Distance learning is a form of education in     1     the main elements include physical separation of teachers and students during instruction and the use of     2     (variety) of technologies to facilitate student-teacher and student-student communication. Since its introduction, distance learning     3     (focus) on nontraditional students, such as full-time workers, military personnel, and nonresidents or individuals in remote regions who are     4     (able) to attend classroom lectures.

However, distance learning has become a (n)     5     (establish) part of the educational world, with trends       6    (point) to ongoing growth. In U. S. higher education alone, more than 5.6 million university students were enrolled in at least one online course in the autumn of 2009, a significant growth     7    1.6 million in 2002. Students of all ages, around the world, were forced into distance learning in early 2020     8     the global coronavirus pandemic resulted in a widespread     9     (close) of many schools. Videoconferencing software such as Zoom gained greatly from this development. Zoom became one of the most popular services of its kind, one of the most downloaded applications worldwide, and     10     household word. Teaching and the student-teacher relationship were fundamentally changed.

3 . I often hear kids say, “I’m not a math person” or “I’m just not good at math.” These statements reflect what’s called a “fixed mindset”, which is often associated with a sense of discouragement, powerlessness and inability to improve one’s situation. A fixed mindset is extremely common in math classrooms, but with the help of teachers, students can adopt a “growth mindset”.

This means believing in their potential to acquire the skills and knowledge. In strong, productive teacher-student relationships, teachers nurture (培养) growth mindsets. And there are some key steps in building these relationships, starting with giving instruction that meets the skill levels of individual students. Besides, it’s important to give students social and emotional support, so they could develop social awareness self-management, decision-making and relationship skills.

How could teachers do these among class prep and grading duties? I believe in applying educational technologies. With the right tools, teachers can skillfully manage to individualize instruction and meet social-emotional needs.

Razzaq, a math teacher at Doherty High School, has students from different socioeconomic backgrounds, and some were still learning English alongside math. The school once placed a student in her class, who hadn’t been in formal school since third grade. Students have different levels and social-emotional needs that demand attention from teachers. Sometimes they’re not aware or communicative of the areas in which they need help. Razzaq gives tests with the help of some educational platforms, which generate reports that summarize individual weak points. Then Razzaq could give instructions suiting their academic situations, making productive use of class time. She also uses technologies that provide insights into social-emotional experiences such as attentiveness and time management. The data enables her to initiate conversations that make a difference in students’ education.

More importantly, we need to examine our approach to education. Are we creating an environment where children can develop healthily? How are we satisfying the needs of our future generations? Only by knowing our vision can we decide the technology to complete the picture.

4 . A long-term American study shows the effect of early education on future learning abilities. The study followed more than 1,300 children from birth through the ages of ten or eleven years. The study is known as the Human Development Study of Early Child Care. It is said to be the largest, longest lasting and most complete study of child care in the United States. The children included in the study were born around 1991 in ten areas of the country. Researchers examined the quality and amount of child care the children received until they were 54 months old. Child care included any care provided by people other than the child’s mother that lasted at least ten hours a week. This included any care given by fathers or other family members. The researchers then examined cach child’s performance in school and social development. They also measured other influences, such as the quality of classroom education and parenting (教养).

Recently, the researchers examined whether the developmental qualities that bad been observed in young children were still present a few years later. They found that the older children who had received higher quality child care continued to show better ability in measures of language skills. The children’s understanding was observed using a method which shows their ability to name objects shown in some pictures. The study confirmed a link between high quality child care and better test results continued as the children grew older. It also found that the children’s ability was not dependent on the amount of time they had spent in child care.

Interestingly, children who had been in child care before entering school were also more likely to have shown aggression (攻击性) or refusal to obey in their early school years. However, the researchers said the children’s behavior was considered normal.

5 . In a new study, researchers found a link between outdoor education and science grades. The findings indicate outdoor education could be a promising tool to help close gender (性别) gaps in science. “The outdoors is a space where teachers can find tangible ways to make science come alive,” says lead author Kathryn Stevenson, assistant professor of parks, recreation, and tourism management at North Carolina State University.

“The natural environment is also a place that everybody has in common. In a way, it’s also a great context for employing teaching practices like hands-on, inquiry-based learning or group work. These practices can be good for all students, but they may be particularly good for reaching students who aren’t as well-served in classroom settings,” Stevenson says.

The researchers studied the impact of an outdoor science education program called Muddy Sneakers on fifth graders’ science grades and knowledge of, and attitude about, science.

Fifth graders from western North Carolina attended between 6 and 10 days of Muddy Sneakers. They had science lessons in nearby natural areas, including state parks and school grounds, Outdoor lessons followed the standard course of study for science through hands-on activities, hikes, nature exploration, and reflections.

Researchers compared the performance of 237 students who learned about science in the classroom to 403 students who participated in the outdoor program. When researchers evaluated (评估) students’ science grades by gender, they saw that girls who participated in the outdoor science program maintained their science grades on average (平均), while girls’ average grades in the traditional science classes dropped. They also saw that participation in average grades in the traditional science classes dropped. They also saw that participation in the outdoor program helped girls learn more about how science works on average, but traditional classrooms did not.

Boys in the outdoor and traditional class settings had fairly stable science grades on average and saw similar gains in knowledge of how science works. “Outdoor education seems to be one of those contexts that helps everyone learn, but it may be really, really helpful for some students in particular,” Stevenson says.

6 . In a crowded migrant (移民) camp in Tijuana, Mexico, a three-year-old girl wandered ________ toward the exit. She was steps from a busy road. Estefanía Rebellón was the only person who ________ her. The writer had just driven from Los Angeles with a group of friends to drop off food and clothing to a(n) ________ organization.

It was December 2018, a time when the US-Mexico border was seeing migrants from Central America ________ violence and poverty. Rebellón rushed over to the child and took her ________. “Where are your parents?” she asked anxiously. Eventually, she and her friends found the girl’s ________ father, who had stepped away to ________ for food.

Back at home, Rebellón gathered a group of volunteer ________ via social media, and using a thousand dollars from her ________, set up a school at the Tijuana border. In five years, the pilot program has grown into the non-profit Yes We Can World Foundation, which has ________ three school buses into classrooms and established two schools.

________ by donations, the foundation’s teachers have provided a bilingual education to more than 3,000 kids. The schools ________ an official curriculum (课程) from Mexico’s education ministry. They also offer ________ courses, which help kids understand more about migration.

Rebellón has received numerous ________ for her work, including Outstanding American by Choice. As more than 6.6 million people still live in refugee camps around the world, she says she’d like to ________ the foundation’s influence and support migrant children globally.

8 . Two authors, Kylen Ribeiro and Michelle Zofrea, have written a children’s book Henry’s Tech-Free Trip to explore why parents want kids to limit screen time.

The authors said they have seen many news stories and studies in recent years warning parents about monitoring (监视) both the quality of the content and the amount of time their kids spent with tablets, phones and smart watches. But they didn’t see any books that were written for kids on the topic.

“We hope that it will help kids connect the topic,” Zofrea said. She said it reminded her that her mother warned her not to overdo it on Halloween candy. She didn’t follow the advice and wolfed down all her treat and felt sick later. “Like with food, we can set rules and lecture kids. It’ll be more effective if they start to notice how they feel,” Zofrea said.

The authors both work for DefenderShield, a Tampa-based company that sells products to block electromagnetic field radiation (电磁辐射) from laptops, cell phones and tablets. Their work there is what inspired the book, though they know it can be a heated topic because of the debate over the science of radiation’s effects.

While concerns are rising about the amount of time kids spend online, parents always remain on their phones at home. “I’ve always said children learn from what we do and not what we say,” said Pam Patranella, a doctor who reviewed the book and liked the idea of taking the screen time lesson to kids.

The book’s authors said parents need to be reminded that their kids have grown up in a different world, one that has had computers and tablets since the day they were born. “We want to bring up the concept (观念) of digital wellness for families and children,” Ribeiro said.

9 . Waking up at the crack of dawn and going for a run might feel intimidating when you start trying to make it a habit. Weaving a significant new activity such as this into your regular routine obviously takes determination and time — but how much time is really needed to make that habit stick?

One popular idea suggests that it takes 21 days to solidify a habit. The “three-week theory” originated from the 1960 self-help book Psycho-Cybernetics, in which plastic surgeon Maxwell Maltz observed that it took his patients about 21 days to get used to their new appearance after surgery. Even without much solid research, the 21-day myth became widely accepted. It likely persisted because it seems like such a reasonable amount of time, Colin Camerer, a behavioral economist at the California Institute of Technology who has conducted research on habit formation, explains.

Almost a half century later, researchers finally gathered strong evidence that countered this idea. A significant 2009 study on habit creation found that habits developed in a range of 18 to 254 days; participants reported taking an average of about 66 days to reliably incorporate one of three new daily activities — eating a piece of fruit with lunch, drinking a bottle of water with lunch or running for 15 minutes before dinner. Consistent daily repetition was the biggest factor influencing whether a behavior would become part of an automatic daily routine, says Lally, who was the first author on the study.

The type of activity is also a factor. Last year a study conducted by Camerer and his colleagues showed that creating a handwashing habit took a few weeks, compared with the half year it took for people to develop an exercise habit. Handwashing, the study noted, is less complex than exercising and offers more opportunities to practice. The researchers also suggested that habit formation depends on the effort that a person puts into practicing an activity and on the presence of environmental cues that would remind them to carry out the behavior.