The sound that woke Damian Languell at 8:15 in the morning was so loud that he assumed it came from inside his house in Wade, Maine. As he got up to investigate, he heard another sound, this one coming most definitely from outside. Looking out of his bedroom window, he noticed a tree enveloped in smoke about 500 yards away. A car wrapped around the trees base, its engine on fire.

Grabbing buckets of water, he and his wife ran to the crash site. Up close the accident looked worse. The car was split nearly in two, and the tree was where the driver's seat ought to have been, as if planted there. No one should have survived this crash, and yet there was 20 year-old Quintin Thompson, his terrified face pressed against the driver's side window, in visible pain.

Languell tried putting out the fire with his buckets of water but failed. When the flames got into the front seats, he knew he had to get the young man out. So Languell opened the car's back door and climbed in. Using a pocket knife that he'd brought with him, he cut through Thompson's seat belt. Now that Thompson was free, Languell pulled him out, and dragged him to safety before the entire car was in flames.

It is empathy that drove Languell to help, just as he said, "My heart goes out to Thompson. When you are that close to that level of hurt, you feel it so directly. "For his heroic action, Languell was added to the list of real-life heroes changing the world.

On a dark winter day in Russia in 1896,   Sergei Prokofiev sat by a piano next to his mother. She was helping him compose (作曲) his first piece of music. Sergei was only five years old.

He had overheard his parents discussing a terrible famine (饥荒) in India. The picture Sergei had of those hungry people in his mind caused him to write a story,   in the form of musical notes. Sergei could not read music,   so he picked out a tune on the piano keys,   and his mother recorded the notes. Sergei titled it “Indian Gallop”.

Sergei’s mother began giving him piano lessons for 20 minutes a day,   and his ability grew quickly. She had a great love for music,   too,   and Sergei often lay awake in bed at night and listened to her play the piano.

Sergei’s parents found a famous music teacher for him. The teacher shouted at Sergei when he didn’t practice reading and playing music. Sergei later wrote,   “I wanted to compose great musical plays,   and instead I was given all sorts of boring tasks. ” Yet he persisted with his studies and grew up to be a great composer.

In 1936 a children’s theater asked Sergei to write music that would teach children about different instruments. He was happy and wrote the piece in a week,   calling it Peter and the Wolf.

Sergei’s Peter and the Wolf was enjoyed by children as well as adults. The first time Sergei played the piece on the piano,   the children listening to it loved it so much that they made him play the ending three extra times. He was excited.

Today Sergei Prokofiev is remembered not only for his contributions (贡献) to classical music, but also for his sense of fun.

“Suffering” is the word that best describes my first year of teaching. I wasn’t prepared for so much stuff on my plate. I didn’t have a handle on class management, and I left each day feeling extremely worn out and defeated.

My first year of teaching was spent learning the new curriculum, developing personalized learning techniques, modifying lessons and analyzing data. I knew these were important work, but I also knew that something was not working. I felt disconnected in my classroom and knew I could do better.

I looked around and saw that there were some teachers who seemed to just take control of everything and really enjoyed what they were doing. I made a decision. I asked if I could sit in on and observe their classes. Over a few months, I observed these teachers around five to seven times, for about 40 to 50 minutes each time. I also watched teachers interact with students outside of the classroom, on the playground, during lunch and in the hallway. I paid attention to their conversations, comments and attitudes.

I started to see that the highest priority for these teachers was forming relationships with students, and thus everything else would fall into place after that. One teacher played basketball with kids during lunch every Friday. Another sat with kids in the lunchroom a few times throughout the week. There was also a teacher who liked to walk during her lunch and would invite different groups of kids to join her for conversations.

I knew I wanted to model myself after these teachers, so I decided to make a change. Making this shift changed me as a teacher, and it noticeably changed the atmosphere in my classroom. I began to feel inspired at school, and I could see that my students were enthusiastic too. They were more prepared to welcome each of my class ahead.