【推荐1】Have you ever wondered how we know the things that we know? How do we know, for example, that the stars are really huge balls of fire like the Sun and very far away? And how do we know that the Earth is a smaller ball turning round one of those stars, the Sun?

The key to these questions is “evidence”, which means the facts, signs or objects that make you believe something is true.

Sometimes evidence means actually(实际上) seeing (or hearing, feeling, smelling...)that something is true. Astronauts have travelled far enough from the Earth to see with their own eyes that it is round. Sometimes our eyes need help. The “evening star” looks like bright twinkle in the sky, but with a telescope(望远镜) you can see that it is a beautiful ball. Something that you learn by direct seeing (or hearing or feeling...) is called an observation.

Often evidence isn’t just observation on its own, but observation always hides at the back of it. If there’s been a murder, often nobody (except the murderer and the dead person!) actually observed it. But detectives can gather together lots of other observations which may all point towards the suspect. If a person’s fingerprints match those found on a knife, this is evidence that he touched it. It doesn’t prove that he did the murder, but it can help when it’s joined up with lots of other evidence.

Prediction(预测) helps to look for evidence. Scientists make a guess about what might be true. For example, if the world is really round, we can predict that any of us, going on and on in the same direction, should eventually find ourselves back where we started.

People sometimes say that you must believe in feelings deep inside, but not all the inside feelings are real evidence.

What can we do about all this? When somebody tells you something that sounds possible, think to yourself: “Is there any evidence for that?” And, next time somebody tells you that something is true, why not say to them: “What kind of evidence is there for that?” Remember, always think carefully before you believe a word.

【推荐3】根据短文内容，从短文后的选项中选出能填入空白处的最佳选项。

Nowadays we often work as a team.     1     People want team leaders they can trust. Would you like to be a good leader? Here’s some advice for you.

Ask to know your team.

Learn about each person on your team.You can’t be a successful leader unless you know your team. Be a “learner” instead of a “knower” as you don’t have all the answers.     2    . For example, as you pass someone, you can ask, “Hi! Do you enjoy doing this work?” or “Do you have any ideas about how to do it better?”

Talk to your team.

    3    

It’s a good practice to talk actively with everyone on your team. Tell them what you’re thinking about and what new problems you are considering. The more you talk to them, the more comfortable they will feel when they give you their opinions.

    4    

Let your team feel you are a good listener. Whenever they have problems at work or at home, listen to what they want to say. Be patient and never trying to interrupt (打断) them. Make your team feel they can talk to you.

Care about your team.

Show your team you care about them. People will work harder for their leaders if they feel they are really cared about.     5     That will make your team trust and respect you more.

【推荐3】How can philosophy help kids' mental health?

Just as it's important for you to have a healthy body, it's also important to have a healthy mind. For a healthy body, you need to eat healthy food and do some exercise. But how do you keep your mind healthy? Perhaps exploring the meaning of things around us and thinking about how we should act in the world might help. That's called philosophy!

Have you ever wondered about the big things in life, like what is happiness? Or what is true friendship? It's normal for all of us to ask these questions. Usually when you are a kid, your parents try to teach you about these kinds of things. In the 1970s, philosophy professor Matthew Lipman developed a series of activities for the classroom which he called Philosophy for Children (P4C). The aim of these activities is to help children think for themselves about things that matter. The series includes different kinds of activities in which kids discuss different topics: the environment, animal rights, and more. Since kids usually spend more time at school than they do at home, school is a great place for these discussions. The teacher's role is to encourage the students to talk and express their thoughts and beliefs, not to give them the 'answers' – after all, these are the kind of questions to which there are no easy answers!

There is evidence that P4C really does make kids better thinkers and better students. But we thought that the program might also help with the students' mental health. After all, over the past years, mental health problems among children have been increasing. So what if schools carried out the P4C program? Would it have a positive influence on their mental health? This is the question we wanted to answer.

To judge the influence of P4C on children's mental health, we asked three classrooms to take part in our study. Even though our results are promising when it comes to levels of self-determination and anxiety, the P4C program didn't show any influence on depression (忧郁) levels. However, perhaps we could expect an influence on children with clinical depression (a very serious level of depression). Because none of our participants suffered from it, there was not much room for improvement – they were already doing pretty well. There was no important change in how satisfied the children were with their lives, nor with themselves. Perhaps the topics we discussed were not that suitable for this kind of improvement. Another possibility is that their self-respect and life satisfaction won't grow immediately but could do so some time after the end of the program.