A child who has once been pleased with a tale likes, as a rule, to have it retold in almost the same words, but this should not lead parents to treat printed fairy stories as formal texts. It is always much better to tell a story than read it out of a book, and, if a parent can produce what, in the actual situation of the time and the child, is an improvement on the printed text, so much the better.

    A charge made against fairy tales is that they harm the child by frightening him or making him sad thinking. To prove the latter, one would have to show in a controlled experiment that children who have read fairy stories were more often sorry for cruelty than those who had not. As to fears, there are, I think, some cases of children being dangerously terrified by some fairy story. Often, however, this arises from the child having heard the story once. Familiarity with the story by repetition turns the pain of fear into the pleasure of a fear faced and mastered.

    There are also people who object to fairy stories on the grounds that they are not objectively true, that giants, witches, two - headed dragons, magic carpets, etc. do not exist; and that, instead of being fond of the strange side in fairy tales, the child should be taught to learn the reality by studying history. I find such people, I must say so peculiar (奇怪的, 异常的) that I do not know how to argue with them. If their cases were sound, the world should be full of mad men attempting to fly from New York to Philadelphia on a stick or covering a telephone with kisses in the belief that it was their beloved girl -friend.

    No fairy story ever declared to be a description of the real world and no clever child has ever believed that it was.

    Mrs. White lived in a town of England. Her husband died three years ago and one of her children worked in the capital and the other three lived in another town. Her husband didn't leave her much money and she had to live a simple (简朴) life. Sometimes her children went to see her during their holidays, but they stayed with her for only two or three days.

    One winter morning the old woman got up early. She was going to buy some food in a shop. And when she came out, she found there was much snow in the street. She had to sweep it away. And suddenly she found a dying dog at the comer of the house. She picked it up and took it into the house quickly. She put it near the fire and gave it some milk and bread. At first the poor dog ate nothing and that afternoon it drank some milk and three days later it was all right. Now the old woman found it was a beautiful dog. And she liked it very much and took it everywhere she went. A week later she went shopping with her dog. At a bus stop a young man was eating fish and chips. The little dog became very excited at the smell of the man's lunch and began jumping up at him.

    “Do you mind if I throw it a bit?'' asked the young man.

    “Not at all,” answered Mrs. White.

    Having heard this, he picked up the dog and threw it over the wall.

    A survey by an international temporary service agency found that U. S. managers believe that people with a sense of humour do better at their jobs, compared with those who have little or no sense of humour. In fact, about 96 percent of those surveyed said people with a sense of humour do better.

    The survey went on to point out that the results suggest that a sense of humour may help light-hearted employees keep their jobs during tough times. And, what's more, it may push them up the corporate ladder past their humourless colleagues. Why? It seems that those with a sense of humour are better communicators and better team players.

    Studies have shown that happy workers are more productive. In fact, a researcher at California State University found that humour could help the employees to release tension.

    Research done by psychologist Dr. Ashton Trice at Mary Baldwin College in Virginia showed that humour helps us think. When people feel stuck on important projects, they tend to feel angry or depressed.  According to Dr. Trice's research, taking time out to laugh can help us to get rid of negative feelings and allow us to return to a task or move on to another project unaffected by past defeat.

    If humour is really this important, then why don't we use it more often on the job? Most likely, the main reason is that many people are unaware of the positive effects of humour in the workplace. However, it is important to realize that some humour is not suitable for the workplace, and that it is often used at wrong times.

    In the past five years, Instagram has taken off faster than anyone would have ever expected. It has become more than just a social media platform; it has become a community. With this community of over 800 million people, there are two distinct sides when it comes to diet culture and weight-loss programs. These two sides are body positivity and body manipulation(操纵）

    I have run a food and lifestyle blog/Instagram for over two years, and I have experienced both of these sides shown through Instagram. I have followed accounts (账户) that have been about strictly counting their calories, and have looked at other people carefully for their food habits

    On the other side of this, the only accounts that I'll follow now are people who support intuitive eating, never calorie counting, and make sure to remind people that their weight is the least interesting thing. They try to remind people that food is fuel, rather than something that will make them lose or gain weight. This side of

    Instagram is what helps people suffering from eating disorders, rather than fueling them.

    The rise of Instagram also led to the rise of what we called" Instagram models. These people have a lot of fans and a very pleasant page on Instagram. Basically, this isn't a bad thing. Humans are attracted to attractive people. Where this does go wrong is when weight-loss programs, weight-loss products, and other people supporting different types of diets get in touch with these people and offer them pay to get their message across.

    We also run into issues with how the public thinks of and admires these people for only their bodies. Not only is it bad for the self-respect of the people viewing the account, but also for the mental health of the person running the Instagram account.

    The people that promote these products are usually attractive, with what we would consider "the perfect body and the products are almost always diet related in some way, which makes consumers believe that in order to reach this ideal body they must use this product.

The hottest cities in the world

    The locations below are the hottest and also travel destinations on the planet.

    Bangkok

    According to the data, Bangkok is the hottest city on the planet﹣not because of any particularly impressive high temperatures, but because it is consistently hot all the year round. The city has an average annual temperature of 29℃, coupled with high dampness and an average of 128rainy days per year; while the highest temperature on record is 40℃.

    Timbuktu, Mali

    Located on the southern edge of the Sahara Desert, the African city of Timbuktu is similar to everything remote. It's also one of the hottest cities in the world, with a hot, dry climate offering record highs of 49℃. Throughout April, May and June, average maximum temperatures are beyond 40℃. Modern﹣day Timbuktu is slowly being swallowed by the desert and is certainly a shadow of the trade center that it once was.

    Ahvaz, Iran

    Built on the bank of the Karun River, Ahvaz is an industrial city with average highs of around 46℃ during July, its warmest month. The city's record high is 54℃, making it one of the world's hottest cities during the summer. Frequent sand and dust storms and an absence of rain from July to September mix with its sky﹣high temperatures.

    Kuwait City

    The wealthy capital of Kuwait is another competitor for the title of the world's hottest summertime city with average highs of over 45℃ from June to August. Nightfall brings little respite（缓解）, with after﹣dark low temperatures often over 30℃ during the summer months. Kuwait City's record high is 52℃, while it rains on an average of just 19 days per year.

    The Chinese invented paper in 105 A. D. They mixed the bark of a tree and rags (破布) with water, put a screen into the mixture, and lifted out a thin piece of wet paper. They dried the paper in the sun.

    The Chinese kept their secret of how to make paper until a war with Muslims in the ninth century. The art of papermaking soon spread throughout the Muslim world.

    The Mayan Indians in Central America and Pacific Islanders also discovered how to make paper, but their knowledge never spread to the rest of the world.

    For centuries, all paper was made by hand. Rags were the main material. Then a French scientist discovered that people could make paper from wood, too. Finally, in the eighteenth century, a Frenchman invented a machine to make paper from wood.