This Monday, the nation will start to celebrate Presidents' Day, just seven days before George Washington's birthday. Everyone agrees that day is a holiday. but is it just to celebrate George Washington's Birthday? What about Abraham Lincoln? Some government offices call it Presidents' Day. Others say the holiday is officially Washington's Birthday. Confused yet?

    George Washington was elected the country's first President on April 30,1789. Soon after, Americans began publicly celebrating his birthday. Presidential historians say the actual date of George Washington's birth is February 11,1732. But a change inthe calendar system 20 years later shifted all dates, making Washington's birthday February 22, which is now well accepted. In 1879. Congress made Washington's birthday an official federal holiday. It was the first federal holiday to celebrate an individual's birthday. In 1968, Congress passed the Monday Holidays Act, which moved the holiday to the third Monday in February. The new law did not change the holiday's name. It was still called Washington's Birthday, even though some law makers wanted to call it Presidents' Day to include Abraham Lincoln, whose actual birthday is February 12.

    Many people argue that the holiday should celebrate all past Presidents. They feel Lincoln should be honored for his role in preserving the nation during the Civil War and helping to free slaves. Others feelthe holiday should only honor Washington. the country's first President. They say shifting the focus away from Washington would mean future generations of kids would not know about the Father of Our Country.

    Laws have been introduced in Congress over the years to requireuse of the term “George Washington's Birthday.”but none of those laws have been passed. Meanwhile, many stategovernments and school districts now use the term “Presidents' Day．”Many stoles also use it to promote holiday sales.

    Should the holiday honor Washington, Washington and Lincoln, or all past Presidents? Write to emailbag@timeforkids, com and tell us what you think.

    The world's first subway was built in London in 1863. At the time, the government was looking for a way to reduce traffic problems in the city of London. The poor areas of the city were so crowded with people that it was almost impossible for horse carriages to get through. The city officials were interested in trying to make it possible for workers to live outside of London and travel easily to work each day. If people had a cheap and convenient way that they could depend on to go to and from work, they would relocate their homes outside of the city. This would help ease(减轻) the pressure of too many people living in the poor parts of London. From these problems, the idea of the London Underground, the first subway system, was born.

    The plans for building the Underground met with several problems and delays, but the fast track was finally opened in January 1863. A steam train pulled the cars along the fast underground track which was 6 kilometers (3.7 miles) long. About 30，000 people got on the subway the first day. Riders were treated to comfortable seats (standing up while the train was moving was not allowed), and pleasant decorations inside each of the cars. However, the smoke from the engine soon filled the air in the tunnels(隧道) with ash and soot(煤灰), as well as chemical gases. Fans had to be put in the tunnels later to keep the air clean enough for people to breathe. Even with its problems, riding in the Underground did catch on. It carried 9 million riders in its first year.

    International Robotics Forum（论坛）

    Tokyo Big Sight, Tokyo, Japan, December 4-5

    The Robotics Society of Japan ( RSJ) , to provide opportunities for young robot lovers to learn more about industrial and service robots, is going to hold the International Robotics Forum that will cooperate with this year's International Robot Exhibition.

    The lectures and explanations throughout the Conference will be given in Japanese but will be interpreted into English at the same time. The Conference will offer a great opportunity for senior high school students from all around the world to communicate with each other through robots. Therefore, we look forward to your active participation.

    The event will take place two days. On the morning of Day One, Prof. Shin' ichi Yuta of the Shibaura Institute of Technology will give a lecture on basic mobile robotics and learning through robots.  This will be followed by a talk by Mr.  Kazuhiko Yokoyama of Yasukawa Electric Corporation who will explain the mechanism and control of robots and also point out the highlights(最精彩的部分）of the International Robot Exhibition.

    We will prepare a challenge for all the participants.  We will send you themes for robot research. You will study them in advance, and on the afternoon of Day One, you wi11 visit the Tokyo International Exhibition Center and investigate (详细研究）real robot . You will be able to experience fun and excitement of advanced robot technologies.  On the morning of Day Two, you will present your study and investigation results.

    On the afternoon of Day Two，as the final event, awards will be given by the RSJ to groups that have given outstanding presentations.

We hope that many future robot researchers and engineers will be born today.

    Can you imagine how great the United Kingdom is? The queen of Britain, Queen Elizabeth II, is also the queen of other 16 countries, including Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Jamaica. Her face is seen on stamps and coins all around the world.

    Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor was born in London on April 21st 1926. Her parents were George, the Duke of York, and Elizabeth, the daughter of the Earl and Count-ness of Strathmore. As a child, Princess Elizabeth lived with her parents and younger sister in London and Windsor. Every summer, she traveled to Scotland to visit her mother's parents. She was interested in all sorts of sports, but her favorites were horse riding and swimming. She was also fond of acting, art and music.

    As princess Elizabeth grew older, she started to play a part in British public life. When she was 14, she broadcast a radio message to all the children of Britain and the Common-wealth(共和国). Two years later, she carried out her first public engagement, and started to go on official tours shortly after that. After a tour to South Africa in 1946, she married Philip Mountbatten. The couple had four children: Prince Charles, born in 1948, Princess Anne, born in 1950, Prince Andrew, born in 1960 and Prince Edward, born in 1964.

    After her father died, Princess Elizabeth became Queen Elizabeth II in a ceremony held in London in 1953. As a queen, she has many duties, and leads a very busy life. She travels throughout the world, meeting the leaders of other countries, and attends a large number of official functions. She also holds a meeting every week with the British Prime Minister. Every year, on Christmas Day, she broadcast a message to the people of British and the Commonwealth, talking about her hopes for the future.

    Queen Elizabeth has been on the throne for more than 40 years and has become one of the most famous women in the world. Lots of people in British believe that she tries hard to understand her people and be a good queen. More than her title, this quality has earned her much love and respect.

    The University of Tokyo has eight museums covering various fields such as medicine, agriculture and art. Click the names of the museums below to read brief introductions about their histories and exhibits.

    The University Museum

    Having accumulated over three million academic materials for its collection since the University of Tokyo was founded in 1877, the University Museum is the largest museum of its kind in Japan. From the time of its reorganization into an independent entity in May 1996, the Museum has held exhibitions over 60 times.

    The Museum of Health and Medicine

    The Museum of Health and Medicine seeks to provide information about health and medicine to the general public and advance education for students studying medicine. The Museum features both a permanent and a temporary exhibition space and a temporary exhibition space, with the latter focusing on topics related to medical care and the study of medicine.

    The Agricultural Museum

    The Agricultural Museum displays materials from the collection of the University's Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Science, Notable items on display include the documents and portraits of scientists affiliated (隶属的)with the University, internal organs of Japan's famous dog Hachiko, and drawings illustrating German agriculture and the varieties of Japanese cows.

    The Farm Museum

    The Farm Museum opened in 2007 within a renovated dairy bam. The bam was built in 1934 as part of the moving of the University of Tokyo's farm from Komaba to Tanashi, an area in Western Tokyo. The Museum features both permanent and temporary exhibitions. Permanent exhibitions include European farming equipment used on the Komaba Farm, tools for agricultural experiments, agricultural machinery, American tractors and drawings illustrating German agriculture.

    I'm sitting in my kitchen in London, trying to figure out a text message from my brother. He lives in our home country of Germany. We speak German to each other, a language that's rich in odd words, but I've never heard this one before: fremdschämen. I'm too proud to ask him what it means. I know that eventually, I'll get it. Still, it's slightly painful to realize that after years of living abroad, my mother tongue can sometimes feel foreign.

    Most long-term migrants know what it's like to be a slightly rusty(生疏的) native speaker. The process seems obvious: the longer you are away, the more your language suffers. But it's not quite so straightforward.

    In fact, the science of why, when and how we lose our own language is complex and often different to what we think. It turns out that how long you've been away doesn't always matter. Socializing with other native speakers abroad can worsen your own native skills. And emotional factors like trauma(精神创伤) can be the biggest factor of all.

    It's not just long-term migrants who are affected, but to some extent anyone who picks up a second language. The minute you start learning another language, the two systems start to compete with each other, says Monika Schmid, a linguist at the University of Essex.

    Schmid is a leading researcher of language attrition, a growing field of research that looks at what makes us lose our mother tongue. In children, the phenomenon is somewhat easier to explain since their brains are generally more flexible and adaptable. Until the age of about 12, a person's language skills are relatively easy to change. Studies on international adoptees have found that even nine-year-olds can almost completely forget their first language when they are removed from their country of birth.

    But in adults, the first language is unlikely to disappear entirely except in extreme circumstances. For example, Schmid analyzed the German of elderly German-Jewish wartime refugees(难民) in the UK and the US. The main factor that influenced their language skills wasn't how long they had been abroad or how old they were when they left. It was how much trauma they had experienced as victims. Those who left Germany in the early days of Nazi occupation, before the worst violence, tended to speak better German – despite having been abroad the longest. Those who left later, tended to speak German with difficulty or not at all.

    "It seemed very clearly a result of this trauma", says Schmid. "Even though German was the language of childhood, home and family, it was also the language of painful memories." The most traumatised refugees had held them back. As one of them said: I feel that Germany betrayed me. America is my country, and English is my language.