1 . A change of heart

Joe woke up in a bad mood. He didn’t want to go to the International Museum of Pottery with his ______ today. The class had voted (投票) on their spring field trip, and his ______ did not win. Joe had wanted to do something outdoors, like visit a horse farm. Joe thought pottery is boring! But he had no ______ .

When they reached the ______ , Joe listened to the guide’s introduction halfheartedly. “You might ______ pottery is just something your teacher paints in a weekly class. but the ______ reaches much further than that. You will learn about its importance from ancient times. It tells us a lot about the ______ they came from.” Joe didn’t know pottery was an ancient art.

As they ______ the Native American pottery of the Southwest, the guide explained the dry climate helped the pottery ______ faster. The guide showed a video of a woman ______ a vase (花瓶) . Joe was ______ by how skillful she was. When seeing the beautiful modern works, Joe laughed at the funny shapes of Picasso’s pottery

By the end of the day, Joe’s mood had completely ______ . He was glad he had come to the museum. He saw the ______ of learning about a variety of cultures through pottery works. He would definitely be ______ to visit the museum again.

2 . A walking school bus (WSB) project can help reduce air pollution, increase the number of students walking and bicycling, and offer children and parents an opportunity to exercise and socialize, while getting to school on time!

WSB is a safe and fun way for children to get physical activity as they travel to and from school. Each “bus” walks along a way with one or more parents leading it, picking children up at stops along a way designed ahead of time and walking them to school. Then it runs back in the afternoons on the way home from school under adults supervision (监管). It is that easy. You may find that families are already doing this with their children and would be glad to help more students get to school in this healthy, safe and fun way!

Planning WSB seems not to be simple. But the key is to make sure you know the steps. This guide will walk you through how to plan a WSB and help to tailor (定制) your project to your school, community and students. First, get started and plan the route, and then recruit (招募) students and leaders. Finally, run and perfect your project. You may or may not choose to perform these steps in order, depending on your project.

As you work through some steps in order, the WSB Planning Worksheet and Timeline will help you organize your project. Each section of the worksheet helps you record the progress: who is responsible for each task, when things need to start, and the date due to finish. These planning documents will help you organize ideas, people and time in order to improve your WSB as easily as possible.

For more information, explore the references at the end of this guide.

3 . A compost (堆肥) program at the Wesley School in Los Angeles is helping kindergarten through eighth grade students to teach them ways to solve human-driven climate change. For the past year, 5, 200 pounds of food waste from the school has gone into compost containers rather than a landfill where it would just break down and produce planet-warming gases.

The school workers could have easily thrown the food waste into a city-provided green bin (垃圾箱) . But taking it out of sight, which would have been easier, would have missed the point, says science teacher Johnna Hampton. “When it’s invisible like that, they don’t see it, but they know it doesn’t sink in (心安) .”

When sixth grader Finn saw the finished compost pile, it sank in. “That’s my orange chicken in there,” he says. “That’s not just like any food. Somewhere in there is my food.”

The school will use the compost on plants around campus. Some will be offered to families that want to use it at home, and whatever is left will be donated.

Fifth grader Sloan felt so encouraged by the school’s compost program she decided to take climate action outside of school. Along with several other fifth graders, Sloane says, “We did a lemonade stand at our friend’s house and we made over $200, and we donated it.” They also helped create a petition (请愿) to replace the plastic forks and spoons in the school cafeteria with compostable ones.

Fifth grader Kingston was excited to learn his food waste will help grow new food on campus. “It feels good that you’re doing something that helps the planet, instead of just sitting and watching it get destroyed,” he says.

Jennifer Silverstein, an expert on climate, says the school’s compost program checks a lot of the boxes for effective, positive climate education to help youth understand the crisis of human-caused climate change.

4 . When Stanford University student Ellen Xu, now 18, was a five-year-old in San Diego, Califormia, she clearly remembers that her parents rushed her little sister to the hospital. Three-year-old Kate had fallen seriously ill; she had a fever, reddened eyes, and some swelling (肿胀) in her hands and tongue.

At first, the puzzled doctors thought she had flu, but when her condition didn’t improve, the Xus returned to the clinic room, where a doctor by chance had a similar earlier experience with such symptoms (症状) in the blood known as Kawasaki disease. Though rare (罕见的), it’s the leading cause of the heart disease in babies and young children, and its causes remain unknown.

The doctor knew how to treat it: He ordered some medicine for Kate, and finally she shook off the illness without suffering damage to her heart.

Xu remembers being curious about her sister’s illness condition and was amazed that the grown-ups couldn’t answer her questions about why it was so hard to check. “In my mind, it was this puzzle I wanted to solve,” she says.

Ten years later, wanting to enter a high school science fair, she had an idea. What if we had a doctor in our pocket? So she created just that: Using AI, Xu designed a program that uses visual facts to check the disease based on five physical symptoms.

The technology works the same way as apps that can identify birds and plants with photos you’ve taken on your cellphone. Worried parents can upload a photo that they have taken of their child, and the technology will scan the picture for symptoms of the disease, which often have a strong visual factors, such as a swollen tongue.

Xu’s invention has been applied as a web app on the website. “The technology could also be developed for recognizing some other diseases,” she says, “It means a lot to me. I want to use AI to help people live happier and healthier lives.”

Xu says that her sister Kate, now in her third year of high school with dreams of becoming an environmental engineer, is strong and healthy.

5 . National Parks are the best places to see raw nature in protected areas, where the wildlife is free and the history is kept alive properly, such is the case of all national parks in Australia.

The Booderee National Park

It offers a protected habitat (栖息地) for native wildlife against high cliffs and white beaches. While summer is good for visiting due to the excellent weather, a special event takes place in June and July when whales come back with their babies. Educational tours are fit for school groups to get close to nature. There are a range of activities such as camping, diving and nature walks.

The Norfolk Island National Park

The history of the Park is eye-catching, so you might want to check out how Captain James Cook got here and why. You can picnic and have a nice barbecue around the highest point on the island, Mount Bates. Another tourist attraction is Phillip Island, six kilometers away from Norfolk, home to many seabirds.

The Uluru National Park

If you’re into learning more about Aboriginals (土著居民) and their influence on the world, you mustn’t miss it, where Tjukurpa stories come from about native songs and dances. The rocks here are extremely loved because they seem to change color during sunrise and sunset. So the spot is also great for walking, considering the knowledge and stories on the rocks’ shapes and purpose for humans.

The Kakadu National Park

It has the longest historical records of Aboriginal people living there, which have been carved in the rock art made by Indigenous civilizations over the years. The Park has remarkable rivers and floodplains that go through the rich ecosystem. With more than 280 species of birds, 117 reptile species and 74 mammals, the park is a joy to the eye of the traveler.

6 . Everywhere and in every given time, children spend their days in simple but interesting games. One such game which has passed the test of time, becoming one of the oldest forms of child’s play ever known, is hoop rolling.

Hoop rolling is both a child’s game and a sport. A large hoop is rolled along the ground, generally by means of an object held by the player to keep it rolling. The aim of the game is to keep the hoop upright for as long periods of time as possible. First, the left hand supports the hoop; the right hand holds the long handle of the hook (钩). And then keep the balance of the hoop with the hook. Push the hoop to the ground, keep it rolling steadily and keep the hoop from falling. In the team competition, it is mainly about who is faster, and how far to roll.

Hoop rolling has a very long history and it has been recorded since ancient times in Africa, Asia and Europe. In Asia, the earliest records date from ancient China, and in Europe from ancient Greece. The ancient Greeks welcomed hoop rolling as a beneficial exercise for those not very strong. Besides, the game was also a common pastime of African village children.

Hoop rolling serves as evidence (证据) of everyday life about the long-gone civilization. Every year at Wellesley College, hoop rolling competition started as a memory of the May Day celebration of spring. Now it gradually becomes part of the graduation ceremony. Students celebrate by dressing up in children’s clothing and playing games. The child’s play popular in ancient times helps them escape from real-world worries.

The long history of the game shows that there indeed are inventions that are timeless. The human ability to make himself and others happy has been present since the beginning of civilization, and will be present forever.

10 . It was a Thursday night in September. Classes were done for the day, homework was complete for the night and excitement for the weekend began to stir (萌动). It was 9:00 pm and music filled the house with the upstairs hallway used as a dance floor. My roommate Lucy and I danced in the hallway with the booming music for an hour.

It was within that one hour that I realized how the world around me had stopped. Thoughts of how busy the weekend was going to be and the homework that was due Monday slipped away. It was just me, my roommate, our music and our hallway. It wasn’t until that night that I realized the importance of dancing it out and why everyone should try it.

Dance has always been a significant part of my life. I have loved to dance ever since I was little, and I had the honor of being on two competitive dance teams as a teenager. But dancing on stage feels different from dancing in your living room with the volume (音量) turned up and not having a care in the world if people walking past the window can see you.

When dancing in your hallway, imperfection is a priority. There’s no conveying emotions to the audience. There’s just releasing emotions. The feeling is freeing. When you dance it out, it’s just you and your music. No one is there to judge you. You can live in the moment, not worrying about the future.

So the next time you feel stressed, get up and turn on your favorite music. Let the music move you and free you. Sometimes in life, when you don’t feel like you have control of anything, you’ve to dance it out because you’re in control of the music.