Some people have the feeling that nothing can be done about their poor reading ability（能力）.They feel hopeless about it.Can you learn to read better,or must you agree that nothing can be done about it?

    To be sure,people are different.You cannot expect to do everything as well as certain other people do.If all the students in a class tried out for basketball,some would be very good players,others would be very poor;and many would be in between.But even the very poor players can become much better players if they are guided in the right way,and with plenty of practice.It is the same with reading.Some seem to enjoy reading and to read well without any special help.Others find reading a slow and tiring job.In between,there are all degrees of reading ability.

    Many experiments have shown that just about every poor reader can improve his reading ability.In these experiments,the poor readers were given tests of reading ability.After some of the causes of their poor reading were discovered,they were given special instruction and practice in reading.After a few months,another test of the same kind was given.In nearly all cases,these people had raised their reading scores.

    Parents who help their children with homework may actually be bringing down their school grades. Other forms of parental involvement, including volunteering at school and observing a child's class, also fail to help, according to the most recent study on the topic.

    The findings challenge a key principle of modern parenting where schools expect them to act as partners in their children's education. Previous generations concentrated on getting children to school on time, fed, dressed and ready to learn.

    Keith Robinson, the author of the study, said, "I really don't know if the public is ready for this but there are some ways parents can be involved in their kids' education that leads to declines in their academic performance. One of the things that was consistently negative was their parents' help with homework." Robinson suggested that may be because parents themselves struggle to understand the tasks."They may either not remember the material their kids are studying now, or in some cases never learnt it themselves, but they're still offering advice.

    Robinson assessed parental involvement performance and found one of the most damaging things a parent could do was to punish their children for poor marks. In general, about 20% of parental involvement was positive, about 45% negative and the rest statistically insignificant.

    Common sense suggests it was a good thing for parents to get involved because "children with good academic success do have involved parents", admitted Robinson. But he argued that this did not prove parental involvement was the root cause of that success. "A big surprise was that Asian-American parents whose kids are doing so well in school hardly involved. They took a more reasonable approach, conveying to their children how success at school could improve their lives."

    Green spaces within and around city schools improve the mental development of young children, a study has found. The findings may partly be explained by reduced exposure to traffic pollution, experts believe. Other influences could include the psychological effect of having views of fields and trees rather than roads and buildings.

    The Spanish researchers found each degree of increase in surrounding greenness led to a 5% improvement in the development of short-term, or working memory over a period of one year. It also improved the progress of "superior working memory”—the ability to update memories. with changing information—by 6%，and reduced inattentiveness. Computer analysis suggested that carbon from traffic might account for up to 65% of the trend.

    The researchers carried out mental performance tests on 2, 593 children attending 36 primary schools in Barcelona every three months for a year. Over the study period, participants' working memory increased by an average of 22.8%, and superior working memory by 15.2%, while inattentiveness decreased by 18. 9%.

    The researchers wrote, "Approximately one half of the world population lives in cities, and by 2030, three in five persons will live in urban areas worldwide, Urban areas are a network of non-natural built-up structures with increased pollutant levels and less green environments. Children's exposure to these pollutants has been associated with harmful impacts on their mental development. Our findings suggest a beneficial impact of greens paces exposure on mental development. "

    British experts said the study was interesting, but pointed out some limitations. Professor Andy Jones, from Norwich medical school, said, “The measure of green space used was the number of plants in the neighborhoods of the children and their schools. It was not a direct measure of usable green spaces, like public parks, although they will be included. " Dr Ross Cameron, at the University of Sheffield, said, “The authors suggest a causal link between air quality and green space. They admit, however, that this factor only seems to explain part of their correlations(相互关系), ”

    Charity is simple in theory：A heart warms, a hand reaches out. In practice, though, charity can become a troubled mix of motives and consequences. Giving can be driven by guilt, duty, praise, or perhaps the hope that giving will somehow make up for past cruelty or ignorance. Too little charity is far less than valuable. Too much can cause dependence which makes the receiver continuously ask for more.

    Giving from the heart is good. But critics have long worried about misdirected charity that does more harm than good. In his 2012 book, "Harmful Charity: How Churches and Charities Hurt Those They Help（And How to Solve the Problem）, "Robert Lupton, an experienced social worker of 40 years of community work in inner-city Atlanta, argues that charity must not do for the poor what they can do for themselves.

    Due to emergencies such as natural disasters, the afterward financial aid is greatly welcome. Mr. Lupton advocates it should focus on the development of self-supporting. The task can be carried out via, for instance, offering microloans, hiring local builders and suppliers, and trying to found self-supported, locally owned and operated enterprises. What seldom works, he argues, are untargeted handouts from far-off providers and the sudden arrival of inexperienced volunteer-tourists hoping to earn personal reputation by digging wells or mending roofs that locals are perfectly able to take care of themselves.

    Getting charity right isn't easy. But from money raising to the boom in volunteering among Millennials（千禧一代）, from the increasing worldwide willingness to give to the efforts by charity organizations to become more effective and fruitful, there is strong evidence that human beings' ability of taking care of others is growing along with their ability to help without harming.

    Charity can be as simple as holding the door for a stranger and as complex as a global campaign to get rid of malaria（疟疾）.Charity works best when it returns the weak to strength, when it helps a small town shaken by a heavy earthquake get back on its feet. A successful charity is one that eventually is no longer needed.

    Stephen Hawking was a famous physicist. He was born in 1942. He died at his home on March 14h, 2018 in Cambridge, Britain.
    As one of the well-known physicists on space and time in the world, Hawking devoted his whole life to discovering the secrets of the universe, and he is called the King of the Universe. Since he was 21 years old, Hawking had been badly ill, but he didn't give up his hope of living. He went on to study at Cambridge University after graduating from Oxford University. In 1965, he got a doctor's degree. Then he worked as a professor at Cambridge University.

    Hawking was known for his work with black holes. He also wrote several popular science books. Although he didn't live as freely as others, he still felt he was happy and he was thankful to life. When Hawking was invited to China, he made speeches in some famous universities.

    From Stephen Hawking's whole life, we learn that no matter how bad life is, we should not lose hope. As he once said," Life is not fair, you just have to do the best you can in your own situation."

What is a boy?

    Between the innocence of babyhood and the seriousness of manhood we find a delightful creature called a "boy". Boys come in different sizes, weights, and colors, but all boys have the belief: to enjoy every second of every minute every hour of every day and to fill the air with noise until the adult males pack them off to bed at night.

    Boys are found everywhere—on top of, under, inside of, climbing on, swinging from, running around, or jumping to this and that! Mothers spoil them, little girls hate them, older sisters and brothers love them, and God protects them. A boy is TRUTH with dirt on its face. BEAUTY with a cut on its finger, WISDOM with chocolate in its hair, and HOPE of the future with a snake in its pocket.

    When you are busy, a boy is a trouble­maker and a noise. When you want him to make a good impression, his brain turns to jelly, or else he becomes a wild creature bent on destroying the world and himself with it.

    A boy is a mixture—he has the stomach of a horse, the digestion of stones and sand, the energy of an atomic bomb, the curiosity of a cat, the imagination of a superman, the shyness of a sweet girl, the brave nature of a bull, the violence of a firecracker, but when you ask him to make something, he has five thumbs (拇指) on each hand.

    He likes ice cream, knives, saws, Christmas, comic books, woods, water (in its natural habitat), large animals, Dad, trains, Saturday mornings, and fire engines. He is not much for Sunday schools, companies, schools, books without pictures, music lessons, neckties, barbers, girls, overcoats, adults, or bedtime.

    Nobody else is so early to rise, or so late to supper. Nobody else gets so much fun out of trees, dogs, and breezes. Nobody else can put into one pocket a rusty knife, a half eaten apple, a three­foot rope, six cents and some unknown things.

    A boy is a magical creature—he is your headache but when you come home at night with only shattered pieces of your hopes and dreams, he can mend them like new with two magic words, "Hi, Dad!"