If you want to become a fluent English speaker, you should take some advice: there are four skills in learning English. They are listening, speaking, reading and writing. The most important thing you must remember is that if you want to improve your speaking and writing skills you should first master the skills of reading and listening.

    Read as much as you can. But your reading must be active. It means that you must think about the meaning of the sentences, the meaning of the unfamiliar words, etc.

    There is no need for you to pay much attention to grammar—or try to understand all the unfamiliar words you come across, but the fact you see them for the first time and recognize them whenever you see them, for example in other passages or books, is enough. It would be better to prepare yourself a notebook so you can write down the important words or sentences in it.

    As for listening, there are two choices: besides reading, you can listen every day for about 30 minutes. You can only pay attention to your reading and become skillful at your reading, then you can catch up on your listening. Since you have lots of inputs(输入) in your mind, you can easily guess what the speaker is going to say. This never means that you should not practice listening.

    For listening you can listen to cartoons or some movies that are specially made for children. Their languages are easy. Or if you are good at listening, you can listen to VOA or BBC programs every day. Again the thing to remember is being active in listening and preferably(更好地) taking some notes.

    If you follow these pieces of advice, your speaking and writing will improve automatically(自动地)，and you can be sure that with a little effort they will become perfect.

    Freedom and Responsibility

    Freedom's challenge in the Digital Age is a serious topic. We are facing today a strange new world and we are all wondering what we are going to do with it.

    Some 2,500 years ago Greece discovered freedom. Before that there was no freedom. There were great civilizations, splendid empires, but no freedom anywhere. Egypt and Babylon were both  tyrannies, one very powerful man ruling over helpless masses.

    In Greece, in Athens (雅典), a little city in a little country, there were no helpless masses. And Athenians willingly obeyed the written laws which they themselves passed, and the unwritten, which must be obeyed if free men live together. They must show each other kindness and pity and the many qualities without which life would be very painful unless one chose to live alone in the desert.The Athenians never thought that a man was free if he could do what he wanted. A man was free if he was self-controlled. To make yourself obey what you approved was freedom. They were saved from looking at their lives as their own private affair. Each one felt responsible for the welfare of Athens, not because it was forced on him from the outside, but because the city was his pride and his safety. The essential belief of the first free government in the world was liberty for all men who could control themselves and would take responsibility for the state.

    But discovering freedom is not like discovering computers. It cannot be discovered once for all. If people do not prize it, and work for it, it will go. Constant watch is its price. Athens changed. It was a change that took place without being noticed though it was of the extreme importance, a spiritual change which affected the whole state. It had been the Athenian' s pride and joy to give to their city. That they could get material benefits from her never entered their minds. There had to be a complete change of attitude before they could look at the city as an employer who paid her citizens for doing her work. Now instead of men giving to the state, the state was to give to them. What the people wanted was a government which would provide a comfortable life for them; and with this as the primary object, ideas of freedom and self-reliance and responsibility were neglected to the point of disappearing. Athens was more and more looked on as a cooperative business possessed of great wealth in which all citizens had a right to share.

    Athens reached the point when the freedom she really wanted was freedom from responsibility. There could be only one result. If men insisted on being free from the burden of self-dependence and responsibility for the common good, they would cease to be free. Responsibility is the price every man must pay for freedom. It is to be had on no other terms. Athens, the Athens of Ancient Greece, refused responsibility; she reached the end of freedom and was never to have it again.

    But, “the excellent becomes the permanent”, Aristotle said. Athens lost freedom forever, but freedom was not lost forever for the world. A great American, James Madison, referred to: “The capacity (能力) of mankind for self-government.” No doubt he had not an idea that he was speaking Greek. Athens was not in the farthest background of his mind, but once man has a great and good idea, it is never completely lost. The Digital Age cannot destroy it. Somehow in this or that man's thought such an idea lives though unconsidered by the world of action. One can never be sure that it is not on the point of breaking out into action only sure that it will do so sometime.

    If we are observant(善于观察的), we can find that most of the flowers in nature are red, orange and yellow. If we have seen a black flower, it is a chance in a million. People have made census (统计) to colors of more than four thousand kinds of flowers and discovered that only eight of them are black. Why are black flowers so rare?

    As we know, sunlight is formed by seven different kinds of colored light. The wave length of each light changes, so the quantity of heat in each light changes, too. Flowers, especially their petals (花瓣) , are very weak and easy to the harm caused by high temperature. Black flowers can take in all the light waves, which cause the flowers to dry up in a high temperature. So the black flowers can hardly continue their lives. While red flowers, orange flowers and yellow ones can protect themselves from sunlight by reflecting（反射） the red light, orange light and yellow light, each of which has a large quantity of heat.

    That is why red, orange and yellow flowers are very common in nature while black flowers are so unusual.

    If you can speak English，you know a lot of English words. You can read，speak and understand. But there is another kind of language you need to know——the language of the body，a part of what is called non-verbal communication. All over the world，people “talk” with their eyes. When Japanese people meet，they put their hands together. What do American and British do?

    Americans are more informal than the British. They like to be friendly. They use first name，they ask questions and they talk easily about themselves. When they sit down，they like to relax in their chairs and make themselves comfortable.

    British people are more quiet. They take more time to make friends. They like to know you before they ask you home.

    When British and American people meet someone for the first time，they shake hands. They do not usually shake hands with people they know well. Women sometimes kiss their women friends，and men kiss women friends （on one cheek only）.When a man meets a man friend，he just smiles，and says “Hello”. Men do not kiss each other. Even fathers and sons do not often kiss each other.

    When we don't understand each other's language, we can talk with the help of signs.

    A Frenchman was once travelling in England. He could not speak English at all. One day he went into a restaurant and sat down at a table. When the waiter came, he opened his mouth, put his fingers in it, and took out again. He wanted to say. "Bring me something to eat."

    The waiter soon brought him a cup of tea. The man moved his head from side to side. The waiter understood him and took the tea away. In a moment he came with a cup of coffee. But the man again refused it. He shook his head whenever the waiter brought him something to drink, for drinks are not food.

    When the man was going away, another man came in. This man saw the waiter, and he put his hand on his stomach. That was enough. In a few minutes there was a large plate of meat and vegetables on the table in front of him.

    So you see, we cannot understand the language of signs as well as we can understand the language of words.

    TESCO has announced it is banning the sale of energy drinks to teenagers, and that the big move will begin in weeks. The supermarket has joined a host of major names banning teenagers from buying high caffeine, high-sugar drinks. The government indicates that the principal question to be determined is whether the purchasing restrictions will apply at the age of 16 or 18.

    Theresa May said the consultation was linked to the government's childhood obesity (肥胖) strategy and said it was necessary to examine the consumption of energy drinks "often because they are sold at cheaper prices than soft drinks".

    The principal reason for the ban is the high level of caffeine in the energy drinks, which has been linked to a string of health problems for children, including head and stomach aches as well as sleep problems.

    Energy drinks often also have higher levels of sugar than soft drinks. According to government figures, sugared energy drinks have 60% more calories and 65% more sugar than normal soft drinks and sugar is one of the largest causes of obesity.

    Jamie Oliver said he welcomed the ban on energy drink sales because "too many children are regularly using them to replace breakfast" and "teachers from across the country have told me how their lessons are disrupted because of these drinks".

    A Downing Street source added that there is no evidence that energy drinks have any nutritional value in children's diet. That accounts for the government's action on measures to tackle childhood obesity and improve children's health.

    The move is the latest step in an approach in relation to childhood obesity and health. According to European Food Safety Authority research, two-thirds of 10 to 16-year-olds regularly consume energy drinks, along with 18% of 3 to 10-year-olds.