1 . Do you often feel cold in winter? When you feel cold, what do you do to warm yourself up? Do you put on more clothes? When it’s cold, how do you sense that?

I like to take a bath. I like the way the warm water feels on my skin. I do not like to get out of the bathtub (浴缸). When I get out of the bathtub, I get really cold. Sometimes I am so cold that my teeth begin shaking, and I start to shiver (颤抖). Why do we shiver when we are cold?

Shivering is a reflex (反射). We don’t have to think about a reflex in order to make it happen. When the air around us suddenly becomes cooler, the nerves (神经) in our skin sense that we are cold. These nerves then send messages to our brain. The brain sends messages back that race through our bodies. These messages tell all of our muscles (肌肉) to start warming up.

Our muscles then start tightening (绷紧) and relaxing. They do this very quickly over and over again. These quick actions are the shivers. These shivers help to warm us up. So the next time you start to shiver, thank your nerves. They’re working to warm you up before you even have the chance to shout, “Mom, I’m c-c-c-old!”

Many travelers feel nervous about going to a strange place. If you plan your trip carefully and get well prepared, you can relax and enjoy yourself. Remembering the following tips can help you have an enjoyable trip.

◆Check Your Paperwork

When you prepare for your leaving, make sure your paperwork is organized. You’ll check the dates on your visa (签证) and passport. Also, do some research on the local currency (货币). Some countries—like Jamaica—use more than one currency. It’s best to know how and when to use them.

◆Mind Your Health

Get a physical checkup before the trip. If you need to take medicine along, keep it in its bottles.

Also, make sure that you know the place or phone number of the local hospital so that if you are sick while traveling, you will be able get the treatment as soon as possible.

◆Pay Attention

Stay safe by keeping one eye on the amazing sights and the other on your personal things. When you get into a taxi, make sure there is a meter (计价器) and it is turned on. If there is no meter, agree on a price before starting out.

◆Learn About the Locals

If you will visit a country, buy a guidebook and a map. It’s a good way to learn about the culture of the country you will visit. Then you will have a better understanding of the country. For example, in Thailand, it’s impolite to point with your feet at someone or something. Also, try to learn a few basic words and sentences of the local language. Not everyone will speak your language.

Note-taking is a skill that can help you do well in all your schoolwork. It can make you confident when you are studying. But unluckily, most students don’t know how to take notes. Here is some advice on taking notes. I hope they are useful to you.

If your teacher writes notes on the blackboard, that’s great. You can copy them or write down the most important facts of all in class. Different teachers do things differently. For example, some teachers may focus on (关注) lots of dates and facts in class, but they only write the important ones on the blackboard. Other teachers may not write anything down, but they may repeat them.

Don’t try to write down every word in class, or you might miss some important points. Some students really learn better with the help of these notes. Don’t be afraid to ask your teacher to repeat what you’ve missed. If your teacher speaks too fast and you can’t follow what he is saying, you can ask him after class.

Comparing your notes with your classmates’ can be good for your learning. It can also help you and your classmates correct some mistakes.

Note-taking also needs organization. Keep notes for each subject in one place, so that you can find everything easily when a test comes.

Good note-taking takes time. If you decide to recopy your notes every evening. you’ll surely have less lime to watch TV. But you’ll save time in the coming test.

5 . My friend, Robert, has a twin sister named Amanda. Though they get along well, there are some things about Amanda and her friends that puzzle Robert. He can’t understand how girls can talk for so long. For example, sometimes when he leaves home to play football, Amanda and her friend, Sharon, are sitting on the sofa, talking. When he comes back three and a half hours later, they’re still sitting on the sofa, continuing the same conversation on the same topic. One day Robert was so curious that he asked Amanda what they talked about, but she replied, “We’re best friends. We talk about almost everything—film stars, pop songs, recipes, everything!”

Boys and girls have different attitudes towards friendship. Friendships between girls are usually based on shared feelings and support, but friendships between boys are based on shared activities or interests. A boy is likely to be careful about sharing his feelings with his close friends. A girl’s closest friend, however, might be eager to tell her about something that has happened in her life.

Many studies worldwide show that girls have more friendships than boys. In fact, many teenage boys cannot name a single best friend. When asked, they hesitate before answering, “My best friend? I can’t think about that. I am busy with my homework, and I have so many different friends that it is hard to choose just one best friend.”

Girls who have been asked can usually answer the question without pausing, “A best friend? Of course. We have a lot to share with each other. We do a lot of things together such as talking and shopping.”

We have to realize: boys share activities, while girls share feelings. The qualities that boys and girls consider important in a friend seem to be the same, regardless of (无论) the basis of these friendships. The important thing to remember is that both of them are friendships. We all need friends in our lives.

6 . Here is a story: A man sees a butterfly. The butterfly tries to get out of its chrysalis（蛹）. Feeling sorry for it, the man decides to help. He cuts the chrysalis and the butterfly comes out easily. Surprisingly enough, the butterfly is unable to fly. If the butterfly doesn’t struggle（拼搏）to leave the chrysalis, it can’t fly! The struggle develops the energy in the butterfly which makes it fly. Similarly, the challenges of life bring out the best in young people and make them fly.

When people are young, meeting and overcoming（克服）challenges will make them strong and ready to face life. When we look at successful people, we see that the most successful of them are people who have had to struggle. Dennis’s father died when he was only twenty. His father’s death forced him to mature fast. He had to bring up a family of nine people. He took up business early and used to sell clothes from door to door, but he took up the challenges and overcame them. Today Dennis is a successful businessman and his brothers and sisters also lead successful lives.

Some parents and teachers actively encourage young people to face challenges. They might organize some activities for young people which provide them with challenges, like rock-climbing, camping, volunteer work and so on. The young people of today will become the leaders of tomorrow. For countries to continue to become successful, it is important that young people learn to meet challenges and overcome them.

8 . Jacky feels different these days. He isn’t as playful as usual and doesn’t like to talk much. Some of us may feel like Jacky sometimes. When unexpected things happen, we can feel like this. There are also some other things that can put us in bad moods. Here are some examples. We might feel bad if we’re not getting along well with our friends, or if we do poorly on an exam. Having bad moods too often can affect our mental (心理的) health. The 4 habits below can harm our mental health.

Sleep too little

A lack of sleep can make us feel bad.

Lack of exercise

For the best result, try to do no less than 30 minutes of exercise three to five times a week.

Bad diets

Studies have shown that eating cakes and bread in large quantities, and low amounts of fruit and vegetables will increase the risk of depression (沮丧) and mood disorders.

Being inside all day

Spending the most of our day indoors can increase our risk for depression.

Don’t be afraid of having bad moods. The tips below can help us overcome them.

·Accept our moods

No one can be happy all the time. Our friends and parents can also have bad moods sometimes. Bad moods are normal. Accept this first and then we can find ways to deal with them.

·Let our bad feelings out

When we feel unhappy or upset, don’t hide our feelings or pretend nothing is wrong. We can find a comfortable way to let them out.

·We can talk to our parents or friends.

·We can write about our feelings in our diary.

·We can read our favorite books.

·We can play sports or do some other kinds of activities.

·Set a new goal

Messing up (搞砸) something can put us in a bad mood, too. But we can just try harder next time. For example:

·We didn’t win a soccer game. Try to score a goal next time.

·We didn’t do well on an exam. Try to get five more points next time.

·We had an argument with our friend. Next time, try to talk to him or her in a nice way.

·Remember that bad things will end

No matter what makes us feel bad, it will end at last. Remembering this will help us feel better.

9 . The 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics closed on Feb. 22nd. Beijing normally doesn’t have much snow in winter, so artificial (人造的) snow is being used for the Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games. The quality of the snow draws praise from many athletes, and even officials.

Artificial snow has a better quality. Through the training period and first days of competitions, many athletes believe the artificial snow is outstanding. “This is the best man-made snow I’ve ever skied on,” American freestyle skier Ashley Caldwell said.

In order to have a perfect place for racing, man-made snow should be compact enough to support the athletes. Although sometimes mixed with natural snow, artificial snow has mostly been used in competitions in the past five to ten years. Snow-making machines were first used at 1980 Winter Olympics in the United States. At Sochi 2014 in Russia, 80% of the snow was artificial, and 90% of the snow was artificial at Pyeongchang 2018 in South Korea.

There are totally nine types of snow made by snow machines, with different water content (含量). The smaller type number is closer to powder (粉末状) snow. The larger number means the snow is wetter. Drier snow is used in the daytime, while No. 7 or No. 8 snow is used during the nighttime with over -20℃. Using which type of snow depends on the different need of each sport. “In most cases, No. 5 snow is used,” said Wei Qinghua, the manager of the Zhangjiakou Venue for Beijing 2022.

On November 7, during the preparation for the Games, Chongli District in Zhangjiakou saw its first snowfall this winter. But the 20-centimeter-thick snow was cleaned up, because it would be more dangerous to use natural snow and it falls off more easily and brings safety risks.

However, some people worry that using so much water for snow-making is harmful to the environment. In fact, the snow machines at Beijing 2022 have completely used renewable energy since the beginning of snow production.

“Water used for snow-making only comes from rainfall and surface runoff (地表径流), and it can be recycled,” Wei pointed out. “For water from melted snow, we have a reservoir (水库) and two lakes which can store it so that it can be used for agriculture, tourism and so on then.”