The Aborigines (澳洲土著) have lived in Australia for about 60,000 years. They painted pictures inside caves, and these are the rock paintings that have given us so much information about Aboriginal life. For example, some of the paintings that are about 10,000 years old show men with boomerangs. From this we know that the Aborigines started using boomerangs for hunting at that time. Other pictures show kangaroos, so we know that there were kangaroos at that time.
The Aborigines believed that spirits made people, animals and plants, and that these spirits still live in the earth. For Aborigines, no one can own the earth—the earth belongs to the spirits.
In 1700, there were many Aboriginal groups with a population of 750,000 all over Australia, and there were probably more than 240 different Aboriginal languages. The groups did not have a leader. Instead, things were decided by the older men in a group. People from different groups often travelled hundreds of miles to meet each other.
Aboriginal life changed when an English boat arrived in Australia in 1770. Many Aborigines were killed in the wars that they had with the English. More Europeans came, and they started taking land from the Aborigines. The Europeans also brought new illnesses that killed the Aborigines. The result is that today there are only about 300,000 Aborigines in Australia.

    Vienna (维也纳) is a beautiful old city on the river Danube. It's the centre of European (欧洲的) classical music. From 1750 a lot of composers and musicians came to study and work in Vienna. The most famous family of musicians was the Strauss family.

    There were two composers called Johann Strauss: a father and a son. The father, Johann Strauss the elder, wrote and played music for a classical dance—a waltz(华尔兹). His waltzes made him famous all over Europe.

    The son, Johann Strauss the younger, was even more successful and popular than his father. His most famous waltz was The Blue Danube. He wrote it in 1867. Strauss and Mozart were two of the most important composers.

    Mozart was born in Austria in 1756. Before he was six he played not only the piano, but also the violin. He wrote his first opera (歌剧) at the age of 12 and hundreds of beautiful pieces of classical music. But he died in 1791 when he was only 35. Some people say he was the greatest European composer.

    In many English homes people eat four meals a day, breakfast, lunch, tea and dinner.

    People have breakfast at any time from seven to nine in the morning. They eat porridge, eggs, or bread. English people drink tea or coffee at breakfast.

    Lunch comes at one o'clock. Afternoon tea is from four to five in the afternoon and dinner is about half past seven. First they have soups, and then they have meat or fish with vegetables. After that they eat some other things, like bananas, apples, or oranges.

    But not all English people eat like this. Some of them have their dinner in the middle of the day. Their meals are breakfast, dinner, tea, and supper and all these meals are very necessary.

    At Parkland International Language School, our aim is to offer excellent junior English summer courses to young people aged 11 to 17. Our residential English summer school is held at one of the best boarding schools in England.

    It has outstanding facilities (设施), and it is situated in a very safe and attractive part of the country. Students aged 11 to 17 from different countries can enjoy the complete summer school experience: a full program of English lessons, activities and entertainment.

    Also, students can make lifelong friendships with students from other countries or with those British students who join them for conversation practice.

    We are a small, friendly and professional family business. We promise to ensure that all of our students are very well cared for and that they can make the most of the opportunities to practice and enrich their knowledge of English at our English Language summer school.

    Thank you for visiting our website. You can find much more information on the other pages of the website.