Have you ever considered buying or moving to a farm? Did you know that children farming and raising animals builds character? 【小题1】.

You needn’t worry about your child spending all day inside playing video games. 【小题2】 When physical activity is an essential part of a child’s life from the start, it keeps them at a health y weight while making them less likely to become fat as an adult.

When a child grows up on a farm, they learn the responsibility of caring for crops or animals. They discover how to understand and feel compassionate toward something that can’t communicate its feelings. 【小题3】. On top of the animals or plants they care for, your child will also learn to appreciate and protect the environment.

By growing up on a farm, your child learns about responsibility. They learn that they have duty and that they can enjoy their free time when those jobs are done. 【小题4】. When they see a beautiful harvest, they see that all those early mornings and long days were worth the reward. This attitude of self-discipline and putting in the work to see the results will benefit them for their entire life.

Kids who grow up on a farm have a good knowledge of their environment in a way most others never will. They learn how to grow plants and raise animals. They can diagnose problems and come up with solutions. They understand how to use farming equipment and how to work with the weather instead of against it. Those skills open the door to allowing your child to live and thrive anywhere they want.

This year, the Music Educator Award, presented by the Recording Academy and Grammy Museum, went to Annie Ray, the performing arts department chair and orchestra director at Annandale High School in Fairfax County, Virginia. She attended the awards ceremony in Los Angeles and brought home both a $10,000 prize and matching grant （资助） for her school’s music program.

Ray created the Crescendo Orchestra for students with severe intellectual and developmental disabilities, as well as a parent orchestra that teaches nearly 200 caregivers a year to play the same instrument as their children. She got the idea mostly from the Annandale community, which she says represents over 60 countries, including many refugees and immigrants. “There’re many cultures that might typically clash, but they come together in this very beautiful harmony,” Ray explained. “And that’s really uniquely expressed in the orchestra classroom, where we’re just all music-ing together.”

Ray says the Crescendo Orchestra is focused on teaching students how to play an instrument, through one-on-one instruction tailored to their needs. The orchestra is about much more than just making music, however. “I really push my students to be brave and go outside of their comfort zone. We have to learn how to work together with others,” she says.

Ray, who comes from a family of musicians and has played the harp （竖琴） since the age of five, knows firsthand the impact that a great teacher can make on their students. “Why I am where I am is because a teacher changed my life and made me want to be a music educator,” she says.

Ray says her warm reception on the awards ceremony is especially meaningful because not many people understand what exactly music educators do in the classroom or how much their work matters. She says that lack of understanding is one of the biggest challenges facing the profession in general. Moreover, she says her school desperately needs new instruments, and adds that she’ll use some of her grant money to buy more.