【推荐1】What is one of the most boring and tiresome words ever? Like discipline, responsibility is one of those words you have probably heard so many times from authority figures that you have been a bit allergic to it. Still, it's one of the most important things to grow and to feel good about your life. Without it as a foundation nothing else in any personal development book really works.

It's been said that the line between childhood and adulthood is crossed when we move from saying “It got lost” “I lost it”. Indeed, being accountable, understanding and accepting the role our choices play in the things that happen are important signs of emotional and moral maturity. That's why responsibility is one of the main supports of good character.

Many people have been refusing to grow up and avoiding the burdens implied in being accountable. Yes, responsibility sometimes requires us to do things that are unpleasant or even frightening. It asks us to carry our own weight, prepare and set goals and exercise the discipline to reach our ambitions. But the benefits of accepting responsibility are far more important than the short-lived advantages of refusing to do so. No one makes his or her life better by avoiding responsibility. In fact, irresponsibility is form of self-forced- servitude(苦役) to circumstances and to other people.

George Bernard Shaw once said, “People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can't find them, make them.” “Man must stop owing his problems to his environment and learn again to exercise his will ---- his personal responsibility in the realm of faith and morals.” said Albert Schweitzer.

The following incident shows blaming others and not taking full responsibility: Bernard L. Brown, Jr., once worked in a hospital where a patient knocked over a cup of water, which spilled on the floor beside the patient's bed. The patient was afraid he might slip on the water if he got out of the bed, so he asked a nurse to mop it up. The patient didn't know it, but the hospital policy said that small spills were the responsibility of the nurse while large spills were to be mopped up by the hospital's housekeeping group.

The nurse decided the spill was a large one and she called the housekeeping group. A housekeeper arrived and declared the spill a small one. An argument followed. “It's not my responsibility,” said the nurse, “because it's a large puddle(水坑).”The housekeeper didn't agree. “Well, it's not mine,” she said, “the puddle is too small.”

The angry patient listened for a time, then took a pitcher of water from his night table and poured the whole thing on the floor. “Is that a big enough puddle now for you two to decide?” he asked. It was, and that was the end of the argument.

So, responsibility is about our ability to respond to circumstances and to choose the attitudes, actions and reactions that shape our lives. It is a concept of power that puts us in the driver's seat. The grand sight of the potential of our lives can only be appreciated when we begin to be accountable and independent. If you want more control over your life and the pleasures, power of freedom and independence, all you have to do is be responsible. Responsible people not only depend on themselves, but show others that they can be depended on.

【推荐3】A kind of sport called e­sports is attracting a large number of audience. However, this latest sports craze is not even a sport.

In e­sports, players and teams compete in popular video computer games such as Dota 2 and Ovenvatch. Fans fill arenas (竞技场) to watch the action live on huge television screens.

The games have gone way past kids playing against each other while sitting on a sofa at home. The International, a major competition for players of Dota 2,awarded $24 million in prizes, with the winner taking home almost $11 million. A recent e­sports competition attracted more than 80,000 fans to the Olympic Stadium in Beijing, China.

I have to admit that I am not a big fan of computer games. I know that some games can be educational, but I think too many kids spend too much time sitting in front of a screen shooting space aliens. I think it would be better if kids spent more time reading or playing real sports such as basketball, baseball and soccer.

And please don’t tell me that competitive gaming is a real sport because it requires hand­eye   coordination. According to my American Heritage Dictionary, a sport is “an activity involving (包含) physical exertion and skill”. I don’t think anyone needs physical effort while playing video games.

Too often, regular sports send kids a kind of message. Competition starts early, when lots of kids are not ready for the ups and downs of games. Tryouts and travel teams come next, giving too many kids the message they are “not good” at sports. So lots of kids quit sports and start playing more video games.

Maybe everyone in youth sports, including coaches,parents and kids,should think more about the advantages of real sports.

【推荐3】Joanna Cole, whose Magic School Bus series made science both dazzling and goofily fun for generations of children, died on July 12 at age 75. Her death was announced by her publisher, Scholastic. The cause of death was not given.

She originally created Magic School Bus in 1986 with ilustrator Bruce Degen. The core idea of a crew of schoolchildren taking field trips into scientific concepts, bodily parts, into space and back to the age of dinosaurs—and always led by their teacher, the intrepid Ms. Frizzle——eventually spun out into dozens of tie-ins and more than 93 million copies in print, plus a beloved television show that aired for 18 years in more than 100 countries.

In the U. S, the original Magic School Bus TV series was broadcast by PBS for 18 years; in 2017, an updated version was launched in 2017 on Netflix with the first of four specials on the way in August.

The book series won many awards, including an NEA Foundation Award for Outstanding Service to Public Education.

Cole was born in Newark, N. J. in 1944. She said that her inspiration for Ms. Frizzle was her own fifth-grade teacher. Cole worked answering letters to the editor at Newsweek, as a school librarian and as a magazine and children’s book editor before becoming a full-time author herself. Her first title, published in 1971, was Cockroaches.

She observed that there were no other children’s books on the market about roaches already, and decided to leap into the opportunity. As she once told her publisher, Scholastic, “An article in the Wall Street Journal inspired me to do some research... Plus, I had ample time to study that creature in my low budget New York apartment!”