2 . What the future school will look like is difficult to make clear, but most experts agree that the school will be electronic in the future.

“Present-day schools will no longer exist in the next century,” says a report in The Age. “At that time, schools will become community-style centers, which run seven days a week, and 24 hours a day.” At the same time, computers will surely become a central part of the school in the future.

According to The Age, the distance learning will be popular and students will listen to teachers on computers. Going into classrooms on their computers, students will study at any time, which is very easy for them. However, it is necessary for students to go to the actual school in order to develop some social skills.

Seashore Primary School is an imaginary school in the future created by the Education Department of Australia. At this school, all the teachers and students have laptop computers. Teachers check messages and call students back with a special telephone system and students use telephones to search for information or speak to their teachers who give their lessons. Besides, all the lessons are related to all sorts of subjects and all the students have their own learning plans created by teachers.

As one headmaster says, a laptop computer is a student’s library, data storage(数据存储) device as well as the bridge to a wider world. Technology has changed the emphasis of future learning. Thus, we’ll pay more attention to the learning of kids rather than the teaching.

5 . What you will become in the future depends a lot on what you are doing to yourself now.     1    .

You can be brilliant, unforgettable or interesting as long as you believe that you are the creator of yourself.    2     The books you have read, the television programs that you have chosen to watch and the type of people you have met are what guide you when you choose to create the type of person you will become in the future.

Don’t hope that life is easier. Don’t let others get you down and stop you from achieving what you set out to achieve.     3     you will get a great harvest. Don’t wait and let luck determine your future. Complaining about your life and your surroundings will not earn you anything.

    4     The best golf players are always in the golf field, the best swimmers are always found in the pool and the best tennis players are often found on the tennis court. They understand that they are the creators of their own self in the future.

Learn to be courageous. Go and discover your unique attributes and learn to move away from your comfort zone. Take a vigorous action.

    5    

6 . All the efforts you put into studying at university may not have been enough—because robots could be coming for your job. A new study finds that as many as 800 million workers could be replaced by robots by 2030.

The study from the McKinsey Global Institute estimates that between 400 million and 800 million individuals could be replaced by automation(自动化) or robots and need to find new jobs by 2030 around the world. It estimates that 30 percent of the hours people spend on working globally could have been automated by that time.

Those most affected will be people who work in predictable environments doing tasks such as operating machines and preparing fast food. Those who make a living by collecting and processing data also face a high risk of being replaced by robots. But people who work in less predictable environments such as gardeners, plumbers, and childcare staff face a smaller risk, because their roles are technically difficult to be automated and often command relatively lower wages, which makes automation a less attractive business proposition(商业提议).

However, it’s not all doom for the future of employment. The Study notes that automation sometimes allows workers to remain employed in a different position. “Even when some tasks are automated, the employment rate in those occupations may not decline because workers may perform new tasks,” McKinsey &Company wrote in a release on its website.

It noted that China has the largest number of employees who would need to switch occupations, up to 100 million if automation was adopted rapidly, or 12 percent of the 2030 workforce. The numbers are higher in more advanced economies, with up to one-third of the 2030 workforce in America and Germany needing to switch occupations, along with nearly half of the 2030 workforce in Japan. Countries which fail to prepare workers for transition to new jobs will feel the impact of a rise in unemployment and depressed wages, according to the study.

Cards and digital(数字的) technologies     1    (kill) off cash slowly, but is it a cause for concern? Not     2    (necessary). Here are some ways of making the most of digital finance.

Cash is no longer king. Over recent years fewer and fewer transactions have been made with cash. The most recent figures show coins and notes are used just 34% of     3     time, down from 63% a decade ago. And usage     4    (predict) to fall to just 10% in 15 years.

Instead we’re paying with cards and digital technologies. Some of this is down to user choice, with contactless cards and smartphones making spending     5    (fast) and more convenient.

But it’s also being forced upon us. Some retailers are refusing physical money as they can avoid the high bank charges levied(征收) at them for     6    (handle) cash. Meanwhile it’s harder to get your hands on notes as cash machines and     7    (bank) disappear from the high street. And these are trends which are likely     8    (increase) in the coming years.

This could be bad news if you still primarily use cash,     9     that’s how you pay your bills or how you budget. For some, cash is just what you know. For     10    , cash is a necessity—especially when going digital is the alternative.

As a result this move towards cashless society makes many uneasy.

9 .     1    

In the future your automobile will run on water instead of gas! You will be able to buy a supercomputer that fits in your pocket! You might even drive a flying car!

Not all past predictions have been proved wrong.    2    Some great thinkers predicted the arrived of the credit card, the fax machine and even the Internet-years before they happened. But for each prediction that has come true, some others have missed by a mile. Many of these predictions didn’t consider how people would want to use the technology, or whether people really needed it in their lives or not. Let’s look at some predictions from the not-too-distant past.

    3    

Where’s the robot in my kitchen? Nowhere, of course. And he’s probably not coming any time soon. Robots do exist today, but mostly in factories and other working environments.

Back in the 1950s, however, people said that by now personal robots would be in most people’s homes.

So why hasn’t it happened? Maybe because robots are still too expensive and clumsy. And probably the clothes is just too strange. At home we seem to be doing fine without them.

    4    

In 1964 an American company introduced the video telephone. They said by the year 2000 most people would have a video phone in their homes. But of course the idea hasn’t caught on yet.

Why? The technology worked fine, but it over-looked something obvious: People desire for privacy. Would you want to have a video phone conversation with someone after you just stepped out of the shower?

Probably not-it could be uncomfortable! Just because technology doesn’t always mean people will want to use it.

And finally, how about that crazy prediction of the Flying car?    5    But a flying car remains one of the most wonderful technology ideas to catch our imagination. Keep watching the news-or perhaps the sky outside your window-to see what the future will bring.

10 . Most people, when they travel to space, would like to stay in orbit (轨道) for a few days or more. And this stands to reason, if you’re paying $ 20,000 for your trip to orbit! So in order for tourism to reach its full potential there’s going to be a need for space hotels. What would a space hotel actually be like to visit? Hotels in orbit will offer the services you expect from a hotel — private rooms, meals, bars. But they’ll also offer two unique experiences: impressive views — of Earth and space — and the endless entertainment of living in zero gravity — including sports and other activities that make use of this.

The hotels themselves will vary greatly — from being quite simple in the early days to huge luxury (奢侈的) structures at a later date. It’s actually surprising that as later as 1997, very few designs for space hotels were published. This is mainly because those who might be expected to design them haven’t expected the costs to come down far enough to make them possible.

Lots of people who’ve been to space have described vividly what it’s like to live in zero gravity. There are obviously all sorts of possibilities for dancing, gymnastics, and zero-G sports. Luckily, you don’t need to sleep much living in zero gravity, so you’ll have plenty of time for relaxing by hanging out in a bar with a window looking down at the turning Earth below.

Of course all good things have come to an end, unfortunately. And so after a few days you’ll find yourself heading back to the earth. You’ll be thinking how soon you can save up enough to get back up again-or maybe you should change jobs to get to work in an orbiting hotel!