Back in April 1939 and armed with $5,000 provided by the Rockefeller Foundation, professor Frank Cyr at Teachers College, Columbia University took a tour of ten states to make the research about school transportation problems. What he found was that many students had no dependable way to get to school and the ones who did often travelled in unsafe buses in the over 100,000 school areas.
Seeing a need to fix this problem, Cyr organised a meeting—one that would change the future of school buses forever. School officials and transportation experts met to set much-needed standards for buses, including those for colour, height and width as well as safety rules that hadn't been set before or that were different in every state.
There were many different bus colours in the US before this meeting; several areas even planned to have red, white and blue buses as a way of encouraging students to love their country. Cyr presented his new choice to education officials, a reported "50 shades( 色度) changing from lemon yellow to deep orange red". The matter was settled quickly. Yellow, or "National School Bus Glossy Yellow", was chosen because it was quite striking, making the school bus easy to be seen. Besides, it made the bold(黑体的), black writing on the side of each bus clear. (The bold, black writing gives information about each school area, telling students which school bus they could take during early morning and late afternoon hours.) Thirty-five states made the changes quickly, and every state took them on
board by 1974.
Being recognised as the "father of the yellow school bus", Frank Cyr has surely influenced your life if you ever rode a school bus or saw that noticeable colour pulling up to your stop on a dusky morning.
Plants may tell us when they're in trouble.Thirsty tomato and tobacco plants make clicking sounds,researchers have found.The sounds are ultrasonic (超声波的),meaning they are too high-pitched for human ears to hear.But when the sounds are transformed to lower pitches,they sound like popping bubbles (爆破的泡泡).Plants also make clicks when their stems (茎) are cut.
"It's not like the plants are screaming," says Lilach Hadany,an evolutionary biologist working at Tel Aviv University in Israel."Plants may not mean to make these noises.We've shown only that plants create informative sounds."
Hadany and her colleagues first heard the clicks when they set microphones next to plants on tables in a lab.The microphones caught some noises.But the researchers needed to make sure that the clicking was coming from the plants.So,the scientists placed plants inside soundproof boxes in the basement,far from the noise of the lab.There,microphones picked up ultrasonic pops from thirsty tomato plants.Though it was outside humans' hearing range,the clicking made by plants was about as loud as a normal conversation.
Cut tomato plants and dry or cut tobacco plants clicked,too.But plants that had enough water or hadn't been cut stayed mostly quiet.Wheat,corn and grapevines also made sounds when stressed out.
The researchers don't yet know why plants click.Bubbles forming and then popping inside plant tissues that transport water might make the noises.But however they happen,pops from crops could help farmers,the researchers suggest.Microphones,for example,could monitor fields or greenhouses to detect when plants need to be irrigated (灌溉).
Hadany wonders whether other plants and insects already tune into plant pops.Other studies have suggested that plants respond to sounds.And animals from pests (害虫),moths to mice can hear in the range of the ultrasonic clicks.Sounds made by plants could be heard from around five meters away.Hadany's team is now studying what the living things near the plants will do after hearing the sounds.
When Zhi Yueying,then 19,went to the remote Niyang village in Yichun City,Jiangxi Province,to work as a village teacher in 1980,villagers were doubtful if she was going to stay long.
Over the past four decades,Zhi has devoted herself to rural education.She is a recipient of Touching China awards that recognize the most inspiring role models in 2016.She was also awarded as a model poverty fighter by the government.Zhi has a profound understanding of the importance of education in the mountains.Over the years,she has taught the students and cared for them,since many of them were "left-behind" children whose parents migrated to other places to work.More than 1,000 students of hers have left the mountain area,and created a better life for themselves.
Located amid the mountains,the village was very poor and far from any town.Villagers had to hike in the mountains."I arrived at the school in an early evening,and was shocked.I had known the conditions were poor,but the reality was worse." Moreover,local people needed to go downhill to buy daily necessities,and transport them back in their hands or balanced across their shoulders."I had never walked uphill on a mountain road before,so I walked much more slowly than others;sometimes I walked slowly behind too much and was scared to tears," says Zhi.Sometimes she had to walk uphill by herself with a flashlight at night.The wild boars and rabbits sometimes frightened her and she enhanced her courage by singing loudly.
But she gradually got used to her life there.At the beginning,she found many local people valued their sons far more than their daughters,and would not like to let them attend school.Zhi went to their homes repeatedly and gradually persuaded them to send all their children to school.For those who could not afford the tuition,she spared her own money to help.
Zhi says seeing her students do well beyond the mountains is deeply rewarding."My dream,the same as before,is to stay by the side of more children.I know poverty will forever say goodbye to the mountainous villages,to my students,and to myself," says Zhi.
China is known as the home of tea.It is said that Shennong discovered tea around 2700 BCE.At first,tea leaves (chew).During the Tang Dynasty,(advance) were made in the processing of tea.The leaves were steamed,oxidized(氧化) and pounded into the cake form.This made tea easier (transport) and more pleasing to the tongue.
The earliest batch(批次) of tea is often ready to be picked before Qingming.This precious small output of tea,widely (seek) after for its outstanding quality,is called Mingqian tea.The seasonal tea is known its tender leaves and fresh flavor.They have better favor than theater batches which can be grown overnight.
East China's Zhejiang Province is acknowledged as a major producer of tea.In spring,local hillsides (fill) with tea workers sowing seeds on their land.In the peak seasons,many tourists flood to witness the beautiful scenery of tea farms for (they),while enjoying a cup of tea.
There are many ways you can experience tea culture in China.You can visit a tea plantation in Hangzhou or elsewhere to learn tea is grown and harvested.You can sit inside a (tradition) teahouse and take in the classical atmosphere as you drink tea.
