic eye.

    Instagram has got people to start noticing the art in their everyday life. It has also allowed us to share the artful moments in our lives with others. Clearly, making people focus on beautiful moments in their lives and how to share them is a positive takeaway from Instagram.

    Not only has Instagram changed the way we look at things around us, but it has also changed the way people view professional photography. Instagram has turned everyone with a smartphone into an artist. Opening up art to the general community is a groundbreaking(创新的) aspect of this application. Making artistic attempts accessible for everyone to discover their artistic talents and explore creatively is something that has made people find the beauty in the everyday. However, this accessibility has also created questioning around art and respect deserved by professional photography.

    The art in a professional photograph versus an Instagram can sometimes be hard to notice at a quick glance. But photographs taken by true professional photographers hold something that Instagram's cannot match in terms of photographic quality, or advanced compositional knowledge.

    This is not to say Instagram is a lesser art. Aesthetic qualities of art are a personal matter and how good an artwork is depends on personal preferences. Good is a very arbitrary term in the art world. For example, I may find one photo more pleasing than another, but not everyone has to agree with me.

    The point I am trying to make is that professional photography should not be lost, but instead approached with a new, enhanced level of respect and admiration — despite how accessible, common and fun Instagram now makes the taking and sharing of photos.

    People eat different things in different parts of the world.

    In south China we eat rice every day. Sometimes we eat it two or three times a day, for breakfast, lunch and supper. We usually eat it with fish, meat and vegetable.

    The Japanese eat rice, too. They also eat a lot of fish. They sometimes eat raw（生的）fish. In Africa, maize（玉米）is the most important food. People there make maize into flour（面粉）.From this flour they make different kinds of bread and cakes.

    In western（西方的）countries such as Britain, Australia and the U.S.A, the most important food is bread or potatoes. People there usually make their bread from wheat flour. They cook the potatoes in different ways. In England the most popular food is fish and chips. Sometimes people cook this food at home, but usually they buy it at the shop. They eat this food at home, in their work place, in the park or on the road. People call it "take-away" food.

    You eat food and drink water, right? Skipping Rocks Lab is changing how you and your future generations will have water. Have you ever thought you could eat water? Think again, this is actually happening somewhere in the world.

    The group at Skipping Rocks Lab has made a water bottle you can eat. The product is called Ooho. Unlike plastic bottles, Oohos are neither tall nor hard. They look more like bubbles, or small, round, clear balls. They can hold liquid inside. People who drink Oohos can be surprised: the outside bursts in the mouth.

    Rodrigo Garcia Gonzalez is with Skipping Rocks Lab. He explains that the outside, or the membrane, of Ooho is made of seaweed, a plant that grows in the ocean. “It's a membrane made of seaweed that can contain water or any kind of liquid. It's made from an extract (汁) of the brown seaweed.”

    The Ooho membrane is tasteless, and you can eat it. The company says even if you throw away the membrane, it will break down in about four weeks. Gonzalez says the membrane is strong, and good for the environment.

Every year, billions of plastic water bottles are thrown away, polluting land and waterways around the world. The typical water bottle made of plastic can take hundreds of years to degrade.

    Lise Honsinger is also with Skipping Rocks Lab. “Most people just grab a bottle of water, hold it for five minutes, drink it, and throw it away. How can that then exist for 700 years? So, yeah, this is absolutely a solution to that. We are very purist: we don't want to see this packaged in plastic.”

    There are limits to the Ooho. It cannot be refilled. Each bottle is small. And Oohos do not store for more than a few days. The Skipping Rocks Lab is working on those issues. “We're still working on things like extending the shelf life, looking at different options in terms of thickness, if we want to make one that stands up more, or more flexible for marathons where people just want to eat it whole.”

    Right now, Skipping Rocks Lab can make only a few thousand Oohos a day. But it is developing new technology that could increase that number to hundreds of thousands.

    I'm Caty Weaver. Kevin Enochs wrote this story. Anne Ball adapted it for Learning English. Kelly Jean Kelly was the editor.

    Do you have a spare room in your house? What about a driveway for your car? Both of these can help you make money. Many people who are feeling the pinch are taking advantage of what's been called the “sharing economy”.

Perhaps the best-known example of a company in this field is Airbnb—an American web business which allows you to rent out your spare room to holidaymakers. It says it operates in 34,000 cities and it has over 1,500,000 listings.It seems to have concerned the market!

A British company is doing something with parking spaces. JustPark's founder, Anthony Eskinazi, says,“When I had the original idea, Ispotted a driveway close to a sports stadium. It would have been so convenient if I could have just parked in that driveway rather than in commercial car park.” And he has a big clientele（客户）:around 20,000 people have advertised their spaces on the site, and he says around half a million drivers use it. There are other sites doing very similar things, like Uber and Lyft—these let drivers share their cars with other passengers. Any driver knows how valuable a place to park is .A church near Kings Cross in central London has apparently made over £200,000 by renting out space in its yard to travelers!

    Because this is a new business world, those rules aren't there yet and many people are happy to share...as long as it pays!

    But the sharing economy has its critics: the competitors of these new companies. People who run things like traditional B&B, commercial car parks and taxi services are afraid of ending up out of pocket. And there is another issue: regulations on these new business are unclear. How will renting out your driveway affect your neighbor?

The Art of Chinese Xinjiang Uyghur Muqam is a {#blank#}1{#/blank#}( represent ) name of various kinds of Muqam in Northwest China' s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region,{#blank#}2{#/blank#}was declared one of the UNESCO Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity in 2005. 

Muqam ,{#blank#}3{#/blank#}( recognise ) as the mother of Uyghur music , is not only{#blank#}4{#/blank#}artistic creation with a long history, but also a record of {#blank#}5{#/blank#}( communicate ) between China and the regions to the west of it in history . It can be found in 19 countries and regions in Central , South , and West Asia , and North Africa , which is {#blank#}6{#/blank#}( particular ) due to Xinjiang' s central location along the Silk Road. 

In Muqam ensembles（乐团）, the lead instruments, called satar, are made from local materials and vary in form. The dancing skills involve unique steps, rhythms, and formations as well as{#blank#}7{#/blank#}( figure ) such as flower-picking-by-mouth, bowl-carrying-on-head, and imitation of animals in solo dances. 

Since the 1950s, every possible means{#blank#}8{#/blank#}( use ) to preserve the Twelve Muqam by the Chinese government. About 20 study centres have been set up {#blank#}9{#/blank#}( train ) professional researchers on Muqam. Moreover, the government has introduced Muqam {#blank#}10{#/blank#}the national artistic education system.