Education

Education includes both the teaching and learning of knowledge, proper conduct, and technical competency. It thus focuses on the cultivation of skills, trades or professions, as well as mental, moral & aesthetic development.

Formal education consists of 【小题1】 instruction, teaching and training by professional teachers. This consists of the application of teaching approaches and the development of curricula.

The right to education is a fundamental human right. Since 1952, Article 2 of the first Protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights 【小题2】 all signatory parties to guarantee the right to education. At world level, the United Nations' International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights of 1966 guarantees this right under its Article 13.

Educational systems are established to provide education and training, often for children and the young. A curriculum 【小题3】 what students should know, understand and be able to do as the result of education. A teaching profession 【小题4】 teaching which enables learning, and a system of policies, regulations, examinations, structures and funding which enables teachers to teach to the best of their abilities. Sometimes educational systems can be used to promote 【小题5】 or ideals as well as knowledge, which is known as social engineering.

Primary (or elementary) education consists of the first years of formal, structured education. In general, primary education consists of six or seven years of schooling starting at the age of 5 or 6, although this 【小题6】 between, and sometimes within, countries. Globally, around 70% of primary-age children are enrolled in primary education, and this 【小题7】 is rising.

In most contemporary educational systems of the world, secondary education consists of the second years of formal education that occur during adolescence. It is 【小题8】 by transition from the typically compulsory, comprehensive primary education for minors, to the optional, selective tertiary, "post-secondary", or "higher" education (e.g., university, vocational school) for adults.

Higher education, also called tertiary, third stage, or post secondary education, is the non-compulsory educational level that follows the 【小题9】 of a school providing a secondary education, such as a high school or secondary school. Tertiary education is 【小题10】 taken to include undergraduate and postgraduate education, as well as vocational education and training. Colleges and universities are the main institutions that provide tertiary education. Collectively, these are sometimes known as tertiary institutions. Tertiary education generally results in the receipt of certificates, diplomas, or academic degrees.

3 . Against all our wishes, advertising works, which is why, even in hard economic times, Madison Avenue is a $34-billion-a-year business. And if Martin Lindstrom, a marketing consultant is correct, trying to _______ the advertisement is about to get especially hard.

83% of all forms of advertising principally _______ only one of our senses: sight. Hearing, however, can be just as powerful, though advertisers have taken only limited advantage of it. Historically, ads have relied on slogans(广告语)to catch our ear, _______ everyday sounds — a steak sizzling(发嘶嘶声), a baby laughing and other sounds we can't help paying attention to. Weave these everyday sounds into an ad campaign and we customers may be _______ to resist them.

According to Lindstrom, the everyday sound that is most impressive, both in terms of interest and _______ feelings, is a baby laughing. The other high-ranking sounds are also powerful — the sound of a car engine or a soda being poured.

In all of these cases, it doesn’t need an experienced advertisement designer to invent the sounds, associate them with meanings and then play them over and over until the subjects _______ them. Rather, the everyday sounds already have meanings and thus can cause a kind of _______ : hunger, thirst or happy expectation.

Some TV ads have already given viewers close-up shots of meat with sizzling sounds. And retailers are _______ . Lindstrom is now consulting with clients, intending to pipe the sound of filtering coffee or fizzing soda into the drink department or that of a baby laughing sound into the baby-food section.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that advertisers can just press the audio button _______ and consumers will come eagerly. Indeed, sometimes customers flee. In the early years of cell-phone use, the ringtone (铃音) of a famous cell phone brand was recognized by many people in the U.K., but soon it became widely ________ . That, Lindstrom says, was partly because so few users observed cell-phone manners and ________ accidents kept happening in places like movie theaters. The computer start-up sound has taken on the similarly negative ________ , because people so often hear it when they’re restarting the computer after it ________ . In these cases, manufacturers themselves may as well revise the bothersome sound or ________ it entirely.

Lindstrom's experiment also shows that people respond to a sound better when it’s ________ . If nothing else, smart marketers may at least keep the volume low.

Social media has become a huge part of everyday life and many people criticize the effect it has, especially 【小题1】 young people. Teenagers and young adults use technology in almost all of their daily activities: tweeting a friend, uploading pictures on Instagram, checking our Facebook messages, etc. This constant usage 【小题2】 (see) as evidence of addiction to social media by some people, but others defend it as a normal part of modern life and communication.

The biggest 【小题3】 (criticize) is that using social media online makes us less sociable in real life. We can become 【小题4】 (addict) to checking if we have new messages. This can lead us to ignore people around us, and there is nothing more annoying 【小题5】 trying to talk to a friend who is texting someone else! Often people confuse social media with reality. Having lots of Facebook friends does not mean 【小题6】 (have) a connection with those people in real life.

【小题7】, I believe social media has opened up many new 【小题8】 (possible), especially for young people. It allows me 【小题9】 (stay) in touch with friends around the world. I can follow my favorite bands and actors along with the websites. Social media is also a great way to promote causes, like the ALS ice bucket challenge, which helped raise 【小题10】 enormous amount of money for charity.

5 . The Truth Is Out

Human beings are not born liars, but the moment we can form complete sentences we begin lying to protect the feelings of others, to avoid punishment and conflict, and, most frequently, because lying gives advantages the truth wouldn’t provide. Lying gets results.

One study by Bella DePaulo, a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, found lies played a part in 30-38 percent of people’s social interactions. Socially skillful people told a lot more lies than their more awkward coworkers. 【小题1】

Nowhere is this more obvious than on the singles scene. First dates have always involved a certain amount of self-boast, but some singles now regard out-and-out deceit (欺骗) as a reasonable strategy.

Experts believe that increased competition and the higher expectations among singles, along with the popularity of Internet dating, are encouraging outbreaks of deceitfulness. The problem is that many singles are presenting images of themselves that are impossible to live up to, and costing their already limited chances of long-term love in the process. 【小题2】

Of course, long-term lovers aren’t immune (不受影响) to the conflict-avoiding, problem-burying lie either. Once again, a pleasant singles scene coupled with unrealistic expectations has put new pressure on less-than-faultless relationships and tempted many into more serious deception. A study last year by Cahoot found that a majority of partners lie to each other about their personal financial situation. Other studies have found that women appreciate wise lies about their weight or looks.

【小题3】 In this context, might a policy of honesty at all costs upset the delicate balance of deceit that we’ve involved in by chance over the past few years? Could lying, as some people suggest, be little more than the latest social art?

Possibly. After all, few of us feel that lying is wrong any more. 【小题4】 But then that, of course, is the real issue. We might be great and frequent liars these days, but we’re not any better at recovering or forgiving, if we discover that we’ve been lied to.

7 . It’s difficult to think about how to spend money, and deciding money value in the future is almost impossible to many people. That’s because it is hard for us to consider the opportunity costs of objects we purchase.

A study was conducted with people who wanted to purchase a car to determine their ability to assess the opportunity cost of that purchase. When asked “If you buy this car today, what will you not be able to do in the future as a result?”, the majority said, “If I buy this SUV today, I will not be able to buy a sports car tomorrow.” Nobody said that he would not be able to buy 300 lunches at a restaurant because they were, though unconsciously, restricted within the car field, not even attempting to think of an item from another field.

The nature of modern spending makes things even harder by making money less concrete. If I give you $1,000 in an envelope each week, you will see in the shop that what you’re buying comes at the expense of other things of the same price. After all, you have the real experience because you have to hand out the real money note if you want to get the object. But with credit cards and loans, financial mechanisms have become increasingly unclear, making it more difficult for people to compare the value of spending now with the value of money in the future as they are allowed to pay for the purchases later.

Irrelevant influences and considerations, such as a person’s present emotions or preferences, can influence how much worth someone places on an object too.

In a study, Professor Dan Ariely and his team asked participants to determine the value of objects like wine, chocolates and electronics.

“We first told them to consider whether they would pay the amount equivalent to the last two digits of their social security numbers,” he says. “We found a significant relation between the amount they were willing to pay and these digits.”

For instance, someone whose social security number（SSN）ends in 25 valued the objects much lower than someone with the last two digits of 78. For no logical reasons, the test subjects leaned toward the most recent number they had access to when valuing the items. Even with full information about the objects, some people had no logical point of reference for the value of the objects. Instead, they used their own irrelevant experiences as references.

National governments neglecting development needs of cities

National governments around the world are neglecting the needs of their major cities with non-existent or inadequate development policies, a new report has found. National governments are key to making cities more sustainable, because cities are limited distinctly in the policy measures they can take for themselves, the report points out. However, only a quarter of the world’s governments have urban development policies at all, and most of those that do exist are far from 【小题1】 to make cities sustainable.

The report looks at the key measures of energy production, transport, waste 【小题2】 and infrastructure(基础建设)，For instance, putting in adequate public transport can transform the lives of citizens and the carbon footprint of the cities they live in. Encouraging the use of electric vehicles above petrol-driven cars can also have a(n) 【小题3】 effect, not just on greenhouse gas emissions but also on removing some of the key causes of air pollution.

The report, from the Stockholm Environment Institute and the Coalition for Urban Transitions and funded by Bloomberg Philanthropies, suggests national governments have 【小题4】 the needs of their major cities even when they have in place national policies on issues such as climate change and greenhouse gas emissions.Derik Broekhoff of the Stockholm EnvironmentInstitute,the lead author of the study, said“Now is the time for national governments to put cities at the heart of their national development 【小题5】 . Countries must consider what policies need to be 【小题6】 in order to ensure their countries and cities are prepared for the unprecedented 【小题7】 and climate challenges the world is facing.”

Cities around the world are facing rapid population growth, and are likely to be among the areas 【小题8】 hit by dramatic climate change, in part because many are at risk of rising sea levels, floods and droughts. For most of human history, the 【小题9】 population was greater than those of cities, and it is only in just over the last decade that this balance has 【小题10】 with most of the world’s populations now living in urban centres, a trend that is expected to speed up even further.