1 . “Good morning,” the new teacher said. “I’m Ernesto Flores, your teacher for fifth grade. “In all his years in school, Julio had never heard a teacher use his or her first name. Of course, the students always found out what they were, but it was up to the students to discover this information for themselves.

“Now I’d like to find out who you are,” said Mr. Flores. He began to call the roll (点名) , starting with the boys. Julio shook his head. Teachers always began with the girls.

“Julio Sanchez,” called Mr. Flores, pronouncing it Hulio. That was the correct way to say the name in Spanish.

Several kids laughed. They had never heard Julio’s name pronounced without the J.

Mr. Flores looked up from the roll book. “Isn’t that how you say your name?” he asked Julio. “Or do you prefer Julio with a J?”

“At home, they call me Hulio. But at school everyone calls me Julio,” Julio said.

“Do you like two pronunciations of your name?” asked the teacher. “It’s a good Spanish name and you should be proud of it.”

Julio smiled. “I know,” he said, “but it doesn’t matter to me.”

“Are you sure?” asked Mr. Flores. “Your name is a very important part of you.”

Julio thought for a moment. “Okay,” he said. “From now on, everyone please call me Hulio. Puerto Rico, where I was born, used to be a Spanish colony (殖民地).”

“That’s right,” said Mr. Flores. “Can you tell us something about Puerto Rico?”

“I came here when I was only eight months old. I don’t remember anything,” Julio replied.

“I think you can interview your parents instead,” Mr. Flores said.

Julio nodded. It would be fun to learn more about the place where he had been born.

Julio had to admit (承认) that Mr. Flores was creative and interesting.

2 . My son was entering Grade 1. He was a bit nervous because he knew his best friend would not be in his new class. I explained to him that even though his best friend would not be in his class, he would still have some of his old classmates. On the first day of school when the class list was posted, I was shocked! My son had zero former classmates in his class. None. Not one.

How could this happen?

I asked my friend who works with the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board. She explained, “Many largely populated schools often shuffle(弄混) the kids around each year to encourage new friendships.”

If schools are actively trying to place two best friends in different classes simply to shake things up, think it is a blunder.

I was lucky enough to attend the same primary school all the way through. It was a small class and our group of students moved through each grade together, We felt like brothers and sisters. It was wonderful.

While it may be good to shake things up a bit in the older grades, it seems almost cruel(残忍的) to separate good friends in the younger grades without good cause. One mom named Karen says that her son is always starting a new grade without any close friends. At first, she thought it was a good idea. Then she realized one thing — her son does not have a “best friend,” which makes her pretty worried. In fact, she thinks that he does not have any close friends because his classmates are always changing.

Part of a school’s responsibility is to provide a safe and comfortable space for children to learn and grow. If that environment is always changing — causing terrible results — perhaps it is time to rethink this practice.

With educational resources publicly available, parents nowadays are becoming interesting in homeschooling. Some people support it when others do not.

I am strong against this practice. Homeschooling is not allowed in our country because it is compulsory for parents to send their children to schools for an all-round education. In addition to, one of the biggest drawbacks was a lack of interaction with others. The social experience at school are very important things to enable a child to fit in with the competitive society. However, homeschooled children may lose many chances to compete with their peers(同辈). What’s worse, learn outside a school environment can consume a lot of Mom’s or Dad’s time, that can be a big challenge for families to balance their budget.

In word, it is necessary that children should be sent to public or private schools for formal schooling.

8 . It has been found in South Australia that a worm-like creature about the size of a grain of rice is the oldest ancestor on the family tree that includes humans and most animals. The creature lived about 535 million years ago. It is considered to be an evolutionary step forward for early life on Earth.

Researchers have been working hard to find evidence of the common ancestor of most animals. Developing its body structure and organization successfully allowed life to move in specific, purposeful directions. This includes everything from worms and dinosaurs to amphibians(两栖动物) and humans. But for our common ancestor, they knew that fossils(化石) of the tiny, simple creatures they imagined would be nearly impossible to find because of its size and soft body. Then, they turned to fossilized burrows(动物洞穴), dated to the Ediacaran Period, found in South Australia.

For 15 years, scientists knew the burrows were created by the creature. There was no evidence of what made the burrows and lived in them until researchers decided to take a closer look at the burrows. Geology professor Mary Droser spotted impressions shaped like ovals(椭圆形) near the burrows.

A 3-D laser scan revealed the impressions containing evidence of a body shaped and sized like a rice grain, with a noticeable head and tail which suggested it had muscles. The muscles would have enabled the creature to move and create the burrows, like the way a worm moves. And the size of the creature matched with the size of the burrows they found.

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