【推荐1】In an online class, developing healthy patterns of communication with professors is very important.     1     While I have only listed two of each, there are obviously many other situations that can arise. Students should be able to extend the logic(逻辑) of each to their particular circumstance.

Do’s

•     2     Questions about subject content are generally welcomed. Before asking questions about the course design, read the syllabus(教学大纲) and learning management system information to be sure the answer isn’t hiding in plain sight.

• Participate in discussion forums(论坛), blogs and other open-ended forums for dialogue.     3     Be sure to stay on topic and not offer irrelevant information. Make a point, and make it safe for others to do the same.

Don’ts

• Don’t share personal information or stories. Professors are not trained nurses, financial aid experts or your best friends. If you are in need of a deadline extension, simply explain the situation to the professor.     4    

• Don’t openly express annoyance at a professor or class.     5     When a student attacks a professor on the social media, the language used actually says more about the student. If there is truly a concern about a professor’s professionalism or ability, be sure to use online course evaluations to calmly offer your comments.

【推荐2】80% of the students who take our courses are mature students who have not done any formal study for several years. The courses at Westley Business School (WBS) require a good knowledge of various skills. If you need some extra preparation before your course, look below and see if any of our preparation courses suit your needs. All courses take place in August and for registered students, the courses listed below are free.

A grounding in statistics is a must for any would-be business student. This one-week course consists of one lecture every night. The tutor will ensure that you will have had a thorough introduction to all the statistical skills you need to start your course at WBS. Each lecture runs from 6 pm to 9 pm.

This is a self-study pack containing guidance, practice and tests. After 10 hours of self-study, you will receive a one-hour tutorial with the essay writing tutor who will go over your work with you.

This is a one-off lecture of 3 hours aimed at reviewing the basic math you will vaguely remember from school! This course is run on a first-come, first-served basis and there are only 20 places (the first Monday in August from 5:45 pm to 8:45 pm), so don’t be late.

This two-week course (Mon — Fri from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm) will give students all the basic computer skills needed for their courses at WBS. There are two courses running at the same time with only 10 places in each, so book early!

【推荐1】Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving Day and the Friday before Cyber Monday in the United States. It is not a federal holiday, but is a public holiday in some states. Many people take a day of their annual leave on the day after Thanksgiving Day. Some people use this to make trips to see family members or friends who live in other areas or to go on vacation. Others use it to start shopping for the Christmas season. Many organizations also close for the Thanksgiving weekend.

Shopping for Christmas presents is also popular on Black Friday. Many stores have special offers and lower their prices on some goods, such as toys. Public transit systems may run on their normal schedule or may have changes. Some stores extend their opening hours on Black Friday. There can also be congestion on roads to popular shopping destinations.

Black Friday is one of the busiest shopping days in the USA. There are two popular theories as to why the day after Thanksgiving Day is called Black Friday. One theory is that the wheels of vehicles in heavy traffic on the day after Thanksgiving Day left many black markings on the road surface, leading to the term Black Friday. The other theory is that the term Black Friday comes from an old way of recording business accounts. Losses were recorded in red ink and profits in black ink. Many businesses, particularly small businesses, started making profits prior to Christmas. Many hoped to start showing a profit, marked in black ink, on the day after Thanksgiving Day.

【推荐2】Fourteen dancers wearing jumpsuits filled with sponge and with special cotton in their mouths recreate the plump figures of Tang Dynasty females. They line on stage with amusing facial expressions and humorous motions. Besides, crescent-shaped makeup and costumes resembling Tang tri-colored pottery make audiences feel like travelling to the Tang Dynasty 1,300 years ago. It is a combination of virtual scene with real stage, along with nifty dance moves of actresses and demonstration of national treasures, which have all made the show impressive.

The magic-like dance program, namely Tang Gong Ye Yan(Night Banquet in Tang Dynasty Palace), was released in the Spring Festival gala of 2021 by Henan TV. The video has been watched 48.62 million times on Sina Weibo, and the view counts of related topics have passed 200 million on Tiktok by Feb 19. It has enlightened people’s passion toward the beauty of traditional culture, and consequently also spread overseas, appreciated by culture lovers around the world.

The dance has become a representation of Guochao, which expresses the rise of China’s native fashion trends. A group of young artists have begun to try to demonstrate traditional Chinese culture in different ways. One of the pioneers is Chen Lei, director of the gala. In his opinion, the dance, in which modern technologies such as 3D and AR are used, is a combination of rich treasures of China’s traditional culture and modern technologies, fashions and aesthetic(美学).

Chen told the Global Times that with the development of China, Chinese young people feel more confident to promote Chinese trends to the international stage. He believes traditions shouldn’t be sealed in glass boxes at museums or merely taught in the classroom, but combined with the digital world. Otherwise, the inheritance of traditions would be artificial and empty.

【推荐3】Crosstalk, a traditional form of comic storytelling, is making a comeback in China's tea houses and theaters.

Audiences can laugh the night away every Saturday at the Qianxiangyi Teahouse in Tianjin, entertained by the students of Hou Baolin, Ma Sanli or Yin Shoushan—all leading crosstalk artists of years past-for only 20 yuan. The success in Tianjin has also caused the comeback of crosstalk in Beijing and other places.

Although the art form began in Beijing in the Qing Dynasty (1644﹣1911), Tianjin became a place where rising stars formed their styles and new pieces were tried out. The city was well﹣known nationwide for the quality of its crosstalk performances.

Known in Chinese as xiangsheng (literally, “face and voice”), crosstalk was the chief form of comedy throughout most of the 20th century. In the old days in Tianjin and elsewhere, temple fairs and markets were the main places for crosstalkers to perform, although they occasionally also appeared in teahouses or theaters.

The Crosstalk piecesdraw onevery aspect of Chinese culture, from history and folk tales to social issues of the time. Although there're hundreds of traditional pieces, they're constantly rewritten to suit the times and the audience, while new works are written as well. It's one of the characters that have made crosstalk a public art form throughout its history.

“Crosstalk was in the doldrums (萎靡不振) with competition from other art forms, especially TV,” said Wang Xiaochun, headmaster of the Northern Storytelling Arts School of China (NSAS). “But it has regained its popularity with crosstalk fans, especially young people, realizing its rare qualities.”

“More and more students are coming to NSAS to study crosstalk, including some girl students,” said Wang. “They're sure that crosstalk will have a strong market.”

【推荐2】The earliest newspapers started in ancient Rome. They were handwritten news sheets. The first printed newspapers appeared in China during the Tang dynasty, which were printed from carved wooden blocks. Modern papers first appeared in Venice, Italy in the middle of the 14th century. The newspapers of today, with advertising and a mixture of political, economic, and social news and comments, were started in Britain in the mid-18^th century.

The main function of newspapers is to report news. Many newspapers also provide special information to readers, such as weather reports and television timetables. They also provide comments on politics, economics, arts and culture. Almost all newspapers depend on advertising to make money. Nearly six out of ten adults in the United States and Canada read a newspaper every day. Seven out of ten read a paper each weekend. Readers search newspapers for detailed background information and analysis. This is what television and radio news reports seldom offer. Newspapers tell readers what happened, and they also help readers understand what caused an event and how it will affect the world around them.

The workers at large newspaper companies work under a lot of pressure to bring news to readers as soon as possible. Reporters, photographers, artists, and editors collect articles in just a few hours. Page designers select articles, photos, advertisements, and eye-catching headlines to make the pages, and then rush their work to the printer. Printing workers may work overnight around printing presses to churn out more than 60,000 copies per hour.

【推荐3】Take a look inside a high school classroom. You will most likely find a teacher at the front of the class and students sitting at their desks. Yet, look closer, and you might notice a familiar scene: many of these students are not paying attention. Instead, they are dozing off (打盹) or even completely asleep.

Today, the majority of high school students are not getting enough sleep. This lack (缺乏) of sleep is a serious problem, especially as students are doing more than ever with their time. They come to school early, spend hours listening to teachers and taking tests, and come home to be faced with even more work. And the homework load these days is not light; teachers give hours worth of homework each night.

Most kids need at least nine hours of sleep per night in order to function properly. Yet the period of this nine hours shifts as a child gets older. After puberty (青春期), the body’s internal clock changes so that it is difficult for teens to fall asleep before 11 p.m. So even if a student falls asleep at eleven, they would need to sleep until at least 8 a.m. to get a full night’s sleep Considering the time at which most high schools in this country begin, those nine hours are clearly being shortened. Few high schools start after 8 a.m.

However, there are schools that have paid attention to this research and delayed the start of their school day. In schools where the start time is after 8:30 in the morning, the teachers believe that there has been a real change in their students. They note that the students miss class less, pay more attention in class, perform better in class, and report lower levels of depression (沮丧). The researchers of these studies say that the results are quite important and that more schools should consider delaying their start time of their school day.