The Winner's Guide to Success

    Do you know what makes people successful? To find out the answers, an American scholar recently visited some of the most successful people in America. {#blank#}1{#/blank#}

Be responsible for yourself.

    Sometimes you may want to blame others for your failure to get ahead. In fact, when you say someone or something outside of yourself is stopping you from making success, you are giving away your own power. {#blank#}2{#/blank#}

Write a plan.

    It is very difficult trying to get what you want without a good plan. It is just like trying to drive through strange roads to a city far away. {#blank#}3{#/blank#} Without this “map”, you may waste your time, money and also your energy; while with the “map” you'll enjoy the “trip” and get what you want in the shortest possible time.

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    Nothing great is easy to get. So you must be ready to work hard — even harder than you have ever done. If you are not willing to pay the price, you won't get anything valuable.

Never give up.

    {#blank#}5{#/blank#} When you are doing something, you must tell yourself again and again: Giving up is worse than failure because failure can be the mother of success, but giving up means the death of hope.

Do you think you could learn a language in an hour?

    We know, we know! We would expect you to be skeptical. It's ridiculous to think you can learn a language in 60 minutes. You wouldn't even get through the As in a bilingual dictionary in that amount of time! Best-case situation: in an hour, most of us could probably stuff a few words and ready-made phrases into our short-term memory (with a high likelihood of forgetting it all by the following day). Accomplishing anything more than that in one hour? Impossible. Unless…

    We posed the one-hour language challenge to four polyglots(通晓数种语言的人) who are experts on how to study languages. To keep the challenge from becoming completely impossible, we gave them a bit of a break: to learn Romanian in one hour. Why Romanian? Because it's a Romance language and shares many similarities with the languages that the polyglots already know: French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese. And to make sure their hour of learning was as effective as possible, all of them were assigned a personal Romanian tutor to help coach them on their way to success.

    Although each polyglot has a different technique for picking up and remembering a new language, all four methods offer valuable insights to anyone, from casual learners to hard-core language enthusiasts.

Alex Rawlings — UK

    "I'm a bit nervous. This is probably the craziest language-learning thing I've ever done, but learning languages has always been about fun. I expect that, after this, I'll be prepared to have a simple chat over a coffee in Romanian. Is that reasonable?"

    Method: Learn the verbs first

    With only an hour until he had to start demonstrating his grasp of Romanian, Alex knew he had to start talking quickly. He chose to focus first on commonly used verbs and how to conjugate（动词变形） them. Once he had some verbs down, he could start collecting nouns from his tutor and plugging them in to make more interesting and relevant sentences.

Luca Lampariello — Italy

    "Every time I have a conversation with native speakers, it really motivates me. Human contact is really important when learning a language."

Method: Start speaking right away

    Speaking doesn't mean speaking perfectly. Speaking even a little bit is a huge confidence boost. When you can say something in a new language and people actually understand you, it's very motivating. Yes, you'll make mistakes, but you'll also learn faster than if you try to get it all perfect in your head first.

Michael Youlden — UK

    "We all speak a variety of Romance languages which I think will help us get into Romanian quickly."

Method: Write everything down

    Language learning is about recall; there's no use learning something if you don't remember it. Speaking new words aloud is very important, but so is writing them down — after all, words exist as sounds and in written form. Taking notes is a proven way to put new vocabulary and grammar into your memory. Writing supports memorizing which supports speaking... it's a cycle. Plus, you have an easy reference when you want to review what you've learned.

Matthew Youlden — UK

    "I'm going to look for the patterns and similarities with languages I already know. We won't be able to speak fluently after an hour of study, but we should be able to get by with some basic vocabulary and phrases."

Method: Look for cognates

    Cognates are words in different languages that look and sound similar and have the same meaning, due to a common origin. Almost every language combination contains cognates (even if two languages aren't seemingly related), but languages from the same language family have many more. Whichever language you are learning, identify the familiar words and then use them to anchor the new words that aren't so familiar. To use English as an example, because it's a sort of Germanic-Romance hybrid, English already has many words that cognate with German, Dutch and Swedish on one hand, and on the other hand it also has lots of words that cognate with French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and, of course, Romanian!

    Learn a language with courses designed by the experts. Start here, today!

    Pick a language to learn. German, Spanish, Italian, French, Portuguese, and Swedish.

    The most wonderful time of the year (the Christmas season) is also the most stressful for lots of people struggling to fit in increased end-of-the-year workloads, holiday parties, shopping, guest hosting, travel, and seeing friends and relatives who you'd otherwise avoid. Luckily, the same coping mechanisms that can help relieve stress and find better balance during the year also work for this holiday.

    Here are four tips to finding work—life balance during this season.

1） Know and avoid your stressors(压力源).

    If cooking for a large group, baking cookies, or Christmas shopping are your key stressors, don't do them. Lots of grocery stores will help cater your next holiday meal. Bakeries exist for a reason, and gift cards are much appreciated by all. Stop trying to live up to someone else's expectations of the holidays and stay merry by outsourcing the pain points.

2） Get flexible at work.

    If you normally travel an hour each way at work, see if your boss will let you work from home in this special season to save time, get more done, and reduce your stress. Or ask if you can start work from home in the mornings and come to the office later in the day to avoid peak hours. Leave early and finish your day from the comfort of home, too.

3） Make your own list and check it twice.

    Make a to-do list for yourself, for both work and life, then divide it up into categories like “must do,” “want to do,” and “feel obligated to do.” If you can remove any or all of your required list, the rest of your to-dos will start to look a lot easier.

    Once you have your lists in order, it's time to start crossing things off. In between your must-dos tasks, include a want-to-do task to break things up and re-energize yourself. Yes, this holiday is a time to give back to others and be selfless, but there's still a bit of “self” in selflessness, isn't there?

4）If you start to feel a cold coming on, come to a full and complete stop.

    The best way to stop a cold from exploding into a weeks-long sickness is to stop it at the start. Unless a task or activity is an absolute necessity, cancel your plans, put away your to-do lists, and settle in for a long winter's nap. A day of rest and enough sleep is the only thing you NEED right now. Feel bad about declining holiday invitations from your friends and family? You're doing them a favor. Once people hear that you're sick, they'll be glad you stayed away — they don't want to come down with a cold during the holiday any more than you do!

    It is certain that you can feel less stressed in this hectic season when you stop expecting so much from yourself, because nobody puts so much expectation on you as you do to yourself. Trying to satisfy clients, co-workers, friends and family can be draining and can finally negatively impact you in many ways. When you simplify things up front, you relieve the stress off of yourself and everyone else in the process. Stop focusing on what you feel like you're obligated to do, and start focusing on what you want and need to do, the load will get lighter and you will feel a lot merrier under the Christmas tree.

    Everybody knows that first impressions count. If you want to know how to meet people, just follow these steps.

    Live in the moment.

    To meet new people, the first thing you have to do is enjoy the present moment of the new conversation.{#blank#}1{#/blank#} They can prevent a conversation from going smoothly.

    When you approach a new person, don't ask yourself, “How do I look?” or “How do I sound?” Instead, ask, “What would this person like to talk about?” “What matters to this person?”

    Stay confident.

    If you keep up your confidence, people feel that you're a person who is worth talking to. You should be confident before you walk into a room with new people in it and build your confidence as the conversation goes along.{#blank#}2{#/blank#}

Body language can help you stay confident.{#blank#}3{#/blank#} When you introduce yourself, speak clearly and loudly enough that you'll be heard.

    Be positive.

    {#blank#}4{#/blank#}You should smile from time to time. Talk about the things you love, the things that make you happy, and your interests to keep people engaged.

    Don't talk about your long-standing hatred for a certain person. Don't nod and agree with what the person is saying every five seconds.{#blank#}5{#/blank#}

A. Maintaining a positive attitude will make people want to talk to you.

B. Let go of your expectations and fears.

C. If you find yourself anxious, take a deep breath and wait until you calm down.

D. Never ask for a person's number or salary in the middle of the conversation.

E. The occasional “That's so true!” or “I know exactly what you mean!” will be far more positive.

F. Just smile, talk about the things that you love, and show everyone that you love who you are.

G. Stand tall, maintain eye contact, and don't look at the floor.

Overcome Culture Shock in the Classroom

    Culture shock occurs in a classroom when students are exposed to a new situation.{#blank#}1{#/blank#}. However, it can also happen to students moving from a small town to a large city, to home-schooled students starting formal school education or to students progressing from one level of education to another. There are several strategies that teachers can use to help students overcome culture shock.

    Make group rules

    Brainstorm(集体讨论) group rules with the class as a whole to create a safe space and good learning environment.{#blank#}2{#/blank#}. Rules could include respecting differences, listening when someone is speaking and not teasing, for example.

    Provide a partner

    Find a partner for the new student in the adjustment period.{#blank#}3{#/blank#}. A good partner is someone who is friendly, outgoing and patient. The partner should show the new student around the school, spend time with him or her after class and eat lunch with him or her.

    Know the source of a problem

    Identify problems early and work with the student and his or her family to deal with them. {#blank#}4{#/blank#}. It can also be caused by overseas or home school environment. Students and parents need to be aware of all the rules and customs that apply.

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    Create lessons that include information about different countries and traditions. These could include story reading, geography, cultural studies and history. Encourage the student to share some information about himself or herself.

A. Create special lessons

B. Respect other cultures

C. They have lost their own language and culture

D. Explain the rules and require everyone to follow them

E. A partner can help him or her quickly adapt to the new environment

F. Classroom culture shock is often caused by the very different environment of a classroom

G. Typically, this happens when a new immigrant(移民) arrives in a classroom for the first time