【推荐1】“Instagram(a social networking app) will cut out many users’ accounts on December 20. To protect your account, repost this warning #KeepMyAccountSafe.” Every few months, it happens again-a dozen of annoying posts from my kids’ friends suddenly start to appear on my Instagram news feed.

According to a new study by Stanford University, most kids don’t know what news is fake. Researchers asked more than 7,800 middle school and high school students to complete 56 tasks, like distinguishing an advertisement from a real news story on a website and determining which blog in a series was most reliable. They found that students judged the credibility of blogs based not on the source of the material, but on how much detail they contained, or whether a large photo was attached.

“Many people assume that because young people are fluent in social media, they can distinguish fake news, but our work shows the opposite to be true,” wrote lead study author Sam Wineburg, a professor at Stanford’s Graduate School of Education.

Both Google and Facebook are now taking steps to control misleading news from making its way on their platforms, but they won’t be able to eliminate it completely. That is why it’s now more important than ever to teach our kids to think critically when it comes to believing various information sources.

“In the coming months, we look forward to sharing our assessments and working with educators to create materials that will guide young people in the sea of disinformation they encounter online,” said Wineburg.

【推荐3】The cancer death rate in the U.S. fell by the most on record as advances in treatments for lung tumors (肿瘤) like video-assisted surgery helped prolong the lives of patients.

The death rate from cancer has been gradually declining for 26 years, thanks in large part to fewer people smoking cigarettes. But from 2016 to 2017, the most recent period available, it dropped by 2.2%, the most ever in a single year, according to a report released Wednesday by the American Cancer Society. That compares with an average 1.5% yearly decline over the decade. The drop translates to roughly 2.9 million fewer cancer deaths. For lung cancer specifically, the death rate declined 4.3% annually from 2013 to 2017.

"It is really lung cancer that is driving this," said Rebecca, scientific director of surveillance research at the American Cancer Society, and lead author on the new study. "We found increases in survival for lung cancer at every stage in diagnosis.” She attributed the lower deaths to improvements in treatments, including video-assisted surgery that enables more patients with early lung tumors to become eligible (合格的) for operations; more precise radiation treatment; and better scanning technology allowing doctors to better assess(评估)the stage of tumor, so the patient gets the best treatment right away. At later stages of illness, new drugs that aim at specific disease-causing genes are helping patients whose tumors have those genetic flaws(缺陷). Overall, lung cancer death rates have dropped by 51% for men since their peak in 1990, and by 26% for women since their peak in 2002.

The report, based on U.S. government data, isn't all good news. Prostate(前列腺)cancer death rates have leveled off recently after a period of decline. That may be because many doctors pulled back on using the controversial prostate-specific antigen(抗原)test, or PSA, which can spot the disease but can lead to over-treatment of men who may never have died from their tumors.

"Though it was definitely causing harm, it was also contributing to declines in death," Siegel said. What's needed now is better screening tests to detect only the prostate cancers that will go on to cause harm.

Population death rates are considered one of the most reliable ways of measuring progress in cancer treatment and prevention. By contrast, cancer survival rates can sometimes be influenced by improvements in diagnosing tiny, early-stage tumors that wouldn't necessarily be deadly.

【推荐1】Have you ever looked at a fashionable item of clothing and felt confused? If so, your confusion may have made sense.

Several months ago, high fashion brand Balenciaga released a “T-shirt shirt”, which is a shirt sewn on the front of a T-shirt. The unusual design has certainly confused a lot of people.

But the “double shirt” isn’t fighting alone on the frontier of strange fashion. Ever since US shoe manufacturer Crocs released its famous hole-filled foam shoes, the so-called “ugly fashion” hasn’t showed any signs of slowing down, the Business of Fashion website noted.

British designer Paul Surridge believes that the rise of ugly fashion is a sign that people are bored with looking perfect all the time. “Fashion thrives(蓬勃发展) on novelty”, he told the Financial Times.

Indeed, fashion is all about changes. Something that’s considered uncool one minute can then turn out to be the latest must-have fashion item the next.

And in the eyes of US fashion writer Megan Collins, ugly doesn’t necessarily mean the design of the item is ugly. After all, ugly is something subjective. “Ugly fashion means ‘not the mainstream’——it is not what everyone’s wearing; it is not what the general population considers as ‘in’ right now,” she told style news site Fashionista.

But throughout the history of fashion, when any new trend appears, most people tend to hate it, before it eventually becomes loved. As Italian designer Miuccia Prada told The New York Times, “Maybe because it is newer, ugly is attractive. Ugly is exciting.”

Meanwhile, popular social media fashion bloggers also help people to pick up new ugly fashion trends. These bloggers express themselves through their clothes, showing their unique personalities and making comments on their clothing choices. However, as Clever-ish Magazine noted, just being comfortable in your own skin could actually be “the best look”.

“I personally love having a unique expression because without ugly fashion and diversity, we’d all look the same,” Australian fashion influencer(网红) and model Zanita Whittington told Fashionista. “I appreciate anything that’s out of the norm(规范).”

【推荐2】Are you smarter than your parents and grandparents? According to James Flynn, a professor at a New Zealand university, you are! Over the course of the last century, people’s IQ test scores have gotten steadily higher --- on average, three points higher each decade. This improvement is known as the “Flynn effect”, and scientists want to know what is behind it.

IQ tests are designed to measure general intelligence rather than knowledge. Flynn believes that intelligence partly comes from our parents and partly is the result of our environment, but the improvement in test scores has been happening too quickly to be explained by heredity. So what has occurred in the 20th century to help people achieve higher scores?

Scientists have proposed several explanations for the Flynn effect. Some suggest that the improved test scores simply reflect an increased exposure to tests in general and the learning of test-taking techniques that help us perform better on any test. Others have pointed to better nutrition. Babies now are born larger, healthier, and with more brain development than in the past. Another suggested explanation is a change in educational styles, with teachers encouraging children to learn by discovering things for themselves rather than just memorizing information, which improves their problem-solving skills.

Flynn has limited the possible explanations after carefully examining test data and discovering that the improvement in scores has taken place in only certain parts of the IQ test. Test-takers are not doing better on the maths or vocabulary sections of the test; they are doing better on the sections requiring reasoning and problem solving. For example, one part of the test shows a set of shapes, and test-takers must find the patterns and connections between them.

According to Flynn, this visual intelligence improves as the amount of technology in our lives increases. Every time you play a computer game, you are exercising exactly the kind of thinking and problem solving that helps you do well on one kind of intelligence test. So are you really smarter than your parents? In one very specific way, you may be.

【推荐3】Doing voluntary work is becoming more and more popular nowadays because it benefits the individual volunteer, people in need and our society.

When helping others, we are enriching our lives as well. First, doing voluntary work is our responsibility and duty. Second, we can enlarge our life circles so that we get more chances to learn deeper about the present situation of our society, which is very important to our future development. Last, when doing voluntary work with others, we are improving our ability to cooperate with different people and build up team spirit. As for us students, doing voluntary work is an effective way to participate in social activities. In other words, it gives us the chances to prepare to fit into the society in advance.

Through voluntary work, the living conditions of people in need are improved. For example, lots of children in remote areas don't have access to enough food and clothes, let alone education. Some people donate money and clothes while some volunteers go to these areas to teach these children, bringing them knowledge as well as the latest information of the world. In this way, these children's qualities of life are improved and they'll integrate into the society more easily and get a sense of belonging.

The more voluntary work we do, the more steady and harmonious our society will be. Volunteers spread warmth and care all over the world, strengthening union and trust among citizens. As Ban Ki-moon once said, “Volunteerism is a source of community strength. It can bring positive social change by promoting respect for diversity, equality and the participation of all."

In conclusion, by doing voluntary work, both volunteers and people in need get the precious life experience, and it benefits our society to a large degree. We should keep on doing and appeal to more people to take part in this meaningful activity.