As we all know, children are our future, and it's up to us to arm them with the tools to succeed. Sadly, today's children are sometimes being armed with more dangerous tools like weapons, drugs and gangs in the USA. Once a relatively peaceful environment, many schoolyards of today are becoming unsafe for both students and teachers.

    Home schools are available to give you choices. Home schooling provides top-quality education, flexibility and freedom to create your own schedule. At Sunny Home School we believe the choice should be yours.

    Thanks to modern technology, home schooling information is becoming readily available across the nation. A recent study by the ITBS (Iowa Tests of Basic Skills) and TAP (Tests of Achievement and Proficiency) shows us that students of home schools do particularly well when compared with the nationwide average. In every subject at every grade level, students of home schooling scored obviously higher than those in public and private schools.

    If you're new to home schooling, you may be asking yourself, “Will home schools really work for my children?”

Fact: A nationwide study using a random selection of 1,516 families found students of home schooling to be scoring, on average, at or above the 80^th percentile (百分位的第80位) in all areas, on standardized achievement test. (Note: The national average on standardized achievement test is the 50^th percentile.)

    Collectively, the staff at Sunny Home School brings 65 years of experience in home schooling curriculum. We've placed students in the top 2% of the nation in math and many are successfully moving on to college.

    One study found that of the home schooled students, 94% said home education prepared them to be independent persons.

    For more home schooling information, call us today toll free at (1800)542-8668.

    A new book called “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother” by Amy Chua has caused a debate (争论) about cultural differences in parenting. Amy Chua is a teacher in an American university and both of her parents are Chinese. In the book, Ms. Chua writes about how she taught her daughters. She told NBC television that she had a clear list of what her daughters were not allowed to do, such as having a play date, watching TV or playing computer games and getting any grade less than an A.

    Many people are against Amy Chua's parenting style (风格), even her husband, who is American. They say it is rude and unfair to children. But she says her parents raised her and her three sisters in that way.

    Ms. Chua says after her younger daughter shouted “I hate my life! I hate you!” she decided to retreat because she was afraid of losing her daughter. But she also says American parents often have low expectations of their children's abilities.

    “The debate is about what it means to be a successful parent and what it means to be a successful child,” said Stacy DeBroff, who has written four books on parenting. She says Amy Chua's parenting style is not limited to Chinese families. It is a traditional way of parenting among immigrants (移民). They hope to get a better future for their children.

    She also sees a risk (风险). When children have no time to be social or to develop their own interests, they might not develop other skills that they need to succeed in life. DeBroff advises parents to develop their own style of parenting and not just repeat the way they were raised.

B

    Kawhi Leonard,who won the 2014 NBA Championship with the Spurs and was named the Finals Most Valuable Player,finished the 2016-17 season with averages of 25.5 points,5.8 rebounds,3.5 assists and 1.8 steals per game in the regular season,and 27.7 points,7.8 rebounds,4.6 assists and 1.7 steals in the playoffs.Then he was selected to the All-NBA First Team for the second time in his career,as well as earning All-Defensive First Team honors for the third time in three years.He's hopeful the playoffs happen to him again next season.

    He lived up to his reputation as the quiet man of the NBA in Beijing on Friday,but that didn't mean he wasn't enjoying himself.The San Antonio Spurs star rarely gets too animated—at least off the court.However,as he explained,people shouldn't read too much into it—it's simply his humble manner.

    Two-time All-Star Leonard is on week-long trip to China - his first visit here - until Aug 24 to promote basketball.Leonard hosted a basketball clinic in Beijing on Sunday for talented migrant school-kids,and on Saturday also met fans at NBA 5v5,the league's five-on-five tournament for elite players in China.

    The 26-year-old will then pay a visit to the NBA Academy Zhejiang in Zhuji,an elite training center which opened last November,to put the young talent there through their paces.“Just make sure that you also take care of your school work.If you are not fortunate enough to get into the NBA,you still can get a scholarship,a degree.”

    Leonard will wrap up his trip by making a special appearance at the NBA Play-zone in Shanghai,an NBA-themed family entertainment destination.After that,he's back home to focus on the build-up to the new season.

    Many people go to school for an education. They learn languages, history, geography, physics, chemistry and mathematics. Others go to school to learn a skill so that they can make a living. School education is very important and useful. Yet no one can learn everything they want to know. The teacher's job is to show his students how to learn. He teaches them how to read and how to think. So, much more is to be learned outside school by the students themselves.

    It is always more important to know how to study by oneself than to memorize some facts or a formula (公式). It is usually quite easy to learn a certain fact in history or a formula in mathematics. But it is very difficult to use a formula in working out a maths problem. Great scientists, such as Einstein, Newton and Galileo didn't get anything from school. But they were all so successful. They invented so many things for mankind.

    The reason for their success is that they knew how to study. They read books that were not taught at school. They worked hard all their lives, wasting not a single moment. They would ask many questions as they read and they did thousands of experiments.

    Above all, they knew how to use their brains.

    If you feel at present that you don't have enough friends in your life, one reason may be that you have let yourself become too busy to make time for the relationships you already have. Starting and keeping friendship requires effort and commitment.

    Many of us let our lives become so busy with work and other responsibilities that we don't get around to scheduling time for pleasure and renewal(叙旧)with the friends, relatives and acquaintances we already have.

    Making the effort to call your friends more regularly and to accept more of their invitations you receive from others can improve your social life in a hurry!

    Are there any people you could call right now and be sure to receive a pleasant welcome? Are there people that you could count onto help you in time of difficulty? Can you have close talks with them? Do you have fun when you are together? Are you happy to have them in your life?

    If you haven't seen much of them lately, is it because you have become too busy? Have you grown apart? Was there an argument?

    If the main reason you haven't been getting together with the people you already know is that you have got too busy, take a good look at how you spend your time. Compare it with your real values and priorities(优先考虑的事)in life. Is your busy lifestyle really bringing you the quality of life that you want?

    If you have become too busy for friends, why has this happened? Are you seeking material toys in your life at the expense of relationships with other human beings? Have you allowed your time to be over spent because you never say “No” to anyone? Do you insist on doing things yourself that could be appointed to others? If so, why? Do you believe that everything depends on you?

    Examine whether the way you are now spending your time accurately reflects your deepest values and priorities. Make sure that you schedule adequate time for the things that are truly most important to you.

    If you really want to keep friends in your life, make a space in your schedule, and a space in your heart for them.

    Distance, just like currency, becomes incomprehensible when it reaches large quantities.

    So, when outdoor enthusiast and Midwest Mountaineering employee Elizabeth John says she only hiked the nearly 500 miles of the Colorado Trail over a period of six weeks, don't let her fool you. That's like walking from St. Paul to St. Louis—give or take a few dozen miles—plus thousands upon thousands of feet of altitude.

    "I'm a gardener, I'm a busy-hands person, but busy feet are just as good," she explains. "I don't meditate, but maybe that's the way I think about it—walking as a way to relax."

    John took childhood hikes in the Boundary Waters and caught her case of busy feet while hiking in Alaska as a teenager. With a background in paddling, mountaineering, and backpacking, she found long-distance hiking rewarding, though exhausting.

    Since then, thru-hiking—hiking a long-distance trail (考验，试验) end-to-end in one hiking season—has gotten friendlier to beginners. John has given up 60-pound packs in favor of a lighter modern backpacking equipment. For her 50th birthday, she decided to fly to Spain and walk close to 500 miles of the Camino de Santiago. The Colorado jaunt, her first solo long-distance hike, followed a few years later in 2017.

    "Going on a big walk is unreasonable and includes being uncomfortable, wet, hungry, sore, tired, lonely…it's challenging," she says. "It's a leap of faith. But I found the rewards surprising and unexpected, some even waiting for me at home after the trip. There is a rhythm to walking, a physicality and simplicity…a discovery."

    Logging some 4, 000 feet of elevation daily, John met many "trail angels" who provided shade, snacks, and sometimes beer at remote points in the wilderness, purely out of the goodness of their hearts. "You're so excited, because you're someplace so incredible, and it wasn't easy to get there," she says. "There was this moment when you love humanity, and you're so proud of people for doing it."