Places You Can Volunteer in L. A.
There are many ways you can help others during the holiday season. Here are our picks of volunteer opportunities.
Big Sunday
Big Sunday is holding its ninth BIG Stuffing Event on June 22, with the goal of volunteers' creating at least 2,000 bags of food to deliver to needy people. The bags will be turned in at Big Sunday's office on June 23, where volunteers will add fruits and then distribute (分发)them the next day.
Address: 6111 Melrose Ave
Phone: (213)629-1227
A 24-year-old Ethiopian runner Shura Kitata won the men's race in the 2020 Virgin Money London Marathon, crossing the line in 2:05:41.
Kitata finished second in the 2018 London Marathon behind the world record holder Eliud Kipchoge. However, this weekend, Kitata won the Virgin Money London Marathon and thanked fellow Ethiopian, Kenenisia Bekele for his win when he talked to a reporter from the BBC. Kitata said Bekele was helping him for the race and advised him how to run. He trained hard for the same course in this way. Fortunately, he won the race for his hard training.
Kitata showed his excellent performances including victories at the 2017 Rome Marathon and 2017 Frankfurt Marathon title victories, where he finished separately with the times 2:07:30 and 2:05:50.
Kitata was born on a family farm in central Ethiopia, not far from the capital of Addis Ababa, and has four sisters and three brothers. As a youngster at school, he learned quickly about his country's marathon history. The names Abebe Bikila, Kenenisia Bekele and Derartu Tulu left a deep impression on him. They seemed to be everywhere t—textbooks, news-papers and on the radio so that even before he started running, he knew about the marathon, and thought it very thrilling.
He loved sports and began running at primary school. When he performed well, he just rode the wave. Kitata took part in his first marathon five years ago in Shanghai, finishing third in 2:08:50 and soon joined an elite training group in Addis Ababa.
Now he appears calm to join the ranks of great Ethiopian marathoners. He is a famous sportsman, like the ones he read about and heard so much about during his childhood. He said it would be a great joy to add his story to the stories of those who came before him.
In April 2015, UK journalist Rebecca Atkinson, along with other parents of children with disabilities started the campaign ToyLikeMe to solve the lack of various toys for children with disabilities. They created a Facebook page where everyone was able to post ideas and pictures about what toys for children with disabilities should look like.
Even though the campaign attracted a lot of attention, these parents couldn't rest until their ideas actually became real. Luckily, only 2 weeks after the campaign started, the people who started the campaign got in touch with a company in the UK that designs toys through 3D printing, and the company agreed to create new series of dolls. That's when the first toys for disabled children were produced.
There are around 150 million children with disabilities, and even though the toy industry is worth over $2.9 billion, it has completely failed to create toys that are fitter for them. Until recently, that is. Thanks to this campaign that has taken the Internet by storm, many toy companies have answered this calling and have made toys specifically for children with disabilities.
Soon enough, the ToyLikeMe campaign on Facebook and Twitter finally reached the big companies like Lego, and now there is an entire series of toys for disabled children that have been sold worldwide.
Even after all the success this campaign has had, ToyLikeMe gets on with its task. The organization has followers in over 45 countries and has received donations from over 700 people. The mission of ToyLikeMe is to continuously influence the worldwide toy industry and hopefully make kids with disabilities all around the world feel accepted and appreciated.
Most online fraud(诈骗) involves identity theft Passwords help. But many can be guessed. Newer phones, tablets, laptops and desktop computers often have strengthened security with fingerprint and facial recognition. But these can be imitated. That is why a new approach, behavioural biometrics(行为生物识别) is gaining ground.
It relies on the wealth of measurements made by today's devices. These include data from sensors that reveal how people hold their phones when using them, how they carry them and even the way they walk. Touchscreens, keyboards and mice can be monitored(监测) to show the distinctive ways in which someone's fingers and hands move. These features can then be used to determine whether someone attempting to make a deal is likely to be the device's habitual user.
"Behavioural biometrics make it possible to identify an individual's unique motion fingerprint", says John Whaley, head of Unifyid, a firm in Silicon Valley that is involved in the field. When coupled with information about a user's finger pressure and speed on the touchscreen, as well as a device's regular places of use—as revealed by its GPS unit—that user's identity can be pretty well determined.
Used wisely, behavioural biometrics could be a great benefit. In fact, Unifyid and an unnamed car company are even developing a system that unlocks the doors of a vehicle once the pace of the driver, as measured by his phone, is recognized. Used unwisely, however, the system would become yet another electronic spy on people's privacy, permitting complete strangers to monitor your every action, from the moment you reach for your phone in the morning, to when you throw it on the floor at night.
How to Improve Your English
Learning English is a continuous process. For tips on how to improve your English, read on.
Read English newspapers, books, and magazines. Reading is an active process that requires your brain to work. When learning a language, much is achieved by speaking, listening and writing. When you read, you learn new words and will be able to use them.
After reading the daily papers, choose one or two articles that stood out among all those that you read, and write down your reactions to them. Read what you wrote afterwards, and check if you made any grammatical errors or would like to improve your work.
Read the book version of a movie that you have already seen. Reading the book version means you will find it easier to understand and guess vocabulary, and you can remember it easily since the story is already familiar to you.
Teach English to children or friends. This also holds true for the English language. When you share and teach English to others, you are able to practice. At the same time, you become more aware of your weak areas.
Use English every day. Whatever you are doing, from washing the dishes or taking out the garbage to going to work or to the gym, use English. Take out those new words that you learned and use them. Bring out those new idioms you came across and use them. Learn how to use it in your daily life.
As you try to improve your English day by day, you will surely see improvements that are going to "make your day".
A. Open your mouth.
B. Keep a news diary.
C. But reading is also a great help.
D. Listening to songs can help you improve your English.
E. The best way to improve something is by teaching it to others.
F. If the new knowledge stays inside your head and in your notebooks, it won't come to life.
G. If you are not a serious book reader, reading a story that you are already familiar with will help you move along page by page.
Craig Foster is a diver and wildlife filmmaker. Once he was diving in 1 cold waters when he saw an octopus (章鱼), an unbelievably shy creature with many behaviors unknown to science, 2 under shells and stones.
3 , he began following her without any disturbance. For weeks she 4 him, after 26 days of close watching, 5, the octopus realized Craig was not a danger, but a(n) 6 .She 7 and allowed Craig into her life. Both Craig and the octopus enjoyed a mutual(相互的) learning and exploration.
Before coming across the octopus, Craig was once in a dark and stressful period. "I was 8. To help myself out, I felt like I needed to be in the ocean, my go-to happy place as a child. Luckily, the octopus, my friend, brought a kind of 9 in my heart," he recalled.
Now Craig regards this daily diving 10 as a way of dealing with the depression that once left him 11 and disconnected. He is able to 12 intimate(亲密的)moments of this octopus' short life by spending two hours 13 her every single day for a year. "Every time I interact with her, it's14 and healing, because she has 15in me. If you gain her trust, she will allow you to step into her secret world," he said.
16 himself into this freezing underwater world has calmed his mind. Over the years, other animals have offered to make contact, but nothing has17to his "once-in-a-lifetime"18with the octopus. Craig says the greatest19she has taught him is that humans are not simple 20, but part of the natural world.
The Spring Festival is the most important festival for the Chinese people, a time all family members get together just like Christmas in the west. Nowadays more and more (country) around the world are holding celebrations for Chinese Spring Festival and it has become increasingly popular. What's more, not only are these attended and enjoyed by Chinese citizens (live) abroad, by many other nationalities, too.
Shopping centers have been organizing events and activities (celebrate) Chinese Spring Festival for years, while concerts and other performances prove to be big success. Tickets for the 2017 Grand Chinese New Year Concert in St Petersburg sold out, 90% of the audience local Russians. People are also discovering the fun of interacting with the celebrations, rather than (simple) watching as part of an audience. Over 1,000 Ghanaian junior high school students got up on stage to perform Chinese songs and dances. Students in New York City, meanwhile, have been able to enjoy an official day's holiday for Chinese Spring Festival since it (begin) in 2016.
It seems that Chinese Spring Festival is becoming a (globe) celebration of joy and love.
增加：在缺词处加一个漏字符号(^)，并在其下面写出该加的词。
删除：把多余的词用斜线(\)划掉。
修改：在错的词下划一横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。
注意：1．每处错误及其修改均仅限一词；
2．只允许修改10处，多者（从第11处起）不计分。
The first day I went to high school, I see some of my classmates playing table tennis. Amazed at what skillful they were, I was determining to be just as good. Late on, I often watched them carefully learn their techniques. Then I kept practicing until we became confident enough to challenge them. At the end of the term, I became one of the best player in our class.
I am real proud of this experience, because of it helps me realize that we all can fulfill our potential and achieve our goals through hard work. It also helps me better understand a proverb "Practice makes perfect."
